Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-09-01
LAND IN MEXICO-By Frederic J. Haskin

The small land owner living on his land
would probably not be molested.
Reds Are Strong
This growing strength of the Red element
in Mexico is the unknown factor in the situa-
ton, according to our informant. He says
that the strength of this element has never
been realized in this country. He points out
that when Red demonstration can get g.
600 men in line, and when the demonstration
is carried out, red flags and ALL without mo-
lestation, the Reds are a political force to
be reckoned with. On the other hand, the
great estates are rapidly being broken up,
and the land distributed in small tracts
among the poems No doubt each peon who
gets good farm ceases to be a Bolshevist
forthwith and becomes a Constitutionalist.
When all who want land have been esiven
land, the extreme radicalism will be confined
to the industrial workers in the large cities,
and in Mexico they are a small fraction of
the population.
The trouble is, according to our informant,
that the breaking up of the big estates is
being carried out clumsily and in way that
disrupts the economic life of the country.
The great land owners are being dispossessed
of their lands without any compensation.
They move away, taking their livestock and
tools. The poems who are given the land
have neither animals nor machinery with
which to work it. The result Is confusion
and idle land.
An instance is related of man who owned
so 900 acres of land He employed all of
the several hundred inhabitants of a village,
mostly Indians. His land was taken away
from him and given t, the Indians. He gath
cred up his possessions, including his horses
and cattle, and prepared to move. delega-
ton from the Indians waited upon him, hat in
hand. They begged him not to go away,
pointing out that they had no means Of cul-
tivating the land. An agreement was finally
reached by which he furnishes seed, tools
and livestock while the Indians furnish the
land. 1t is farmed shares. Everything
goes on much as before. The former land
lord is now the renter, and the former rent
ers are now the landlords. But the differ
ence is nominal. Everyone had plenty to
eat before and everyone still has plenty to
eat.
In other instances the adjustment has not
been made so easily. Lands have been left
idle. Dispossessed landlords have sold out
and have left the country. .
1t would seem to be this readjustment OF
the land tenure which threatens the stability
Of the country. Once it is over, the country
will probably settle down to an era of pro-
duction and prosperity, IL it is not disturbed
from without For it will be land Of con-
tented agriculturists owning their own la
Such men furnish no stuff for revolution.
Mexico's ten years of revolution have been
caused by political opportunists leading
bands of land-hungry poems. With the land
hunger appeased, the fore which the pro-
fessional revolutionists manipulated will pc
gone And the average Of intelligence and
of education in the Mexican electorate will
be raised by infusions Of high-class European
immigration. For good land draws good
men, The United States drew q high-class
of immigrants just as long as it had GOO
grade of land to offer them. And when It
had nothing but shovel in ditch or a
needle in sweat shop to offer them, it be-
gan to draw poor class of immigrants. Mex
leo is land of unused natural wealth which
will dra" wealth of human brain and Drawn
to it,