Mexican Revolution Questions of the Day

Daniel W. Blackmon

IB HL History

Coral Gables Senior High

Question # 1

• How important were economic grievances in causing the Mexican Revolution that began in 1910 and to what extent were these grievances solved by the Constitution of 1917? (HL) (2001)

Key Terms

• How important– Economic– Social– Political

Key Terms

• To what extent– Compare grievances to specific clauses in

Constitution of 1917– Does the Constitution of 1917 solve the

problem, or is there an issue with implementation?

Thesis

• “Although Francisco Madero’s The Presidential Succession of 1910 called for political, rather than economic, reform, the fundamental cause of the Mexican Revolution was economic grievances.

Thesis

• “The economic costs of the Porfiriato led to deep social unrest and a call for political reform that swept Díaz from office. However, although the Constitution of 1917 directly addressed economic and social grievances,

Thesis

• “those provisions were inadequately implemented by Venustiano Carranza, Alvaro Obregón and Plutarco Calles .”

Context: The Porfiriato

• Policies– Positivism

• Order and Progress

• Pan o Palo

– Cientificos• Justo Sierra

• José Ives Limantour

Limantour: Financial

• eliminated many import duties,

• allowed special tariff exemptions, negotiated favorable loans,

• shifted Mexico to the gold standard,

• overhauled the administrative machinery,

• balanced the budget.

Limantour: Harbor and Docking Facilities

• Tampico and Vera Cruz

• Increased government revenue from 50 million pesos to 488 million pesos by 1910

Foreign Investment: Railroads

Railroad mileage increased from 400 miles to 15,000.

80% of the capital came from the US.

New Mining Code

• “In order to appeal to the foreign investor the code made no mention of traditional Hislpanic jurisprudence reserving ownership of the subsoil for the nation. Further, the proprietor of the surface was explicitly granted ownership of all bituminous and other mineral fuels.” (445)

New Mining Code

• Foreign investors brought modern machinery and the cyanide process to work ores that previously were not profitable. Gold, silver, lead, and copper were mined.

New Mining Code

• The Guggenheims invested in the American Smelting and Refining Company, the Aguascalientes Mining Company, the Guggenheim Exploration Company and the Mexican Exploration Company. Investments reached $12,000,000.

New Mining Code

• In 1898, Colonel William Greene became the copper king of Sonora, investing his profits from copper into ranching and lumber

Oil

• Edward Doheny (who will later be involved in the Teapot Dome Scandal in the US) forms the Mexican Petroleum Company in Tampico and Tuxpan.

• Sir Weetman Dickinson Pearson formed the El Aguila Company.

• These two companies made Mexico one of the leading oil producers in the world.

Political Cooptation: Pax Porfiriana

jefes politicos

• Elites who cooperated with the regime became wealthier.

• The rurales enforce Pan o Palo.

jefes politicos

• Díaz spent 25% of his budget on the military.

jefes politicos

• “The Díaz regime was self-reinforcing. The military provided the ordder necessary for economic development, and economic development provided the revenues necessary to keep the military loyal. Economic growth also built a modern communications network, which made it far easier for the army to stamp out disorders in the outlying areas.” (456)

The Hacendados

• As was usually the case, the peasants bore most of the cost of modernization.

• One of the most important trends was the seizure of communal and private lands by the hacendados.

• There were 8,245 haciendas in 1910

The Terrazas-Creel Clan in Chihuahua

• Luis Terrazas founded the power of the clan when he acquired property from a supporter of the French intervention. By 1910 he owned 7,000,000 acres of land, 500,000 head of cattle, 225,000 sheep, 25,000 horses, and 5,000 mules. His sons and sons-law held other substantial holdings.

The Terrazas-Creel Clan

• His sons and sons-law held other substantial holdings.

• Enrique Creel, his son-in-law held 1,700,000 acres. He also founded the Banco Minero de Chihuahua.

