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Agrarian Reform and Revolutionary Justice in Soconusco, Chiapas: Campesinos and the Mexican State, 1934–1940*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 September 2010

CATHERINE NOLAN-FERRELL
CATHERINE NOLAN-FERRELL
Affiliation:
Catherine Nolan-Ferrell is an Assistant Professor of History at the University of Texas at San Antonio. Email: catherine.ferrell@utsa.edu.
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Abstract

During the mid- to late 1930s, rural activism surged in the coffee-growing region of southern Chiapas and north-western Guatemala. This article examines the causes and impacts of sustained campesino protests at the grassroots level on the Mexican side of the border. The porous border between the two nations hindered the development of centralised power networks that prevailed in other parts of Chiapas. Campesinos and reformist federal government officials such as teachers and agrarian engineers built alliances that challenged the power of the coffee growers. This article explores the process of negotiation that occurred among campesinos, federal bureaucrats, regional authorities and elite coffee planters in order both to implement and to challenge agrarian reform.

Abstract

Durante mediados y finales de los años 30 surgió un movimiento rural en la región cafetalera del sur de Chiapas y el noroccidente de Guatemala. Este artículo examina las causas e impactos de las protestas campesinas a nivel de base en el lado mexicano de la línea divisoria. La frontera porosa entre las dos naciones dificultó el desarrollo de redes centralizadas que existían en otras partes de Chiapas. Campesinos y funcionarios gubernamentales federales reformistas, como maestros o ingenieros agrarios, construyeron alianzas que desafiaron el poder de los caficultores. El material explora el proceso de negociación que se dio entre campesinos, burócratas federales, autoridades regionales y caficultores de la élite, con el fin tanto de implementar como de desafiar la reforma agraria.

Abstract

Entre os meados até o final da década de 1930 o ativismo rural irrompeu na região cafeicultora compreendendo o sul de Chiapas e o noroeste da Guatemala. Este artigo examina as causas e os impactos dos prolongados protestos das bases camponesas, no lado mexicano da fronteira. A fronteira porosa entre ambas as nações dificultou o desenvolvimento de redes de poder centralizadas que prevaleceram em outras partes de Chiapas. Camponeses e funcionários reformistas do governo federal, incluindo professores e engenheiros agrônomos, construíram alianças que desafiavam o poder dos produtores cafeeiros. Este artigo explora o processo de negociação que ocorreu entre camponeses, burocratas federais, autoridades regionais e cafeicultores de elite para implantar e também desafiar a reforma agrária.

Keywords

Mexican Revolutionagrarian reformlabourstatecampesinosChiapasCárdenasRevolución mexicanareforma agrariatrabajoestadocampesinosChiapasCárdenasRevolução Mexicanareforma agráriasindicalismoo estadocamponesesChiapasCárdenas
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Latin American Studies , Volume 42 , Issue 3 , August 2010 , pp. 551 - 585
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

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References

1 Lázaro Avila to President Cárdenas, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, 7 April 1939; Lázaro Avila to President Cárdenas, 9 July 1940; Ing. Crotte to Jefe del Departamento Agrario, Finca El Retiro, 29 Oct. 1940; ‘Solicitud de Tierras Ejidales’, Finca El Retiro, 18 Feb. 1938. All these documents are in the Archivo Histórico de la Secretaría del Estado de Desarrollo Agrario (henceforth cited as SEDA), exp. El Retiro, 1099. The ejidatarios officially received government-promised land on 29 October 1940. Within three years community members had petitioned for expansion of the ejido because poorly marked boundaries had caused conflicts with the neighbouring communities: Félix Gonzalez to president of Comisión Agraria Mixta (the state-level agrarian agency in Chiapas, hereafter cited as CAM), Finca El Retiro, 16 Dec. 1943, SEDA, exp. El Retiro, 1099.

2 At the time of this research in Chiapas in 1997–8, 2001 and 2004, several people remarked that the Zapatista Rebellion of 1994 occurred because the Mexican Revolution never really took place in Chiapas. Such comments have appeared in the international press: see, for example, Business Week, 17 Jan. 1994; El Mundo, 25 Feb. 2001.

