Jerry Langton Three-Book Bundle

by Jerry Langton

  These actions made him a lot of new enemies. Anti-imperialist movements—called Republicans because of their shared philosophy of deposing Agustín and installing a republic—sprang up all over Mexico. Even the most conservative Peninsulares were greatly offended by this commoner (born in Valladolid yet!) who so pompously wrapped himself in emperor's robes. But most of his enemies were liberal Criollos and Mestizos, both of which groups wanted something better than a home-grown dictator. With the Mexican empire stretching from present-day Oregon thousands of miles south to what is now Colombia, the political and economic necessities of such a large and diverse country needed deft government, not a self-involved plutocrat.

  One of these insurrections, in Veracruz, was led by a charismatic army general named Antonio de Padua María Severino López de Santa Anna y Pérez de Lebrón (now generally just called Santa Anna). A shrewd man with a passion for gambling and little reluctance to change sides when he saw a better offer, Santa Anna had been one of Emperor Agustín's early supporters, calling him “El Libertador” (the Liberator), a move that earned him his rank and a nice hacienda. When he saw the emperor's support waning, however, he threw his lot in with the Republicans, joining with Victoria, one of the signators of the Plan de Iguala, who was now deeply embittered with Agustín.

  When Agustín sent an army to quell Victoria and Santa Anna, he made a huge mistake. He appointed Colonel José Antonio Echavarri Aldai, an old friend of Santa Anna's, as its leader. It was not long before Echavarri changed sides and the combined armies of Echavarri and Santa Anna were reinforced by Victoria's men.

  Agustín sent an emissary to Santa Anna, asking him to meet in Mexico City. Fearing an assassination plot, Santa Anna responded with the Plan de Casa Mata, which called for an end to the empire and the establishment of a republic with a written constitution. After the widespread distribution of the plan, Guerrero, who was also angry at the betrayal of the man who called himself emperor, came out of hiding to join their cause. Making matters worse for Agustín, the southern provinces of his empire—the states of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica—declared their independence from Mexico (and Spain) under the name República Federal de Centroamérica (Federal Republic of Central America) and there were armed independence movements in a number of neighboring states.

  Santa Anna and his men marched on the capital, facing little serious opposition. The emperor gathered his few remaining loyal troops, but they were badly outnumbered. On May 11, 1823, Agustín signed the document of surrender that also called for his exile. He sailed for Tuscany, but pressure from their Spanish allies forced him to settle in England. The new Mexican congress named him a traitor, but continued to pay him a small pension.

  This new congress abolished the Empire and all other preceding documents, and on March 31, 1823, decided that a triumverate, comprising Victoria, Nicolás Bravo and Pedro Celestino Negrete, a Peninsular, would lead the country as Supreme Executive Power. Three alternates—Miguel Domínguez, Mariano Michelena and Guerrero—were named to provide insurance.

  Over the next year and a half, the triumverate ruled and put together a government. After a year, the Constitución Federal de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos de 1824 (Federal Constitution of the United States of Mexico) was signed, calling for a presidential election. Victoria won a large majority and named Bravo as his vice-president.

  There were no political parties at the time, but all of the elite were Freemasons, and were divided according to the lodge they attended, the Scottish Rite (los Ecosses) or the York (los Yorquinos). This caused a lot of internal problems and there were many coup attempts, including one led by Bravo (an Ecosse) against the Yorquino Victoria.

  And President Victoria had other problems to worry about. The economy was in a shambles, in part due to a Spanish blockade. After Mexico was recognized by the United Kingdom, the United States and several other countries who became trading partners and were easily powerful enough to challenge the Spanish, things improved. Mexico also joined Simón Bolívar's Pan-American Union, supplying him with financial support in his attempt to free Peru.

  Victoria stepped down in 1829 and was replaced by Guerrero. However, neither he nor any of his immediate successors had much luck staying in office. In fewer than 26 years between April 1, 1829 when Guerrero took power until December 11, 1855, the head of state of Mexico changed 46 times. Santa Anna was himself president 11 non-consecutive times in a span of less than 22 years.

