Emiliano Zapata
According to a perhaps apocryphal story, when Emiliano Zapata was but nine years old, he asked his father why so many families, unlike his, were landless and destitute. (As much as 90% of Mexican peasants and Natives had lost their lands during the Reforma and Porfirio Díaz’ long reign.) When his father answered that there was nothing to be done, Zapata replied, “Nothing? Well, when I am older, I will return their lands to them.”
Zapata dedicated (and gave) his life to fulfilling that pledge.
As a young man, Zapata joined a delegation to “President” Díaz to plead the peasants’ cause but was arrested for his efforts and banished to the military. Years later, after the elders of his town of Anenecuilco elected him its council president, he tried by legal means to return land to its deeded owners. When that failed, he and his armed compatriots simply took it back. And, when Francisco Madero called for Revolution, Zapata became the Wiley general of the Southern Liberation Army. Although dismissed by even the other revolutionaries as merely an uncivilized bandit because his soldiers were mostly poor and Native, he won many crucial battles and helped win the revolution.
Zapata quickly became disillusioned with Madero, who reneged on his promise of land reform. So, Zapata published his Plan of Ayala, which Harvard economist/historian John Womack called “sacred scripture.” Borrowing from Ricardo Flores Magón’s writing, the plan demanded “Reform, Liberty, Justice and Law.” Specifically, it insisted that land stolen during the previous decades finally be returned, and for at least a third of the large haciendas and corporate estates to be distributed to the landless. “Mexicans,” Zapata implored, “consider that the cunning and bad faith of one man is shedding blood in a scandalous manner, because he is incapable of governing; consider that his system of government is choking the fatherland and trampling with the brute force of bayonets on our institutions…”
Zapata called for Mexicans to continue the revolution against, first, Madero, then Victoriano Huerta, and finally even Venustiano Carranza, relentlessly fighting to achieve his Plan of Ayala. Of all the revolutionaries, only he remained true to the cause of real reform: “The land for those who work it.”
Madero, Huerta and Carranza used ruthless, scorched-earth tactics against Zapata, which only increased the people’s support for him. Finally, Carranza resorted to a devious ruse to assassinate him.
As if it were that easy to get rid of Emiliano Zapata! His vision endured. President Álvaro Obregón (who assassinated Carranza—what came around went around!) allowed Zapata’s followers to redistribute land in Zapata’s home state of Morelos. More importantly, his Plan of Ayala became a cornerstone for the truly liberal Constitución of 1917. Marlon Brando portrayed him in the 1952 Academy-Award winning film Viva Zapata!
Even today, many indigenous uprisings throughout Latin America against multinational land/resource/peasant exploitation cite Zapata as their inspiration, including the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, which continues its epic struggle in Mexico’s southernmost state of Chiapas.
And throughout the world Zapata stares fiercely out from huge public photographs and posters, dressed in his charro outfit, grasping a rifle and a sword, still proclaiming his immortal statement of defiance, “I’d rather die on my feet, than live on my knees!”
Emiliano Zapata lives on.
This is a selection from Ellison’s recently published book, Mexican Streets: Tales of Tragedy and Triumph, available on Amazon, at Handy Mail and Diane Pearl’s.
- Streets of Mexico – May 2025 - April 30, 2025
- Streets of Mexico – Mexico - March 30, 2025
- Streets of Mexico – March 2025 - February 27, 2025
