From ‘Regeneración’, English Section, June 28 to July 5, 1913, Los Angeles, edited by William C. Owen (uncredited), having originally appeared in the Spanish language in ‘Cultura Obrera’, May 3, 1913, NYC, edited & published by P. Esteve
It never surprised me that the Mexican Revolution was finding no great echo in non-Spanish speaking countries, and I explained to myself easily how it came about that occasional Anarchist papers, such as the “Temps Nouveaux,” of Paris, or “Il Risveglio,” of Geneva, had not reached an understanding of and were even abusing it.
For, here we have a movement with features that in our struggles are completely new; and, since they get no direct reports, have to refer to the bourgeois press of Europe and North America, which represents the movement as of a political character, and, owing to their ignorance of Spanish, cannot consult Mexican papers, it is difficult for those who do not know Mexico to believe it possible that a revolutionary movement for the obtaining [of] land and liberty can exist in a country where there have been no proofs of life, and no Anarchist, Socialist or even workingman’s forces on which to draw.
To such persons the Mexican Revolution differs little from the innumerable revolts which are taking place almost constantly in Central and South America, the motive power being, “Get out that I may have your place.”
I myself looked at the matter thus, at first, and I attached little importance to the agitation a few comrades were making on their own account. I believed they would meet the fate which befell those who joined hands with the Cuban Insurrectos, when they were fighting for their independence — that of dying uselessly on the field of battle or passing over into the camp of politics.
But here, in North America, there was a little nucleus of men, who knew Mexico because they had been born and lived and had struggled there and who, after having studied the theories of Anarchism, insisted that the Mexican revolutionary movement had as its object, not a change of governments, but possession of the land and the freeing of the Mexican peon.
Their Propaganda Developed
These men had formed part of the Junta of a so-called Mexican Liberal Party, whose [1906] program had been far from satisfactory to me. However, their work as propagandists and revolutionists interested me. I followed it eagerly and saw how, little by little, it kept on becoming more radical until finally it developed into a propaganda frankly Anarchist-Socialist.
I convinced myself that the Mexican Revolution was very different from the revolts that are chronic with the other nations of Central and South America, and in the columns of “Cultura Proletaria” of New York and “L’Era Nuova,” of Paterson, I issued an appeal to the proletariat of all the world, and, above all, to the Anarchists, urging them to give moral and material aid in the Mexican revolutionists who, to the cry of “Land and Liberty,” were struggling on the fields of Mexico, arms in hand.
I wrote also to various comrades in Europe, inviting them to keep an eye on the revolutionary movement developing in Mexico. I do not repent having done so, and I do not think my forecasts were erroneous.
Two years have passed and I have more hopes of the Mexican Revolution than I had then. Does that mean that I look for the immediate triumph there of [the] Anarchist and Socialist? No I believe that the triumph of Anarchist-Socialism will be universal or will not come at all. If the Mexican revolutionists should reach the point at which they abolished the government and took possession of the land and all the social wealth, the Mexicans would have to contend against all other nations, who would league themselves against them, for if they would not permit the existence of such a regime in diminutive Andorra they certainly would not in a country so large as Mexico.
But — are Anarchists to support only such movements as are purely anarchistic, and are certain to succeed or have, at least, great prospects of success? Surely no one ever dreamed of such a thing, and yet they decry the Mexican Revolution because as yet it has not succeeded in implanting Anarchist Socialism.
Where Is Their Logic?
Those who grew enthusiastic over the triumph of the “Young Turks,” and the Portuguese and Chinese revolutions; those who consider all movements of the workers that acquire any extension and lead to turbulence as being of transcendental importance, though they may have no other object than that of a slight increase of wages or a small diminution of the hours of toil; those who commemorate the taking of the Bastille or the proclamation of the Commune, and loudly extol Barcelona’s “tragic week;” those who risk their lives and liberties in insignificant strikes, and who have got to the point at which they consider every rebellious act worthy of praise, though it may have neither an emancipation nor libertarian character — can such persons refuse importance to the Mexican Revolution or depreciate it because the great part of those engaged in it are not convinced Anarchists? If they are logical, I think not.
That the Mexican Revolution is not a simple revolt, to eject one man and put another in his place, has been demonstrated by facts. Madero knew how to abrogate to himself the position of representing the Mexican revolutionists, expelled Porfirio Diaz from power and even from the country, and seated himself in the Republic’s presidential chair — but the revolution went on as potently, of even more so, as when Madero was pretending to direct it.
Vasquez Gomez sought to lead the movement and broke down, but the movement pursued its ascending way. Part of the garrison of Mexico City revolted and, acting in accord with his military rivals, got rid of Madero, assassinated him and caused Huerta to be named as interim president of the Republic, that time might be gained in which to legalize the presidency of Felix Diaz — and the revolution goes on all the time, the more powerful because it has no visible head. No; what it wants is not the presidential chair or “get out that I may have your place,” but the land, to be cultivated for the people’s own benefit.
Some of the Mexican revolutionists will be Indians, who are Communists by tradition; others, the peons, will be peasants who desire a piece of land to cultivate for themselves; others will be adventurers in search of loot, who fish in the stream of revolution and are the tools of different ambitious men; a few will be convinced Anarchists. But they are nearly all men who no longer expect anything from the government; who have no longer any respect for property; who set prisoners at liberty and burn records wherever they pass; who appropriate whenever they can and carry as the motto of their red flag the words “Land and Liberty.”
