Special Thanks to Dr. Hector Agredano, whose dissertation Rails to Revolution: Railroad Workers and the Georgraphies of the Mexican Revolution serves as the foundation of this exhibit
Railroads and Inequality in Mexico, 1876-1909
Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821. However, its economy remained underdeveloped for the next several decades.
In 1876, then President Porfirio Díaz initiated the Porfiriato, a new economic era for Mexico. The Porfiriato invited North American and European companies to build mines and railroads across the country.
American railroad companies like the Southern Pacific built almost all of Mexico’s railroad during this period. The Southern Pacific Railroad Company had a monopoly on railroads that connected northern Mexico to the rest of the country and the U.S.
The Porfiriato also gave land to Mexican landowners. These landowners leased land to foreign businesses and investors. The Porfiriato made President Díaz very popular with Mexico’s landowners and foreign businesses.
The railroads contributed over half of Mexico’s economic growth during the Porfiriato. These tracks connected northern Mexican plantations, known as haciendas, to American markets across the border.
By the 1900s, northern Mexico had some of the country’s most developed towns. The Porfiriato looked like it was a success.
However, the Porfiriato did not benefit everyone.
Northern Mexico was one of the most unequal places in the country. Farmers on the haciendas were getting poorer with increasing rents and stagnant wages. Meanwhile, Mexican landowners and American and European businesses were becoming wealthier.
The profits from the railroads and the haciendas went straight to foreign business owners and Mexican haciendas families.
American railroad companies in northern Mexico underpaid Mexican railroad workers. Mexican railroad managers, superintendents, and engineers in 1884 earned an average of 45-150 pesos per month compared to their American counterparts. American managers, superintendents, and engineers earned an average of 350 pesos per month.
American railroad unions rejected Mexican participation in the unions. American railroad employees in the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers (BLE) and the Order of Railway Conductors called Mexican workers “peons” and “greasers.” These unions also only used English in their meetings.
Rejected from the railroad unions and suffering from low wages, Mexican railroad workers across the country demanded the Díaz government to nationalize the railroads.
However, reform came too slow. The railroad workers grew impatient and the hacienda peasants could not endure poverty for much longer. A revolution that threatened Díaz’s grip on power was just around the corner.
Madero’s Democratic Revolution and the Railroads, 1909-1913
Sensing that the country needed a fresh start, President Diaz promised that he would not run for re-election in the upcoming 1910 presidential election. However, in 1909 just a year before the election, he changed his mind and announced his intention to run for reelection.
Enter Francisco I. Madero. Madero started his presidential campaign to stop Díaz. Although he came from a wealthy hacienda family, Madero believed Mexico needed democratic and progressive reforms. He believed that the Porfiriato failed to deliver true prosperity to the masses.
During his campaign, Madero promised to bring higher wages, labor rights, public education, and freedom of press to a country worn out by Diaz’s unfair business dealings and corruption.
Throughout 1909, Madero traveled across Mexico on rail. Thanks to the railroad, Madero’s campaign traveled across the country in just two weeks. Without the railroads, his campaign would have needed over two months of travel.
On each of his “whistle stop” stations, Madero made rousing speeches that drew thousands of people. President Diaz’s own presidential campaign failed to use the railroad in the creative way Madero did. Although Díaz and his foreign business allies built the railroads, these very railroads began to threaten Díaz’s regime.
Just as Madero’s popularity was soaring across Mexico, President Díaz arrested Madero on the eve of election day in June 1910. Díaz declared himself president.
A few months later in October, Madero escaped prison disguised as a railroad worker. With the help of railroad workers, Madero escaped into exile in Texas.
There, he issued the “Plan of San Luis.” The Plan called on the Mexican people, especially the peasantry, to rebel against the undemocratic President Díaz.
The Mexican Revolution had begun.
While in exile, Madero ordered attacks against Díaz’s troops. Madero’s revolutionary army and Diaz’s federal troops fought along the northern Mexican railroad and hacienda towns that boomed during the Porfiriato. Madero’s and Díaz’s armies needed the railroad to transport troops and supplies to battle sites across northern Mexico.
The Canadian-owned Northwest Railroad and the American-owned Kansas City, Mexico, and Orient Railroad (KCM&O) in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua witnessed some of the most violent conflicts of the revolution. American railroad engineers and managers, who occupied the best positions on railroads, eventually fled the country.
Once operated by Americans, the railroad became a tool of the Mexican Revolution. The railroad workers now recognized that the revolution was the best opportunity to finally take control of their own railroad system.
