200 CHAPTER 9 DECOLONIZATION AND THE SEARCH FOR NATIONAL IDENTITIES, 1821–1870
to increase the prosperity of the interior by link-
ing it to the capital and the coasts. In their use of
the central government to promote education
and national economic development, the liberals
showed that they were not doctrinaire adherents
oflaissez-faire.
This liberal program inevitably provoked cleri-
cal and conservative resistance. Army offi cers began
to organize revolts; priests proclaimed from their
pulpits that the great cholera epidemic of 1833 was
a sign of divine displeasure with the works of the im-
pious liberals. Meanwhile, General Antonio López
de Santa Anna, a classic caudillo who earlier had
supported liberal movements, now placed himself
at the head of the conservative rebellion, occupied
the capital, and sent Gómez Farías and Mora into
exile. Assuming the presidency, he summoned a
hand-picked reactionary congress that repealed the
reform laws of 1833 and suspended the constitu-
tion of 1824. The new conservative constitution of
1836 reduced the states to departments completely
dominated by the central government, ensured
upper-class control of politics through high property
and income qualifi cations for holding offi ce, and re-
stored the fueros of the church and army.
Santa Anna and the conservatives ruled Mex-
ico for the greater part of two decades, 1834 to
- Politically and economically, the conserva-
tive rule subordinated the interests of the regions
and the country as a whole to a wealthy, densely
populated central core linking Mexico City, Puebla,
and Veracruz. Its centralist trend was refl ected in
the Tariff Act of 1837, which restored the alcabala,
or sales tax system, inland customhouses, and the
government tobacco monopoly, ensuring the con-
tinuous fl ow of revenues to Mexico City.
Thereafter, conservative neglect and abuse of
outlying or border areas like northern Mexico and
Yucatán contributed to the loss of Texas in 1836
and almost led to the loss of Yucatán. Santa An-
na’s destruction of provincial autonomy enabled
American colonists in Texas, led by Sam Houston,
to pose as patriotic federalists in a revolt against
Santa Anna’s tyranny. In Yucatán, the Caste or So-
cial War of 1839 combined elements of a regional
war against conservative centralism and an indig-
enous war against feudal landlords. For almost a
decade, Yucatán remained outside Mexico.
After the United States annexed Texas in 1845,
the North American Invasion or Mexican War
(1846–1848) marked another conservative dis-
aster. Its immediate cause was a dispute between
Mexico and the United States over the boundary of
Texas, but the decisive factor was the Polk admin-
istration’s determination to acquire California and
New Mexico. The war ended in catastrophic Mexi-
can defeat, largely because conservatives, dreading
the mobilization of peasant armies in a prolonged
guerrilla war against the U.S. invasion, concluded
a hasty surrender. “The Mexican government,”
says Mexican historian Leticia Reina, “preferred
coming to terms with the United States rather than
endanger the interests of the ruling class.” By the
treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848), Mexico gave
up half the country, ceding Texas, California, and
New Mexico to the United States; in return, Mexico
received $15 million and the cancellation of cer-
tain claims against it.
Naturally, puro leaders, including Benito
Juárez, Melchor Ocampo, and Ponciano Arriaga,
urged continued resistance. “Give the people
arms,” said Ocampo, “and they will defend them-
selves.” In some regions of the country, peasant
revolts broke out that combined demands for divi-
sion of large haciendas among the peasantry and
other reforms with calls for a continued resistance
to the invaders. Congressional opposition mobi-
lized against ratifi cation of the treaty and urged
continuing the war. In his “Observations on the
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo,” the liberal Manuel
Rejón predicted that the treaty would mean the
inevitable economic conquest of Mexico by the
United States. He foresaw that the new boundary,
bringing American commerce closer to the Mexi-
can heartland, would lead to the Americanization
of Mexico; he argued that “we will never be able
to compete in our own markets with the American
imports.... The treaty is our sentence of death.”
Finally, in view of the intense American racism, he
questioned whether Mexican citizens in the ceded
territories would be protected in their civil and
property rights as promised by the treaty.