3 Thomas Benjamin, A Rich Land, a Poor People: Politics and Society in Modern Chiapas (Albuquerque NM, 1989); Antonio García de León, Resistencia y utopía: memorial de agravios y crónica de revueltas y profecías acaecidas en la provincia de Chiapas durante los últimos quinientos años de su historia, vols. 1 and 2 (Mexico City, 1985); Daniela Spenser, ‘Economía y movimiento laboral en las fincas cafetaleras de Soconusco’ and ‘La reforma agraria en Soconusco y la contraofensiva de finqueros cafetaleros’, in Daniela Spenser et al. (eds.), Los empresarios alemanes, el Tercer Reich y la oposición de derecha a Cárdenas, vol. 1 (Mexico City, 1988).

4 For the revisionist perspective that developed in the 1970s, see Carr, Barry, ‘Recent Regional Studies of the Mexican Revolution’, Latin American Research Review, vol. 15, no. 1 (1980), pp. 3–14Google Scholar; and Bailey, David C., ‘Revisionism and the Recent Historiography of the Mexican Revolution’, Hispanic American Historical Review, vol. 58, no. 1 (1978), pp. 62–79CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For an articulation of post-revisionism, see Gilbert Joseph and Daniel Nugent, ‘Popular Culture and State Formation’, in Gilbert Joseph and Daniel Nugent (eds.), Everyday Forms of State Formation: Revolution and the Negotiation of Rule in Modern Mexico (Durham NC, 1994), pp. 3–23; and Mallon, Florencia, ‘Time on the Wheel: Cycles of Revisionism and the “New Cultural History”’, Hispanic American Historical Review, vol. 79, no. 2 (1999), pp. 331–51Google Scholar.

5 Knight, Alan, ‘Cardenismo: Juggernaut or Jalopy?’, Journal of Latin American Studies, vol. 21, no. 1 (1994), pp. 73–107CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Joseph and Nugent (eds.), Everyday Forms of State Formation; Florencia Mallon, Peasant and Nation: The Making of Postcolonial Mexico and Peru (Berkeley CA, 1995).

6 Mary Kay Vaughan, Cultural Politics in Revolution: Teachers, Peasants, and Schools in Mexico, 1930–1940 (Tucson AZ, 1997); Stephen Lewis, The Ambivalent Revolution: Forging State and Nation in Chiapas, 1910–1945 (Albuquerque NM, 2005).

7 Jan Rus, ‘The “Comunidad Revolucionaria Institucional”: The Subversion of Native Government in Highland Chiapas’, in Joseph and Nugent (eds.), Everyday Forms of State Formation, pp. 265–300.

8 María Eugenia Reyes Ramos, El reparto de tierras y la política agraria en Chiapas, 1914–1988 (Mexico City, 1992) and Conflicto agrario en Chiapas, 1934–1964 (Tuxtla Gutíerrez, 2002); see also Aaron Bobrow-Strain, Intimate Enemies: Landowners, Power, and Violence in Chiapas (Durham NC, 2007).

9 Adrian Bantjes, As if Jesus Walked on Earth: Cardenismo, Sonora, and the Mexican Revolution (Wilmington DE, 1998); Marjorie Becker, Setting the Virgin on Fire: Lázaro Cárdenas, Michoacán Peasants, and the Redemption of the Mexican Revolution (Berkeley CA, 1996); Boyer, Christopher, ‘Old Loves, New Loyalties: Agrarismo in Michoacán, 1920–1928’, Hispanic American Historical Review, vol. 78, no. 3 (1998), pp. 419–55CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ben Fallaw, Cárdenas Compromised: The Failure of Reform in Postrevolutionary Yucatán (Durham NC, 2001).

10 Documents in Tapachula's municipal archive are loosely organised in boxes, sometimes by date, sometimes by document type. Many documents have suffered damage by water, mould or insects. The archivists have been working diligently on organising and preserving the material, and box or file information may have changed. I collected oral histories from ejidatarios and former ejidatarios over several months in 1997 and 1998. The three ejidos where this was done – Ahuacatlán, Santo Domingo and El Edén – all appeared frequently in the archival sources. I was extremely fortunate to meet archivists and teachers who knew people in these ejidos and who facilitated my initial contacts with the interviewees.

