VivirLatino

California Congressman Xavier Becerra and Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen co-sponsored bill H.R.512, that was signed by President Bush. The bill establishes a commission to study the feasibility of a National Museum of the American Latino. That’s a good thing no? I mean wouldn’t it be great if I could take my daughters to a museum was about the different Latino groups in the U.S., including their own Chile, Mapuche-Rican heritage and social movements? I mean there is a Smithsonian Museum of African American History and Culture coming soon , and the National Museum of the American Indian. Why not a Latino museum documenting and celebrating us? And anyway maybe some history, showing that some of our ancestors have been on the North American continent and in U.S. territory for a long time would give some anti-immigration activists a new perspective?

From the website of the National Museum of the American Latino:

Latinos were present on the American continent for more than two centuries prior to the Declaration of Independence. The first permanent European settlement in 1565 was St. Augustine, Florida, 41 years before the establishment of Jamestown. Spaniards mapped an explored a large portion of the continent, from California to the Southwest; up the Mississippi and the east coast. They named many of the areas and those names still are part of this country: Florida, Colorado, California, Nevada, Montaña, San Francisco, Los Angeles, El Paso and Santa Fe.

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