bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
A Discriminatory Frontier Land Policy: Chile, 1870-1914
Authors: Solberg Carl E.
Published: July 2006

Writing in 1904, the Chilean intellectual Nicolás Palacios bitterly complained that his fellow-countrymen inhabiting the southern frontier provinces were “orphans” in their own land. The simile was appropriate. Since the 1870's, the government, through its land policy, systematically and deliberately had excluded Chile's wage-labor class from property ownership in the frontier. As a direct result, many Chilean laborers fell to peonage while European immigrants and wealthy Chileans acquired ownership of much of the public domain. Shortly before World War I, social and political pressures in Chile forced the government to end this discriminatory policy and to begin distributing the remainder of the public domain to nativeborn settlers.
Negro Slaves in Early Colonial Mexico
Authors: Boyd-Bowman Peter
Published: July 2006

I the widow Catalina Vélez Rascón do hereby promise to pay to you, Diego de Villanueva, alderman of this City of los Angeles, 1,100 pesos of pure gold … for six slaves (piezas de esclavos), to wit: the Negro Lorenzo, ladino, born on the Island of Tercera (in the Azores), his wife Antonia, Negress, born in Biáfara, with a young mulatto daughter of hers named María, plus a Negro called Manuel, born in Zapa, and a Negress Catalina, born in Portugal, with a young Negro daughter of hers named Paula, making six slaves in all, all of whom were disposed of in public auction as part of the estate of Francisco Muñoz, deceased, in two lots, and were sold to my son-in-law Don Juan de Zúñiga, bidding on my behalf. … Given in this city of los Angeles on the 16th day of July in the year of the birth of Our Savior Jesus Christ 1554.

The notarial archive of the Mexican city of Puebla de los Angeles, virtually complete from 1540 on, is a treasure-house of information about social and economic life in the early colony. Many of its earliest documents are, however, in deplorable physical condition, unindexed and chronologically unorganized, which makes them extremely difficult and time-consuming to consult. In order to remedy this condition and make the archive more accessible to scholars both in Mexico and elsewhere, I have indexed and extracted from microfilm the substance of over 1,600 documents executed between 1540 and 1555. These will probably appear in a two-volume collection published by the Editorial Jus in Mexico City. The documents make fascinating reading. There are wills, dowries, contracts, law-suits, partnerships, promissory notes, rentals, powers of attorney, as well as bills of sale itemizing every imaginable kind of property from real estate to livestock to produce to general merchandise.
Alvaro Obregón and Anticlericalism in the 1910 Revolution
Authors: Bailey David C.
Published: July 2006

A social revolution must concern itself immediately with the past, since it is a basic conviction of the revolutionist that the moribund and corrupt order which causes society's distress makes impossible the kind of future that he sees as desirable and necessary. Old institutions, structures, and habits of thought must be abolished or severely modified, and persons who direct or personify those vestiges must change, step aside, or be removed from positions of power and influence.

Religious institutions and beliefs present a peculiarly complicated problem to a social revolution. Invariably associated with traditional ways, they are often too deeply rooted in the national mentality and sentiment to admit of any easy or rapid modification. Obliteration, even if though to be the desirable solution, is usually recognized as impossible; and to change mass attitudes by persuasion alone, is at best a long and uncertain process.
The Mexican Empire and the Vatican, 1863–1867
Authors: Blumberg Arnold
Published: July 2006

In the course of the long struggle between Mexican conservatives and liberals, the issue of the fate of the church was the first preoccupation of both parties. The Liberal president, Don Benito Juárez, had cut the Gordian knot by seizing the church's landed wealth. Thereafter, from 1859 to 1867, Mexico's conservatives bent their efforts to the repeal of Juárez's Reform Laws. Liberals staked their future upon their maintenance.

In April 1864, before quitting Europe for Mexico, Maximilian and his consort, Empress Charlotte, had visited Rome. That visit excited a great deal of speculation in the diplomatic world because it was thought that Maximilian might attempt to lay the foundation for a concordat through personal negotiation. Instead, the new sovereign merely asked the Pope to send a nuncio to Mexico to open negotiations as soon as possible. He had also taken the occasion to establish a Mexican Legation at the Vatican and to name Ignacio Aguilar as his envoy at that court.
The Church and Spanish American Agrarian Structure: 1765–1865
Authors: Bauer Arnold
Published: July 2006

During the century between 1765 and 1865, the double impact of the industrial and agricultural revolutions brought profound change to rural society in Europe and North America. In England, the enclosure movement and the innovations associated with “ high farming ” culminated in the destruction of the English peasantry and the growth of a productive rural capitalism that underlay Victorian industrial development. On the continent new crop rotations and improved animals increased output while political revolution resulted in drastic changes in European agrarian structure and in the lives of lord and peasant. In North America (and in such regions as Australia and New Zealand) wholly new rural societies were created as population grew and rail and steam began to put these peripheral zones within reach of the industrial world.
Nineteenth Century Urban Labor Precursors of the Mexican Revolution: The Development of an Ideology
Authors: Hart John M.
Published: July 2006