The Terrazas-Creel Clan

• Through the Banco, the Terrazas-Creel clan controlled most other ways of making a living in Chihuahua. Through that, they controlled virtually all political activity as well. (459-460)

1883 Land Law

• “This law, designed to encourage foreign colonization of rural Mexico, authorized land companies to survey public lands for the purpose of subdivision and settlement. For their efforts the companies received up to one third of the land surveyed and the privilege of purchasing the remaining two-thirds at bargain prices.

1883 Land Law

• “If the private owners or traditional ejidos could not prove ownership through legal title, their land was considered public and subject to denunciation by the companies.” (449)

1883 Land Law

• By 1894, 20% of the land mass of Mexico was owned by land companies. By 1910, most villages had lost their ejidos, 134,000,000 acres had passed into a few very wealthy hands, and over half of all rural Mexicans worked on haciendas by 1910. (449)

Hacendados in Morelos

• A handful of sugar families controlled Morelos.

• They needed income to pay for new machinery, and so they sought to increase production by squeezing ejidal lands ruthlessly

The Indians

• In 1911, there were still 2,000,000 Indians who could not speak Spanish. (457)

Debt Peonage

• “The scant wages he received most often were not paid in currency but in certificates or metal discs redeemable only at the local tienda de raya, an all-purpose company store located on the hacienda complex.

Debt Peonage

• “Credit was extended liberally, but the prices, set by the hacendado or the mayordomo were invariably several times higher than those in a nearby village. For the hacendado the situation was perfect.

Debt Peonage

• “The taxes on his land were negligible, his labor was, in effect, free, for all the wages that went out came back to him throuhg the tienda de raya with a handsome profit.

Debt Peonage

• “The peon found himself in a state of perpetual debt, and by law he was bound to remain on the hacienda so long as he owed a single centavo. Debts were not eradicated at the time of death but passed on to the children.” (461)

Debt Peonage

• Compare this with the practices in company towns such as Homestead, PA or the Pullman stikers in Chicago.

• Since the mayordomo administered justice on a hacienda, the peon had no rights at all.

Condition of Labor

• Wages in the 19th century ramained the same–about 35 centavos per day, but the cost of corn and chile doubled and beans increased six fold. (460-461)

• Most Mexican workers had a 7 day work week and an 11 or 12 hour day.

Condition of Labor

• There were no pensions or workmen’s compensation benefits.

• Life expectancy remained at 30 years.

• Infant mortality remained at 30%

Cananea Strike 1906

• The strike was against William Greene’s Consolidated Cananea Copper Company. Greene called in Arizona Rangers, who invaded Mexico who violently broke the strike.

Rio Blanco Textile Strike 1907

• Conditions in the Rio Blanco mills were abysmal.

• The workers appealed to Díaz in vain.

• When the tienda de raya refused wives of strikers credit for food, violence broke out.

• Troops arrived to crush the strike

Economic Grievances under the Porfiriato

• “Porfirio Díaz had developed his country at the expense of his countrymen. He hermetically sealed himelf off from the stark realities of Mexican masses. The great material benefits of the age of modernization in no way filtered down to the people.” (464)

The Liberal Program

• The Flores Magon brothers (Jésus and Enrique) became outspoken opponents, publishing Regeneración

The Liberal Program

• Published from St. Louis

The Liberal Program

• freedom of speech

• freedom of the press

• suppression of the jefes politicos

• secularization of education

• nationalization of church property

The Liberal Program

• abolition of the death penalty (except for treason)

• educational reform in favor of the poor

• prison reform

• 8 hour work day and a 6 day work week

• abolition of the tienda de raya

The Liberal Program

• payment to all workers in legal tender

• prohibition of child labor

• Redistribution of all uncultivated lands to peasants

• an agricultural credit bank

• restoration of ejidal lands

Francisco Madero and the Anti-Re-electionist Campaign

• Madero wrote The Presidential Succession of 1910 to express his opposition

Francisco Madero and the Anti-Re-electionist Campaign

• Díaz once again manipulated the election, and was amazingly re-elected again

Francisco Madero and the Anti-Re-electionist Campaign

The Plan de San Luis Potosí“ ‘I declare the last election illegal and accordingly the republic, being without rulers, I assume the provisional presidency of the republic until designate their rulers pursuant in the law.’” (499)

Madero as President

• A political, not a social reformer

• A Department of Labor was established but put in the hands of a conservative.

