The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1872-08-15


Tho Policy OF Railways and Tsle-
| graphs.
Our latest advices from the city Of Mexico
give us q more hopeful view in behalf Of
the establishment of law and order in that
revolutionary republic. While the Cabinet of
Lerdo de Tejada the constitutional President
pro tem, is still an open question it is the gen.
eral belief that he will be regularly elected to
the Presidency with but slight opposition. The
country is becoming paciied the roads are
safe-that u.s. comparatively clear of highway
robbers-confdence is being restored in the
ally expected to follow. Martial law has been
revoked in several of the States where it had
been found necessary by Juarez to enforce it,
and the local civil authorities Of those States
have been restored with their full powers; and
such revolutionary leaders against Juarez as
Diaz, Negrete, Aravarrite, jose Pestillo,
Mariana and Gonzales had accepted the am
nesty offered them, and many Of them had
reported in person at the capital. Best of all
is the report that President Lerdo's course
gives general satisfaction; and better even
STILL as we are assured to-day, that the re-
bellion in Mexico is closed. and that railroad
surveyors are travelling through the territory
unmolested.
In the presence of all these facts in favor Of
the pacific and conciliatory policy of President
Lerdo, it does not appear violent assumption
on the part of the Traits d Union that his for
NAL election as President is question of life
or death to the Republic. It is apparent that
he has shown himself to be the very man
needed at the head of the government for this
crisis in Mexican affairs The long admins
tration of Juarez-a fighting administration
from first to last-had resulted in establishing
civil war, which would doubtless have lasted
while he held the government, had he lived to
hold it by the bayonet for five, ten or twenty
years to come His death has disarmed the
rebel leaders and their fighting factions, organ
lied and maintained for the single purpose of
putting him out. Hence the ready responses
of the revolutionary generals to the amnesty
offered by President Lerdo. This popular man,
having no enemies to punish and no revenges
to satisfy, and having the solid advantages of
the army and the sinews Of war left him by
Juarez, sets out like full-freighted ship with
a fayoring wind and tide, though on danger
GUS voyage.
A glorious opportunity is thus offered Lerdo
de Tejada for name and fame as President
of Mexico which will eclipse the fame of Ju-
arez and all his predecessors in the substan-
tal benefits secured to his country, although
the name of Juarez will be henceforth, in the
the history of Mexico, associated with the ex-
pulsion of foreign imperial usurpation and
armed occupation, and with the establish
ment, against q powerful Mexican party, in
the field of argument and the field of battle, of
civil and religious liberty. Juarez had prepared
the ground from which rich harvest may be
secured to Mexico through President Lerdo
by simply rising to the grandeur of the golden
opportunity before him. On being regularly
established in his government by ''the will of
the people," and after providing the needful
safeguards against revolutionary disturbers,
highwaymen and border cattle-stealers and
assassins, President Lerdo should look at once
to the policy of uniting the Mexican States
with the central government and of developing
on grand scale, the enormous material re-
sources of the country, mineral, agricultural
and manufacturing. And the simple scheme
by which both these great objects may be COW
cred is a scheme of railways and telegraphs,
binding the country together with bands Of
iron, bringing the remotest parts into direct
rapport with the capital and giving to those
districts which are now almost inaccessible to
trade quick and easy communications with
each other and the capital and with the
reciprocal traffic of the United States.
| To Mexico, an extensive section of the Con-
tinent of seacoast lowlands, mountains and
elevated table lands, without navigable rivers,
a network of railways is as necessary for the
development of the resources of the country
as it is to our new States and Territories west
of the Mississippi. Within twenty years-yea,
ten-more may be done by comprehensive
network Of railways to develop the unmeas-
ured riches of Mexico than has been done
since the invasion Of Cortes. Nor can we over
estimate the importance to Mexico, in politi-
col view, Of On extensive system Of railways
and telegraphs. With even single line of
rails and wires running through the Republic
via the capital, from north to south, and
another from Vera Cruz across to the Pacific,
that imperial armed occupation by the French
would have been impossible. Without these
powerful agents Of national strength, unity
and cohesion, railways and telegraphs, we
could not have put down JEFF Davis and his
Southern Confederacy, and we could have done
nothing with our States and Territories west
ward of the Rocky Mountains. Without rail-
ways and telegraphs there would have been no
such thing as Italian unity or German unity,
or French Republic in the place of Louis
Napoleon. Without railways and telegraphs
there can be no such thing as national unity,
STRENGTH or cohesion among the Mexicans.