10: Mexico in Revolution
<< 9: The Republics of South America || 11: The Republics of the Caribbean >>
When, in 1910, like several of its sister republics, Mexico
celebrated the centennial anniversary of its independence, the
era of peace and progress inaugurated by Porfirio Díaz seemed
likely to last indefinitely, for he was entering upon his eighth
term as President. Brilliant as his career had been, however, and
greatly as Mexico had prospered under his rigid rule, a sullen
discontent had been brewing. The country that had had but one
continuous President in twenty-six years was destined to have
some fourteen chief magistrates in less than a quarter of that
time, and to surpass all its previous records for rapidity in
presidential succession, by having one executive who is said to
have held office for precisely fifty-six minutes!
It has often been asserted that the reason for the downfall of
Díaz and the lapse of Mexico into the unhappy conditions of a
half century earlier was that he had grown too old to keep a firm
grip on the situation. It has also been declared that his
insistence upon reelection and upon the elevation of his own
personal candidate to the vice presidency, as a successor in case
of his retirement, occasioned his overthrow. The truth of the
matter is that these circumstances were only incidental to his
downfall; the real causes of revolution lay deeprooted in the
history of these twenty-six years. The most significant feature
of the revolt was its civilian character. A widespread public
opinion had been created; a national consciousness had been
awakened which was intolerant of abuses and determined upon their
removal at any cost; and this public opinion and national
consciousness were products of general education, which had
brought to the fore a number of intelligent men eager to
participate in public affairs and yet barred out because of their
unwillingness to support the existing regime.
Some one has remarked, and rightly, that Díaz in his zeal for the
material advancement of Mexico, mistook the tangible wealth of
the country for its welfare. Desirable and even necessary as that
material progress was, it produced only a one-sided prosperity.
Díaz was singularly deaf to the just complaints of the people of
the laboring classes, who, as manufacturing and other industrial
enterprises developed, were resolved to better their conditions.
In the country at large the discontent was still stronger.
Throughout many of the rural districts general advancement had
been retarded because of the holding of huge areas of fertile
land by a comparatively few rich families, who did little to
improve it and were content with small returns from the labor of
throngs of unskilled native cultivators. Wretchedly paid and
housed, and toiling long hours, the workers lived like the serfs
of medieval days or as their own ancestors did in colonial times.
Ignorant, poverty-stricken, liable at any moment to be
dispossessed of the tiny patch of ground on which they raised a
few hills of corn or beans, most of them were naturally a simple,
peaceful folk who, in spite of their misfortunes, might have gone
on indefinitely with their drudgery in a hopeless apathetic
fashion, unless their latent savage instincts happened to be
aroused by drink and the prospect of plunder. On the other hand,
the intelligent among them, knowing that in some of the northern
States of the republic wages were higher and treatment fairer,
felt a sense of wrong which, like that of the laboring class in
the towns, was all the more dangerous because it was not allowed
to find expression.
Díaz thought that what Mexico required above everything else was
the development of industrial efficiency and financial strength,
assured by a maintenance of absolute order. Though disposed to do
justice in individual cases, he would tolerate no class movements
of any kind. Labor unions, strikes, and other efforts at
lightening the burden of the workers he regarded as seditious and
deserving of severe punishment. In order to attract capital from
abroad as the best means of exploiting the vast resources of the
country, he was willing to go to any length, it would seem, in
guaranteeing protection. Small wonder, therefore, that the people
who shared in none of the immediate advantages from that source
should have muttered that Mexico was the "mother of foreigners
and the stepmother of Mexicans." And, since so much of the
capital came from the United States, the antiforeign sentiment
singled Americans out for its particular dislike.
If Díaz appeared unable to appreciate the significance of the
educational and industrial awakening, he was no less oblivious of
the political outcome. He knew, of course, that the Mexican
constitution made impossible demands upon the political capacity
of the people. He was himself mainly of Indian blood and he
believed that he understood the temperament and limitations of
most Mexicans. Knowing how tenaciously they clung to political
notions, he believed that it was safer and wiser to forego, at
least for a time, real popular government and to concentrate
power in the hands of a strong man who could maintain order.
