Limits of Liberty: Mobility and the Making of the Eastern U.S.-Mexico Border

The Limits of Liberty chronicles the formation of the U.S.-Mexico border from the perspective of the 'mobile peoples' who assisted in determining the international boundary from both sides in the mid-nineteenth century.

In this historic and timely study, James David Nichols argues against the many top-down connotations that borders carry, noting that the state cannot entirely dominate the process of boundary marking.

Even though there were many efforts on the part of the United States and Mexico to define the new international border as a limit, mobile peoples continued to transgress the border and cross it with impunity.