Living and Writing in Mexico

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An except from my, “A Gringo Guide to the Cristero Rebellion”.

When General Plutarco Elías Calles was elected President during the summer of 1924, he was regarded as a leader of the left wing, an enemy of the old military chieftains, and the hacendados who hated agrarian reform. He had little of Obregón’s tolerance. He proposed to govern as a master, if necessary as a dictator.

He paid little attention to Obregón who was forced to return to his farm in Sonora.

Calles entered office with a passion for social reform, promising to enforce provisions of the Constitution which Obregón had chosen to ignore. In his four years he would advance the promises of the Revolution.

(In Chicago Al Capone was king in 1925, with a gang of 700 gunsels controlling 10,000 speakeasies. In New York the “New Yorker” magazine was launched, tackling American life with a wicked, penetrating wit.)

The Calles period would be one of commercial prosperity, and as a result the government had more money at its disposal. Calles carried forward the Educational Program which had been initiated by José Vasconcelos, started campaigns of sanitation and hygiene, began extensive programs for irrigation, and built modern roads.
Calles was also embroiled in a battle with “foreign” oil companies for control of the oil fields, and their wealth. He threatened to, “light up New Orleans with the fire of the oil fields.”

Agrarian reform moved forward with the distribution of 8 million acres to 1,500 villages, and agricultural banks were formed. But serious opposition began to fester among Church radicals who were bitterly opposed to land redistribution.

In April of 1926, the Church republished speeches in opposition to the Constitution, and the conflict began to look like a war to the death between the Church and the Revolution.

On March 5, 1926, President Plutarco Elías Calles urged state governors to enforce constitutional articles on religion saying, “As long as I am President of the Republic, the Constitution of 1917, will be obeyed”.

In a dramatic attempt to focus public opinion, the Church decreed a cessation of public worship. On Sunday, August 1, 1926, not one priest mounted the altar of a Mexican church for morning Mass for the first time in 400 years.

Chapter Six

THE CRISTERO REBELLION
The Cristeros, soldiers of Christ, were country people of the States of Jalisco, Michoacán, Guanajuato, Durango, and Zacatecas. They were mostly landed farmers, students, and women in whose lives religion played an important part. They followed the orders given by an association known as, the Catholic Association of Mexican Youth (ACJM).

On September 21, 1926, Congress rejected a petition to rescind the repressive laws against the Church, signed by 2 million Catholic Mexicans. The only course of action left for the NLRD was to take up arms.

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