Mexican industrialization, which began during the second half of the nineteenth century, was paralleled by the appearance of an urban labor movement. Industrialization resulted in a sudden concentration of new workers from the countryside in a few urban areas—especially Mexico City. Living conditions for the new city dwellers were generally intolerable and were compounded by chronic economic and political instability. Crowning the laborer's difficulty were the almost impossible working conditions in the new factories. The working class, virtually in self-defense, began to organize. Because the urban labor movement during the last third of the nineteenth century was a prelude to similar and more famous developments during the violent years of the early twentieth century, analysis of its causes, nature, and significance is essential for understanding an important aspect of the Mexican Revolution.
Andeanism and Anti-Andeanism in Twentieth-Century Venezuela
Authors: Burggraaff Winfield J.
Published: July 2006

A significant but largely overlooked phenomenon in twentieth-century Latin America has been the extended dominance of a single region over an entire nation. To one degree or another this type of regionalism has existed in several countries, including revolutionary Mexico, with the rise of the North and the Sonora Dynasty, and Brazil, with the control of national politics by the São Paulo-Minas Gerais axis from the 1890’s to 1930, followed by the rise of Rio Grande do Sul. In the following pages I will examine this type of regionalism as it occurred in Venezuela, in the form of Táchiran dominance over the government and armed forces for the first forty-five years of this century. My purpose is to explain how the men of one small agricultural state could maintain such long-term mastery over the country, what sort of reaction this “hegemony” produced, what the limits of regional control were, and, finally, when Táchiran rule definitively ended.
The Muddied Waters of Columbus, New Mexico
Authors: White E. Bruce
Published: July 2006

There is neither lake nor river in Columbus, New Mexico, now nor was there on March 9, 1916, when it was raided by Mexican bandits. The muddied waters are those of history as the events that took place over 59 years ago are almost as cloudy today as the day they occurred. Many questions about the raid remain unanswered: Was Pancho Villa at Columbus? If so, did he enter the town? How many Mexicans took part in the raid? However, the question that has concerned the amateur and professional historian of Mexico, the United States, and Germany is why did the raid take place? What was the greater importance of the raid? Most of these questions cannot be adequately answered without an examination of the political and military career of Francisco Villa, the recent and contemporary American viewpoint of Villa, and some salient events that preceded March 9, 1916.
The World Crisis and the Good Neighbor Policy in Panama, 1936-41
Authors: Langley Lester D.
Published: July 2006

The 1936 Hull-Alfaro treaty, which fulfilled New Deal pledges to Panama, represented also the impact of Panamanian nationalism. For thirty years following the 1903 isthmian revolution, Panama remained a subject of American Canal policy. In 1921, for instance, the Panamanian government hurried troops to the Costa Rican boundary in order to compel a favorable decision in a long-standing border dispute. The Department of State, however, had decided that Panamanian military action against Costa Rica was unjustifiable. Arguing that hostilities between Panama and Costa Rica endangered Canal security, a warning was sent to Panama City, followed by the cruiser Sacramento. This act of “gunboat diplomacy” was castigated throughout Panama, but the Panamanian government withdrew its troops. Similarly, Panamanians voiced charges of economic domination, even exploitation, by arguing that the Canal failed to satisfy the republic's commercial aspirations. In 1903, Panamanians had welcomed military intervention by the United States on the grounds that it would be followed by technological intrusion capable of building the canal. By the late 1920's, however, it was obvious to many Panamanian critics that the profits of the isthmian waterway were returned to the United States. The American government strictly limited the operation of Panamanian merchants inside the Canal Zone. Moreover, the more desirable positions in Zone employment, the so-called “gold roll” jobs, were invariably meted out to Americans. Those Panamanians who found employment in the Zone were usually grouped with imported West Indian Negroes on the “silver roll,” a term referring to unskilled positions. Racial antagonism between West Indians and Panamanians resulted from economic competition.
Fernão de Loronha and the Rental of Brazil in 1502: A New Chronology
Authors: Vogt John L.
Published: July 2006

In July, 1502, the fleet which Dom Manuel I had dispatched following Cabral's discovery of Brazil returned to Lisbon with news of Portugal's New World possession. The findings were incorporated into an official report and geographical observations were placed on the sea charts of the day, including the famous Cantino map of September, 1502. The three vessels in this expedition had sailed along the Brazilian coast for over a thousand miles, exploring and charting the major landfalls, from the northeastern tip around Cape Calcanhar to at least as far south as Cape Frio at 23° S. Lat. But no products of any great commerćial wealth which could compare with the riches being obtained in the Orient had been discovered, and the dispatch of further royal expeditions to Brazil seemingly was not justified. There were, however, private parties in Portugal who showed an interest in the slight commercial possibilities that were offered by this new land. The leader of this group was Fernão de Loronha, a wealthy merchant with a family business in Lisbon and sufficient capital to outfit several ships a year in overseas ventures. Moreover, Loronha had a first-hand acquaintance with this new land. He had been the overall commander of the fleet of 1501-1502 which had just returned from Brazil. There was one item of value in Brazil which particularly attracted Loronha. This was the dyewood trees growing in great abundance there. A large market for this commodity existed in northern Europe, for the dye extracted from the wood of the Asian variety of this tree had been a staple in the finishing of fine cloths produced by the weavers of Bruges, Liége, and other cities in the Low Countries since the twelfth century.
Ideas and Society in Don Porfirio's Mexico
Authors: Raat William D.
Published: July 2006

