Diaz Falls in Mexico – 2

It is rather the cry nowadays that men’s best work is done before forty; and even their good work no later than sixty; but among endless exceptions General Diaz must take high rank.

Continuing Diaz Falls in Mexico,
with a selection by Mrs. E.A. Tweedie.

Previously in Diaz Falls in Mexico.

Time: 1911
Place: Mexico City

It is rather the cry nowadays that men’s best work is done before forty; and even their good work no later than sixty; but among endless exceptions General Diaz must take high rank.

His real career began at forty-six. Up to that time he had been an officer in a somewhat disorganized army, and his ambition at the outset never soared beyond a colonelcy.

He was nearly fifty when he entered Mexico City at the head of a revolutionary force. Romance and adventure were behind him, although personal peril still dogged his steps. He had to forget that he was a soldier, and to be born again as leader and politician, a maker and not a destroyer. In that capacity he had absolutely no experience of public affairs, but such as he had gained in a smaller way in early years spent in Oaxaca. Yet Diaz became a ruler, and a diplomat, and assumed the courtly manners of a prince.

Paradoxical as it may seem, his overthrow is the result of a revolution mainly pacific in its nature, and in substance a revolt of public feeling against abuses that have become stereotyped in the system of government by the too long domination of one masterful will. The military rising was but its head, spitting fire. Behind was an immense body of opinion, in favor of effecting the retirement of the President by peaceful means, and with all honor to one who had served his country well.

In 1908 General Diaz had stated frankly, in an interview granted to an American journalist, that he was enjoying his last term of office, and at its expiration would spend his remaining years in private life. There is no reason to doubt that this assurance represented his settled intention. The announcement was extensively published in the Mexican Press, and was never contradicted by the President himself. Then rumors gained currency that Diaz was not unprepared to accept nomination for the Presidency for an eighth term. The statement was at first discredited, then repeated without contradiction in a manner that could hardly have failed to excite alarm. At length came the fatal announcement that the President would stand again.

Hardly had the bell of Independence ceased ringing out in joyous clang on September 15, 1910, in celebration of free Mexico’s centenary, hardly had the gorgeous fêtes for the President’s birthday or the homage paid him by the whole world run their course, when the spark of discontent became a blaze. He had mistaken the respect and regard of his people for an invitation to remain in office.

By the time the Presidential election approached, signs of agitation had increased. A political party rose in direct hostility, not so much to General Diaz himself or Limantour, as to the Vice-President, who, as next in the succession, in the event of the demise of the President, would have been able to rivet the autocracy on the country.

Corral was the Vice-President. What little I saw of him I liked; but then he had hardly taken up the reins of power. He did not make himself popular; in fact, a large part of the country hated and distrusted him. But for that, probably nothing would have been heard of the troubles which ensued. As the party anxious for the introduction of new blood into the Government increased in vigor, the people showed themselves more and more determined to get rid of Corral. They wanted a younger man than Diaz in the President’s chair: they wanted, above all, the prospect of a better successor.

But the official group whose interests depended on the maintenance of the Diaz régime was, for the moment, too powerful, and it succeeded in inducing the President to accept reelection.

To the general hatred of this group on the part of the nation, Madero owed his success. He was almost unknown, but the malcontents were determined to act, and to act at once, and they could not afford to pick and choose for a leader. As a proof that the country thought less of the democratic principles invoked than of the destruction of the official “cientificos,” may be cited the fact that it at first placed all its trust and confidence in General Reyes, who is just as despotic and autocratic as General Diaz, but has at the same time, to them, a redeeming quality — his avowed opposition to the gang. Reyes refused to head the insurrection, and it was then Madero or nobody.

In the spring of 1910 Francis I. Madero came to the front. He was a man of education, of fortune, of courage, and a lawyer by profession. He had written a book entitled the Presidential Succession, and although without experience in the management of State affairs, he had shown that he had the courage of his convictions. He consented to stand against Diaz in a contest for the Presidency of the Republic.

The malcontents had found their leader. Madero not only accepted nomination, but began an active campaign, making speeches against the Diaz administration, denouncing abuses, more especially the retention of office by the Vice-President and the tactics of Limantour, and showing the people that as General Diaz was then eighty years of age, and his new term would not expire until 1916, Corral would almost certainly succeed to the inheritance of the Diaz regime.

Energetic, courageous, and outspoken, Madero had full command of the phraseology of the demagog. His only shortcoming in the eyes of his own party was that he had not been persecuted by the Government. The officials, alas, soon supplied this deficiency. A few days before the Presidential election in July, 1910, when making a speech in Monterey, Madero was arrested as a disturber of the peace and thrown into prison, where he was kept until the close of the poll.

The election resulted, as usual, in a triumphant majority for General Diaz, though votes were recorded, even in the capital itself, for the anti-reelectionist leader.

Continued,

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