What events led to the Mexican revolution?

Answer 1

One of the main reasons was the terrible economic inequality created by the dictator Porfirio Diaz.

Porfirio Diaz made sure it happened while he was president the following: sold almost all of Mexican industry to foreign investors ( U.S. and France in particular), in exchange for participation in each of those businesses. He also became the main beneficiary of one of the few remaining industries: the henequen.

The henequen is a natural fiber used to make ropes and early twentieth century, was the leading export from Mexico. The entire production was purchased by United States, and is said that 50 chiefs powerful landowners owned all production, and they all worked for Diaz.

The working conditions for Mexican workers were basically slavery. There was a system called peonage which forced workers to accept monetary loans if they work, knowing that he could never pay. Peonage that gave legal power to employers to make workers work without paying them.

Many workers were brought in the north east, where were all the crops of hemp, and died in less than a year on average by the inhuman conditions of work. That was the reason the Tarahumara of Mexico almost disappeared.

The writer John Kenneth Turner, who did research on the subject of years, says that 1) At that time Mexico was the poorest country in the world, even lower than any African country, 2) that the working conditions in the Southeast were worse than in Siberia, Russia, because at least in Siberia people received salaries and 3) that Diaz was possibly the richest man in the world in those years.

The story is reminiscent of Hitler and Stalin as one of the worst murderers in history, but Diaz was responsible for the deaths of millions of Mexicans from starvation, perhaps as many as Stalin starved.

Answer 2

The Mexican Independence movement against the Spanish monarchy was led by the Bourbon Reforms, and the loss of the Spanish kingdom to the French. The Hapsburg kings ruled New Spain (Mexico) since its addition to the empire. When the last Hapsburg king died the French Bourbon nobles took the throne. They changed the entire governing system of the colonies by creating reforms that led to increased controlled of the royalty to the colonies. Before during the Hapsburg dynasty the colonies of Spain were very autonomous and did as they pleased so long as they gave tribute to the King. When the Bourbon's came in, they created a system that benefited the peninsulares (Spaniards born in the Iberian peninsula but live in New Spain) because they received better government jobs while the increasingly powerful criollos (Spaniards born in Mexico) lost many powers that they had once held. Furthermore, the mestizos (Mexicans of Indigenous and European blood) and Indians both were furious at the increasing taxes from the Bourbon reforms as well as land inequality as the peninsulares became favored in all positions of the economy. The final blow was the French take over of Spain by Napoleon which left the precedent for Mexico to declare independence because the new French king was not the true ruler of the empire. The Mexican independence movement was caused by a fake king and the increasing oppression of the criollos, mestizos, and Indians of Mexico.

Answer 3

The incarceration of Francisco Madero to prevent him from participating on the 1911 elections.

There were two phases of the revolution. The first was triggered when Porfirio Diaz, president of Mexico for the last 27 years got Francisco Madero in jail. Madero was the only contender against Diaz for the 1911 presidential elections, and after escaping prison, on October 5, 1910, Madero issued a "letter from jail" called the Plan de San Luis. It declared the Diaz regime illegal and called for revolt. In late 1910, revolutionary movements broke out in response to Madero's letter, and by May 25 of 1911, Diaz was forced from office and fled the country for France.

Madero led a short-lived, weak regime. Due to his refusal to implement land reforms, he was badly seen by liberals and conservatives alike, and on Februrary 18, 1913 he was assassinated along with the Mexican vice president Jose Maria Pino Suarez during a coup d'etat staged by Mexican General Victoriano Huerta and American ambassador Henry Lane Wilson. This triggered the second phase of the revolution, when many leaders including Emiliano Zapata, Venustiano Carranza and Francisco Villa, felt that Huerta was an illegal usurper of presidential power in violation of the Constitution of Mexico.

Answer 4

explotation, they used to live as slaves