Francisco I. Madero

“ Nearing Vera Cruz.
Very hot, though early this morning there was a drenching rain, a deluge. The heavens simply opened, and everything, for an hour, was running with a great sound of water. Now the sun is out, a strange, pricking, nerve-disturbing sun.
THE REVOLUTIONARY CAMP, MAY 5, 1911
(In front, Francisco I. Madero; behind him, José Marcia Suarez; next him, Gustavo Madero. In khaki at left front, Abram Gonsalez. All are dead)
I have a deep thrill of excitement when I think of the Mexico in revolution that we are nearing, steaming so quickly to the center of it all. ”

“ These are some of the causes and circumstances that made the revolution of 1910-11—not all of them, for there must be remembered in addition the Yaqui slave traffic, the contract-labor system of the great southern haciendas, and a dozen other iniquities, greater and lesser, which also contributed to precipitating the revolt. It was fortunate that that revolt was captained by a man of Francisco Madero's type—a man who knew how to win the world's sympathy for his cause and how to make his subordinates merit that sympathy by their observance of the rules of civilized warfare. ”

“ Díaz does not allow the light democratic attempt and chases after Madero getting him to jail. Díaz was re-elected president and Madero already free takes refuge in the United States, who encouraged the movement against the interests of Europe in our country. With the Plan of San Luis Potosí on November 20, Madero calls for a fight under the theme "Effective suffrage. No Re-election". Pascual Orozco (1882-1915) , Francisco Villa (1877-1923) in the north and Emiliano Zapata (1879-1919) in the south will be the first to go along with the start of the revolution. ”

“ He took off his hat with an elaborate bow as the Salvador's boat left him standing with his three men on the little dock below his residence; but Francisco and the other two scowled fiercely at Mr. Todd, whom they reproached for deceiving them about Madero's reward, although they had elected to remain with their old master rather than be taken to America.
"It's a good thing for civilization that those villains are sequestrated on a far-away, unknown island," remarked Chesty, when he had regained the yacht's deck. ”

“ Once more the sword of the United States is suspended over the Mexican people's neck. "The Mexicans are incapable of self-government," say all the adventurers who wish to make millions by exploiting the labor and natural wealth of Mexico.
Madero has promised to hand over to Americans the liberties of Mexico; and, in addition, the land, the woods, the mines, the waters, all Mexico itself. Naturally, the Americans are on Madero's side. ”

“ L'appétit vient en mangeant, and a taste for revolutions may be like a taste for anything else. Many of these millions have nothing to lose, and hope, mixed with desire, is rampant during the periods of upheavals.
Some sort of a new day is rising in Mexico, but Madero would seem to be President, not because he is a good and honest man and a well-wisher to all, but simply because he is a successful revolutionary leader, and what has been can be. There was, however, a general effect of everybody patting himself on the back. ”

“ If Madero was incapable of ordering the country, it required a strong action against the government. More so when the Mexican President dared to correct the illegal status achieved by some foreign investors, thanks to which were exempt from the minimum obligations to the country, such as paying taxes. The alarm was raised, and led by representatives of those foreign interests and by the embassy of United States as general headquarters, revolution defeated mexicans, allied with the largely intact porfirian army despite their defeat, assaulted power and assassinated Madero. ”

“ The Mexican families of repute boycott the Madero receptions. The few Mexicans who do go don't figure in the real national accounting. The diplomats feel that they at least ought to go, so last Thursday the inclosed clipping was produced. [171]
Madame Madero, though small and worn-looking, is always dignified and courteous, and receives with simplicity and cordiality. Madero seems in a continual ecstasy; one would think he found Chapultepec the seventh heaven. He is full of confidence in himself and in the country. A happy man, one involuntarily says in looking at him. ”

“ The Maderos are reputed enormously wealthy; their [76] wealth is mostly invested in lands, however. I understand Madero spent all the available family cash on the revolution, though he told N. last night that no revolution had ever been carried through so cheaply from the standpoint both of men and of money.
Von H. does things very well. The courses were accompanied by wines of special, rare vintages, and his dinner was lavishly and handsomely presented. He has the same majordomo that the Towers had in Berlin—that huge, blond man (I forget his name) . I asked him how he liked Mexico ”

“ All the better elements of the country realize that Madero no longer represents an individual or even a political administration. He represents the civilization of Mexico struggling against the unreined savagery of a population which has known no law but abject fear, and having lost that fear and the restraint which it imposed upon it, threatens to deliver Mexico to such a reign of anarchy, rapine, and terror as would be without a parallel in modern history. ”

“ The Porfiristas—all the old régime—hold the United States responsible for Madero's success, because of our permitting him to organize and finance himself on our border, and there are others who think, rather paradoxically, that it is due to us that he has not had more success.
As for the Maderistas, they don't understand anything, feel no obligation to us, and wonder why we don't do more. The active anti-Maderistas feel very bitter that in any revolt aimed against Madero they can't "use" the border. Nobody has any political love for us. ”

“ As a matter of fact, Madero himself, far from overstating the benefits of the revolution led by him or making unwise promises of a Utopia impossible of realization, addressed these words to the Mexican people at the close of that conflict: "You have won your political freedom, but do not therefore suppose that your economic and social liberty can be won so suddenly. This can only be attained by an earnest and sustained effort on the part of all classes of society." ”

“ Twice we drove them out of Mexico and allowed them to return with the same rights as Mexicans, and they used these rights to steal away our land, to make the people slaves, and to take up arms against the cause of liberty. They supported Porfirio Diaz. They were perniciously active in politics. It was the Spaniards who framed the plot that put Huerta in the palace. When Madero was murdered the Spaniards in every State in the Republic held banquets of rejoicing. They thrust on us the greatest superstition the world has ever known—the Catholic Church. They ought to be killed for that alone. ”