Accordingly, backed by his political adherents, known as
científicos [scientists; the author wrongly says doctrinaires], some of whom had acquired a sinister
ascendancy over him, and also by the Church, the landed
proprietors, and the foreign capitalists, Díaz centered the
entire administration more and more in himself. Elections became
mere farces. Not only the federal officials themselves but the
state governors, the members of the state legislatures, and all
others in authority during the later years of his rule owed their
selection primarily to him and held their positions only if
personally loyal to him. Confident of his support and certain
that protests against misgovernment would be regarded by the
President as seditious, many of them abused their power at will.
Notable among them were the local officials, called jefes
politicos, whose control of the police force enabled them to
indulge in practices of intimidation and extortion which
ultimately became unendurable.
Though symptoms of popular wrath against the Díaz regime, or
Díaz potism as the Mexicans termed it, were apparent as early as
1908, it was not until January, 1911, that the actual revolution
came. It was headed by Francisco I. Madero, a member of a wealthy
and distinguished family of landed proprietors in one of the
northern States. What the revolutionists demanded in substance
was the retirement of the President, Vice President, and Cabinet;
a return to the principle of no reelection to the chief
magistracy; a guarantee of fair elections at all times; the
choice of capable, honest, and impartial judges, jefes politicos,
and other officials; and, in particular, a series of agrarian and
industrial reforms which would break up the great estates, create
peasant proprietorships, and better the conditions of the working
classes. Disposed at first to treat the insurrection lightly,
Díaz soon found that he had underestimated its strength. Grants
of some of the demands and promises of reform were met with a
dogged insistence upon his own resignation. Then, as the
rebellion spread to the southward, the masterful old man realized
that his thirty-one years of rule were at an end. On the 25th of
May, therefore, he gave up his power and sailed for Europe.
Madero was chosen President five months later, but the revolution
soon passed beyond his control. He was a sincere idealist, if not
something of a visionary, actuated by humane and kindly
sentiments, but he lacked resoluteness and the art of managing
men. He was too prolific, also, of promises which he must have
known he could not keep. Yielding to family influence, he let his
followers get out of hand. Ambitious chieftains and groups of
Radicals blocked and thwarted him at every turn. When he could
find no means of carrying out his program without wholesale
confiscation and the disruption of business interests, he was
accused of abandoning his duty. One officer after another
deserted him and turned rebel. Brigandage and insurrection swept
over the country and threatened to involve it in ugly
complications with the United States and European powers. At
length, in February, 1913, came the blow that put an end to all
of Madero's efforts and aspirations. A military uprising in the
city of Mexico made him prisoner, forced him to resign, and set
up a provisional government under the dictatorship of Victoriano
Huerta, one of his chief lieutenants. Two weeks later both Madero
and the Vice President were assassinated while on their way
supposedly to a place of safety.
Huerta was a rough soldier of Indian origin, possessed of unusual
force of character and strength of will, ruthless, cunning, and
in bearing alternately dignified and vulgar. A cientifico in
political faith, he was disposed to restore the Díaz regime, so
far as an application of shrewdness and force could make it
possible. But from the outset he found an obstacle confronting
him that he could not surmount. Though acknowledged by European
countries and by many of the Hispanic republics, he could not win
recognition from the United States, either as provisional
President or as a candidate for regular election to the office.
Whether personally responsible for the murder of Madero or not,
he was not regarded by the American Government as entitled to
recognition, on the ground that he was not the choice of the
Mexican people. In its refusal to recognize an administration set
up merely by brute force, the United States was upheld by
Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Cuba. The elimination of Huerta
became the chief feature for a while of its Mexican policy.
Meanwhile the followers of Madero and the pronounced Radicals had
found a new northern leader in the person of Venustiano Carranza.
