6: Peril from Abroad
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Apart from the spoliation of Mexico by the United States, the
independence of the Hispanic nations had not been menaced for
more than thirty years. Now comes a period in which the plight of
their big northern neighbor, rent in twain by civil war and
powerless to enforce the spirit of the Monroe Doctrine, caused
two of the countries to become subject a while to European
control. One of these was the Dominican Republic.
In 1844 the Spanish-speaking population of the eastern part of
the island of Santo Domingo, writhing under the despotic yoke of
Haiti, had seized a favorable occasion to regain their freedom.
But the magic word "independence" could not give stability to the
new state any more than it had done in the case of its western
foes. The Haitians had lapsed long since into a condition
resembling that of their African forefathers. They reveled in the
barbarities of Voodoo, a sort of snake worship, and they groveled
before "presidents" and "emperors" who rose and fell on the tide
of decaying civilization. The Dominicans unhappily were not much
more progressive. Revolutions alternated with invasions and
counterinvasions and effectually prevented enduring progress.
On several occasions the Dominicans had sought reannexation to
Spain or had craved the protection of France as a defense against
continual menace from their negro enemies and as a relief from
domestic turmoil. But every move in this direction failed because
of a natural reluctance on the part of Spain and France, which
was heightened by a refusal of the United States to permit what
it regarded as a violation of the Monroe Doctrine. In 1861,
however, the outbreak of civil war in the United States appeared
to present a favorable opportunity to obtain protection from
abroad. If the Dominican Republic could not remain independent
anyway, reunion with the old mother country seemed altogether
preferable to reconquest by Haiti. The President, therefore,
entered into negotiations with the Spanish Governor and Captain
General of Cuba, and then issued a proclamation signed by himself
and four of his ministers announcing that by the "free and
spontaneous will" of its citizens, who had conferred upon him the
power to do so, the nation recognized Queen Isabella II as its
lawful sovereign! Practically no protest was made by the
Dominicans against this loss of their independence.
Difficulties which should have been foreseen by Spain were quick
to reveal themselves. It fell to the exPresident, now a colonial
governor and captain general, to appoint a host of officials and,
not unnaturally, he named his own henchmen. By so doing he not
only aroused the animosity of the disappointed but stimlated that
of the otherwise disaffected as well, until both the aggrieved
factions began to plot rebellion. Spain, too, sent over a crowd
of officials who could not adjust themselves to local conditions.
The failure of the mother country to allow the Dominicans
representation in the Spanish Cortes and its readiness to levy
taxes stirred up resentment that soon ended in revolution. Unable
to check this new trouble, and awed by the threatening attitude
of the United States, Spain decided to withdraw in 1865. The
Dominicans thus were left with their independence and a
chance—which they promptly seized—to renew their commotions. So
serious did these disturbances become that in 1869 the President
of the reconstituted republic sought annexation to the United
States but without success. American efforts, on the other hand,
were equally futile to restore peace and order in the troubled
country until many years later.
The intervention of Spain in Santo Domingo and its subsequent
withdrawal could not fail to have disastrous consequences in its
colony of Cuba, the "Pearl of the Antilles" as it was proudly
called. Here abundant crops of sugar and tobacco had brought
wealth and luxury, but not many immigrants because of the havoc
made by epidemics of yellow fever. Nearly a third of the insular
population was still composed of negro slaves, who could hardly
relish the thought that, while the mother country had tolerated
the suppression of the hateful institution in Santo Domingo, she
still maintained it in Cuba. A bureaucracy, also, prone to
corruption owing to the temptations of loose accounting at the
custom house, governed in routinary, if not in arbitrary,
fashion. Under these circumstances dislike for the suspicious and
repressive administration of Spain grew apace, and secret
societies renewed their agitation for its overthrow. The symptoms
of unrest were aggravated by the forced retirement of Spain from
Santo Domingo. If the Dominicans had succeeded so well, it ought
not to be difficult for a prolonged rebellion to wear Spain out
and compel it to abandon Cuba also. At this critical moment news
was brought of a Spanish revolution across the seas.
