Hispanic people have always played an important part in history of the United States. As early as the 1500’s, Spanish explorers and colonists settled on the Caribbean islands that are today known as Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. In 1898, the United States won the Spanish-American war and took the island of Puerto Rico to be its colony, which eventually led to wide spread to Puerto Rican immigration to the United States in the …showed first 75 words of 300 total…

…showed last 75 words of 300 total…California and the southwest, where they worked for extremely low wages as farm laborers. Because they were so poor, they could be made to work for lower wages than native born white workers and were used by employers to drive wages down for everyone. Rather than blaming the employers for this policy, white workers often blamed the Mexican immigrants, creating prejudice against Mexicans and Mexican Americans. The fact that employers had discriminated against the Mexican