300 UNIT 3 MODERN MESOAMERICA
Figure 8.3 Emiliano Zapata, leader
of the peasant revolutionary forces in
southern Mexico. Courtesy of the
Organization of American States,
Columbus Memorial Library.the part of the United States and England to name his successor (first Madero, then
Huerta, and finally Carranza). Not only did the collapse of authority at the center cre-
ate a vacuum into which the revolutionaries rushed but also outside meddling gave
the movement a strong antiforeign and pronationalist tint. The idea of Mexico as an
independent, “revolutionary” country provided political legitimacy for the new gov-
ernment in the years that followed.