Just as the plight of Spain in 1808, and again in 1820, had
afforded a favorable opportunity for its colonies on the
continents of America to win their independence, so now in 1868
the tidings that Queen Isabella had been dethroned by a liberal
uprising aroused the Cubans to action under their devoted leader,
Carlos Manuel de Cespedes. The insurrection had not gained much
headway, however, when the provisional government of the mother
country instructed a new Governor and Captain General—whose
name, Dulce (Sweet), had an auspicious sound—to open
negotiations with the insurgents and to hold out the hope of
reforms. But the royalists, now as formerly,would listen to no
compromise. Organizing themselves into bodies of volunteers, they
drove Dulce out. He was succeeded by one Caballero de Rodas
(Knight of Rhodes) who lived up to his name by trying to ride
roughshod over the rebellious Cubans. Thus began the Ten Years'
War—a war of skirmishes and brief encounters, rarely involving a
decisive action, which drenched the soil of Cuba with blood and
laid waste its fields in a fury of destruction.
Among the radicals and liberals who tried to retain a fleeting
control over Mexico after the final departure of Santa Anna was
the first genuine statesman it had ever known in its history as a
republic—Benito Pablo Juárez, an Indian. At twelve years of age
he could not read or write or even speak Spanish. His employer,
however, noted his intelligence and had him educated. Becoming a
lawyer, Juárez entered the political arena and rose to prominence
by dint of natural talent for leadership, an indomitable
perseverance, and a sturdy patriotism. A radical by conviction,
he felt that the salvation of Mexico could never be attained
until clericalism and militarism had been banished from its soil
forever.
Under his influence a provisional government had already begun a
policy of lessening the privileges of the Church, when the
conservative elements, with a cry that religion was being
attacked, rose up in arms again. This movement repressed, a
Congress proceeded in 1857 to issue a liberal constitution which
was destined to last for sixty years. It established the federal
system in a definite fashion, abolished special privileges, both
ecclesiastical and military, and organized the country on sound
bases worthy of a modern nation. Mexico seemed about to enter
upon a rational development. But the newly elected President,
yielding to the importunities of the clergy, abolished the
constitution, dissolved the legislature, and set up a
dictatorship, in spite of the energetic protests of Juárez, who
had been chosen Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and who, in
accordance with the terms of the temporarily discarded
instrument, was authorized to assume the presidency should that
office fall vacant. The rule of the usurper was short-lived,
however. Various improvised "generals" of conservative stripe put
themselves at the head of a movement to "save country, religion,
and the rights of the army," drove the would-be dictator out, and
restored the old regime.
Juárez now proclaimed himself acting President, as he was legally
entitled to do, and set up his government at Vera Cruz while one
"provisional president" followed another. Throughout this trying
time Juárez defended his position vigorously and rejected every
offer of compromise. In 1859 he promulgated his famous Reform
Laws which nationalized ecclesiastical property, secularized
cemeteries, suppressed religious communities, granted freedom of
worship, and made marriage a civil contract. For Mexico, however,
as for other Spanish American countries, measures of the sort
were far too much in advance of their time to insure a ready
acceptance. Although Juárez obtained a great moral victory when
his government was recognized by the United States, he had to
struggle two years more before he could gain possession of the
capital. Triumphant in 1861, he carried his anticlerical program
to the point of actually expelling the Papal Nuncio and other
ecclesiastics who refused to obey his decrees. By so doing he
leveled the way for the clericals, conservatives, and the
militarists to invite foreign intervention on behalf of their
desperate cause. But, even if they had not been guilty of
behavior so unpatriotic, the anger of the Pope over the treatment
of his Church, the wrath of Spain over the conduct of Juárez, who
had expelled the Spanish minister for siding with the
ecclesiastics, the desire of Great Britain to collect debts due
to her subjects, and above all the imperialistic ambitions of
Napoleon III, who dreamt of converting the intellectual influence
of France in Hispanic America into a political ascendancy, would
probably have led to European occupation in any event, so long at
least as the United States was slit asunder and incapable of
action.
