WAR OF REFORM: ANTECEDENTS, CAUSES, DEVELOPMENT - HISTORY - 2025

The Reform War or the Three Years War (1857-1861) was an armed Mexican civil conflict where the two prevailing political factions of the time, liberals and conservatives, faced each other to impose themselves on the other. There was such an atmosphere of instability that the sections of the Constitution where individual guarantees were protected were ignored.

At that time the liberal faction was ruling, who in 1854 took power from a liberal political proclamation called the "Ayutla Plan", in which the then dictator of Mexico was removed from office.

For its part, the conservative side was unaware of the government's legitimacy by opposing various radical laws that it was seeking to implement (the reform). This was one of the many episodes in which both sides would fight for political power in Mexico during the 19th century.

During this period, a social reorganization was sought that would try to end the benefits of the ruling classes, the reactivation of the economy and the restoration of work.

Background to the war

Overthrow of Antonio López de Santa Anna

Antonio López de Santa Anna

Santa Anna had established himself in a kind of presidency for life (he ruled for ten periods). Finally he was separated from his position by the Ayutla Plan, of liberal ideas.

Santa Anna had repealed the Constitution of 1824, so he was perpetuated in power under the figure of His Serene Highness. He was removed from office and sent into exile. In his place, Juan Álvarez was appointed as interim president in 1855.

Political rise of the Liberals

Jose Ignacio Comonfort

On December 11, 1855, through elections, General José Ignacio Comonfort was elected as president of Mexico, who would be in charge of launching the Reform of the state of Mexico.

Benito Juárez was appointed as president of the Supreme Court of Justice. Thus a clearly liberal government was established. Special rights were conferred on the Federal Army to govern.

Constitution of 1857

It was approved on February 5, 1857. This constitution contained a series of provisions of social order, among which slavery was abolished, and freedom of education and worship was established.

It also contained radical provisions against property and benefits of the Catholic Church and the army; both groups were the most powerful in Mexico. Such provisions radicalized the population for their devotion to Catholicism.

The very modern ideas contained in the Constitution were the product of the influence of the ideas of the Enlightenment and of modern European philosophy.

The reaction of the conservatives provoked a Comonfort self-coup, known as Plan de Tacubaya.

Tacubaya Plan

Fragment of the Plan of Tacubaya

The Tacubaya plan demanded the annulment of the Constitution of 1857. It was created in the Archbishop's Palace of Tacubaya and was drafted by Félix María Zuloaga, in response to people's disagreement with the Constitution, who were unaware of it.

Those who were in favor of the plan decide that Comonfort remains in the presidency, who in the following days adheres to the plan, but maintaining a rather ambiguous position.

Faced with such radical laws towards the figure of the Catholic Church, this promises excommunication for those who remain attached to those statutes.

Comonfort then asks for Juárez's help to negotiate his release, for which the plan was later released as a coup to repeal the Constitution.

The plan was a victory for the conservative faction. This achieves the mass resignation of the liberals in Congress. Benito Juárez, Isidoro Olvera (president of the Congress) and several deputies were deprived of their liberty.

On the other hand, the country is sinking into a growing division between those who were in favor of the Plan of Tacubaya and those who were in favor of the Constitution of 1857.

Causes of the Reform war

The Juarez law

Benito Juarez

The Juarez law, which is how this set of laws is known, was promulgated on November 23, 1855 under the official name of the Law of Administration of Justice and Organization of the Courts of the Nation of the District and Territories.

Benito Juarez was at that time the secretary of Justivia, Ecclesiastical Business and Public Instruction of Juan Álvarez's cabinet. Juan Álvarez had assumed the presidency after the Ayutla revolution.

Juarez, who was considered a pure radical, wanted to eliminate all privileges to the military and religious. However, the Minister of War, Ignacio Comonfort, did not agree.

In the first instance, he had recommended to the president prudence with the promulgation of these laws. For this reason, for a few years the military and ecclesiastical courts were maintained.

Once the new law was promulgated, Juarez sent it to the Archbishop of Mexico. This was contrary to the law, considering that it violated the rights of the Catholic Church.

The bishops and archbishops resigned to accept the law and refused to renounce their jurisdiction, appealing to the decisions of the Holy See on the basis that the ecclesiastical jurisdiction was based on divine law.

This was one of the first causes that led to the war of the Reformation. Conservative newspapers repudiated the Law, while liberals hailed it.

