PERSPECTIVES ON ELECTION FALLOUT : A Rude Awakening for Latinos : Prop. 187 proved the power of the vote to those reluctant to become U.S. citizens. Now, thousands will.

“Maybe this is the kick in the pants we Latinos needed,” Huntington Park resident Rebecca Avila said after it was announced that Proposition 187 had been approved by an overwhelming majority of California voters. On election night and the following day, the mood in communities with the heaviest concentration of Latino immigrants was sullen, but not defeated. Many locals comforted themselves by pointing out that Latino immigrants have never before participated so enthusiastically in electoral politics in this or any other country.

Many credit the activism inspired by Proposition 187 with birthing a new political consciousness among Latinos, driven in large part by immigrants. One day in the not-so-distant future, a predominantly Latino California electorate will be confronting complex issues like the state’s response to illegal immigration.

“Proposition 187 woke us up,” said Ernestine Mansour, a Mexican-born poll watcher. The Southwest Voter Research Institute estimates that the percentage of Latino voters who are immigrants increased from 20% to 30% since the last election. Fifty-five percent of all Latinos who are registered to vote cast ballots last Tuesday. In neighborhoods from Boyle Heights to South Gate, precinct leaders reported that naturalized Latino immigrants, many voting for the first time, doubled their turnout in previous elections. Unprecedented numbers of teen-agers, too young to vote themselves, became politically involved.

Of the 2.7 million Latinos in California who are eligible by age and citizenship to register to vote, 1.75 million have done so, according to the Southwest Voter Research Institute.

Even if immigration from Latin America were to come to a sudden halt tomorrow, high Latino birth rates, coupled with a virtual zero population growth for Anglos, would give California a Latino majority by the year 2040. As it is, Latinos will make up more than half the population by 2020.

Of course, Latino activists have been invoking the imagery of the Latino electorate as the “sleeping giant” for decades. On election night, Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard recalled asking her father, Edward Roybal, California’s first Latino congressman, what the phrase meant when she was a little girl in the 1950s. Today, the now-hackneyed metaphor inspires groans in more than a few U.S.-born Latinos who have given up hope that Latinos will ever become a politically active population. They feel that without a galvanizing issue in 1996, these same voters will slip quietly back into passivity.

Antonio Gonzalez, president of the Southwest Voter Research Institute, finds the Swiftian imagery insulting as well as misleading. He sees Proposition 187 as speeding up what has already been a healthy growth in Latino political involvement. He reminds us that the number of registered voters and Latino elected officials has doubled in California since 1984. “We haven’t been sleeping,” he says.

Latin American immigrants have long confused the notions of citizenship and cultural identity. Largely because of that, they have had the lowest rates of naturalization of any immigrant groups. “Green card” holders have said they are reluctant to become U.S. citizens because they fear losing the values that make them Latino. Immigrants from Latin America, unlike those of European origin, also come from countries whose national identities have been, in great part, defined by the overpowering and often intrusive presence of the United States, the “Colossus to the North.” Latin nations have frequently manipulated anti-Yankee sentiment to promote national unity. In Mexico, becoming “North American” is seen as betrayal of one’s culture. So, in an ill-defined effort to maintain their identity, many Latinos have wound up straddling the border, living in the United States without becoming citizens.

Until now, Latino immigrants were able to avoid having to make that choice. The hubbub over Proposition 187 and its ultimate passage has changed all that. Although the measure specifically targets illegal immigrants, many legal immigrants have taken the issue personally and feel they have been made guilty by association. According to Domingo Rodriguez, the head of Los Angeles Unified School District’s citizenship program, huge numbers of legal immigrants have begun to search for security and a voice in citizenship. Since Gov. Pete Wilson’s anti-illegal-immigrant campaign began, there has been a marked increase in the number of permanent resident aliens applying for citizenship. The district is preparing for 30,000 students to attend adult-school citizenship classes this academic year, up from last year’s enrollment of 8,300. This is happening at a time when more and more Latinos are realizing that becoming an American citizen does not stop them from maintaining the social ties and values that give their lives meaning.

“If Proposition 187 wins,” Huntington Park Councilman Raul Perez said shortly before the polls closed on Tuesday, “immigrants will get the message that they can’t continue to sit on the fence. They need to make up their mind that this is their country and that they’re here for good.”

That message appears to be hitting home.