  Warfront

  This kind of instability did little to help the economy or to gain Mexico much respect from its neighbors. Until the 1830s, Mexico had enjoyed good relations with the United States. As English-speaking settlers moved westward with the United States' purchase of almost a million square miles of territory from France in 1803, many settled in the Mexican territory of Tejas, or Texas. By 1829, English speakers outnumbered Spanish speakers. Santa Anna, who had abandoned Republican ideals and established a dictatorship, charged extra taxes on English-speaking Texans beginning in 1834, and prohibited any further immigration of English speakers, but they came anyway.

  A Texan independence movement under the leadership of Stephen F. Austin emerged and Santa Anna invaded. He won a major victory at the Alamo but, facing a brilliant strategist in General Sam Houston, was utterly routed at the Battle of San Jacinto in 1836. Retreating, Santa Anna realized he was surrounded by Texans and stripped off his lavish uniform before he was captured. Unfortunately, the combination of his silk underwear and an underling referring to him as “El Presidente” led the Texans to realize whom they had as prisoner. They took him to Houston, who guaranteed him a safe trip back to Mexico if he would withdraw all troops from the territory, cease hostilities and recognize the new sovereign nation of Texas. He agreed, but was quickly out of power again.

  In 1845, Texas joined the United States. The Americans, who wanted to establish a Pacific coast colony before the British could, sent a representative down to Mexico City to negotiate a purchase of Mexico's northern territories. It didn't go well. Mexico saw four different presidents, six war ministers and 16 finance ministers in 1846 alone. Popular opinion considered the offer an insult to national pride and there were calls for war. The American envoy agreed.

  The United States declared war in 1846 and saw rapid success in English-speaking areas of Mexico. Santa Anna, who had been secretly negotiating with the Americans to effect the sale, offered his services to Mexico as a general stating he had no presidential aspirations. Once appointed general, he double-crossed both the Americans and the Mexican government by making himself president again and fighting to retain the territories.

  A naval blockade hindered Mexico's economy and it found few allies. Under the leadership of General Winfield Scott, the Americans launched a huge amphibious landing at Veracruz, taking it quickly. They marched to Mexico City, surrounded it and inflicted terrifying casualties. With the capital under siege, a small number of Americans marched to Puebla, but the people there were so frustrated with Santa Anna they surrendered without a fight. After the battle of Chapultepec at which Bravo led his last loyal troops into a massacre (he was taken prisoner), Mexico City was left undefended and occupied by Scott's men. He forced them to sign the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which allowed the U.S. to purchase what are now California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, most of Arizona and Colorado and smaller parts of Oklahoma, Kansas and Wyoming. In great debt both personally and as president, Santa Anna sold more territory to Washington in 1853 when the Americans found a suitable railway route through the extreme northern part of Mexico.

  With peace established with the United States, Mexican internal politics were still not reconciled between Republicans and Royalists, now known as Liberals and Conservatives. The Liberals wanted a democratic vote and a reining in of both the church and military, while the Conservatives opposed these ideas and many even desired a return to a monarchy.

  By August 1855, even the staunchest Conservatives could no longer abide Santa An
na's corruption and abuse of power, and he was overthrown, exiled to Cuba and tried as a traitor, with his estates handed over to the new government. This led to a series of liberal presidents and one of them, Benito Juárez (Garcia), enacted a law that limited the power of church courts—at the time, many countries had already established a separation of church and state by abolishing church courts. But Archbishop Lázaro de la Garza called the move an attack on the church and rallied the clergy to fight back. Further laws allowing the state to confiscate church lands and to tax some parishes angered the clergy even further.

  Although much of the military had been angered by Juárez and his laws (not to mention freezing their pay), the first attack came from an unexpected source. Despite being of indigenous ancestry, General Tomás Mejía was a staunch Conservative who considered himself defender of the faith, and launched a rebellion in the central state of Querétaro. Others soon joined him and the Conservatives captured Mexico City, installing their own president—actually, there were eight in four years—while Juárez ran an opposing liberal government from Veracruz. Juárez and the Liberals eventually retook Mexico City and reunited the government, but conservative rebels, including Mejía, continued to operate for many years.

