Editing Mexican Revolution (section)

==Madero presidency: November 1911 – February 1913==
{{main|Francisco I. Madero|1911 Mexican general election}}
[[File:Presidente Francisco I. Madero.jpg|thumb|upright|Francisco I. Madero, as President of Mexico.]]
[[File:Madero (and) Pascual Orozco. (21879503251).jpg|thumb|right|upright|Madero and northern revolutionary [[Pascual Orozco]], who rebelled against him in 1912.]]

Madero had drawn some loyal and militarily adept supporters who brought down the Díaz regime by force of arms. Madero himself was not a natural soldier, and his decision to dismiss the revolutionary forces that brought him to power isolated him politically. He was an inexperienced politician, who had never held office before. He firmly held to democratic ideals, which many consider evidence of naivete. His election as president in October 1911 raised high expectations among many Mexicans for positive change. The [[Treaty of Ciudad Juárez]] guaranteed that the essential structure of the Díaz regime, including the Federal Army, was kept in place.{{sfn|Katz|1998|pp=114–118}} Madero fervently held to his position that Mexico needed real democracy, which included regime change by free elections, a free press, and the right of labor to organize and strike.

The rebels who brought him to power were demobilized and Madero called on these men of action to return to civilian life. According to a story told by [[Pancho Villa]], a leader who had defeated Díaz's army and forced his resignation and exile, he told Madero at a banquet in Ciudad Juárez in 1911, "You [Madero], sir, have destroyed the revolution ... It's simple: this bunch of dandies have made a fool of you, and this will eventually cost us our necks, yours included."<ref>quoted in {{harvp|Katz|1998|p=117}}</ref> Ignoring the warning, Madero increasingly relied on the Federal Army as armed rebellions broke out in Mexico in 1911–12, with particularly threatening insurrections led by [[Emiliano Zapata]] in Morelos and [[Pascual Orozco]] in the north. Both Zapata and Orozco had led revolts that had put pressure on Díaz to resign, and both felt betrayed by Madero once he became president.

The press embraced its newfound freedom and Madero became a target of its criticism. Organized labor, which had been suppressed under Díaz, could and did stage strikes, which foreign entrepreneurs saw as threatening their interests. Although there had been labor unrest under Díaz, labor's new freedom to organize also came with anti-American currents.{{sfn|Katz|1981|p=48}} The [[anarcho-syndicalist]] {{lang|es|italic=no|[[Casa del Obrero Mundial]]}} (House of the World Worker) was founded in September 1912 by [[Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama]], Manuel Sarabia, and Lázaro Gutiérrez de Lara and served as a center of agitation and propaganda, but it was not a formal labor union.<ref>Cumberland, Charles C. ''Mexican Revolution: The Constitutionalist Years''. Austin: University of Texas Press 1972, pp. 252–253.</ref><ref>Lear, John. "Casa del Obrero Mundial" in ''[[Encyclopedia of Mexico]]'', 206–207</ref>

Political parties proliferated. One of the most important was the National Catholic Party, which in several regions of the country was particularly strong.{{sfn|Knight|1986a|pp=397–404}} Several Catholic newspapers were in circulation during the Madero era, including {{lang|es|El País}} and {{lang|es|La Nación}}, only to be later suppressed under the [[Victoriano Huerta]] regime (1913–1914).{{sfn|Knight|1986b|p=77}} Under Díaz relations between the Roman Catholic Church and the Mexican government were stable, with the anticlerical laws of the [[Mexican Constitution of 1857]] remaining in place, but not enforced, so conflict was muted.{{sfn|Knight|1986b|p=503}} During Madero's presidency, Church-state conflict was channeled peacefully.{{sfn|Knight|1986b|p=503}} The National Catholic Party became an important political opposition force during the Madero presidency.{{sfn|Knight|1986a|p=402}} In the June 1912 congressional elections, "militarily quiescent states&nbsp;... the Catholic Party (PCN) did conspicuously well."{{sfn|Knight|1986a|p=400}} During that period, the Catholic Association of Mexican Youth (ACJM) was founded. Although the National Catholic Party was an opposition party to the Madero regime, "Madero clearly welcomed the emergence of a kind of two-party system (Catholic and liberal); he encouraged Catholic political involvement, echoing the exhortations of the episcopate."{{sfn|Knight|1986a|p=403}} What was emerging during the Madero regime was "Díaz's old policy of Church-state detente was being continued, perhaps more rapidly and on surer foundations."{{sfn|Knight|1986a|p=402}} The [[Catholic Church in Mexico]] was working within the new democratic system promoted by Madero, but it had its interests to promote, some of which were the forces of the old conservative Church, while the new, progressive Church supporting social Catholicism of the 1891 papal encyclical {{lang|es|italic=no|[[Rerum Novarum]]}} was also a current. When Madero was overthrown in February 1913 by counter-revolutionaries, the conservative wing of the Church supported the coup.{{sfn|Knight|1986a|p=404}}

Madero did not have the experience or the ideological inclination to reward men who had helped bring him to power. Some revolutionary leaders expected personal rewards, such as [[Pascual Orozco]] of Chihuahua. Others wanted major reforms, most especially [[Emiliano Zapata]] and [[Andrés Molina Enríquez]], who had long worked for [[land reform]].{{sfn|Shadle|1994}} Madero met personally with Zapata, telling the guerrilla leader that the agrarian question needed careful study. His meaning was clear: Madero, a member of a rich northern {{lang|es|hacendado}} family, was not about to implement comprehensive agrarian reform for aggrieved peasants.