• Juan Francisco Moncaleano, a Spanish anarchist, organized a union, but strikes were dispersed by troops.

Madero as President

• Madero did nothing to increase funding for education

• Ordered Zapata to disband his men even though the army in Morelos was led by Porfiristas (Huerta)

Pascual Orozco, Jr.

• Capture of Ciudad Juarez with Pancho Villa in 1912 signaled end of the Porfiriato

• Break with Madero in 1912

The Plan Orozquista 1912

• 10 hour workday

• restrictions on child labo

• higher wage

• suppression of the tienda de raya

• nationalization of railroads

The Plan Orozquista 1912

• Land illegally seized to be returned

• Homestead rights to be applied retroactively

• Government owned land to be distributed

• Land owned by hacendados but not cultivated to be redistributed

The Revolutionaries: Zapata and Villa

• Emiliano Zapata

• Tierra y Liberdad!

The Revolutionaries: Zapata and Villa

• Not only did Zapata appeal to villagers in Spanish, but he also addressed them in their native tongue, Náhuatl.

• Some idea of his charisma may be gained by his statement, “I prefer to die on my feet than to live on my knees.” (“Prefiero morir de pie . . . que vivir de robillas.”)

The Plan de Ayala 1911

• “ ‘The lands, woods, and water that the landlords, cientificos, or bosses have usurped . . . will be immediately restored to the villages or citizens who hold the corresponding titles to them . . . . lands, woods, and water are monopolized in a few hands .. .

The Plan de Ayala 1911

• “ ‘one-third of these properties will be expropriated, with indemnification, so that the villages and citizens of Mexico may obtain ejidos, town sites and fields.’ ” (514-5)

The Convention of Aguascalientes

• The Convention divided between delegations loyal to Zapata and Villa, on the one hand, and Carranza and Obregón on the other.

The Convention of Aguascalientes

• “The underlying issue was whether the Revolution was going to follow the politically oriented Plans of San Luis Potosí and Guadalupe or the agrarian Plan de Ayala.” (536)

The Convention of Aguascalientes

• When the revolutionaries gained control of the convention, Carranza withdrew to Veracruz.

• This led to civil war which Carranza eventually won

The Constitution of 1917: Article 3

• Free, obligatory, secular education

The Constitution of 1917: Article 3

• Other anti-clerical provisions:

• Marriage is a civil ceremony; religious organizations have no special legal status; priests are considered ordinary citizens; worship outside the church is banned

The Constitution of 1917: Article 3

• State legislatures could determine the maximum number of priests in the state; all priests must be native-born; clergy are prohibited from forming political parties;

• Clergy must register with the government; all new church buildings must be approved by the state.

The Constitution of 1917: Article 27

• Restoration of lands seized illegally.

• Private ownership of land no longer seen as a right but as a privilege.

The Constitution of 1917: Article 27

• If land did not serve a socially useful function, it may be expropriated by the state.

• Subsoil rights are reserved– Remember the new Mining Code

The Constitution of 1917: Article 123

• an 8 hour work day, a 6 day workweek, a minimum wage, and equal pay for equal work, regardless of sex or nationality.

• labor and capital have the right to organize.

• Labor has the right to bargain collectively and to strike.

Implementation: Carranza

• CROM 1917

• Luis Morones founded the first national union, the Confederación Regional Obrera Mexicana

Implementation: Carranza

• Carranza confused a change in government with a change in society (545)

• Despite Article 27, he distributed only 450,000 acres of land. (545)

Implementation: Carranza

• In 1915 and again in 1916, Carranza used troops to suppress strikes.