11 Benjamin, A Rich Land, a Poor People, chap. 4; Lewis, Ambivalent Revolution, chaps. 1 and 8.

12 Theda Skocpol, Protecting Soldiers and Mothers: The Political Origins of Social Policy in the United States (Cambridge MA, 1992), pp. 1–62.

13 Adulfo Granados V. to President Cárdenas, Mexico City, 11 Dec. 1934, Archivo General de la Nación, Fondo Presidentes, Lázaro Cárdenas (henceforth cited as AGN-LC), 542.1/20.

14 Lewis, Ambivalent Revolution, chap. 6.

15 Regina Wagner, Los alemanes en Guatemala, 1820–1944 (Guatemala City, 1996), pp. 145–6; Washbrook, Sarah, ‘Enganche and Exports in Chiapas, Mexico: A Comparison of Plantation Labour in the Districts of Soconusco and Palenque, 1876–1911’, Journal of Latin American Studies, vol. 39, no. 4 (2007), pp. 811–12CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Departamento de la Estadística Nacional, Censo general de habitantes: 1921, vol. 1 (Mexico City, 1926); Washbrook, ‘Enganche and Exports’, p. 807.

17 Jan Rus, ‘Coffee and the Recolonization of Highland Chiapas, Mexico, 1892–1912’, in William Gervase Clarence-Smith and Steven Topik (eds.), The Global Coffee Economy in Africa, Asia and Latin America, 1500–1989 (Cambridge, 2003), pp. 259–68; Germán Martínez Velasco, Plantaciones, trabajo guatemalteco y política migratoria en la frontera sur de México (Tuxtla Gutiérrez, 1994), pp. 77–85.

18 Washbrook, ‘Enganche and Exports’, p. 809; Moises T. de la Peña, Chiapas económico, vol. 1 (Tuxtla Gutiérrez, 1951), pp. 215, 287–90.

19 Rosalva Aída Hernández Castillo, Histories and Stories from Chiapas: Border Identities in Southern Mexico (Austin TX, 2001), chap. 1; ‘Informe administrativo’, San Marcos, Guatemala, 3 April 1934, in Archivo Histórico de Centroamérica, Archivo de la Secretaría de Gobernación y Justicia (henceforth cited as AHCA-ASGJ), Expedientes: San Marcos, leg. 29567; ‘Delito de Vagancia’, AHCA-Archivo General de Tribunales, San Marcos, Ramo Criminal, Juzgado de la 1a. Instancia, Indice Juicios, #168, año 1934, leg. 7E, exp. 11.

20 Lewis, Ambivalent Revolution, p. 122.

21 Leo Waibel, La Sierra Madre de Chiapas (Mexico City, 1998 [originally published by Sociedad Mexicana de Geografía y Estadística, 1946]), pp. 185–7; Karl Helbig, El Soconusco y su zona cafetalera en Chiapas (Tuxtla Gutiérrez, 1964), p. 92.

22 Helbig, El Soconusco, p. 101; interview with Jacobo Gálvez, Ejido El Edén, 5 Oct. 1997. Gálvez described how acasillados and colonias agricolas differed.

23 Rébora, Memorias de un chiapaneco, pp. 100, 104.

24 Brigida von Mentz, ‘Empresas mercantiles y fincas cafetaleras en la década de 1910–1920: las empresas alemanes en general’, in Spenser et al. (eds.), Los empresarios alemanes, pp. 102–4.

25 Baumann, Friederike, ‘Terratenientes, campesinos y la expansión de la agricultura capitalista en Chiapas, 1896–1916’, Mesoamerica, vol. 4 (1983), p. 49Google Scholar; Daniela Spenser, ‘Soconusco en la Revolución’, in Spenser et al. (eds.), Los empresarios alemanes, pp. 119–20.