While the Juarez Law was in the crosshairs of Mexican society, another law, the Lerdo Law, continued to stir up controversy.

The Lerdo law

Miguel Lerdo de Tejada

The Lerdo law has the official name of the Law of Confiscation of Rural and Urban Farms of the Civil and Religious Corporations of Mexico. It was approved on June 25, 1856.

Their main objective was to create a rural middle class to clean up state finances, eliminating what they considered obstacles to prosperity, which were above all the lack of movement of part of the property that was in the hands of the church and the army.

These goods were considered to be in dead hands, and in need of expansion and use by rural labor.

The Catholic Church in Mexico, like the army, had numerous real estate that was not being used, so the government decided and decreed the sale of them to individuals to promote the market.

This law not only forced the army and the Church to dispose of their assets, but also prevented them from acquiring others that were not strictly necessary for the development of their activity.

One of the main consequences of this law was that many foreign investors took advantage of the situation to acquire large estates, which led to large estates.

Reform laws

The Juarez Law and the Lerdo Law were the main laws that were later known as Reform Laws. Where the separation of Church-State and the abolition of ecclesiastical fueros took place.

At this point the Civil War began facing liberals and conservatives. On the one hand, the liberal party headed by Benito Juarez that would defend the constitutional order.

And on the other hand, Félix Zuloaga. When the president had to leave, Juarez took command of the government in Guanajuato, while Zuloaga did so in the capital.

Zuloaga promulgated the Five Laws that repealed the Lerdo Law and the Juarez Law, among others. The liberal government suffered a continuous series of defeats which led it to toughen the laws and its position

Other laws that influenced this Reform Law that were reinforced by the liberal defeats suffered were, the Law of Nationalization of Ecclesiastical Assets on July 12, 1859; the Civil Marriage Law, approved on the 23rd of the same month; the Organic Law of the Civil Registry, which was approved on the 28th, and the Law on the Civil Status of the people, approved on July 31, 1859, all of them approved in Veracruz.

Development of the war

The war developed after the growing division caused by the liberal ideas embodied in the Constitution of 1857 and, later, by the Plan of Tacubaya, prolonging the conflict for three years.

Two governments were established: the conservative, in what is now known as the State of Mexico; While Juárez, from the liberal faction, had a rather "nomadic" government at the beginning, which toured several cities in search of the organization of an army.

For their part, the conservatives once again recognized foreign authorities, the army and the Catholic Church. The latter used its wealth to finance the war, which ensured many victories for the conservative side during the first year of the conflict.

The Liberals, under the leadership of Juárez, improvised an army of mostly civilians and settled in the city of Veracruz. Despite the victories of the Conservatives, these did not translate into resounding success, since a conflict arose between the Conservatives.

Zuloaga was overthrown by Miramón, who took power and decided to act quickly against the Liberals. He led the army to Veracruz but was stopped by the Liberals before they touched port.

The balance would be tilting towards the liberal side in 1859, when the government of Washington recognized and supported Juárez, both materially and economically.

This meant the conception of the McClane-Ocampo treaty, where free transit and security were granted to Americans in some parts of Mexican territory. For this, they had to pay a sum of money in "hard", as rent for the transit.

This treaty was never carried out because it lacked the approval of the Washington Senate.

For their part, the conservatives made their treaty with the Spaniards celebrated in Paris, called the Mon-Almonde Treaty, in which Spain was compensated for the citizens who had entered the country during the civil war. Treaty that was not fulfilled either.

What such alliances demonstrated, despite never having been carried out, was the intense desperation of the factions for success over the other.

The end of the war

After the three years that the civil war lasted, the two sides faced each other in a last battle on December 22, 1860 in Calpulapan, where the Liberals won. Juarez triumphantly entered the capital and called elections.

He won with a fair victory and Benito Juarez was proclaimed president with González Ortega in charge of the Court of Justice, which implied being the substitute for the president if something happened to him.

Once the constitutional order of the country was restored, the reforms that had been approved during the war were reinforced, and some new ones were added, such as the Law of Secularization of Hospitals and Charitable Establishments in 1861.

Despite having been defeated, Zuloaga once again proclaimed himself president of the republic. This coup did not end, but for Juarez the problems had not yet ended.

The years in which the conservatives had manipulated public finances had left the country in a decadent situation, where the reform laws were not enough to achieve the pacification of the country and solve its financial problems.

References

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