In an expulsion that rivaled the brutality of Jackson’s removal policy, tens of thousands of Yaqui were driven from their homes in Sonora and deported south, to the Yucatan and Oaxaca. There, they were put to work on sugar, tobacco, and henequen plantations (though Mexico had long abolished chattel slavery, the post–Civil War spread of export-led capitalism intensified various mechanisms of forced labor, including those based on peonage and vagrancy laws). Tens of thousands more died in the assault. Women and children were forced into servitude. Confiscated Yaqui property in Sonora went to
...more
