Page 313 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

1614 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and
passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own
destruction. • Khalil Gibran (1883–1931)

Obregon crushed the Villistas by using the modern of civilian government in contrast to the military dicta-
artillery and machine guns provided by the United States. torships in support of oligarchy (government by the few)
Meanwhile, Carranza announced an agrarian reform that still plague much of the Western Hemisphere.
program designed to undercut support for the Villistas
John Mason Hart
and Zapatistas. In the spring of 1915 the Villistas and
Constitutionalists fought the largest battles of the revo-
lution at Celaya and Leon.The indirect fire of Obregon’s Further Reading
artillery and machine guns inflicted decisive defeats on Cumberland, C. C. (1974). Mexican Revolution: Genesis under Madero.
the Villistas. The Villista army dissolved into guerrilla Austin: University of Texas Press.
Cumberland, C. C. (1974). Mexican Revolution: The constitutionalist
bands, and many soldiers returned to their lives in the
years. Austin: University of Texas Press.
small towns and countryside of the North. Reduced to Hart, J. M. (1978). Anarchism and the Mexican working class, 1860–
guerrilla warfare, Villa remained a political force, man- 1931. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Hart, J. M. (1987). Revolutionary Mexico:The coming and process of the
dating agrarian reform laws, the confiscation of the great Mexican Revolution. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of Califor-
estates, and labor laws regulating the northern mining nia Press.
Hart, J. M. (2002). Empire and revolution:The Americans in Mexico since
and timber industries.
the Civil War. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.
During 1916 Carranza consolidated his power. He Katz, F. (1981). The secret war in Mexico: Europe, the United States, and
demobilized the Casa del Obrero Mundial and its the Mexican Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Katz, F. (Ed.). (1988). Riot, rebellion, and revolution: Rural social conflict
350,000 members and red battalions, which totaled in Mexico. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
more than 4,000 troops. Carrying red and black flags in Katz, F. (1998). The life and times of Pancho Villa. Stanford, CA: Stanford
University Press.
public demonstrations the Casa del Obrero Mundial
Womack, J. (1970). Zapata and the Mexican Revolution. New York:
proclaimed the goal of workers’ control of production, Vintage.
and during the spring of 1916 it paralyzed Mexico City
with a general strike. During the summer, however, the
army crushed the Casa del Obrero Mundial during a sec-
ond strike. In the North Villa began executing U.S. citi-
zens, and in March he raided Columbus, New Mexico, to Revolution—
lure President Wilson into an invasion and expose Car-
ranza as a traitor. U.S. General John “Blackjack” Pershing Russia
failed to catch Villa, but Carranza and Obregon had a
more sophisticated agenda. he Russian Revolution of 1917 was an event of
In February 1917 delegates from every sector of soci- Tenormous significance in twentieth-century world
ety promulgated a new constitution that satisfied most history. It marked the end of the distinctive society of
aspirations. It stipulated national ownership of natural czarist Russia, the world’s largest country, and the begin-
resources, frontiers, and coastlines; universal male suf- ning of the first large-scale effort to construct a modern
frage; land reform and municipal autonomy for the rural socialist society. To many oppressed people it repre-
working class; and social justice for industrial workers as sented a beacon of hope, promising that capitalist
fundamental objectives for the new government. The exploitation and imperialist domination need not be
revolution defeated the caste system that still character- permanent. However, to most Western capitalist societies,
izes much of Latin America; returned more than 25 per- the revolution was a threat of epic proportions—
cent of the nation’s surface, including much of the best challenging private property, existing social structures,
land, to the peasantry and rural workers; initiated school- parliamentary democracy, and established religion. Its tri-
ing for the indigenous population; and created a system umph in Russia initiated a deep seventy-year rift in the