Texas Beer, Tamales and Gift Cards

Point of View:
By Andy Porres

What is this political world coming to?

Buying votes with plastic -gift cards- to assure those those in power stay in power are the latest charges making headlines in Mexico these days.

Ho-hum. Haven’t we all been there at least once? Except for the plastic bit, the act remains the same.

In Mexico’s latest presidential elections, however, both the PRD and PAN parties, as well as the PRI, were accused of passing out gift cards and groceries to garner votes. Down there, political parties are allowed by law to give away anything they want, as long as they report all expenses and don’t exceed spending limits.

“This way those offering the rewards won’t make people feel their vote is being bought.” said a border poll watcher to a TV reporter.

Yes, there have been election reforms, both in Mexico and the U.S. and there have been measures to stop any kind of voter fraud, but allegations of vote buying run rampant once elections are over.

“I think it has become a kind of ‘national pastime,’” said Eddie Salas, a Sacramento civil rights activist and political junkie. “We love to dwell on election stories even long after the elections are history.”

Regardless of how it emerg-ed, Mexico has new leadership in the likes of Enrique Peña Nieto and his Primera Dama, a telenovela favorite, Angelica Rivera. This coming November it’s America’s turn for its election drama. It’ll time for us to endure the mudslinging and outrageous charges from both main parties. And maybe even some vote-buying stories.
Back in the day, in my native South Texas, beer and tamales were the preferred choice of “rewarding” voters that particular candidates sought out. Some politicos staged Texas-size fish-frys in public parks and still others visited barrio cantinas right before election day. But it was during the time that Texans and other voters in the South, had to pay a “poll-tax” for the right to express their political choices, that vote-buying peaked.

“They used to roundup Mexicans and Mexican-Americans, legal or not, and persuade them to vote a particular way,” my late Dad, José would tell me. “On the eve of election night, they’d wine and dine the men then be given instructions as what to do the following morning, most of the time assuring their benefactors of a victory.”

Whereas, the gift-card scheme in Mexico alleges gift cards given to would-be voters, worth from $300 to $700 pesos (roughly from $22 to $52 USD) and supposedly used to buy groceries and home appliances, the Texas version gave the prospective voter mostly a hangover, but a full stomach.

“It was the old Lone Star and tamale trick,” my Dad would laughingly tell me.” In other towns it may have been Pearl Beer, but it was basically the same idea and it worked every time.”

After making me laugh along with him, my Dad would then become very serious, even to the point of damning the idea of his fellow Tejanos allowing themselves to be bought with beer and food.

“I wish I could have afforded to pay for lots of poll-taxes and give them away to my friends and allow them to vote for whomever they favored,” he told me once. “Finally, when the poll-tax was outlawed, I figured we’d be left alone, but the practice continued in a more refined manner.”

It must be noted that poll taxes added a direct out-of-pocket transaction cost to voting by charging fees to vote. The state of Texas adopted a poll tax in 1902 requiring eligible voters pay between $1.50 and $1.75 to register to vote – a lot of money at the time, and a big barrier to the working classes and poor. Poll taxes disproportionately affected African Americans and Mexican Americans. The tax was finally abolished for national elections by the 24th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1964.

It is also worth noting that iin Mexico, a country so poor, with so much inequality, there are forces that will try to take advantage of the situation.

Just like they did in South Texas, many years ago.