Arizona weekly enterprise., 1890-12-20
DOWN SOUTH.
SOME OF THE CUSTOMS PECULIAR
 TO MEXICO.
How a Republic is Managed--The Degra' dation of LabOr---The PeOns Happy
 Even though held in Bondage.
BY JOHN A. SPRING.

house whose executive officer IS the Presl- dent with a more or less numerous cabi- net of secretaries, there called 'ministros." Each one of these countries has adopted at one time or other a certain constitution, | supposed to be the base of all legislation. subject under certain conditions to changes LOT so-called amendments. | Hence it would appear that these repub- | lies have governments similar to ours ln | the most essential features The differ | ence however Is this: The United States | government is practically a democracy i while the republics referred to are so only | in theory or, to be more plain. on paper, while in reality their chief executive | officers are for the most part more or less absolute rulers who in the good old days of republican Greece would have been at least banished forever from Athens and stoned to death at Sparta without com junction by the whole populace, senators, | patricians and plebeians.
 It Is by this time a well known fact that the President of our sister republic on our southern frontier rules his country with on iron hand the liberty of the press and to great extent the freedom of
 speech are mere chimeras; the ballot box
 is mere toy, a jack-in the box who jumps
 out at the pulling of the string by the
 federal party and if this should be divid-
 ed into different factions. by the Presi-
 dents faction. An election day in the re-
 public of Mexico Is completely devoid of
 all excitement; there are no public discus
 sions. processions and arguments pre-
 ceding the election and on the day itself
 there is very little voting. The reasons
 are self evident About seven eighths of the population can neither read nor write and vote only if compelled to do so The educated class know that if they vote for
 candidate in opposition to the govern
 ment's aspirant their votes will either dis appear or be changed, and those who are
 in with the powers that be know perfectly
 well that whether they go to the polls or
 not their man will be elected to certainty. Hence 1t Is not surprising that 1n a city
 containing two thousand legitimate voters
 hardly from three to four hundred votes
 are boiled on an average. In sparsely
 settled districts this average may be safely
 reduced by one half.
 Porfrio Diaz maintains federal army
 of nearly 50,O00 men, well drilled, dis
 ciplined, armed and especially well
 offered, for it cannot be denied that the
 military academy at Chapultepec turns
 out officers who, being sons of the
 most respectable families, are thoroughly
 instructed in all military sciences and
 receive thorough college education be-
 sides. With such an army at his com
 mand who will, who can deny, that Por-
 firio Diaz is the absolute ruler of Mex
 ico?
 But let us consider for awhile what
 manner of use he is making of his great
 power and especially what may be, I think
 undoubtedly are, his motives for con
 centrating in the executive such absolut-
 ism. Let us turn for moment to the
 history of England where we find the
 Hong parliament" treading severely upon
 the toes of the monarch Charles l , For twelve long years this selfish and un-
 scrupulous king had ruled without a parliament; ignoring magma charta and all | other guarantees of English freedom he ; levied heavy taxes such as poundage tonnage and ship money. The corrupt } twelve judges of the Court of Exchequel said that it was impossible these things
 could be wrong, because the king could
 do no wrong, however hard he tried and he really did try very hard during these
 twelve years. The reaction came as come , it will and must in every like occasion; its r eliminating point was the execution o , Charles First at Whitehall palace. Tc
 those who have called and still will cal r that unfortunate monarch a martyr 5 would say: Remember those long twelve years"
 : We'll now in this case the tyrant came , first, the peoples rule came next. If VIC : now turn to the history of Mexico, quit, 5 recent, by the way, and look backward g from the presidency of Porhrio- -Diaz i what do we ind? During more thar ] twenty-five years our unhappy sister re ] public had been torn to pieces by { l formidable foreign invasion, civil war g innnmerable revolutions of more or les g magnitude; the male population was be : ing gradually eradicated from the face o t the earth; we find to-day nine femal. t, one male in the neighboring state of So t nora. These revolutions were neve 5 started by the people at large; the poore l classes were as a rule too ignorant an( 8 too happy to even think of pronuncia 1 mento; 1t was in most cases the ambition e governor of state of the confederation 6 who by bribes, threats, promises and var [ ious other means would procure a stron, l. following and sometimes alone, sometime q with the aid and support of other gover ]. nors try to overthrow the existing admin d istration under one pretext or another t Thus the whole republic was constant,
 involved in bloody strife where quit y frequently father fought against son | brother against brother, where neithe k life nor properly could be effectively pro t tected. Porfrio Dlaz saw this; he knev s that the greater the cancer the sharpe l. must be the surgeons knife and deepe Il the cut Without infringing too muc It upon the rights of the individual state > he began the work of centralzation an, J. the creation of a powerful and reliabl e federal army with which to quell at one > and radically any and every revolutionar } movement and to protect the lives an n- property of his countrymen. This regula l. army, usually bugbear to every republi 1T can government, is for Mexico necessar e evil as yet although it consumes a larg 2 part of the public revenue and causes 1- heavy burden of taxation. The civ It service is well regulated and care is take r. that the revenue reaches the treasur IS and every possible effort is put forth t le increase the public schools and to brin @ those alreadyin existence to respectabl r. standard of efficiency. Railroads, wate @ and highways. large irrigation canals an
 aqueducts are being built and the minin IT industry has taken an impetus beyon 0 the most sanguine expectation. If ther It fore President Diaz has accumulated, Il r. great power which by virtue of his hig al station he now yields, for the purpose le bringing about all these ameliorations | 10 deserves to be classed among the re d formers of mankind, especially so if th K same results could not be obtained b g less rigorous measures; whereas If he ha n concentrated this almost absolute autho @ ity over eleven millions of souls to satisf a the thirst of selfish ambition, then he ha 'n imply murdered republic and should b at desecrated like any tyrant that ever el W slaved nation.
 is While cannot share the apprehel ,e sions of Dr. Gregory as to the detriment le results of English capital taking a foo G. hold (no matter how strong) in our r D. public, this matter assumes for obvior ln reasons different aspect in our sister F Id public and I much fear that Mexico
 paying too much for her whistle; that sI as is admitting within her gates a woodt 1t, horse more formidable and which wi e, eventually be more fateful than the Or, r. clan horse of Troyes; but as this involv, "a, question of political economy to of solved in the course of future events V lg will ignore it here.
 The population of Mexico may be, D. rather is, divided into three distin ct classes: The aristocracy, middle al at laboring classes; for middle we mig le ! auhstituta thA French word hour0aOisa