Let them eat banana bread

Aunt Mary again

My Aunt Mary worked for the CIA, and had friends who worked for the State Department. One of her friends -- call him Gerald so we have a name to use -- was stationed in Colombia at the beginning of his career in the 1950s. He loved Bogota, and went for long walks through the city, talking to people. Part of his job was to understand Colombia, and sometimes he found it hard to tell the difference between work and play. He loved what he was doing, whichever it was.

One beautiful day, there was a demonstration in the streets, and protesters marched past the American Embassy on the way to government offices. All the staff watched, and chatted a bit. At one point, there was some kind of incident that made the march stop for a while, and so it was easy for the American spectators to hear the chanting and singing. They didn’t hear a snatch from this group and a scrap from that group; they only heard the demonstrators stalled in front of the embassy, singing clearly. “Listen!” said the military attache. “They’re singing the Internationale!” (The “Internationale” was a French protest song that became the anthem of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union. If the Colombian protesters were singing Communist songs, that would be interesting during the Cold War.)

But Gerald spoke up. “No, that’s not the Internationale. That’s the Colombian national anthem!” Everybody turned around to stare at him.

Young Gerald, the junior member of the staff, was the only person in the embassy who recognized the national anthem of their hosts.

Sometimes you listen to Americans fussing about Latino immigrants, and you realize that the fussers have no idea why there is any emigration going on. Why are all these people moving, anyway? There is a Marie Antoinette “let them eat cake” feeling about it. (Sometimes.) But when I watch Latino friends, I don’t see them get angry about it. They are used to it. After all, if you want to explain it to an American (an Anglo Norte Americano, that is -- “Latinos” are Americans), where do you start?

The Self-righteous Banana Appeal

Aunt Mary was a proper Bostonian. She was very funny, very smart, very sophisticated -- and more than a little intimidating. So I remember things she said even when they made no sense to me at the time. She was a liberal Democrat who worked for the CIA, focused on Latin America. I guess that many people would consider that impossible, but she lived with the apparent contradictions for decades. She said that there were analysts and there were decision-makers, and sometimes they talked to each other. She did not attack her superiors, but she did not defend them either. I had the impression that she -- like my father, a pioneering astrophysicist who defended some controversial theories -- believed firmly that facts triumph in the end, and collecting solid data was worthwhile even when most people ignored it for a time.

I remember a story she told that made her laugh and shake her head. I did not understand the story when she told it, but I did understand from her tone that the story was true, but hard to believe. When she was studying law (at Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy), there was a case about Latin America that they read. It was an anti-trust case, and the statement of facts (the stipulations) that both sides accepted was startling. An American company wanted more land in Central America. They had trouble getting it, so they started a war between two nations. When the war was over, the national boundaries had shifted to accommodate the company. The case before the court did NOT ask whether it was legal to start wars to get rich, nor whether it was legal for Americans to start wars between two sovereign nations. Just: was this a violation of anti-trust laws?

I do not know whether Aunt Mary was permanently amazed by the insanity of law, the weirdness of the court, or the stunning arrogance of the company.

I think that the case was American Banana Co. v. United Fruit Co., 213 U.S. 347 (1909). But I’m not a lawyer, and I don’t know how many times American companies have started wars elsewhere and then asked the U.S. Supreme Court to decide the right and wrong of a boundary dispute between two sovereign nations. 

I do understand why some Latinos find it hard to swallow an American demand that they must respect our sacred borders. Squabbling about borders is one thing, but invoking God to condemn law-breakers who dare to cross our line in the sand -- well, I think Aunt Mary would laugh at the ignorance and foolishness of it.