Those without a nation: the 1932 National Registry of Foreigners and Guatemalans in Chiapas”

Abstract

From a historical perspective, this article analyzes Mexico’s 1932 National Registry of Foreigners (NRF) through its application in Chiapas as a migratory policy conceived to count the number of foreigners residing in the country. The measure had peculiarities and inconveniences in its implementation along the southern border because Mexican authorities, having lost sight of the precise line that had divided the two nations geographically since 1882, were little concerned about the consequences of granting nationality to people living on the Mexican side. We examine how the application of the NRF in Chiapas listed a large number of people with no nationality who lived along that border and traveled freely between the two nations, and discuss the advantages of this “non-nationality” for some coffee plantation owners, mainly indigenous Guatemalans. The study also analyzes the main causes that led to this omission of nationality, including rampant illiteracy, a largely rural population, indifference and ignorance of nationality laws, and the need for cheap labor on those plantations. Finally, though briefly, it examines key features of the Interdepartmental Demographic Commission (Comision Demográfica Intersecretarial), the governmental mechanism that performed the naturalization of a massive number of people in the region as Mexicans.