An opinion often expressed by historians of Mexico and Latin America is that the age of Don Porfirio's Mexico was one in which the philosophy of positivism, wherther Comtean or Spencerian, was the dominant and official ideology of the day. In contrast to this viewpoint, an important supposition of this essay is that the intellectual history of the Porfiriato can only become intelligible if and when other ideas, concepts, and philosophies are distinguished from positivism. In addition, an accurate description of the role of ideas necessitates that some attention be focused upon the function of ideas in society. Thus a concern of this essay, apart from differentiating ideas, is that of suggesting the interrelationship of ideas to certain political and socio-economic groups during the Porfiriato. To do this properly will first require a statement about the social structure of Mexico between 1876 and 1911.
The Commissary Issue in American-Panamanian Relations 1900-1936
Authors: Leonard Thomas M.
Published: July 2006

Although the Panama Railroad Company had operated commissaries in the nineteenth century, not until the United States had begun canal construction in 1904 did pressure increase for supplies and services. In 1905 Canal Zone Governor Charles Magoon reported that two salary increases had been granted to meet rising food costs on the isthmus. On each occasion, however, the salary increment was offset by the Panamanian merchants who had raised commodity prices. Laborers purportedly slipped into the jungle in search of food. In July, 1905, Governor Magoon and Chief Engineer of the canal project, John F. Stevens, agreed to establish a commissary system to distribute food at cost to the canal labor force totalling approximately 17,000 men. Apparently reacting to the jungle environment and to greedy Panamanian merchants, the United States government turned to the commissary operation. With time's passing, the commissaries blossomed “from a pork and beans beginning to silk stocking maturity.” By the late 1940's, the casual visitor wondered if he had stumbled upon a typical United States Department store in the tropics. Many Panamanians were deeply angered by this business activity, believing that their country's economy had been crushed and their right to live and expand denied. Some Panamanians charged that an international crime had been committed by the United States against the small nation. The Republic's merchants contended that most of the commissary trade actually belonged to them.
The Obraje in the Late Méxican Colony
Authors: Greenleaf Richard E.
Published: July 2006

One of the most important native industries in New Spain, allowed to flourish because of its rational necessity, and given exemptions from restrictive mercantile prohibitions was theobraje, or colonial textile factory. This institution had its origins in the tribute and labor policies of the quasi-feudal economic system imposed by the Spaniard in the decades after the conquests in the Caribbean and on the American mainland. For almost three hundred years clerics and humanitarians protested, viceroys raged, monarchs threatened, a plethora of regulations was issued, inspections were conducted, trials held, fines levied, obrajes were closed, and yet the obraje as an institution survived, and the inhuman conditions of the worker remained unchanged. While the Mexican encomienda system was being shorn of its abuses and gradually deemphasized by the crown, and while the repartimiento system of forced labor for wages was subordinated to a policy of conservation of human resources in the face of a shortage of Indian labor, the Mexican colony was becoming each decade more dependent on the locally-produced textiles, especially the commercial, non-luxury fabrics in everyday use. These were produced in the obrajes.
Samuel Gompers, Communism, and the Pan American Federation of Labor
Authors: Toth Charles W.
Published: July 2006

The Primary purpose for the creation of the Pan American Federation of Labor was to foster the development of trade-unionism in Latin America. But from its inception at Laredo in 1918 until 1927, when the fifth and last congress was held, autonomous trade-unionism became a secondary endeavor. Uppermost for Samuel Gompers and his associates in the AFL was the effort to deal with problems largely political in character.
The Third Mexican Council (1585) in the Light of the Vatican Archives
Authors: Burrus Ernest J.
Published: July 2006

Several of the key problems of the Third Mexican Council are better understood and partially solved by a study of the Vatican documents. This important ecclesiastical gathering was the first in Mexico to take into serious consideration the decrees of the Council of Trent. It had held its first sessions in Mexico City from January 20 to October 20, 1585. Its acts and statutes were written in Spanish; in order to secure papal approbation a Latin translation was made of both by Father Pedro Ortigosa, S. J., the Mexican Archbishop’s personal theologian and prominent participant at the Council.
Brazilian Foreign Policy and the Dominican Crisis: The Impact of History and Events
Authors: Santos Ralph G.
Published: July 2006

