Jamestown weekly alert. [volume] (Jamestown, Stutsman County, D.T. [N.D.]) 1882-1925, 1914-05-07
INTERESTING FACTS
ABOUT MEXICO
Has Had 81 Dictators and
Rulers in So Years.

Recourse to the pages of the new
Encyclopedia Britannica article on
Mexico gives the following informa-
tion of special note at this time:
The advent of Porfirio Diaz as
president of Mexico marks a sharp
change in the affairs of the country.
Diaz brought about many financial
and political reforms, made scrupu-
lous settlement OF all national debts
and welded together the peoples and
tribes of the country. (There are
$50 different Indian tribes.) He es-
tablished railroads and telegraphs
and did all this in land which
for one hundred years had been
the scene of constant revolution and
bloodshed and which had SO dicta-
tors, presidents and rulers in SO
years. Up to the election of Diaz
and in fact till the second election of
Porfirio Diaz to the presidency in
1884, the history of Mexico is one of
almost continuous warfare, in which
Maximilian's empire is a mere epi-
sode. The conflicts which at first
sight seem to be merely between
rival generals, are seen upon closer
examination to be mainly ID be-
tween the privileged classes, j. e.,
the church and Cat times) the army,
and the mass of the other civilized
population, (2) between Centralists
and Federalists, the former being
identical with the army, the church,
and the supporters of despotism,
while the latter represent the desire
for republicanism and local self-gov-
ernment. Similar conflicts are ex-
hibited, though less continuously, by
most Of the other Spanish American
States.
On both sides in Mexico there was
an element consisting of honest doc
trines; but rival military leaders ex-
plotted the struggles in their own in
terest, sometimes taking each side
successfully; and the instability was
intensified by the extreme poverty
of the peasantry, which made the
soldiery reluctant to return to civil
life, by the absence of a regular mid
die class, and by the concentration
of wealth in a few hands, so that
revolutionary chief was generally
sure both of money and of men. But
after 1884, under the rule of Diaz,
the Federal system continued in
name, but it concealed in fact, with
great benefit to the nation, a highly
centralized administration, very in
telligent, and on the whole both pop
ular and successful-a modern form
of rational despotism.
Mexican Blood in Mexico.
AS the Spanish conquerors brought
few women, there was much mixture
of races. Among the pure whites
who were practically all of Spanish
extraction-there were two well-de-
fined classes, the Gachupines or
chepatones, Spaniards born in Eu-
rope, said to be so named in allusion
to their spurs, from Aztec words
meaning "prickers with the foot"
and the native-born or Creoles; the
former, though a small minority, had
almost all the higher positions, both
in the public services and in COM
merce. Besides these there were five
well-defined castes:-Mestizoe (1n-
dian and white), mulattoes (negro
and white), Zambos (negro and In
diam who were regarded as special
ly vicious and dangerous; native In
dians and negroes. But there were
about dozen intermediate named
varieties, of which the salto-atras
(tending away from white) and
tente en- laire (tending towards
white) may be mentioned; and
many of the last named eventually
passed into the Creole class, some
times by the decree of court. The
fact that the trade route to Manila
passed through Vera Cruz, Mexico
City and Acapulco entailed the set
tlement also of few Chinese and
Malays, chiefly on the Pacific coast.
.... Its Area.
Mexico is officially called "Estados
Unidos Mexicanos'' and "Republica
Mexicana." Mexico has an area OF
767,290 square miles. The greatest
length of the country is, from moth
west to southwest, 1900 miles; It's
greatest width is $50 miles, and It's
least width a little short of 140
miles. The outlet of Mexico is some
times compared to huge cornu-