They called themselves Constitutionalists, as indicative of their
purpose to reestablish the constitution and to choose a successor
to Madero in a constitutional manner. What they really desired
was those radical changes along social, industrial, and political
lines, which Madero had championed in theory. They sought to
introduce a species of socialistic regime that would provide the
Mexicans with an opportunity for self-regeneration. While Díaz
had believed in economic progress supported by the great landed
proprietors, the moral influence of the Church, and the
application of foreign capital, the Constitutionalists,
personified in Carranza, were convinced that these agencies, if
left free and undisturbed to work their will, would ruin Mexico.
Though not exactly antiforeign in their attitude, they wished to
curb the power of the foreigner; they would accept his aid
whenever desirable for the economic development of the country,
but they would not submit to his virtual control of public
affairs. In any case they would tolerate no interference by the
United States. Compromise with the Huerta regime, therefore, was
impossible. Huerta, the "strong man" of the Díaz type, must go.
On this point, at least, the Constitutionalists were in thorough
agreement with the United States.
A variety of international complications ensued. Both Huertistas
and Carranzistas perpetrated outrages on foreigners, which evoked
sharp protests and threats from the United States and European
powers. While careful not to recognize his opponents officially,
the American Government resorted to all kinds of means to oust
the dictator. An embargo was laid on the export of arms and
munitions; all efforts to procure financial help from abroad were
balked. The power of Huerta was waning perceptibly and that of
the Constitutionalists was increasing when an incident that
occurred in April, 1914, at Tampico brought matters to a climax.
A number of American sailors who had gone ashore to obtain
supplies were arrested and temporarily detained. The United
States demanded that the American flag be saluted as reparation
for the insult. Upon the refusal of Huerta to comply, the United
States sent a naval expedition to occupy Vera Cruz.
Both Carranza and Huerta regarded this move as equivalent to an
act of war. Argentina, Brazil, and Chile then offered their
mediation. But the conference arranged for this purpose at
Niagara Falls, Canada, had before it a task altogether impossible
of accomplishment. Though Carranza was willing to have the
Constitutionalists represented, if the discussion related solely
to the immediate issue between the United States and Huerta, he
declined to extend the scope of the conference so as to admit the
right of the United States to interfere in the internal affairs
of Mexico. The conference accomplished nothing so far as the
immediate issue was concerned. The dictator did not make
reparation for the "affronts and indignities" he had committed;
but his day was over. The advance of the Constitutionalists
southward compelled him in July to abandon the capital and leave
the country. Four months later the American forces were withdrawn
from Vera Cruz. The "A B C" Conference, however barren it was of
direct results, helped to allay suspicions of the United States
in Hispanic America and brought appreciably nearer a "concert of
the western world."
While far from exercising full control throughout Mexico, the
"first chief" of the Constitutionalists was easily the dominant
figure in the situation. At home a ranchman, in public affairs a
statesman of considerable ability, knowing how to insist and yet
how to temporize, Carranza carried on a struggle, both in arms
and in diplomacy, which singled him out as a remarkable
character. Shrewdly aware of the advantageous circumstances
afforded him by the war in Europe, he turned them to account with
a degree of skill that blocked every attempt at defeat or
compromise. No matter how serious the opposition to him in Mexico
itself, how menacing the attitude of the United States, or how
persuasive the conciliatory disposition of Hispanic American
nations, he clung stubbornly and tenaciously to his program.
Even after Huerta had been eliminated, Carranza's position was
not assured, for Francisco, or "Pancho," Villa, a chieftain whose
personal qualities resembled those of the fallen dictator, was
equally determined to eliminate him. For a brief moment, indeed,
peace reigned. Under an alleged agreement between them, a
convention of Constitutionalist officers was to choose a
provisional President, who should be ineligible as a candidate
for the permanent presidency at the regular elections. When
Carranza assumed both of these positions, Villa declared his act
a violation of their understanding and insisted upon his
retirement. Inasmuch as the convention was dominated by Villa,
the "first chief" decided to ignore its election of a provisional
President.