26 Waibel, La Sierra Madre de Chiapas, p. 157.

27 Rus, ‘Coffee and the Recolonization of Highland Chiapas’, pp. 283–4; Knight, Alan, ‘Mexican Peonage: What Was It and Why Was It?’, Journal of Latin American Studies, vol. 18, no. 1 (1986), pp. 56–60CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

28 Rébora, Memorias de un Chiapaneco, pp. 77–9.

29 Daniela Spenser, El Partido Socialista Chiapaneco: rescate y reconstrucción de su historia (Mexico City, 1988).

30 Reyes Ramos, El reparto de tierras, pp. 54–5.

31 María Barragán to President Cárdenas, 15 July 1935, AGN-LC, 437/120; Angel Franco to President Cárdenas, 16 Nov. 1935, Archivo General de la Nación, Dirección General del Gobierno (cited hereafter as AGN-DGG), caja 42, 2.384(5)5699; Adulfo Granados V. to President Cárdenas, Mexico City, 11 Dec. 1934, AGN-LC, 542.1/20; Confederación General de Trabajadores to President Cárdenas, 16 Nov. 1935, forwarded by Esteban García de Alba to Governor Grajales, 30 Dec. 1935, AGN-LC, 542.1/20.

32 Cámara Regional de Trabajadores del Sureste to Governor Grajales, June 1934, AGN-DGG, caja 19a, exp. 29; Liga de Comunidades Agrarias to Governor Grajales, April 1935, AGN-DGG, caja 107, 2.384.2.1(5) 2972. The Cámara de Trabajadores de Chiapas was formed in early 1934 as an independent labour organisation and had multiple regional offices: see García de León, Resistencia y utopía, vol. 2, p. 195.

33 Hernández Castillo, Histories and Stories from Chiapas, pp. 36–7; Reyes Ramos, El reparto de tierras, pp. 47–55.

34 Partido Socialista Revolucionario Chiapaneco to Interim Governor, Feb. 1931, AGN-DGG, caja 6, 2.380(5)21.

35 Carmen Carpio to President Cárdenas, 24 Jan. 1936, AGN-LC, 432/403.

36 Alejandro C. Vázquez to President Cárdenas, 25 July 1936, AGN-DGG, caja 21A, 4.

37 Angel Franco to President Cárdenas, 16 Nov. 1935, AGN-DGG, caja 42, 2.384(5)5699.

38 García de León, Resistencia y utopía, vol. 2, pp. 197–202.

39 Benjamin, A Rich Land, a Poor People, pp. 189, 193–4.

40 Reyes Ramos, El reparto de tierras, pp. 59–61, 68.

41 Departamento Agrario, Memoria del Departamento Agrario, apéndice estadístico, 1935 (Mexico City, 1935), pp. 14–19; Departamento Agrario, Memoria del Departamento Agrario, 1935–1936 (Mexico City, 1936), pp. 9–14.

42 Departamento Agrario, Memoria, 1935–1936, pp. 9–14.

43 ‘Código Agrario de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos’, Diario Oficial, 29 Oct. 1940, Book 1, Articles 1–5.

44 ‘Código Agrario’, Book 1, Articles 36 and 39.

45 Sotero Luarca to Ing. José Manuel Fernández, 12 July 1938, SEDA, exp. 1130.

46 ‘Código Agrario’, Book 7, Penalties, Article 322, Section II.

47 Ibid., pp. 28, 41–2.

48 Departamento Agrario, Memoria del Departamento Agrario, 1937 (Mexico City, 1937), pp. 19–27.

49 Interview with Rosalia Mazariegos, 22 Aug. 1997. SEDA archival research supports her comments. I found no petitions from the Liga Feminil in the Ahuacatlán papers, SEDA, exp. 1130.

50 Josefina Abarto de T. to Señora Amalia Cárdenas, 7 May 1939, SEDA, exp. 1099; Josefina Abarto de T. to President of CAM, undated (in packet from autumn 1938), SEDA, exp. 1099; Olcott, Jocelyn, ‘ “Worthy Wives and Mothers”: State-Sponsored Women's Organizing in Postrevolutionary Mexico’, Journal of Women's History, vol. 13, no. 4 (2002), pp. 106–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51 ‘Código Agrario’, Book 1, Articles 16–22, 39–42, 219–28; Book 2, Article 36; Book 3, Articles 209–19.

