News of Mexico
595 NEWS OF MEXICO THE drift of events in Mexico is ominous. For months past we have continued to say, relying as we could upon much unadulterated information, that the Calles system of utterly...
...We need also to reckon with the evidence so apparent in our time—evidence showing that a great nation, and in many respects a virtuous nation, needs to be aided toward that political mastery of itself which produces social and economic order...
...If we were asked to choose between the Calles forces and their antagonists, we should unhesitatingly cast our lot with the second...
...We need that badly...
...The United States is, however, deeply involved...
...But—and the point seems of supremely great importance—it may not yet be too late to avert war and bloodshed, chaos and destruction, in Mexico...
...The case is now the Calles regime versus the people, and the central point at issue in the case is undoubtedly religion...
...At any rate, the triumphs of the Church are never achieved on bloody battlefields...
...It is difficult for Americans, who live in a country wholly tolerant to all creeds, to understand how completely a spiritual faith held in common determines the cultural character of a people like the Mexicans...
...of one general against another...
...The supreme authority of the Church had counseled peace and patience...
...of one scheme of social change against another...
...But there must come to pass—as is always the case in lands where recourse to law and the principles of justice is forcibly repressed —an armed resentment of tyranny...
...Can we aid the agricultural, industrial, and educational growth of Mexico...
...End our protection of the Mexican army, and we end the Calles regime...
...Americans who have profited by years of good government and racial solidarity need to think of a neighboring people in terms far superior to oil and other property rights...
...They would suffer seriously again...
...It is not now a question of one political party against another...
...Pax Christi in regno Christi" is a motto for which tremendous hardship must sometimes be endured...
...So long as there is such a hope, the United States should scrupulously refrain from open belligerent action...
...This end is near at hand...
...It may be that the rumor of a rapprochement between the Vatican and the Mexican authorities is true and that it signifies an answer to this prayer...
...Can we give added impetus to the saving work of the Church, once she is released from bonds which by the very necessity of things can only be temporary...
...Meanwhile the State Department has taken what looks like a critical step...
...Peter Guilday reminded us recently that thousands of documents, preserved in Spanish archives, await the historian who shall some day write a truthful history of the Mexican people...
...It would be most deplorable even if it could remain a purely domestic Mexican concern...
...For months past we have continued to say, relying as we could upon much unadulterated information, that the Calles system of utterly unconstitutional government would end in revolution and chaos...
...Our struggle for the maintenance of property rights, legitimate certainly if history and precedent mean anything, will find the same outcome as the imminent revolution...
...the hierarchy in authority had earnestly repeated that counsel...
...For many months this embargo has been the target at which a variety of Calles opponents have fired...
...To loose the fury of the populace is to enkindle passion and lust, destruction and manifold barbarity...
...Revolution in Mexico, let it be remembered, would not be altogether a glorious and august crusade...
...Property rights have suffered more from revolution in Mexico than from tyranny in Mexico...
...Perhaps the Calles government, brought face to face with a realization that its policies cannot be made effective in practice, will finally give way to a sensible abrogation of its accumulated injustices...
...We shall be in whatever position the new Mexico desires us to be...
...Such an eventuality is not easy to contemplate...
...Never was it more necessary to think of the work that remains to be done in Mexico, patiently, sacrificially, intelligently...
...That is a fact nobody will deny...
...In view of what Mexico's President undoubtedly is— a tool in the hands of violently anti-social groups—it is not easy to see why the government of the United States should endeavor to keep him in power...
...Experienced press correspondents, returning from the Mexican scene, declare that opposition to the government has grown formidably and is still developing...
...In so far as Catholics are concerned, the ideal attitude is prescribed for them in the prayer for peace that has been offered so many times by the Holy Father...
...So long as there is a spark of hope for such an ending, it is imperative to keep it alive, regardless of emotions and recriminations, however just...
...One was in duty bound to hope and pray that the long, insane dispute would somehow be settled peaceably and that revolution in Mexico would in no sense of the term be affiliated with the Catholic name...
...In abrogating the treaty designed to prevent smuggling, it has paved the way toward making any future effort to lift the arms embargo affective...
Vol. 5 • April 1927 • No. 22