“ The Mexican people are taking possession of their on country's natural wealth; and this fact, coupled with the revolutionary effervescence now clearly observable, has caused the American speculator to cry to heaven and proclaim that Mexico should be acquired by the United States, at any price.
Madero being naturally weak, as Diaz was, is seeking the aid of the American government, that he may maintain himself in power. To this end it has been necessary for him to agree to the American bourgeoisie's demand for slavery in Mexico. ”

“ I certainly wish him success. He, too, hopes all things from Madero. So few Americans have come this way that to have any of the really nice ones here is a great treat. It made me think of all those far-away tales of my childhood, when you knew his father as President. The luncheon was the vehicle for one of those informal, intimate exchanges from like standpoints, always so particularly agreeable against an exotic background.
Yesterday, the 30th, Madero was nominated for President by the Mexican Progressive party in convention in the city. ”

“ Madero is naturally generous toward his enemies, of which the crops, however, hourly increase. He is averse to shedding blood, but I sigh for the difficulties of his position, between various upper and nether mill-stones, with the destinies of fifteen millions of people like to be ground between. ”

“ Madero has publicly announced that he will encourage American investments, but that he will oppose all trusts and unjust concessions. It sounds almost too reasonable to be true. He made these statements from some place in the north when he promised to liberate all political prisoners and all prisoners of war. This revolution in Mexico has been full of contrasts, to say the least. Has any one ever seen such an anomaly as we witnessed here? The heads of a solid, recognized government turning over their offices to a relatively few armed opponents. ”

“ Secretary Stimson has poured oil on the troubled waters by saying there is no thought of intervention in Mexico for pacification and otherwise, but it's [233] all a playing with fire—and a good many American and Mexican fingers are like to be burnt. It would seem 'twere better to let the Mexican revolutions quietly simmer till they boil dry—we can't do a little; all or nothing.
I must say I have some sympathy with Madero, for, having allowed him to "use" the border for equipping and organizing his revolution, he now naturally wonders at our coldness. ”

“ And Madero wouldn’t resign. Huerta heated the poker and started to tickle him with it. You could see the blood running out of Madero’s eyes, but he was stubborn as a mule, and he just kept saying, ‘I’m the rightful president of Mexico!’ Finally Huerta had to shoot him. But he was a great stickler for constitutionality, so he put Madero’s body in a coach, and took it out for a ride and had his troops fire a volley on the coach; then he told the world that Madero was shot by his own men while fleeing the country. Some one had to take the presidency then, so Huerta took it. ”

“ Madero is as simple as a child in many ways, and as impulsive, but simplicity isn't the first requirement for manipulating government in the land of the cactus. A Spanish proverb took my attention the other day to the effect that "an official who cannot lie may as well be out of the world," and Madero is as honest as the day. If language is given to conceal our thoughts, he makes little use of the covering. It is complained of him that he is always revealing something to somebody. ”

“ Madero is impotent to bring into submission all the elements opposing him. He would play the dictator, the strong man with the hand of iron, and the result is that he is a nutshell floating aimlessly upon a storm-tossed sea. In his despair, in his utter dejection, he begs from the Colossus of the North what the Mexican people will not give him—its support. He does as Diaz did.
The people are not rebelling for the pleasure of rebelling. The revolutionist is not tearing the life out of his enemies for the satisfaction of witnessing a spectacle of bloodshed. ”

“ Diaz had his Madero, Madero his Reyes. How easy it would have been to have made a friend of Reyes, who was the idol of the army!
Madero now talks about crushing all revolutionary movements with an iron hand; but his hand, alas! has no likeness to iron or anything that can crush. It appears that Madero and Reyes made a pact according to which each was to have a free hand at the presidential nomination. But the Maderistas either got nervous or impatient, or did not want to take chances, and Reyes was persecuted and threatened until he resigned his commission in the army and left the country. ”

“ And these people—the obreros (skilled working men) and the professional middle class, as well as the better elements of the laboring classes, are supporting Madero—not all in the spirit of his personal adherents, but because they realize the tremendous peril to Mexico of continued revolution. In 1911 the revolution was necessary—the peril had to be incurred, because nothing but arms could move the existing despotism ”

“ I couldn't explain, if I would, the real uses of the jefe. You have to live in Mexico to understand even dimly his attributes. Madero, whom no difficulties daunt, even tackles the vexed question of the Indians, saying that he intends to show the same interest in their affairs as in those pertaining to other shades of Mexicans, especially in those of the Mayas and the Yaquis, whose tragic deportations in great groups from hot climates to cold climates, and vice versa, have long been a blot on the Mexican 'scutcheon. ”

“ Madero's face, so familiar in photographs, and which seems featureless but for the broad forehead and black, pointed beard, becomes illuminated as he speaks, and his gestures are continuous, the voice soft, with a smooth flow of words. I could not catch what he said, but I knew it was his work of hypnotizing Mexico.
A more material diversion, N. told me, was created later by a cock-fight, forbidden by the police, but secretly adored, which took place in a little inclosure. There is no doubt about that animal being in every sense the cock of the Mexican walk. ”

“ The vice-presidency between de la Barra, who does not want it, another man, Vasquez Gómez, who does want it, and Pino Suarez, the obscure and evidently not over-popular Maderista candidate from Yucatan. Personally I shall be most sorry to see the De la B.s go. They are people of the world. De la B. is a trained diplomat, and these months of his "Interinato" [15] have been a "finishing-school" indeed. His father and mother were Chilians, afterward naturalized in Mexico.
Crowds parade the streets crying "Pino-no-no-no!" Why Madero insists on that running-mate we don't understand. ”