- The emergence of the Mexican Revolution. Background
- The Porfiriato
- Consequences
- Prominent figures
- Pancho Villa
- Emiliano Zapata
- References
The Mexican Revolution began and emerged with force as a rejection of the thirty-five years of uninterrupted dictatorship, in order to find a solution for the presidential succession. The Mexican Revolution was an armed struggle (1910-1920), which radically transformed the culture and the Mexican political system.
In addition, it was one of the great revolutionary revolts of the 20th century that put an end to the military regime of dictator Porfirio Díaz, to later establish important political, economic and social reforms in the country.
According to Alan Knight (1997) the Mexican Revolution was genuinely national.
The emergence of the Mexican Revolution. Background
The panorama showed the political crisis among the competing elites, the opportunity for agrarian insurrection was propitious (John Tutino: 1996).
The landowner, Francisco Madero, challenged Porfirio Díaz in the presidential election of 1910 and, in protest at the fraudulent results, led the revolt called Plan de San Luis Potosí.
The armed conflict expelled Díaz from power and a new election was held in 1911, assuming Madero assumed the presidency.
The soldaderas in the Mexican Revolution - The forgotten heroines. They are the women who joined the Mexican revolution and did much more than cook, they loaded and fired rifles.
The Porfiriato
The Mexican revolution rose up against El Porfiriato. Although the constitution ordered a public electoral process, Díaz and his followers rigged the elections in their favor.
The opposition faction led by Francisco Madero, formed the Anti-Reelectionist Party and in 1910 ran as a candidate for the presidency.
Madero lost to Díaz, having been imprisoned prior to the elections. Later, he went into exile, where he issued the manifesto on the San Luis Potosí plan, in order to encourage an uprising.
The main objective was to eliminate re-elections. He was joined by Francisco Pancho Villa from the northern states, and Emiliano Zapata from the southern regions. Finally, the rebel forces defeated Díaz who was captured in Ciudad Juárez.
Consequences
Many historians believe that the revolution ended in 1920, others that it lasted until 1940. In any case, in that period of 20 years, major reforms were introduced:
- The hacienda system was abolished
- Trade unions and agricultural organizations were formally recognized.
- The oil industry developed
- A mixed economic system was established.
- Etc.
The fraudulent election of 1910 became the focus for the outbreak of political rebellion. Elements of the Mexican elite hostile to Díaz, led by Madero, expanded into the middle class, the peasantry and organized labor. As a result, in October 1911, Madero was elected president in a free and fair election.
However, an opposition band began to form. Conservatives viewed him as too weak and liberal, while ex-revolutionary fighters and the dispossessed, too conservative.
In February 1913, Madero and his vice president Pino Suárez were overthrown and assassinated. The counterrevolutionary regime of General Victoriano Huerta came to power, backed by US business interests and supporters of the old order.
Huerta ruled from February 1913 to July 1914, when he was expelled by a coalition of different regional revolutionary forces. The revolutionaries' attempt to reach a political settlement after Huerta's defeat failed and Mexico entered a bloody civil war (1914-1915).
The constitutionalist faction, led by the landowner Venustiano Carranza, emerged victorious in 1915, defeating the revolutionary forces of the former constitutionalist Pancho Villa and forcing the revolutionary leader Emiliano Zapata to take command of the guerrilla war. Zapata was assassinated in 1919 by agents of President Carranza.
Prominent figures
Pancho Villa
Pancho Villa
Mexican revolutionary and guerrilla who fought against the Porfirio Díaz and Victoriano Huerta regimes. Villa spent much of his youth working on his parents' farm.
He was fifteen when his father died and he became head of the family. In his role as protector, he was forced to kill the man who was harassing one of his sisters (1894).
A successful military man, guerrilla commander and also provisional governor of Chihuahua, only twenty years after his death he was accepted into the pantheon of national heroes.
His memory is honored today by Mexicans, Americans, and people around the world. In addition, numerous streets and neighborhoods in Mexico and other countries bear her name in her honor.
Emiliano Zapata
A prominent figure in the Mexican Revolution, he formed and commanded the Liberation Army of the South, an important revolutionary brigade. Zapata's followers were known as Zapatistas.
An orphan and revolutionary from an early age, in 1897 he was arrested for participating in a protest with the peasants of his town against the landowners. Once pardoned, he continued to agitate the peasants.
Then he was recruited into the Mexican army and by 1909 his leadership was so well known that in his village he was elected president of the town council.
References
- The Mexican revolution. Recovered at historytoday.com.
- Knight, Alan (1997). Mexican Revolution: Interpretations. Encyclopedia of Mexico, vol. 2 P. 873. Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn.
- Tutino. John (1986), From Insurrection to Revolution: Social Bases of Agrarian Violence, 1750–1940. Princeton: Princeton University Press, p. 327.
- What was the outcome of the Mexican Revolution? Recovered at reference.com.
- Katz, Friedrich. The Secret War in Mexico: Europe, the United States, and the Mexican Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1981, p. 35. Recovered at wikipedia.org.
- Encyclopædia Britannica (2016). Recovered at britannica.com.
Photographs
- Adela Velarde Pérez, "Adelita". Camillera de la Cruz Blanca, was not soldadera. File photo. Recovered in elsoldemexico.com.mx.
- The soldaderas in the Mexican Revolution - The forgotten heroines. They are the women who joined the Mexican revolution and did much more than cook, they loaded and fired rifles. Recovered at.com.
- Francisco “Pancho” Villa, pseudonym of José Doroteo Arango Arámbula, (June 5, Durango, Mexico - July 20, 1923, Chihuahua, Mexico). Recovered at biography.com.
- Emiliano Zapata, August 8, 1879, Anenecuilco, Mexico - April 10, 1919 Emiliano Zapata, the Agrarian Leader. Lithography by Diego Rivera, 1932. Library of Congress, Washington, DC, (neg. No. LC-USZC4-390).