TREATIES OF CIUDAD JUÁREZ: ANTECEDENTS AND CONSEQUENCES - HISTORY - 2025

The Ciudad Juárez Treaties were an agreement signed by the governments of Porfirio Díaz and Francisco I. Madero to end the hostilities unleashed after the presidential elections of 1910. In this document, Díaz promised to leave office, ending the almost four decades of the so-called Porfiriato.

Porfirio Díaz had been elected 9 times as president of Mexico. His government had become a de facto dictatorship, with no visible opposition due to repression. Before the 1910 elections, the situation seemed to change, as Díaz announced that he would allow candidacies contrary to his.

Official photograph of the winners of the Battle of Ciudad Juárez - Source: Pàgina de l'autor

The main rival was Francisco I. Madero, candidate of the Anti-reelection Party. However, Díaz stopped him shortly before the elections and, with allegations of fraud, he was elected again. Madero managed to escape from prison, heading to the United States. There he launched an appeal for the population to unite to overthrow Díaz.

The response was massive and leaders such as Orozco, Villa or Zapata began to attack the government forces. Under these circumstances, Madero and Díaz began negotiations to stop the war. The result was the Treaties signed in Ciudad Juarez.

Background

Porfirio Diaz

Porfirio Díaz had been elected president of Mexico for the first time in 1876. Since then, and despite the fact that, at first, he had been a supporter of non-reelection, he had been reelected almost without interruption until 1910.

His government had managed to modernize the country and made considerable progress in the cultural or scientific fields. However, among its shadows is the great repression against opponents and the increase in economic inequality.

1910 elections

Since the beginning of the 20th century, the Porfiriato had begun to show signs of exhaustion. Protests followed one another and the social climate was very unfavorable to his government. In addition, the economy showed clear signs of slowdown.

In an interview with an American media in 1908, Díaz seemed in favor of allowing the participation of more political parties for the 1910 elections. This encouraged opponents of the regime, who began to prepare for the occasion.

Among the groups that appeared, the one led by Francisco I. Madero stood out. The politician won the support of the majority of the anti-Porfiriato sectors and presented his candidacy for the elections. According to the chroniclers, his campaign was an absolute success.

However, Díaz changed his mind and unleashed a campaign of repression against his rivals. Madero himself was arrested before the voting.

Finally, Porfirio won an election plagued with irregularities. Madero, who had managed to escape from prison, went into exile in the United States.

Plan of San Luis de Potosí

Francisco I. Madero

From his American exile, on October 5, 1910, Madero published a document drawn up during his stay in prison: the Plan of San Luis. In this, the politician did not know the result of the elections, as well as the presidency of Porfirio Díaz.

Through the San Luis Plan, Madero appealed to the Mexican population to take up arms against Díaz. Likewise, it called for the elimination of presidential re-election, return to the peasants their seized lands and other revolutionary measures.

The document included a roadmap for post-Porfiriato Mexico. First, elections would be called immediately, with Madero himself occupying the presidency provisionally until that date.

The San Luis Plan was clandestinely distributed throughout the country. November 20 was set as the date chosen to begin the uprising, although the regime reacted earlier with actions such as the assassination of Aquiles Serdán in Puebla. This only increased the supporters of the insurrection.

Rebellion

Pascual Orozco

The response to the Plan launched by Madero was swift. In November various armed uprisings broke out across the country. In Chihuahua, Pascual Orozco attacked government troops and then headed for Ciudad Juárez.

At the same time, a rebellion broke out in the state of Morelos, where there had already been various disturbances carried out by the peasants. The leaders of this movement were the Zapata brothers: Eufemio and Emiliano.

Madero, encouraged by the uprisings that were taking place, returned to Mexico in February 1911, immediately meeting with Pancho Villa and Orozco. Their combined forces besieged Ciudad Juárez by the end of April.

Pancho Villa. Source: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ggbain-09255

The revolutionary leaders did not want that, when bombing the city, some projectile could miss its objective, cross the border and end up in the United States. Therefore, they decided to attack directly to conquer it. On May 10, Ciudad Juárez fell into the hands of the rebels.

For their part, the Zapatistas had extended their revolt to Puebla, Tlaxcala, Mexico, Michoacán, and Guerrero. Madero, on April 14, had appointed Emiliano Zapata as his representative in the region.

Talks

The Díaz government, as well as the large landowners who supported it, began to show their concern about the events. The taking of Ciudad Juárez and the extension of the Zapatistas were two threats that they did not seem to be able to stop.

For this reason, they established contact with Madero to negotiate with him, since they considered him preferable to Zapata and his family.

Emiliano Zapata. Source: By Bain News Service, publisher, undefined

The first contacts took place in New York, in March 1911. On Madero's side, his father and brother Gustavo attended. On the government side, the negotiator was José Yves Limantour, Minister of Finance. As mediator, the Ambassador of Mexico to the United States was appointed.