• With respect to the Constitution, Carranza’s philosophy was Obedezco pero no cumplo. (550)

Implementation: Carranza

• The Zapatistas are crushed after long and bitter fighting, with Zapata being lured into a trap and assasinated

Implementation: Obregón

• Positive achievements supporting the Revolution

• José Vasconcelos institutes a vigorous program of rural education. His purpose (at this time) was to integrate the Indians into mainstream mestizo society, to incorporate them into a raza cósmica. (Meyer 572-3)

Implementation: Obregón

• Vasconcelos employed the Muralists– Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, and David Alfaro Siqueiros– to decorate buildings with works that would also educate.

Implementation: Obregón

• Obregón favored CROM over any other union organization. Morones chose to moderate his positions rather than risk being crushed. Membership rose from 50,000 in 1920 to 1,200,000 in 1924. (Meyer 575)

Implementation: Obregón

• Limitations on his achievements

• The Church– Obregón could not enforce the complete

secularization of education because he lacked the resources to dispense with the Church.

Implementation: Obregón

• Land Reform

• Obregón is cautious. He did not wish to disrupt the hacienda system. Redistribution of the land would result in reduced productivity, and he also wished to avoid that.

Implementation: Obregón

• Land Reform

• Land redistribution is very modest: 3,000,000 acres.

Implementation: Obregón

• Bought off Villa with a hacienda.

• Villa later assassinated

Implementation: Obregón

• Summary: Obregón “had been slow to implement the reforms promised by the Constitution. . . . [T]hrough shrewd pragmatism he had co-opted the radical thrust of the Revolution, and, while occasionally yielding to the rhetoric of reform, he had not done much to alter the sustaining structure of society.” (580)

Implementation: Obregón

• Summary: Obregón “had been slow to implement the reforms promised by the Constitution. . . . [T]hrough shrewd pragmatism he had co-opted the radical thrust of the Revolution, and, while occasionally yielding to the rhetoric of reform, he had not done much to alter the sustaining structure of society.” (580)

Implementation: Calles

• Positive achievements supporting the Revolution

• Agrarian Reform: Calles redistributed 8,000,000 acres. Most of this land goes to the ejido rather than to individuals.

Implementation: Calles

• Agricultural productivity declined as a result of this, so Calles began irrigation projects, established agricultural schools, and began to extend agricultural credit to small farmers. (583)

Implementation: Calles

• Labor

• Like Obregón, Calles favored CROM over all other unions. CROM’s membership continued to rise, and members were elected to Congress.

Implementation: Calles

• Labor

• By 1928, Luis Morones was a wealthy man, and it seems evident that the “system” had co-opted him. (584)

Implementation: Calles

• Education

• Vasconcelos’ program is continued, with heavy emphasis on the teaching of Spanish to Indians.

Implementation: Calles

• Health: Sanitation and health is improved. Vaccination programs are begun, and food vendors (bakeries, butcher shops, dairies, cantinas, etc) begin to be inspected. (585)

Implementation: Calles

• The Church

• Calles decided to enforce the anti-clerical articles of the Constitution of 1917.

Implementation: Calles

• When the archbishop of Mexico told an interviewer that, in all conscience, a Catholic could not accept the Constitution, Calles replied by deporting foreign priests and nuns, closing church schools, and ordering all priests to register with civil authorities.

Implementation: Calles

• The archbishop ordered a strike.

• For 3 years, the sacraments could not be obtained in Mexico. (587)

Implementation: Calles

• The Cristero Rebellion 1926-1929

• The war that erupted became vicious. The Cristeros rallied to the call of Viva Cristo Rey!

Implementation: Calles

• In 1928, with his term coming to an end, Calles supported the election of Alvaro Obregón, thinking Obregón would repay the favor in 1934.

• Obregón, however, was assassinated by a Cristero.

Implementation: Calles

• Limitations on his achievements:

• The Maximato 1929-1934

• Calles, following Obregón’s death, continued as the power in Mexico, but he chose to be a puppet master–the Jefe Máximo

Implementation: Calles

• Calles reorganizes the revolutionary party as the Partido Nacional Revolucionario (PNR) PNR would change its name but control the government for the rest of the century.

• Calles shifts the Revolution strongly to the right.

Implementation: Calles

• Land Reform

• Land redistribution slows.