On May 24, 1965, nearly a month after the first U. S. Marines landed in Santo Domingo, an inter-American military force under the command of a Brazilian general took over peacekeeping activities in the Dominican Republic. Although the first Brazilian contingent to arrive comprised only 300 troops, it later reached a total of 1,250, the largest contribution by a single Latin American nation. While Brazil's participation in the Dominican crisis was a clear indication that the independent foreign policy of Quadros and Goulart had been discarded in favor of a realignment once again with the United States, it also signified an abrupt departure from one of the basic tenets of Brazilian foreign policy—nonintervention. The case study of Brazil's role in the Dominican Republic in 1965 which follows provides a unique opportunity to examine the impact of traditional forces and contemporary events on Brazilian foreign policy at a critical juncture in that nation's history.
Indian Integration in Peru, 1820-1948: An Overview
Authors: Davies Thomas M.
Published: July 2006

Since the days of the Spanish conquest, Peru has been a predominantly Indian nation; today nearly half of the population is culturally Indian. Scholars and government officials for centuries have recognized the vital importance of integrating this human mass into the national life. Despite repeated efforts to alter the situation, however, the Indian population remains isolated economically, politically, and educationally.
The Economic Organization of the Ancient Maya
Authors: Mann Arthur J.
Published: July 2006

The achievements of ancient Mayan civilization in the fields of astronomy, architecture, sculpture, and mathematics have been well documented. Recent research has found that in many respects Mayan culture attained heights originally thought to be nonexistent among the Amerindian populations of the New World prior to the coming of the Europeans. To have reached such cultural levels there must have been established a rather solid economic base which afforded an economic surplus, for a people merely surviving at subsistence levels have little time to appropriate to tasks other than those of seeking sustenance. The purpose of this paper will be to explore, in most elementary fashion, the bases of the economic organization of the Maya; i. e., to attempt to answer how the Maya resolved the four fundamental economic problems any society has to face: (1) the problem of the allocation of resources—what to produce given a relatively scarce resource base; (2) the problem of the organization of production, essentially a technological and administrative issue; (3) the problem of the distribution of production—how factors are recompensed for their productive services; (4) the savings and investment problem—what provision is made for future production. Emphasis should be placed on the rudimentary nature of the essay, because apparently little is known and / or has been written on the economics of Mayan civilization in very specific terms. Those who have studied the Maya have generally been anthropologists, archaeologists, and historians, who have shown more interest in social and political culture, art forms, and religion than in economics. Therefore, what appears below is, more than anything else, a hodge-podge of pieces culled from multi-sources and threaded loosely together.
Root’s Watchful Waiting and the Venezuelan Controversy
Authors: Hendrickson Embert J.
Published: July 2006

Elihu Root, Secretary of State from 1905 to 1909 under President Theodore Roosevelt, ranks as one of the most successful secretaries in dealing with Latin America before the coming of the Good Neighbor policy. His approach, the product of a practical statesman in a period of growing reaction to diplomatic adventure, concerned the means rather than the ends of inter-American relations. While the Secretary did not renounce the role of hemispheric policeman proclaimed by President Roosevelt in 1904, he did attempt to stress the benevolent character of America’s Caribbean interests and to sub-ordinate the policing aspect. Root held a special concern for Latin America and labored assiduously to improve relations and to promote the solidarity of the Western Hemisphere. When the Secretary retired in 1909 he bequeathed his successor a legacy of kindly feeling that he had successfully cultivated.
The Expulsion of The Jesuits From Spain and Spanish America In 1767 in Light of Eighteenth-Century Regalism
Authors: Mörner Magnus
Published: July 2006

When Expelling the Jesuits from his realm in 1767, Charles III of Spain explained this extraordinary measure in only vague and mysterious terms. He said he was “moved by weighty reasons, conscious of his duty to uphold obedience, tranquility and justice among his people, and (was also acting) for other urgent, just, and compelling causes, which he was locking away in his royal breast.” Furthermore, the first part of the report of the committee preparing the expulsion, the Extraordinary Council of Castile, a report which must have contained the motivation, has been missing since at least 1815. The whole history of the expulsion has thus been shrouded in an air of mystery. Historians have not been satisfied with pointing to possible Jesuit implication in the so-called “Hat and Cloak Riots ” of 1766, which caused the Extraordinary Council to be set up to undertake the inquiry that less than a year later produced the royal decision to expel the Jesuits. Instead, they have suggested other explanations according to their gift of imagination and their religio-political orientation. Several theories of “conspiracy ” have been advanced. Either the Freemasons, impious Voltairians or the manteistas, that is, intellectuals of poor background, supposedly resentful of the snobbism of Jesuit education, have been held responsible for such “conspiracies ” against the Jesuits. Important documentation from the Extraordinary Council, which almost compensates for the lost piece, has been easily available since the 1890’s.
Membership in the Order of Christ in the Seventeenth Century: Its Rights, Privileges, and Obligations
Authors: Dutra Francis A.
Published: July 2006

