The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1926-09-18
History of the Catholic
Church in Mexico

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leo has not yet workers and peas
ants government, but the peasants
are still armed in great numbers and
the agrarian revolution is still going
forward, while the working class, rs
per cent organized in trade unions,
occupies a strategic position in the life
OF the nation. President Gales,
bourgeois, but sincere national
revolutionary, is carrying out policy
based upon the principle of making
Mexico economically as well as politi-
cally independent. His fear that
the class-conscious workers may
seize too many of the good things that
he wishes to accumulate for petty
Mexican capitalism has led him to
make some ill-conceiVed compromises
with Wall Street and Washington
which proves that petty-bourgeois
leadership cannot be trusted to pilot
the Mexican revolution to fruition.
Nevertheless, his program indicates
many points on which a constructive
Mexican nationalism can base Itself.
The Mexican nation has won the ad-
mirauon of all Latin America. which
looks to it as a leader against U. S
aggression. Turnout Mexico, and
turnout Latin America as well, there
Is a growing consciousness that Mex
leo may be able not only successfully
to resist the encroachments of inn
perialism but to build for itself
sound, independent economic founda-
ton in the process, and at the same
time to lead Latin America along the
path Of unified resistance to the lords
of Wall Street.
Mexican catholicism has no part in
all this. AS usual, it stands in open
opposition to what is plainly the only
program on which truly independent
Mexican nationalism can be embodied.
The Present Conflict.
The present conflict between the
Gales government and the catholic
hierarchy is not religious struggle,
but a struggle between the revolution
and reaction. The fight to nullify the
nationaLreYolutionary constitution of
1917 has been going on for long
time. 1t was first waged around the
anti-foreign and agrarian provisions Of
article 81; then it shifted for time
to article 1913 containing labor pro-
visions); it was again concentrated on
article q when the new oil and land
laws were adopted In the spring OF
this year.
That the general reactionary attack
is now concentrated on the anti-cleri-
cal provisions OF the constitution fol
lows as a matter of course. Since the
debacle of AdoIfo de La Huerta's at
tempted counter-revolution the church
is the only important organized reac-
tionary force in Mexico.
On August / the anti-clerical pro-
visions of the constitution were to go
into effect. The provisions to which
the church took particular exception
were those prohibiting the church
from holding property, requiring the
civil registration of all priests, secu-
larizing primary education, and deny
ing to ecclesiastical publications the
right to invade the field of politics.
Against the provision for registration
the clergy declared a general strike.
With the advice of Rome, an interdict
was laid upon the country. All church
functions requiring the participation
Of a priest were discontinued. Twenty
five thousand priests announced them
selves in open rebellion against the
revolution.
Behind the church was the reaction.
Wealthy Mexican aristocrats organ
lied themselves into the League for
Religious Defense and declared boy
colt on Injuries, the announced pur-
pose being to paralyze all economic
life and thus bring the government to
it's knees.
However, the rebellion has already
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