• The Terrazas-Creel Clan was able to re-purchase land previously lost

Implementation: Calles

• Education

• Rural education is de-emphasized

Implementation: Calles

• Labor

• The government withdrew support for CROM.

• Morones was exposed as corrupt.

Implementation: Calles

• “The anti-Communist hysteria reached its apex in 1930 and 1931, years that witnessed the aberrance of the Gold Shirts, a fascist inspired organization of thugs whose self-appointed task was to terrorize all Communists and Jews.” (592)

Implementation: Cárdenas

• To Calles’ surprise (and dismay), Cárdenas returns to revolutionary principles

Implementation: Cárdenas

• Agrarian Reform

• “Agrarian reform more than anything else dominated the administration’s concern during the first few years. . . . Cárdenas early made up his to fulfill twenty years of promises. . . . .

Implementation: Cárdenas

• [B]y the time his term expired, he had distributed 49 million acres, about twice as much as all his predecessors combined. By 1940 approximately one third of the Mexican population had received land under the agrarian reform program.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• In fact, most of Mexico’s arable land had been redistributed. Only the large cattle haciendas on arid or semiarid land remained untouched.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• “The vast majority of the land distributed did not go to individuals or even heads of households but rather to the communal ejidos.” (598-9)

Implementation: Cárdenas

• The largest ejido was Laguna, with 8,000,000 acres.

• The complex grew cotton, maize, wheat and alfalfa, provided schools and had a hospital.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• Cárdenas created the Banco de Crédito Ejidal to provide loans for the small farmers.

• Its performance is weakened by a population which grew faster than its assets, and by favoritism in its loans.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• Still, this is a very positive step–agrarian reform must go beyond merely redistributing the land.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• Economically, the ejidos were not as efficient, and agricultural production declined.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• However, “Cárdenas’ dedication to agrarian reform spelled the demise of the traditional hacienda complex in Mexico. Millions of peasants were given a new faith in the revolutionary concept. . . .

Implementation: Cárdenas

• . . . the type of servitude that had bound hacendado and peón for centuries was broken by 1940. . . . If the ejido system was an economic failure, it was a political and social success.” (600)

Implementation: Cárdenas

• The Church

• Cárdenas is clearly anti-clerical. He instituted a socialist curriculum into the schools, which angered the Church.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• When he added sex education, the Church became still more incensed.

• In response, he backed off the sex education, and softened the socialist education by emphasizing positive attitudes and avoiding anti-religious propaganda.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• Labor

• Cárdenas supported the creation of a new labor organization, the Confederación de Trabajadores de México, (CTM) under the leadership of Vicente Lombardo Toledano

Implementation: Cárdenas

• CTM set to improve the wage structure in Mexico

Implementation: Cárdenas

• Education

• Twice as much money is appropriated for rural education than any previous president.

• Rapid population growth and high inflation however meant that the literacy rate actually seems to have fallen. The government could not keep up.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• Expropriation of US Oil Companies

• In 1936, Mexican workers at US owned fields went on strike. The companies refused to negotiate with the strikers.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• The strike began to damage the economy, so Cárdenas ordered arbitration.

• The arbitration board ruled in favor of the strikers, ordering a 33% increase in pay and improvements in the pension and welfare system.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• The companies appealed to the Mexican Supreme Court.

• The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the arbitrator.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• The companies continued to defy the ruling, whereupon Cárdenas ruled that they had defied Mexican sovereignty and nationalized the holdings.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• A storm of protest erupted in the US, with the oil companies, led by Standard Oil, urging intervention to prevent this Communist conspiracy.

Implementation: Cárdenas

• But the President is Franklin D. Roosevelt, who has proposed the Good Neighbor Policy.

• FDR refused to intervene, and instead insisted that the oil companies seek compensation through negotiations.

• They eventually settled for $24 million

Conclusion

• Under Cárdenas, PNR is reorganized as PRM (Partido Revolucionario Mexicano) It consisted of representatives from the military, labor, agrarian and popular sectors.

– .PRM is the official party, and Mexico remained a single party state. (606)