For Some students of Luso-Brazilian history mention of the Order of Christ brings to mind its headquarters, the magnificent Portuguese monastery at Tomar, graced by Diogo de Arruda’s great window, a masterpiece praised by Robert C. Smith as “probably the best-known single motif in Portuguese art” and “the outstanding example of Manueline preoccupation with exotic naturalism.” Others would think of the Order's successes under the aegis of the Infante Henrique, “the Navigator,” when it underwent reform, received a new rule, and obtained countless spiritual and temporal favors from the popes at Rome. Lesser known is that the Order of Christ was also a clerico-military order whose members pledged to live a more spiritual life while being ready to serve militarily their God and their King. Since a considerable number of those holding important offices in Portuguese America wore the habit of the Order it might be well to examine closely exactly what this membership entailed.
The Sale of the Hacienda of Tabaloapa: A Case-Study of Jesuit Property Redistribution in Mexico, 1771-1781
Authors: Benedict H. Bradley
Published: July 2006

One of the most momentous actions in the history of the Spanish colonial empire was the crown's expulsion and expropriation proceedings against the Society of Jesus in 1767. This topic has long received much scholarly attention. Perhaps of greater significance, but of almost total historiographical neglect, was the Spanish government's management, redistribution, and liquidation of the Jesuit assets during 1767-1820. As a result of those processes, hundreds of the best real and improved properties in Spanish America changed hands and millions of pesos were siphoned to Spain from overseas.
Lucas Alamán Pioneer of Mexican Historiography: An Interpretative Essay
Authors: Martin Luis
Published: July 2006

At the end of the eighteenth century, Guanajuato was one of the richest and most cultured provincial cities in New Spain. Mining had for years been a source of wealth, and the provincial aristocracy of Guanajuato could easily compete both in culture and in gracious living with the upper classes of viceregal Mexico. The Alamán family belonged to that upper circle of Guanajuato. They were wealthy and, on their maternal side, their ancestry sprang from the better houses of Castile. When, in 1792, the first male child was born to the family, he was christened in the best aristocratic tradition, for he was baptized Lucas Ignacio José Joaquín Pedro de Alcantara Juan Bautista Francisco de Paula Alamán.
William Wheelright and Early Steam Navigation in the Pacific 1820-1840
Authors: Duncan Roland E.
Published: July 2006

William Wheelwright, an American merchant-mariner and entrepreneur from Massachusetts, was the successful pioneer of commercial steam navigation in the Pacific in 1840 but, as is frequently the case, his predecessors prepared the way. Steam powered the Industrial Revolution from the late eighteenth century, and was soon applied to the movement of ships. Practical steam navigation on sheltered inland waters or open oceans depended upon James Watt's development of the steam engine from 1769 to 1782, including such improvements as the use of expansive steam, external condensers which reduced the loss of heat and power, and double-acting pistons. Inventors quickly adapted the new power mechanism to boats.
United States and the Invasion of Texas, 1810–1814
Authors: Gronet Richard W.
Published: July 2006

The chronicle of United States relations with the Mexican Republic has been one marked by professed sympathy, misunderstanding, and undisguised hostility. All three descriptions may be applied to the earliest official and extralegal contacts between the peoples of these neighboring countries. Such turmoil has understandably léd to diverse interpretations by not a few historians in the United States, and probably the most confused period in this chronicle was that of 1810 to 1814 when the accredited United States Agent William Shaler became involved in a government sponsored project aimed at influencing the struggle for Mexican independence.
The Destruction of the Religious Orders in Paraguay, 1810-1824
Authors: Cooney Jerry W.
Published: July 2006

For three centuries the Church in colonial Spanish America was the primary cultural institution affecting the lives of all Spain's overseas subjects. Education, charity, art, architecture, all the humane arts had been the legacy of the Church as well as its greatest gift to the New World, the Christianization of the Indians. In all these pursuits the Church was ably and dutifully supported by the Crown. Concurrently, clerics of all ranks and occupations were tied closely to the civil authority by the Royal Patronage.

The achievements of the orders of the Church were out of proportion to their numbers. Franciscans, Dominicans, Mercedarians, then Jesuits and others all left their mark on Spanish America and often expanded the empire through missionary activities. Paraguay, an isolated province in the Río de la Plata, was a striking example of the successful toil of various orders. However, in 1767 by command of the regalist Carlos III, the Jesuits were expelled from this region (and the entire empire) and at the turn of the century there remained but three orders in the province, Franciscans, Dominicans, and Mercedarians. Of the three the Franciscans were the most important in the colonial era. Ever since the 1530's, this order was concerned with the conversion and welfare of the Indians. Reductions of the Guaraní were established by the Franciscans long before those of the better known Jesuits. Among the great figures of the Franciscan first century in Paraguay were Fray Martín Ignacio de Loyola and especially fray Luis de Bolaños, the “Apostle of Paraguay.”
The Political Strategy of Military Reform: Álvaro Obregón and Revolutionary Mexico, 1920-1924
Authors: Hansis Randall
Published: July 2006