Limantour's proposal was to end the fighting in exchange for an amnesty for all revolutionaries, the resignation of Vice President Ramón Corral, and the replacement of four ministers and the governors of 10 states by supporters of Madero. In addition, he offered to recover the principle of no reelection.

Madero's response was positive, although he added a non-negotiable point: Díaz should leave the presidency immediately.

Objective and main points

The leaders of the Anti-Reelection Party met in the liberation army camp to analyze the results of those first talks. After the meeting, they agreed to continue with the negotiations, setting some objectives apart from the resignation of Díaz.

Among those points was that party members obtained a position within the government. Fourteen would be appointed provisional governors in order to call immediate elections.

In addition, they wanted the troops located in Chihuahua, Sonora and Coahuila to move, and lastly they requested guarantees for the political processes and compensation for what was lost during the revolution.

Meeting in Ciudad Juárez

On May 21, 1911, a representative of the Díaz government, Francisco S. Carbajal, and Madero and his team met in Ciudad Juárez. From this meeting came the definitive Treaties that bore the name of the host town of the meeting.

Most important points

The most important point of the Ciudad Juárez Treaties was the one that established that Porfirio Díaz and his vice president, Ramón Corral, should present their resignation in May of that same year.

Francisco León de la Barra, at that time Secretary of Foreign Relations, would be the one who assumed the position of interim president until the elections.

Other points included

In addition to the previous one, the document contemplated another series of measures, beginning with the cessation of hostilities between the government and the revolutionaries. The latter would be amnestied and offered the opportunity to enter the rural areas.

On the other hand, the Treaties included a commitment to demobilize the revolutionary forces. In addition, Madero's request to appoint fourteen provisional governors was approved, as well as to have the last word on the cabinet formed by De la Barra.

Aspects not included in the Treaties

For later events, the aspects not included in the treaty were as important as those included, since they caused a division among the revolutionaries.

Thus, no social reform was established in the peace agreement, something that Madero had previously promised. Furthermore, the structure of the Díaz government remained practically unchanged.

Finally, Madero supported the courts to be in charge of resolving conflicts over land ownership, something that provoked the anger of the Zapatistas and other peasant movements.

Consequences

On May 25, fulfilling the terms of the Treaties, Porfirio Díaz ended his long presidency. After resigning, he left for Veracruz and from there he went into exile in France.

As agreed, Francisco León de la Barra was appointed provisional president. After this, Madero entered Mexico City and would end up winning the presidency.

Discontent of Emiliano Zapata

Emiliano Zapata showed from the first moment his disagreement with a good part of the Treaties. To begin with, he never approved the appointment of De la Barra as provisional president. For this reason, he refused to cease hostilities in Morelos.

Madero and Zapata held several meetings during the month of June. The agrarian leader, at first, trusted the future president, but ended up walking away from him due to the non-approval of reforms that favored the peasants.

Among the points that most separated the two leaders was the agrarian reform that Zapata wanted. This would have meant a confrontation with the great landowners, something that Madero did not dare to do.

In addition, the capital's newspapers began a campaign against Zapata. As it was owned, most of them, the landowners, began to label him a bandit. The federal generals, including Huerta, undertook a military campaign against him on the pretext of not demobilizing the Zapatistas.

The result of this disagreement was the publication of the Plan de Ayala by Zapata. This document, presented in November 1911, denounced Madero and recognized Pascual Orozco as the legitimate president and leader of the revolution.

Opposition from other revolutionaries

Other revolutionary leaders also ended up distancing themselves from Madero, whom they called too moderate and conciliatory.

Carranza, who would later become president of Mexico, affirmed that the revolution had to begin again, since Madero had surrendered to the reactionaries. For his part, Orozco showed his discontent at being appointed simply commander of the rural of Chihuahua.

In addition, when he ran for governor of the state, he found that Madero supported his rival, Abraham González.

This resentment caused Orozco not to obey Madero's order to repress Zapata after the promulgation of the Ayala Plan. In March 1912, he launched the Empacadora Plan and declared a rebellion against Madero.

Madero assassination

Despite his break with the revolutionaries, the end of the Madero presidency was not caused by them. The president, along with his vice president, were victims of the coup led by Victoriano Huerta and supported by conservative sectors of the country.

Zapata, Villa, Carranza, and Orozco, despite their differences with Madero, condemned his murder and began a new struggle to end the Huerta dictatorship.

References

1. Historians. Treaties of Ciudad Juárez (1911). Retrieved from historiando.org
2. Know Learn. Treaties of Ciudad Juárez. Obtained from independencedemexico.com.mx
3. Brief history of Mexico. The Treaties of Ciudad Juárez. Obtained from historiademexicobreve.com
4. The Library of Congress. Treaty of Ciudad Juárez, May 21, 1911. Retrieved from loc.gov
5. Dasandi, Niheer. Battle of Ciudad Juárez. Retrieved from britannica.com
6. Minster, Christopher. The Mexican Revolution. Retrieved from thoughtco.com
7. Biography. Francisco Madero. Retrieved from biography.com