Editing Mexican Revolution (section)

==1917 Constitution==
{{main|Constitution of Mexico}}
{{see also|Plan of Agua Prieta}}
[[File:Congreso Constituyente de 1917.jpg|thumb|The new constitution was approved on 5 February 1917. This picture shows the Constituent Congress of 1917 swearing fealty to the new Constitution]]

The Constitutionalist Army fought in the name of the 1857 Constitution promulgated by liberals during the [[La Reforma|Reform era]], sparking a decade-long armed conflict between liberals and conservatives. In contrast, the 1917 Constitution came at the culmination of revolutionary struggle. Drafting a new constitution was not a given at the outbreak of the Revolution. Carranza's 1913 Plan of Guadalupe was a narrow political plan to unite Mexicans against the Huerta regime and named Carranza as the head of the Constitutionalist Army. Increasingly revolutionaries called for radical reform. Carranza had consolidated power and his advisers persuaded him that a new constitution would better accomplish incorporating major reforms than a piecemeal revision of the 1857 constitution.<ref>Niemeyer, E. V. ''Revolution at Querétaro: The Mexican Constitutional Convention of 1916–1917''. Austin: University of Texas Press 1974, 26–27</ref>

In 1916 Carranza was only acting president at the time, and the expectation was to hold presidential elections. He called for a constituent congress to draft a new document based on liberal and revolutionary principles. Labor had supported the Constitutionalists and [[Red Battalions]] had fought against the Zapatistas, the peasant revolutionaries of Morelos. As revolutionary violence subsided in 1916, leaders of the Constitutionalist faction met in Querétaro to revise the 1857 constitution. The delegates were elected by jurisdiction and population, with the exclusion of those who served the Huerta regime, continued to follow Villa after the split with Carranza, as well as Zapatistas. The election of delegates was to frame the creation of the new constitution as the result of popular participation. Carranza provided a draft revision for the delegates to consider.

Once the convention was in session after disputes about delegates, delegates reviewed Carranza's draft constitution. That document was a minor revision of the 1857 constitution and included none of the social, economic, and political demands for which revolutionary forces fought and died. The convention was divided between conservatives, mostly politicians who had supported Madero and then Carranza, and progressives, who were soldiers who had fought in revolutionary battles. The progressives, deemed radical [[Jacobins]] by the conservatives, "sought to integrate deep political and social reforms into the political structure of the country."<ref>Gilly, ''The Mexican Revolution'', 232.</ref> making principles for which many of the revolutionaries had fought into law.

The [[Mexican Constitution of 1917]] was strongly nationalist, giving the government the power to expropriate foreign ownership of resources and enabling land reform (Article 27). It also had a strong code protecting organized labor (Article 123) and extended state power over the [[Roman Catholic Church in Mexico]] in its role in education (Article 3).

{{lang|es|[[Villistas]]}} and {{lang|es|[[Zapatistas (Mexican Revolution)|Zapatistas]]}} were excluded from the Constituent Congress, but their political challenge pushed the delegates to radicalize the Constitution, which in turn was far more radical than Carranza himself.<ref name=":0">{{cite journal|last=Centeno|first=Ramón I.|date=2018-02-01|title=Zapata reactivado: una visión žižekiana del Centenario de la Constitución|journal=Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos|language=es|volume=34|issue=1|pages=36–62|doi=10.1525/msem.2018.34.1.36|s2cid=149383391 |issn=0742-9797|url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/737687}}</ref> While he was elected constitutional president in 1917, he did not implement its most revolutionary elements, particularly those dealing with land reform. Carranza came from the old Porfirian landowning class and was repulsed by peasant demand for redistribution of land and their expectation that land seized would not revert to their previous owners.

Although revolutionary generals were not part formal delegates to the convention, Álvaro Obregón indirectly, then directly, sided with the progressives against Carranza. In historian [[Frank Tannenbaum]]'s assessment, "The Constitution was written by the ''soldiers'' of the Revolution, not by the lawyers, who were there [at the convention], but were generally in opposition."<ref>Tannenbaum, Frank. ''Peace by Revolution'', 166.</ref> The constitution was drafted and ratified quickly, in February 1917. In December 1916, Villa had captured the major northern city of Torreón, with Obregón especially realizing that Villa was a continuing threat to the Constitutionalist regime. Zapata and his peasant followers in Morelos also never put down their guns and remained a threat to the government in Mexico City. Incorporating radical aspects of Villa's program and the Zapatistas' Plan of Ayala, the constitution became a way to outflank the two opposing revolutionary factions.

Carranza was elected president under the new constitution, and once formally in office, largely ignored or actively undermined the more radical aspects of the constitution. Obregón returned to Sonora and began building a power base that would launch his presidential campaign in 1919, which included the new labor organization headed by [[Luis N. Morones]], the [[Regional Confederation of Mexican Workers]] (CROM). Carranza increasingly lost support of labor, crushing strikes against his government. Carranza did not move forward on land reform, fueling increasing opposition from peasants. In an attempt to suppress the continuing armed opposition conflict in Morelos, Carranza sent General [[Pablo González Garza|Pablo González]] with troops. Going further, Carranza ordered the assassination of Emiliano Zapata in 1919. It was a huge blow, but Zapatista General [[Genovevo de la O]] continued to lead the armed struggle there.