  A second emperor

  The economy broken by yet another civil war, Juárez suspended interest payments on Mexico's massive debts to the United Kingdom, Spain and France. That angered the Europeans and Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (Napoleon III, president and King of France and nephew of Napoleon I) came up with a plan, unknown to Britain and Spain, to invade Mexico and install an emperor who would answer to France.

  In January 1862, fleets from France, Spain and Britain landed at Veracruz. The Americans protested vigorously, but with their own Civil War raging, were powerless to do anything. When the Spanish and British realized the French had bigger ambitions than just getting Juárez to restart interest payments, they left. The French invaded and with the help of local Conservatives marched inland. A small but decisive victory by the local army at Puebla on May 5, 1862 is now remembered each year as the Cinco de Mayo holiday.

  But the French prevailed and entered Mexico City on June 7, 1863 after months of bitter fighting. They installed a military junta who established a Second Mexican Empire, offering the crown to Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian Joseph of Austria. The 32-year-old navy officer wasn't a Bourbon, but as a Habsburg-Lorraine, at least he was European royalty. Despite never having visited Mexico or being able to speak Spanish, he accepted from his castle, Miramare, in Italy. He took the name Emperor Maxmilian I and his wife, Princess Marie Charlotte Amélie Augustine Victoire Clémentine Léopoldine of Belgium, became Empress Carlota.

  Once installed in Mexico City, Maximilian angered Conservatives by re-enacting many of the reforms of the Juárez government. That didn't appease Juárez and the Liberals, however, who opposed him as a foreign dictator. His government was largely ineffective, relying on French military might to get anything accomplished.

  The U.S. Civil War ended during his reign, and American protests became more tangible when they started supplying Juárez and his northern commander, General Porfirio Diaz (Mori) with weapons. It was a clever plan that circumvented international diplomacy as the Americans would place arms and ammunition on the banks of the Rio Grande at what is now El Paso, Texas, declare them officially “lost,” then repeat the process after Diaz and his men took the loot back to Mexico.

  Further angering the U.S., Maximilian started two new communities between Mexico City and Veracruz—the New Virginia Colony and the Carlota Colony—specifically for former Confederate soldiers, though he later opened them up to immigrants from other European and Latin American countries.

  Under heavy pressure from the Americans and needing his army for a clearly imminent threat from Bismarck's Prussia, Napoleon III withdrew from Mexico, advising Maximilian to return to Europe. But the emperor decided to stay, instead sending Carlota to other European capitals and even the Pope to seek aid.

  None came. Maximilian escaped Mexico City just before it fell and hid in Santiago de Querétaro. The town was surrounded by rebels and one of Maximilian's men betrayed him and told them of his escape plan. Captured, he was tried and sentenced to death. Although many of the crowned heads of Europe and even progressives like Guiseppe Garibaldi and Victor Hugo sent letters asking Juárez to reconsider, he didn't and Maximilian was executed on June 19, 1867 as an object lesson to would-be invaders.

  The Liberal Party held sway after that, but became increasingly less liberal as it evolved. By the time Porfirio Díaz took power for the second time on November 29, 1884 his leadership was obviously a dictatorship and he was king in all but name. He brought a great deal of economic prosperity to Mexico, but also a great deal of oppression. His philosophy of government can be summed up in his famous quote: “A dog with a bone in his mouth neither barks nor bites.”

  But not every dog had a bone. Soon, revolutionary movements of all types began to coalesce under leaders like Francisco I Madero (González), Pancho Villa (a nom de guerre for José Doroteo Arango Arámbula) and Emiliano Zapata (Salazar). Madero, a wealthy young man who was conservative but not in favor of a dictatorship, decided to run in the 1910 national election as a member of the Progressive Constitutionalist Party—PCP, formerly the Anti-reelectionist Party—even though he knew the vote would be rigged in Diaz's favor.

  On the day of the election, Diaz jailed Madero and announced he had won another term by a huge landslide. From jail, Madero wrote his Plan de San Luis Potosí, a vague proposal for a more democratic government. The “letter from jail,” as it came to be known, inspired revolutionaries all over Mexico.

