Francisco Madero
Francisco Madero inherited one of the five greatest fortunes in Mexico, so he and his family had done quite well under Porfirio Díaz’ three decades of dictatorship; and he had everything to lose by leading a revolution. But, lead one he did; and lose his life for it he did, too.
Madero was a short, sickly child. He became a teetotaler, a vegetarian, and a spiritualist, convinced that he was a medium who could communicate with the dead. In fact, during one seance, he channeled his deceased brother Raúl, who urged him to abandon his business career and turn to politics: “Aspire to do good for your fellow citizens…working for a lofty ideal that will raise the moral level of society, that will succeed in liberating it from oppression, slavery, and fanaticism.”
Madero soon wrote a best-selling book, The Presidential Succession in 1910, (this time channeling none other than Benito Juárez) in which he daringly decried the Diaz regime, earning for himself the title “The Apostle of Democracy.” He started a political party (which he financed by selling off much of his land, often at a terrible loss) dedicated to “Effective suffrage, no reelection,” and became its immensely popular presidential candidate.
Even though Díaz had promised not to run for reelection, he arrested Madero and, after yet another sham election, declared himself president anew.
Madero escaped and on November 20th (Mexican Revolution Day), 1910, he called for revolution: “Throw the usurpers from power, recover your rights as free men, and remember that our ancestors left us a heritage of glory which we are not able to stain. Be as they were: invincible in war, magnanimous in victory.”
The response, after so many years of injustice, exploitation and suppression, was as enthusiastic as it was widespread, led by a diverse pantheon of revolutionaries including Pascual Orozco, Pancho Villa, Emiliano Zapata, and Venustiano Carranza. Thus, Madero defeated the federal troops with surprising ease, forced Díaz into exile, and, after the first free and fair elections in decades, became Mexico’s celebrated new president.
The honeymoon was short-lived. Madero was a sincere idealist, but an inept, naive politician. Yes, he freed political prisoners, abolished the death penalty, limited the workday to 10 hours, regulated child labor, and unshackled both the unions and the press. Yet, he appointed primarily Díaz’ supporters to his cabinet, redistributed little land; and, while he insisted his revolutionaries put down their arms, he refused to disband the federal army.
By trying to placate everyone, Madero alienated them all. Pancho Villa claimed to have tried to warn him, “You, sir, have destroyed the revolution…. It’s simple: this bunch of dandies have made a fool of you, and this will eventually cost us our necks, yours included.”
As Villa had predicted, a series of counterrevolutions ensued, culminating with the “The Ten Tragic Days” when the general to whom Madero had entrusted his defence, Victoriano Huerta, joined with Diaz’ nephew and the US ambassador to stage a bloody coup. Huerta assassinated Madero, then became a far more brutal and far less effective dictator than Díaz had ever been.
Ironically, so many of the revolutionaries who’d turned against Madero now called him a martyr and used him as their rallying cry in the uprising against Huerta.
And so, the Mexican Revolution resumed and would drag on for seven more horrific years.
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