page_title: Lázaro Cárdenas
section_title: Spanish Civil War and refugees in Mexico
hierarchical_section_title: Lázaro Cárdenas / Presidency, 1934–1940 / Spanish Civil War and refugees in Mexico
caption_attribution_description: Español: Ubicado en la Ciudad de México. Monumento de Lázaro Cárdenas. En el fondo se puede observar el parque. English: Located in Mexico City. Monument of Lazaro Cardenas. In the background you can see the park.
context_page_description: Lázaro Cárdenas del Río was a general in the Constitutionalist Army during the Mexican Revolution and a statesman who served as President of Mexico between 1934 and 1940. He is best known for nationalization of the oil industry in 1938 and the creation of Pemex, the government oil company. He also revived agrarian reform in Mexico, expropriating large landed estates and distributing land to small holders in collective holdings.
  Although he was not from the state of Sonora, whose generals had dominated Mexican politics in the 1920s, Cárdenas was loyal to Sonoran general and former president Plutarco Elías Calles. Calles had founded the National Revolutionary Party in the wake of the assassination of Sonoran general Alvaro Obregón, who served as president and was president-elect in 1928. Cárdenas was Calles's hand-picked candidate in 1934 to run for the presidency. While Calles did not hold the title of president, he had remained the power behind the presidency, and expected to maintain that role when Cárdenas took office.
context_section_description: Cárdenas supported the Republican government of Spain against right-wing general Francisco Franco's forces during the Spanish Civil War. Franco was given support by Germany and Italy. Mexico's support of the Republican government was "by selling arms to the Republican army, underwriting arms purchases from third parties, supporting the Republic in the League of Nations, providing food, shelter and education for children orphaned during the Spanish Civil War." 
  Although Mexico's efforts in the Spanish Civil War were not enough to save the Spanish Republic, it did provide a place of exile for as many as 20,000-40,000 Spanish refugees. Among those who reached Mexico were distinguished intellectuals who left a lasting imprint in Mexican cultural life. The range of refugees may be seen from an analysis of the 4,559 passengers arriving in Mexico in 1939 on board the ships Sinaia, Ipanema and Mexique; the largest groups were technicians and qualified workers (32%), farmers and ranchers (20%), along with professionals, technicians, workers, business people students and merchants, who represented 43% of the total. The Casa de España, founded with Mexican government support in the early 1930s, was an organization to provide a safe haven for Spanish loyalist intellectuals and artists. It became the Colegio de México in October 1940, an elite institution of higher education in Mexico, in 1940 with the support of Cárdenas's government.
  In 1936, Cárdenas allowed Russian exile Leon Trotsky to settle in Mexico, reportedly to counter accusations that Cárdenas was a Stalinist. Cárdenas was not as left-wing as Leon Trotsky and other socialists would wish, but Trotsky described his government as the only honest one in the world.
caption: Monument to Cárdenas in Parque España, Mexico City
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