  It didn't take long for Madero's army—conveniently but not always willingly allied with socialist, anarchist and indigenous-rights groups—to defeat the national army in what was called the Mexican Revolution and Diaz was soon deposed. Madero installed himself as interim president on November 11, 1911 and called for new elections.

  He actually won by a landslide and enjoyed not only the support of his allies in the revolution, but also the United States. However, his government didn't last long, as Madero's centrist approach pleased neither conservatives nor liberals. Many of his former supporters broke from him and formed new revolutionary movements, including the Colorados and Zapatistas. Fearing another revolution, Madero's commander-in-chief, General Victoriano Huerta staged a coup on February 8, 1913.

  Madero and his vice-president José María Pino Suárez were held captive until Huerta and his men decided to exile them. Almost as soon as they were freed, both men were assassinated by members of the rurales, a mounted paramilitary group loyal to Huerta. Most Mexicans at the time (and now) believe they were acting under Huerta's command.

  In a cynical move to give the new regime a sheen of legitimacy, Huerta announced that foreign minister Pedro Lascuráin (Paredes) would be president—even though Attorney General Adolfo Valles (Ibañez) was actually the legitimate successor. But his reign lasted, by some accounts, as little as 15 minutes and his only act would be to step aside for Huerta, who set up a very repressive military state.

  Huerta made few friends internationally, and a strong enemy of President Herbert Hoover, who repeatedly asked him to step down. Relations between the two countries worsened in March 1914 when rebels surrounded Huerta's men in the oil refining town of Tampico on the Gulf Coast. Although the American government agreed at least in principle with the Constitutionalist rebels, they rushed navy ships to the port in an effort to protect and potentially evacuate the many American oil workers there. The first American warship to arrive—and the only one that could navigate the shallow harbor—was the USS Dolphin, a small gunboat that had seen action in the 1898 Spanish–American War.

  When a few American sailors left the ship to get fuel, they were arrested at gunpoint by Huerta's soldiers. None of the Americans could speak Spanish and none of the Mexicans could speak English, so the incident dragged on. When he found out that at leas
t one of the sailors was arrested on board the Dolphin—which technically could be seen as an invasion of U.S. sovereign territory—area commander Rear Admiral Henry T. Mayo demanded the men's release and a formal apology. Mexican officials freed the sailors and issued a written apology, but refused to fly the U.S. flag on Mexican soil, which the Americans had demanded.

  Using that as a pretext, Hoover asked Congress to invade Mexico in an effort to dislodge Huerta's regime. While he was waiting for their approval, U.S. intelligence learned of an embargo-breaking arms shipment to Veracruz from Germany. That allowed Hoover to mount an invasion without Congressional assent.

  The U.S. sent a number of boats and 2,300 men to Veracruz. They landed without opposition—to crowds of curious Americans and Mexicans lining the beach—and quickly took control of the city. Most of the Mexican military retreated, but about 50 remained loyal to the Huerta cause and a few of the cadets at the Naval Academy tried to defend the building. The Americans prevailed and occupied the city for six months. The two countries were on the brink of war until they called upon the ABC Countries—an alliance of Argentina, Brazil and Chile—to mediate at a special summit in Niagara Falls, Ontario.

  The situation became complicated in the north of Mexico as well. There were two major armies fighting Huerta's forces—top Constitutional commander Venustiano Carranza (de la Garza) in the south and Pancho Villa in the north. Villa had been very successful in his drive toward the capital when he received word from Carranza instructing him to divert his attack to a coal-mining town because the southern army needed more coal.

  Angered by what he saw as Carranza trying to deprive him of the glory of taking the capital, Villa cut ties with him and declared his movement independent. It was a bold move, and one that would cost him dearly. Previously, Villa had been something of a folk hero on both sides of the border, and many of his band of raiders were English-speaking American volunteers attracted by the romance of the lifestyle and the idea of freeing Mexico from a dictatorship. That image began to fade as news of the violence and excesses not only of his men, but Villa himself, became known. A meeting with General John Pershing convinced the Americans that Villa was the wrong horse to back—for years he had enjoyed moral and material support from the U.S., but the U.S. now chose to side with Carranza.