The Revolution's Leaders
Francisco “Pancho” Villa and Pascual Orozco emerged as two revolutionary figures. Villa was the governor of the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua. Orozco was a military tactician under Diaz and defected to Madero’s revolutionary army.
Both Villa and Orozco carried out the revolution while Madero was in exile. The two conducted hit-and-run attacks on federal trains on the Northwest Railroad and the KCM&O. Their armies consisted of hacienda peasants and railroad workers across northern Mexico.
In 1911, Madero returned from exile and crossed into northern Mexico. Villa and Orozco teamed up with Madero and secured northern Mexico for the revolution. Controlling most of the railroads, Madero, Orozco, and Villa eventually defeated Díaz. Soon afterwards, Madero became Mexico’s new president.
Celebrating his victory and promising new reforms, Madero welcomed a victory crowd of over 200,000 people. He traveled the country on the very railroads that made him so popular just a year ago.
However, Madero faced new challenges. The military was still loyal to Díaz. Villa and Orozco grew frustrated with Madero’s slow attempts at reform.
Another revolutionary leader from the peasantry, Emiliano Zapata, led his own more radical revolution against landowners in southern Mexico. He denounced Madero’s inability to implement land reforms. Madero’s alliance was about to collapse.
In 1913, General Victoriano Huerta, an ally of Díaz from the military, assassinated President Madero and declared himself president. Orozco even broke away from Villa and supported Huerta. Huerta soon afterwards exiled Villa. A new phase of the revolution began.
The Revolution Picks Up Steam, 1913-1917
Madero was assassinated, Villa was in exile in El Paso, Huerta established a military dictatorship, and Zapata waged a peasant revolution in the south.
One of Madero’s allies, Venustiano Carranza, the governor of Coahuila, organized against Huerta’s new government. Villa even returned from exile and rejoined the revolution in northern Mexico.
Villa and his “Northern Division” became extremely popular throughout the north and the state of Chihuahua. The hacienda peasantry, revolutionary soldiers, and reformist middle classes supported Villa. Villa even won the support of railroad workers. He repaired tracks along the north and increased wages for railroad workers. He seized assets from hacienda owners who collaborated with the old Díaz regime.
Villa eventually defeated President Huerta and Orozco in the summer of 1914. However, Villa’s success threatened Carranza. Carranza demanded railroad workers to stop shipping supplies to Villa. Carranza even took credit for Villa’s victory against Huerta. Carranza declared himself as the leader of the revolution and Mexico’s new president.
The revolution turned into a civil war by 1914. Villa and Zapata, also known as the “Liberator of the South,” forged an alliance against Carranza. They both viewed Carranza as a moderate who stole the revolution from the peasantry and workers.
In the following year, Villa and Carranza’s army faced off in the Battle of Celaya. During the battle, Carranza’s army cut Villa’s army off from his railroad supply lines. Villa suffered a major defeat and retreated into the mountains of northern Mexico. In the south, Carranza’s army defeated Zapata’s army. Villa’s and Zapata’s progressive vision of the revolution was defeated.
Even though Villa’s and Zapata’s revolution failed, Carranza still recognized the influence of workers and the peasantry. In 1917, after Villa’s and Zapata’s defeat, Carranza convened a constitutional convention to create a new constitution for Mexico.
The new 1917 constitution guaranteed significant labor rights and protections for workers for the first time in Mexican history. Of course, Villa and Zapata were not present at the constitutional convention of 1917. However, Carranza could not ignore the political power that workers earned over the years. Afterall, it was railroad workers and the peasantry who helped lead Madero, Carranza, and Villa to victory in the early years of the revolution.
Despite the absence of Villa and Zapata during the 1917 constitutional convention, historian Frank Tannenbaum noted the powerful influence of the revolutionary soldiers:
"The Constitution was written by the soldiers of the Revolution, not by the lawyers."
Epilogue
The story of the railroads during the Mexican Revolution demonstrates that the railroads played a crucial part in not only the tactical nature of the revolution, but the political and social. The railroads proved to have a long lasting impact on the politics of Mexico beyond the individual efforts of revolutionary leaders.
Obregon, Carranza's decorated general who defeated Villa in Celaya, assassinated Carranza and declared himself President in 1920. Mexico continued to cycle through corrupt leaders over the next decades and never achieved the revolutionary vision of Villa and Zapata. However, the 1917 constitution continues to enshrine, to this day, the workers rights and protection won during the revolution. Their continued presence in the constitution serves as a reminder of the powerful influence of workers and soldiers who operate a nation's vital infrastructure like the railroads.