The struggle between the Conventionalists headed by Villa and the
Constitutionalists under Carranza plunged Mexico into worse
discord and misery than ever. Indeed it became a sort of
three-cornered contest. The third party was Emiliano Zapata, an
Indian bandit, nominally a supporter of Villa but actually
favorable to neither of the rivals. Operating near the capital,
he plundered Conventionalists and Constitutionalists with equal
impartiality, and as a diversion occasionally occupied the city
itself. These circumstances gave force to the saying that Mexico
was a "land where peace breaks out once in a while!"
Early in 1915 Carranza proceeded to issue a number of radical
decrees that exasperated foreigners almost beyond endurance.
Rather than resort to extreme measures again, however, the United
States invoked the cooperation of the Hispanic republics and
proposed a conference to devise some solution of the Mexican
problem. To give the proposed conference a wider representation,
it invited not only the "A B C" powers, but Bolivia, Uruguay, and
Guatemala to participate. Meeting at Washington in August, the
mediators encountered the same difficulty which had confronted
their predecessors at Niagara Falls. Though the other chieftains
assented, Carranza, now certain of success, declined to heed any
proposal of conciliation. Characterizing efforts of the kind as
an unwarranted interference in the internal affairs of a sister
nation, he warned the Hispanic republics against setting up so
dangerous a precedent. In reply Argentina stated that the
conference obeyed a "lofty inspiration of Pan-American
solidarity, and, instead of finding any cause for alarm, the
Mexican people should see in it a proof of their friendly
consideration that her fate evokes in us, and calls forth our
good wishes for her pacification and development." However, as
the only apparent escape from more watchful waiting or from armed
intervention on the part of the United States, in October the
seven Governments decided to accept the facts as they stood, and
accordingly recognized Carranza as the de facto ruler of Mexico.
Enraged at this favor shown to his rival, Villa determined
deliberately to provoke American intervention by a murderous raid
on a town in New Mexico in March, 1916. When the United States
dispatched an expedition to avenge the outrage, Carranza
protested energetically against its violation of Mexican
territory and demanded its withdrawal. Several clashes, in fact,
occurred between American soldiers and Carranzistas. Neither the
expedition itself, however, nor diplomatic efforts to find some
method of cooperation which would prevent constant trouble along
the frontier served any useful purpose, since Villa apparently
could not be captured and Carranza refused to yield to diplomatic
persuasion. Carranza then proposed that a joint commission be
appointed to settle these vexed questions. Even this device
proved wholly unsatisfactory. The Mexicans would not concede the
right of the United States to send an armed expedition into their
country at any time, and the Americans refused to accept
limitations on the kind of troops that they might employ or on
the zone of their operations. In January, 1917, the joint
commission was dissolved and the American soldiers were
withdrawn. Again the "first chief" had won!
On the 5th of February a convention assembled at Querétaro
promulgated a constitution embodying substantially all of the
radical program that Carranza had anticipated in his decrees.
Besides providing for an elaborate improvement in the condition
of the laboring classes and for such a division of great estates
as might satisfy their particular needs, the new constitution
imposed drastic restrictions upon foreigners and religious
bodies. Under its terms, foreigners could not acquire industrial
concessions unless they waived their treaty rights and consented
to regard themselves for the purpose as Mexican citizens. In all
such cases preference was to be shown Mexicans over foreigners.
Ecclesiastical corporations were forbidden to own real property.
No primary school and no charitable institution could be
conducted by any religious mission or denomination, and religious
publications must refrain from commenting on public affairs. The
presidential term was reduced from six years to four; reelection
was prohibited; and the office of Vice President was abolished.
When, on the 1st of May, Venustiano Carranza was chosen
President, Mexico had its first constitutional executive in four
years. After a cruel and obstinately intolerant struggle that had
occasioned indescribable suffering from disease and starvation,
as well as the usual slaughter and destruction incident to war,
the country began to enjoy once more a measure of peace.
Financial exhaustion, however, had to be overcome before
recuperation was possible. Industrial progress had become almost
paralyzed; vast quantities of depreciated paper money had to be
withdrawn from circulation; and an enormous array of claims for
the loss of foreign life and property had rolled up.
<< 9: The Republics of South America || 11: The Republics of the Caribbean >>