Some years before, the Mexican Government under the clerical and
militarist regime had made a contract with a Swiss banker who for
a payment of $500,000 had received bonds worth more than fifteen
times the value of the loan. When, therefore, the Mexican
Congress undertook to defer payments on a foreign debt that
included the proceeds of this outrageous contract, the
Governments of France, Great Britain, and Spain decided to
intervene. According to their agreement the three powers were
simply to hold the seaports of Mexico and collect the customs
duties until their pecuniary demands had been satisfied.
Learning, however, that Napoleon III had ulterior designs, Great
Britain and Spain withdrew their forces and left him to proceed
with his scheme of conquest. After capturing Puebla in May, 1863,
a French army numbering some thirty thousand men entered the
capital and installed an assemblage of notables belonging to the
clerical and conservative groups. This body thereupon proclaimed
the establishment of a constitutional monarchy under an emperor.
The title was to be offered to Maximilian, Archduke of Austria.
In case he should not accept, the matter was to be referred to
the "benevolence of his majesty, the Emperor of the French," who
might then select some other Catholic prince.
On his arrival, a year later, the amiable and well-meaning
Maximilian soon discovered that, instead of being an "Emperor,"
he was actually little more than a precarious chief of a faction
sustained by the bayonets of a foreign army. In the northern part
of Mexico, Juárez, Porfirio Díaz ,—later to become the most
renowned of presidential autocrats,—and other patriot leaders,
though hunted from place to place, held firmly to their resolve
never to bow to the yoke of the pretender. Nor could Maximilian
be sure of the loyalty of even his supposed adherents. Little by
little the unpleasant conviction intruded itself upon him that he
must either abdicate or crush all resistance in the hope that
eventually time and good will might win over the Mexicans. But do
what they would, his foreign legions could not catch the wary and
stubborn Juárez and his guerrilla lieutenants, who persistently
wore down the forces of their enemies. Then the financial
situation became grave. Still more menacing was the attitude of
the United States now that its civil war was at an end. On May
31, 1866, Maximilian received word that Napoleon III had decided
to withdraw the French troops. He then determined to abdicate,
but he was restrained by the unhappy Empress Carlota, who
hastened to Europe to plead his cause with Napoleon. Meantime, as
the French troops were withdrawn, Juárez occupied the territory.
Feebly the "Emperor" strove to enlist the favor of his
adversaries by a number of liberal decrees; but their sole result
was his abandonment by many a lukewarm conservative. Inexorably
the patriot armies closed around him until in May, 1867, he was
captured at Querétaro, where he had sought refuge. Denied the
privilege of leaving the country on a promise never to return, he
asked Escobedo, his captor, to treat him as a prisoner of war.
"That's my business," was the grim reply. On the pretext that
Maximilian had refused to recognize the competence of the
military court chosen to try him, Juárez gave the order to shoot
him. On the 19th of June the Austrian archduke paid for a
fleeting glory with his life. Thus failed the second attempt at
erecting an empire in Mexico. For thirty-four years diplomatic
relations between that country and Austria-Hungary were severed.
The clerical-military combination had been overthrown, and the
Mexican people had rearmed their independence. As Juárez
declared: "Peace means respect for the rights of others."
Even if foreign dreams of empire in Mexico had vanished so
abruptly, it could hardly be expected that a land torn for many
years by convulsions could become suddenly tranquil. With Díaz
and other aspirants to presidential power, or with chieftains who
aimed at setting up little republics of their own in the several
states, Juárez had to contend for some time before he could
establish a fair amount of order. Under his successor, who also
was a civilian, an era of effective reform began. In 1873
amendments to the constitution declared Church and State
absolutely separate and provided for the abolition of peonage—a
provision which was more honored in, the breach than in the
observance.
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