The Alaska citizen., 1914-07-13

terview published in the Saturday
Evening Post. declared that his de
termination is to provide the people
Of Mexico with their former rights
10 the land, though just how thaj
can be done without infringing on
the rights of others. the President
was not ready to explain.
II seems that the President has
been carefully studying the condi-
tons in Mexico and has learned that
the poor, ignorant poems have been
robbed of their lands by the crafty
men who have been controlling the
government.
Just how this robbery of lands
from the poems has been accomplish
ed and how it figures in the present
war is Interestingly told in the New
York Times. by Reed, the war cores
pendent Of that newspaper. who spent
four months with the Mexican revol-
utionists Reeds article in part is
as follows:
Only on Revolution.
The correspondents have spoken
of the Madero revolution, the Oroz-
60 revolution, the Carranza revolu-
ton, and the Zapata revolution; but
there is and has been only one revolu
ton in Mexico. 1t is very necessary
at this time that the American PEG
pie should know what the revolu
lion is about.
1T was at first purely and simply
fight for land During the last
twenty years of the Porfirio Diaz
regime the landed aristocracy of
Mexico. created originally by the
Spanish land grants, slowly and de-
finitely absorbed the open cattle
ranges, the communal fields around
the towns, the village commons, and
lastly. the small independent farms
| that had been held sometimes by
one family for three generations,
Then the big haciendados banded to-
gether and secured the passage of
the Land Law of 1896, which per-
mitted the denunciation of all pro
perty in the Republic not secured
| by a legal title. Since most of the
small holdings were occupied by ill
| iterate poems. too ignorant to know
anything about titles, and since in
many cases their occupancy of the
land had been undsturbed for gen
erations, great tracts of fertile coun-
try passed into the hands Of the ha-
ciendados. And for the tenants
evicted by the aid of federal soldiers
there was no alternative but to be-
comes slaves on great estates and
no hope for the future
Poems Wanted Homes.
1T was and is nothing but a
revolution of the poems. And the
first man who proposed any plan,
no matter how inadequate, to remedy
the land question was followed. Ia
pata rose in arms year before
Madero did, demanding confiscation
and distribution of the great estates
among the poems and political auton-
omy for two great states. Madero's
| proclamation to the Mexican people
from prison at San Luis Potosi in
famed the poems only because he
| promised to acquire the big land
! monopolies and reapportion them
| among the poor But when his gov
eminent was established in Mexico
| City, either he became conservative.
or because of political pressure,
| he was unable to carry out his plans,
! or the time was too short; anyway.
the situation remained the same, and
| the poems became discontinued.
First, Zapata abandoned him and
raised the standard of War for the
Land then OroZco issued the plan
of Tacubaya, in which he promised
the poems free farms. In the twina
ling of an eye the turbulent North
rose in arms, but Orozco betrayed
the poems. He had been bribed by
the big landowners to embarrass
Madero, whom they feared. and never
intended to settle the land question
at all When the poems learned
that, they abandoned his red flag by
thousands and returned, hopeless and
disheartened, to their homes. Zapa
ia, who had acknowledged Orozco
as president of Mexico, renowned
him. And that was why the Orozco
revolution failed.
when Carranza proclaimed him
self First Chief of the Revolution
on the death of Madero, he cleverly
Endorsed the principles of Madero
as set forth in the plan of San Luis
Potosi, but put all the emphasis up
on the restoration of constitutional
government in Mexico. Either be-
cause he was afraid that if he made
promises he could not fulfill them