[[File:El presidente Francisco I. Madero y su estado mayor presidencial (c. 1911), de Agustín Víctor Casasola.tif|thumbnail|Madero and his military staff officers, [[National Palace (Mexico)|Mexico National Palace]], 1911. Rather than keeping the revolutionary force that had helped bring him to power, Madero in a fatal decision kept the [[Federal Army]] intact]]
In response to this lack of action, Zapata promulgated the [[Plan de Ayala]] in November 1911, declaring himself in rebellion against Madero. He renewed guerrilla warfare in the state of [[Morelos]]. Madero sent the Federal Army to deal with Zapata, unsuccessfully. Zapata remained true to the demands of the Plan de Ayala and in rebellion against every central government up until his assassination by an agent of President [[Venustiano Carranza]] in 1919.

The northern revolutionary General [[Pascual Orozco]], a leader in taking Ciudad Juárez, had expected to become governor of Chihuahua. In 1911, although Orozco was "the man of the hour", Madero gave the governorship instead to [[Abraham González (governor)|Abraham González]], a respectable revolutionary, with the explanation that Orozco had not reached the legal age to serve as governor, a tactic that was "a useful constitutional alibi for thwarting the ambitions of young, popular, revolutionary leaders".{{sfn|Knight|1986a|pp=289–290, 554, fn. 259}} Madero had put Orozco in charge of the large force of {{lang|es|rurales}} in Chihuahua, but to a gifted revolutionary fighter who had helped bring about Díaz's fall, Madero's reward was insulting. After Madero refused to agree to social reforms calling for better working hours, pay, and conditions, Orozco organized his army, the {{lang|es|Orozquistas}}, also called the {{lang|es|Colorados}} ("Red Flaggers") and issued his {{lang|es|Plan Orozquista}} on 25 March 1912, enumerating why he was rising in revolt against Madero.<ref>Meyer, Michael C. ''Mexican Rebel: Pascual Orozco and the Mexican Revolution'', 138–147.</ref>

In April 1912, Madero dispatched General [[Victoriano Huerta]] of the Federal Army to put down Orozco's dangerous revolt. Madero had kept the army intact as an institution, using it to put down domestic rebellions against his regime. Huerta was a professional soldier and continued to serve in the army under the new commander-in-chief. Huerta's loyalty lay with General [[Bernardo Reyes]] rather than with the civilian Madero. In 1912, under pressure from his cabinet, Madero called on Huerta to suppress Orozco's rebellion. With Huerta's success against Orozco, he emerged as a powerful figure for conservative forces opposing the Madero regime.<ref name=":12">Richmond, Douglas W. "Victoriano Huerta". In ''[[Encyclopedia of Mexico]]'', vol. 1, p. 656.</ref> During the Orozco revolt, the governor of Chihuahua mobilized the state militia to support the Federal Army. [[Pancho Villa]], now a colonel in the militia, was called up at this time. In mid-April, at the head of 400 irregular troops, he joined the forces commanded by Huerta. Huerta, however, viewed Villa as an ambitious competitor. During a visit to Huerta's headquarters in June 1912, after an incident in which he refused to return a number of stolen horses, Villa was imprisoned on charges of insubordination and robbery and sentenced to death.{{sfn|Katz|1998|p=165}} Raúl Madero, the President's brother, intervened to save Villa's life. Jailed in Mexico City, Villa escaped and fled to the United States, later to return and play a major role in the civil wars of 1913–1915.

There were other rebellions, one led by [[Bernardo Reyes]] and another by [[Félix Díaz (politician)|Félix Díaz]], nephew of the former president, that were quickly put down and the generals jailed. They were both in Mexico City prisons and, despite their geographical separation, they were able to foment yet another rebellion in February 1913. This period came to be known as the [[Ten Tragic Days]] ({{lang|es|La Decena Trágica}}), which ended with Madero's resignation and assassination and Huerta assuming the presidency. Although Madero had reason to distrust Victoriano Huerta, Madero placed him in charge of suppressing the Mexico City revolt as interim commander. He did not know that Huerta had been invited to join the conspiracy, but had initially held back.<ref name=":12"/> During the fighting that took place in the capital, the civilian population was subjected to artillery exchanges, street fighting and economic disruption, perhaps deliberately caused by the coup plotters to demonstrate that Madero was unable to keep order.<ref>Tuñon Pablos, Esperanza. "Mexican Revolution: February 1913 – October 1915", in ''[[Encyclopedia of Mexico]]'', vol. 2, pp. 855–756.</ref>