What of it that they do not understand our doctrines? Did the French peasants who assaulted the feudal castles in 1789 understand the doctrines of the Encyclopedists? Were those who, in 1835, burned the Spanish convents, atheists? Are workingmen who fight against capital, and its defender, Government, all Anarchists or Socialists? No. Only a minority, a very small minority, has been convinced. It is intuition that impels the others to combat their enemies. The mission of revolutionists is precisely to convert into conscious act this intuitive impulse, and it is for this we make our propaganda, for this we agitate, for this we struggle in the midst of the mass.
Doing Their True Work
This has been the work of Ricardo Flores Magon and his companions of the Mexican Liberal Party Junta (from which they succeeded in throwing overboard the political ballast it had originally carried) up to the moment when they crossed the threshold of the prison in which they are now incarcerated. They made “Regeneracion” a frankly Anarchist paper, which urged the Mexican people to struggle against all government, against private property and against the Church.
That “Les Temps Nouveaux” can describe that work as “incoherent and ridiculous” explains itself to us by the fact that in all probability there is no one on its staff who is able to read “Regeneracion.” Let “Les Temps Nouveaux” reproduce the article entitled “The Worker’s Future,” by Magon, which our celebrated colleague ought to receive and read.
I know Magon only by his letters and by what he has written in “Regeneracion;” I do not know if he is or is not proud; but it appears to me most incorrect to attack him when he is in prison and, therefore, rendered incapable of defending himself, and more than incorrect — being unjust — to say that “Regeneracion” is still an “incoherent and sterile paper.”
It is certain that only a few numbers of “Regeneracion” make their way into Mexico, but it circulates freely in the Mexican colony of North America, which sustains it, although to do so costs more than a hundred dollars a week.
From that colony many Mexican revolutionists (and how many of other nationalities!) have crossed the frontier to fight for the revolution and implant the principles of Anarchist Communism. It is certain that many have perished on the battle-field, and that not a few (above all those who had become chieftains) have passed over to the political side. But nobody who has read “Regeneracion” can deny that its campaign has been, from the very beginning of the revolution, Anarchistic.
Ought Anarchists to depreciate the Mexican Revolution because in it Anarchist-Socialist ideas have not been able to accomplish the miraculous? Does not the force this revolution is showing, in spite of the various political changes, tell us anything? If we co-operate gladly with every workingman’s movement, however insignificant it may be and however poor its aspirations, why should we not co-operate with one in which almost an entire nation is trying to free itself from the economic and political yoke?
That the money collected here and outside this country has not gone to those who are fighting on the battlefield — who knows? Perhaps “Regeneracion” has not published details of all the amounts sent it, or indicated how they have been invested — whether for “Regeneracion” itself and “the printing of manifestos, or for the assistance of comrades.
Does any one think that with a few cents and a few hundred dollars it is possible to supply with artillery those who are fighting for Land and Liberty? They get that for themselves, by attacking the federal troops. At the worst, some comrade resident in the country will be able to furnish the wherewithal to get a gun and a little ammunition, but generally those who have crossed the frontier have supplied themselves with these.
The important thing for the Mexican Revolution is not that we should aid it with a few cents, but that we should make all the world acquainted with it and create an atmosphere, favorable to it, so that if North American or European intervention should come it may be checked or at least, weakened; that those who have the courage and the means to do so should join the fighters; that we should do for it, at least, what we do for every workingman’s movement directed against the exploiter; in short, that we should give our moral and material support to those who have undertaken the difficult and dangerous labor of converting from intuition to consciousness the fine revolutionary movement which has as its object the gaining possession of the land and the freeing of the Mexican peon from the semi-slavery it which he used to live.
Is this Anarchist work? I continue to believe it is.
Also
Voices of Mexican Anarchists & Supporters
Anarchism & Indigenous Peoples
Preface to ‘Land and Liberty’, by Albert Meltzer (1977)
Pedro Esteve (1865-1925), from Wikipedia
The Social Revolution in Sonora, by Ricardo Flores Magón (1914)
The Mexican Comrades at McNeils, from Why? (1913)
A True Indian Type, by William C. Owen (1913)
A Livelong Propagandist [Honoré J. Jaxon], by William C. Owen (1912)
Manifesto of the Organizing Junta of the Mexican Liberal Party to the People of Mexico (1911)
Reds Die For Freedom, by the Industrial Workers of the World (1911)
Will this Struggle be Drowned in Blood?, by Voltairine de Cleyre (1911)
Capitalism in Mexico, by Honoré J. Jaxon (1911)
The Tragic Week in Catalonia, from Freedom (1909)
To the Cuban People, by Errico Malatesta (1900)
Cuba, by Fernando Tarrida del Mármol (1899)
Anarchists & Socialists debate the Mexican Revolution (featuring anti-Indigenous/anti-Mestizo racism)
“…standing out amongst our enemies [who are engaged in a smear campaign against Mexican revolutionaries], Luigi Galleani of Cronaca Sovversiva and Jean Grave of Les Temps Nouveaux.”
-Ricardo Flores Magón, Regeneración, Los Angeles, April 13, 1912
Observations and Comments on the Mexican Revolution, from Mother Earth (1911)
The Mexican Revolt, by Voltairine de Cleyre (1911)
Open Letter to Eugene V. Debs, by Lucille Norman (1911)
Murderous Silence: Luigi Galleani and Cronaca Sovversiva, from Regeneración Sezione Italiana (1911)
The Mexican People are Suited to Communism, by Ricardo Flores Magón (1911)
When Put to the Test, by William C. Owen (1912)
Anarchists Who Are All Talk?, by Estela Arteaga / No More Charades!, by Lucia Norman (1916)
U.S. Socialists and the Mexican Revolution, by Dan La Botz (2010)
“The Whole World is Our Country” [featuring racism from Luigi Galleani], by Kenyon Zimmer (2015)
