Weekly journal-miner., 1913-08-06
THE INSIDE IN MEXICO.

he Mexican situation needs eN-
 blaming. It is complex condition
 of wheels within wheels. The
 American people have little idea of
 it except that revolution has been
 active for the past three years. Per
 haps it would be better to say many
 revolutions have existed during that
 time. Independent bands unrelated
 to each other have at the same time
 been waging war against the gov ernment
 Some people have an idea that the
 strife has arisen solely from the read
 mess of the Latin to fight when
 stirred up by ambitious demagogues.
 But there is deeper reason. Latin peoples when honestly and justly governed are free from revolution. That is true where the masses have education and equable taxation. Wit ness Argentina, which is not the sole example of Latin-American stability and progress.
 Lying at the base of it all is the fact that in Mexico there is no mid dle class, no saving bourgeois as in the European countries. There is a ruling class composed of the rich, the near rich, the professional and business men. The people of that class are divided into cliques and factions, the leaders of which are striving for political preference and power.
 The working or peon class is com posed of people hopelessly poor and hopelessly ignorant-utterly hopeless except when stirred by the speeches of agitators who promise them an impossible socialistic heaven. They know that any change must be for the better, therefore they are never loath to take up arms for some thing or against something. With many of them the incentive is loot. They know no better. Largely because of the ignorance and the poverty in which they have been brought up and because most of them are strongly mixed with In- dian blood and many of them are unmixed Indian with all the tradi- tions of their savage forefathers, they are cruel and brutal in their method of waging warfare.
 It is said that more than a billion dollars of American money has been invested in Mexico. To that may be added hundreds of millions of dollars invested by the English, the Germans and the French. Foreign CTS have built the railr pads, are operating the mines and the fac tories. They are developing the lum- Der industries and have large ranch and livestock holdings.
 The Mexican invests in nothing, as a rule, except land With him mother earth is the one sure thing in which he can put his money. He wants nothing of your railroads, mines and factories. He does raise cattle and sheep.
 Nearly all of the lands of Mexico are in the hands of a few families, many of them owning up in the mil lions of acres. During the reign of Porfirio Diaz foreigners acquired millions of acres of the public do- main as concessions for which there was little return to the government. President Diaz reasoned that the influx of foreign ac pital meant the industrial development of the country. He reasoned we'll Capital in Mexico flourished and million aires grew overnight, as in Pitts burg during the palmiest days of Andrew Carnegie's activities. Also discontent grew faster.
 The peon was in the habit of working for about twenty-five cents a day. To get and hold the best and the most intelligent of them, the foreigners increased wages about one hundred per cent Beside the {, Mexican -laborer who was getting 1 a peso a day. there were foreign 1 laborers doing the same work who were paid from four to five times | as much Notwithstanding belief to. 1 the contrary, the Mexican laborer l did as much work as the foreigner, and he knew it. While the peon | was getting more money than he 1 ever had before in his life his sense 1 of justice was outraged by the dis which extended not only to his pay but to the house in which | he lived. The house built for the | foreigner employed in the same sort ! of work was much better and more | comfortable. The big companies i made Mexican sections and foreign