On December 1, 1920, General Álvaro Obregón of Sonora became President of Mexico. During the previous May, his supporters had staged a popular coup d'etat which paved the way for his constitutional election. Mexico was then in the throes of revolutionary ferment, and the instability which had accompanied Obregón's ascendancy to Executive Office also threatened to attend his demise. Obregón thus sought to achieve political and social reforms which would strengthen his regime and allow for a peaceful Presidential succession in 1924. As the major institution of coercion during a time of revolutionary violence, the Army had emerged as the most important political institution in Mexico. Although part of a broader political effort which included labor, agrarian and administrative reforms, Obregón's military reconstruction can be viewed as the important keystone in his attempt to consolidate control of Mexico. Obregón’s military reforms sought to insure, first, Army loyalty to the office of President, and, second, military effectiveness when the Army would be called upon to defend the Federal Government. His reforms grew out of the Agua Prieta movement of May 1920, and continued throughout his own administration. As President, Obregón gave intensive attention to military affairs and his military reforms were the most significant achievement of his broadly based effort to consolidate the Mexican Revolution.
The Catholic Lay Movement in Peru: 1867-1959
Authors: Klaiber Jeffrey L.
Published: July 2006

The dramatic changes in the Latin American church since the Second Vatican Council have taken many observers by surprise. In search of an explanation for these changes, much recent scholarship has devoted itself to analyzing the changing political climate, the influx of foreign religious personnel, the creation of radical priests' groups, the impact of Vatican II itself and the episcopal assemblies of Medellín and Puebla and, of course, the varying currents of liberation theology. In contrast, the tendency has been to overlook pre-Vatican II history. The pre-conciliar Peruvian church in particular has been characterized as tradition-bound, obscurantist or subservient to the upper classes. One author writing in the early seventies stated:

“The intimacy between the church and the Peruvian upper class has been an unvarying characteristic of colonial, post-independence and modern eras in Peru.”
Reflections on Revolution in America, 1776–1976
Authors: Savelle Max
Published: July 2006

The year 1976 is correctly taken to be the bicentennial year of United States independence, which officially began on July 4, 1776. In a broader sense, however, the year 1776 was also pivotal year in the “Age of the Democratic Revolution” that swept through the entire Atlantic Community of nations during the last decades of the eighteenth century and the first decades of the nineteenth.

This year, 1976, therefore, may also be properly considered the bicentennial of the opening year of the “age of revolutions” in the whole of America. Professor Robert R. Palmer, in his distinguished work on the subject, convincingly shows that, as he says,

All of these agitations, upheavals, intrigues, and conspiracies were part of one great movement. It was not simply a question of the “spread” or “impact” or “influence” of the French Revolution . . . But revolutionary aims and sympathies existed throughout Europe and America. They arose everywhere out of local, genuine and specific causes; or, contrariwise, they reflected conditions that were universal throughout the Western world. They were not imported from one country to another. . . . There was one big revolutionary agitation, not simply a French revolution due to purely French causes and foolishly favored by irresponsible people in other countries.
Santiago Chile, 1541–1581: A Case Study of Urban Stagnation
Authors: Fichandler Joseph B. , O’Brien Thomas F.
Published: July 2006

Attempts to understand the nature of colonial Latin American cities have tended to focus on the role of urban centers in the process of empire building. The Spanish cities of the New World served initially as spearheads of conquest, and later as centers for the exercise of Imperial control. A particularly important aspect of this control was the effort by the Crown to limit the power ofencomenderos, men whose royally granted right to use Indian labor threatened to create a local ruling class independent of Imperial power. Richard Morse has recently asserted that the patrimonial nature of many of these urban centers resulted from the efforts of the mother country to retain them in the Imperial structure against the counter-claims of the encomenderos. As for those poorer settlements on the outskirts of empire. Morse believes that the appeal of landed wealth drew many of their most prominent citizens into the countryside, leaving the cities to stagnate.
Juan Esteban De Ubilla and The Flota of 1715
Authors: Newton Lowell W.
Published: July 2006

For Spain the Succession War (1702-1713) capped a century of stagnation and decline with a decade of civil war, invasion, and anarchy. Together with many other issues at stake in the conflict, commercial ambitions—particularly those relating to the Indies—lurked behind the facades of Habsburg and Bourbon dynastic claims. Both before and during the war foreign penetration, especially by the English and the Dutch, challenged Spain’s claims to exclusive trading rights in the New World, a challenge which neither the Spanish Navy nor Spanish imperial strategy was able to thwart.
White Legend Against Black: Nationalism and Enlightenment in a Spanish Context
Authors: Hauben Paul J.
Published: July 2006

The appearance of no less than four books in English marked 1971 as a banner year for Black Legend studies, especially for their colonial side. As in the past discussion emphasized the sixteenth century, dominated by the commanding and controversial Dominican, Bartolomé de Las Casas on one hand, and the grim Indian demographic catastrophe on the other. This was no less so during the Enlightenment's passionate debates on the subject. Modern research gives greater credence to mortality rates suggested by Las Casas, but centers on the dire effects of disease as the main agent causing mass death. As this essay will suggest, eighteenth century discussants were somewhat betwixt and between concerning the American experience and the Hispanic impact. Clearly much of the ongoing appeal of Las Casas' interpretation of the Indians' calamity, which stressed the conquerors' brutality, comes from its foreshadowing of modern agonies over race relations and western treatment of other colonialized peoples.
Positivism and Revolution in Brazil's First Republic: The 1904 Revolt
Authors: Nachman Robert G.
Published: July 2006

