 Why do we celebrate Cinco de Mayo every year? Cinco de Mayo means the fifth day of May. It's an annual celebration that commemorates the victory of the Mexican army in a single battle against French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5th in 1862. To understand the significance of Cinco de Mayo in both Mexican and US history, let's briefly review some events during the second French intervention in Mexico from 1861 to 1867. In 1861, Benito Juarez was elected president of Mexico. He was from a Zapotec family and he was the first, and to date, the only person of indigenous origin to become the president of Mexico. In 1861, when he became president, the nation was politically divided between conservatives and liberals. Benito Juarez was a liberal who was supported by the United States. The Catholic Church and its conservative supporters disagreed with the economic policies of the liberal government headed by Benito Juarez. The conservatives looked to European Catholic monarchs for political support. Mexico was financially devastated and owed a lot of money to France, Britain and Spain. Since there was no money in the treasury, the newly elected president Juarez suspended payment of all foreign debt for two years. This decision prompted an immediate demand for repayment from France, Britain and Spain and these three nations signed a tripartite agreement in London and agreed to send a joint expedition to Mexico to reclaim their money. Although this violated one of the main tenets of the Mundo doctrine, the civil war impeded U.S. ability to protect Mexico. The Spanish and British soon realized that the French had no intention of adhering to the tripartite treaty of London, so they withdrew their troops from Mexico and negotiated their debt payments directly with Mexico. Meanwhile, a group of Mexican conservatives invited French Emperor Napoleon III to oust Benito Juarez and establish a monarchy in Mexico. Mexico became independent from Spain in 1821, but many conservatives still had monarchist tendencies. The idea of monarchy had been discredited in the Americas, but it hadn't completely disappeared. With the departure of the English and Spanish forces, Napoleon III began his efforts to establish an empire in Mexico. Perhaps as a replacement for all the land that his uncle, Napoleon Bonaparte, sold to Thomas Jefferson as part of the Louisiana purchase. But more important, Napoleon III wanted access to the cotton of the American South. The Union blockade of Confederate ports during the American Civil War had an adverse effect on the cotton shipments to France. The French openly developed economic ties with the Confederates and were confident that the Confederates would prevail. In 1861, France sent a well-armed naval fleet and thousands of troops to Veracruz and started military operations in Mexico in 1862. Napoleon III's goal was to oust Benito Juarez and seize Mexican territory. Approximately 6,000 French troops marched inland, with the support of some Mexican conservatives and attacked the town of Puebla de los Ángeles, about 60 miles east of Mexico City. President Benito Juarez sent a small Mexican army to Puebla, led by General Ignacio Zaragoza to fight the French troops. On May 5, 1862, the Mexican and French forces fought against each other in Puebla. Although the French army was large, well-trained and equipped, it was forced to retreat due to heavy casualties. Nearly 500 French soldiers died in the battle, while fewer than 100 Mexican soldiers lost their lives. But this was not the end of French intervention in Mexico. The Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862 did not stop the French occupation of Mexico. The French remained in Mexico for the next five years until 1867, but this battle represented a symbolic victory for an outnumbered Mexican army of liberals. And Cinco de Mayo is a celebration of a great victory against all odds over the superior French army. Although the victory was short-lived, this victory instilled national pride in Mexicans and restored hope in a fragmented nation. After the French defeat at the Battle of Puebla, Napoleon III sent approximately 30,000 more troops to Mexico. He figured the US would not be able to enforce the Monroe Doctrine or stop him from establishing a French stronghold in the Americas. In 1863, the French eventually took control of Puebla and the capital, Mexico City, and set up a provisional government. In 1864, Napoleon III installed Ferdinand Maximilian, second in line to the Austro-Hungarian throne as Emperor of Mexico's Second Empire. The United States recognized the potential danger of French intervention and Napoleon III's ambitions in Mexico. After the Civil War ended, the United States exerted diplomatic pressure on the French and supplied weapons to the Mexican army. With his coffers running low, Napoleon III decided in 1866 to end France's occupation of Mexico. Maximilian unwisely stayed on, and on June 19, 1867, he and his top generals were executed by a Mexican firing squad. Benito Juarez was re-elected as President of Mexico in 1867, and he remained in office until his death in 1872. In Mexico, Cinco de Mayo is primarily a regional celebration that includes parades and re-enactments of the 1862 Battle of Puebla. In the United States, Cinco de Mayo has increasingly become a highly commercialized day of celebration of Mexican culture and heritage, marked with parades, mariachi music, Mexican food, beverages, and folk dances. Let's take a moment to remember that Mexicans who lived in the United States during the American Civil War viewed the French defeat in Puebla as a blow to the Confederacy. The first celebration of Cinco de Mayo in the United States might have started in California as early as 1863. However, it was not until the mid-20th century at the height of the Chicano movement that Chicano activists embraced Cinco de Mayo as a symbol of social justice and as an expression of their support for freedom and democracy throughout the Americas. Thank you for watching. Please feel free to comment, like, and subscribe.