Through the use of newspaper editorials, oral histories, photographs, and archival records that primarily focus on the Henderson County apple industry, this thesis contends that the 1989 Migrant Housing Act followed a historical trend of previous national migrant labor legislation that was largely ignored and only marginally improved migrant housing and health conditions. This thesis will contend that the incongruity between legislation and the physical realities of migrant workers in North Carolina was predictable and due in part to an economic disincentive by growers to ignore housing and health legislation, the political and economic influence of agricultural growers associations in North Carolina, and the lack of bargaining power of migrant workers, which made them susceptible to physical abuse. Lastly, this thesis will argue that the geographical and cultural disconnect between the majority Hispanic agricultural migrant worker and North Carolina communities provided little political incentive for the state government to strictly enforce migrant housing legislation in 1989.