On November 14, 1904, the eve of the fifteenth anniversary of the founding of the Brazilian Republic, General Silvestre Travassos, leading a corps of several hundred cadets from Rio de Janeiro's military school, fell fatally wounded before the forces loyal to the constitutional government he had pledged to overthrow. His loss came only hours after the uprising had begun, but in those early moments the revolt had already foundered. This brief armed movement climaxed nearly a year of unrest, a month of agitation and almost a week of running clashes between working-class groups and local government forces. Although the revolt continued sporadically for two days more, the death of its leader in the early hours of fighting signalled its failure.
The Clark Memorandum Myth
Authors: Sessions Gene A.
Published: July 2006

For nearly three decades after the turn of the twentieth century, the United States took upon itself the policing of the Caribbean and Central America. Under an expanded interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine known as the Roosevelt Corollary, American policymakers justified numerous military interventions in those small republics until Monroeism became a synonym in Latin America for imperialism and expansionism. By 1930, this policy of attempted hegemony by force was a failure: Public opinion at home and abroad had opposed the “big stick” concept of hemispheric relations almost from the beginning; the interventions seldom achieved their nebulous goals.
Political Democracy and the Mexican Constitutionalists: A Re-Examination
Authors: Roman Richard
Published: July 2006

The Mexican Constitutional Congress of 1916-1917 represents in many respects a culmination of the struggle begun before 1910 against the dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz. The Constitutional Congress was not only a culmination of the violent phase of the Mexican Revolution. It also involved a codification, if not a crystallization, of goals and perspectives that either pre-date 1910 or emerged during the struggles of 1910-1917. These struggles involved competing mobilizations within the Revolutionary coalition and, finally, a civil war within the Revolution between the forces of the Convention (the unstable coalition between the Zapatistas and the Villistas) and those of the Constitutionalists. The Constitutional Congress takes place after the military victory of the Constitutionalists and delegate eligibility was restricted to those who had actively supported the Constitutionalists. The radical economic nationalism and other innovative features of the Constitution have captured the attention of commentators. While the interpretation of the economic nationalism and other features remains the subject of considerable dispute, the notion that the Constitutionalists had a democratizing thrust in the political realm has remained unchallenged. Our analysis of both the articles and, more importantly, the debates at the Constitutional Congress leads us to challenge the premise of a democratizing impulse. This is not to say that the Constitutionalist delegates were for dictatorship, but it is to suggest that compared to the Constitution of 1857, the Constitutionalists do not emerge as radical democrats but as elitists that are fearful of mass participation as well as fearful of the possibility of a new dictatorship. We will examine the debates on four issues for this purpose: (A) suffrage; (B) literacy requirements to serve as a Deputy (member of Congress); (C) directness of electing officials; (D) no re-election.
Juan Vázquez, Muleteer of Seventeenth-Century Mexico
Authors: Boyer Richard
Published: July 2006

On January 4, 1614, a fat thirty-year old mulatto with reddish-black hair rode into the town of Tula and stopped at the inn. The man's horse was a roan mare, thin, saddle-backed, and run down. The stirrups of his saddle were barely intact. Such arrivals, however commonplace, never failed to interest the curious, this time to the stranger's harm. Onlookers told don Gabriel Arías de Riquelme, alcalde mayor, that the man was Juan Vázquez, a bigamist. Don Gabriel, always ready to strike against the lawless, especially one of the “unruly ox drivers” so irksome to the town, acted at once. He arrested Juan, placed him in the local jail, and reported to the Holy Office of the Inquisition in Mexico City.
Federal-State Relations During the Porfiriato: The Case of Sonora, 1879–1884
Authors: Coerver Don M.
Published: July 2006

Federal-State Relations have long been assigned a prime role in explaining both the success and the ultimate failure of the Porfirian power structure. Despite this importance there have been few detailed analyses on a sub-national basis of the manner in which these relationships were established and maintained. This lacuna is often glossed over through the use of such phrases as pan o palo or poca politica y mucha administracion. While these descriptions are essentially accurate, they often convey little basic information and frequently oversimplify highly-complex political associations. The traditional view of a central government exercising absolute control over federal and local authorities in the provinces is becoming increasingly suspect. The unavailability of Porfirio Díaz's personal papers long precluded a behind the scenes study of this key subject and the many manifestations it assumed. The opening of Díaz's personal archive, La colección General Porfirio Díaz, in the late 1960's provides ample resources for an in-depth investigation into federal-state relations during the Porfiriato.
O Exemplo: Afro-Brazilian Protest in Pôrto Alegre
Authors: Bratzel John F. , Masterson Daniel M.
Published: July 2006

The last fifteen years have witnessed a growing amount of historical scholarship offering sound evidence that slavery and postemancipation racial attitudes in Brazil were not as benign as some historians have suggested. These writings have demonstrated that racial and class prejudice existed both during and after slavery. Comparatively little attention, however, has been devoted to specific studies of free Afro-Brazilians in the years immediately following the passage of the Golden Law in May, 1888. Such studies are required to better understand the problems involved in the integration of blacks and mulattoes into modern Brazilian society.
Inter-American Trade in the Early 1870s— A State Department Survey
Authors: Pletcher David M.
Published: July 2006

A hundred years ago the United States had one of the worst depressions in its history. The disastrous drop in wages, prices, and output threw the mid-1870s into deep gloom and made the Centennial celebrations of 1876 seem to many persons no more than a bad joke. In subsequent years no one found a permanent cure for depressions, but during the late 1870s and 1880s a conviction developed that the Federal government must do more to aid American foreign trade. Thereafter the State Department cooperated increasingly with American business to expand the nation’s influence abroad.
Spanish Folklore in the Southwest: The Pioneer Studies of Aurelio M. Espinosa
Authors: Espinosa J. Manuel
Published: July 2006

The centuries-old Spanish folk heritage of our Southwest, and its many faceted and enduring influence on the cultural life of the region, has been written about from various rims of observation. This article describes the pioneer studies of Aurelio M. Espinosa on Spanish folklore in the Southwest, with special emphasis on northern New Mexico. Although he made important contributions to the study of Spanish folklore of southern Colorado, Arizona, and California, and to that of Spain, Mexico, and other parts of Spanish America as well, he devoted most of his research and field work to the upper half of New Mexico which is the richest field of Spanish folklore in the Southwest.

In viewing the cultural history of New Mexico, Espinosa reminded his readers that its first century as a Spanish colony, the 17th, was the second great century of Spain's Golden Age of arts and letters. With the vigor of Spain's sense of mission in those centuries, her Golden Age radiated to all parts of Spanish America via Mexico City, Lima, and the other principal colonial capitals. At the same time, from the bookshelf and the store of knowledge of the humble missionary, and the folklore of the Spanish settlers, passed down from generation to generation, the spirit of the Golden Age was reflected on the most remote settled frontiers.
The Construction of the Interoceanic Railroad of Guatemala
Authors: Ross Delmer G.
Published: July 2006

For centuries the only roads in Guatemala were no more than trails—slippery and muddy during rainy seasons, dry and dusty during dry seasons, and always treacherous. Travelers who ventured outside the few cities and towns usually walked or rode horses or mules. Freight traveled similarly, on the backs of pack animals or on the backs of men. Consequently, communications were at a minimum; Guatemalans and other Central Americans were isolated. And if they had little communication among themselves, they had less with foreigners. The few ports touched occasionally by foreign ships offered little in the way of trade because of the difficulty of transportation to and from the interior. Under conditions such as these it is no wonder that prosperity was limited and that progress was slow.
The Catholic Historian in Nineteenth Century Chile
Authors: Woll Allen L.
Published: July 2006

Church-State relations in nineteenth century Chile remained relatively calm when compared with tempestuous events occuring in Mexico during the War of the Reform. While tempers flared in both nations when the rights of the Church in a secular society were discussed, the problem was resolved in Chile without bloodshed or violence. The question of the economic power of the Church had already been settled by 1830, as the financial genius of the new Republic, Manuel Rengifo, urged that all lands that had been confiscated by Bernardo O’Higgins in 1824 be returned to the original owners. Despite a well-intentioned belief that Church ownership of land was smothering the economic development of the new nation, the expropriation of these lands failed to produce any dramatic change. While the Treasury received 226, 442 pesos for the sale and rental of these lands, the government was forced to spend 181,297 pesos from 1824 to 1830 in order to finance religious affairs and pay the congregations for the expropriation of their lands. After the Conservative victory at Lircay in 1830 the lands were returned to the Church, providing considerable relief for the heavily burdened state treasury. The minor importance of Church property to the Chilean economy was symbolized by the relative ease of the confiscation and return of the lands, while similar attempts in Mexico unleashed civil war.
The Black Ragamuffins: Racial Hypocrisy in Nineteenth Century Southern Brazil
Authors: Leitman Spencer L.
Published: July 2006

On September 20, 1835, borderland chieftains and their followers in Rio Grande do Sul, known as Farrapos or Ragamuffins, toppled the provincial government in Pôrto Alegre. By November 1836 the Farrapos had established a republican government in the small town of Piratini in the southwest hills of the province; for close to ten years they would withstand the power of the Brazilian Empire in their bid for independence. At the outset, when the rebels had captured the initiative, they were reluctant to use slaves in the Ragamuffin army. Aware of internal security problems and the sanctity of private propetry, the leadership expressed fear of arming and training Afro-Brazilians. But as the maddening horse-war dragged on, the newly created Republic of Rio Grande do Sul became eager for men who might be counted as white. By the end of the Ragamuffin War, slaves were the backbone of the rebel army.