52 Efraín Gutiérrez, Trayectoria de un gobierno revolucionario, esfuerzo y labor realizado en el estado de Chiapas: 1936–1940 (Tuxtla Gutiérrez, 1940), p. 49, cited in Reyes Ramos, El reparto de tierras, pp. 58–9.

53 Departamento Agrario, Memoria del Departamento Agrario, apéndice estadístico, 1935, pp. x, 17–25.

54 Lázaro Avila to José Manuel Hernández, 29 July 1939, SEDA, exp. El Retiro, 1099; Angel García González to Governor Gutiérrez, 26 Oct. 1938, SEDA, exp. El Retiro, 1099.

55 Rafael Verdugo Cruz to Municipal President of Motozintla, 24 Dec. 1938, SEDA, exp. El Horizonte, 1075.

56 Lázaro Avila to President Cárdenas, 7 April 1938, SEDA, exp. 1099.

57 Bernardo Román Piedra Santa, quoted by Secretary of Department of Agriculture to President of CAM, 11 Feb. 1936, SEDA, exp. 747.

58 Interview with José Galindo Figueroa, Ejido Ahuacatlán, 8 Aug. 1997; interview with Jacobo Gálvez, Ejido El Edén, 5 Oct. 1997.

59 Fallaw, Cárdenas Compromised, pp. 151–7; Bantjes, As if Jesus Walked on Earth, chaps. 5–7; Rus, ‘The “Comunidad Revolucionaria Institucional” ’, pp. 265–300.

60 Vaughan, Cultural Politics in Revolution; Becker, Setting the Virgin on Fire. See also Elsie Rockwell, ‘Schools of the Revolution: Enacting and Contesting State Forms in Tlaxcala, 1910–1930’, in Joseph and Nugent (eds.), Everyday Forms of State Formation, pp. 170–246; and Adrian Bantjes, ‘Saints, Sinners, and State Formation: Local Religion and Cultural Revolution in Mexico’, in Mary Kay Vaughan and Stephen Lewis (eds.), The Eagle and the Virgin: National and Cultural Revolution in Mexico, 1920–1940 (Durham NC, 2006), pp. 137–56. Both of these edited volumes contain other relevant essays.

61 Lewis, Ambivalent Revolution, p. 157. Mexico's 1917 constitution required plantations with more than 20 school-aged resident children to establish schools, staffed by government teachers and paid for by the plantation owner. These federal schools, named Article 123 schools after the constitutional law that created them, became crucial links between campesinos and federal educators: see Lewis, Ambivalent Revolution, chaps. 2 and 9.

62 Ibid., pp. 173–80.

63 ‘Plan General de Trabajo que desarrollará la Dirección de Educación Federal del Estado de Chiapas, durante el año escolar de 1935’, Archivo Histórico de la Secretaría de Educación Pública, Departamento de Escuelas Rurales, Dirección de Educación Federal (henceforth cited as AHSEP-DERDEF), 236/10.

64 Paulino García to President Cárdenas, 17 July 1938, AHSEP-EA123, 80/470. The well-written letter begins, ‘Que protestamos atenta pero energicamente contra las maniobras de los reaccionarios del Sindicato de Cafeteros del Soconusco, capitalistas extranjeros que siempre vienen desarrollando labor anti-revolucionaria en ésta región … pués es del todo falso que los maestros federales esta [this is struck through and replaced with ‘esten’] desarrollando labor desorientadora anti-revolucionaria, por que son ellos los más revolucionarios que hay en el Soconusco, que no son solo de palabra sino lo han demostrado y siguen demostrando con hechos'. Teacher shortages closed the school for three years, resulting in the letter from which the following extract is taken, written in 1941, in which campesinos requested a Mexican flag: ‘por el caso que en distintas Ocasiones se an dasaparesido barios Utiles Escolares al separarse determinados profesores que an estado en esta Escuela, y como hay Obras que sean echo con la coolaveracion de todos los avitantes de este lugar … este Comite de educativo recogio dicha Bandera para sumayor seguridad. Aciendo saver a Vd. A la vez que en todo caso que la Escuela Nesesite la Bandera, como es desir en las fiesta patrias este comete de educación lo proporcionara con toda rapides considerando que es indispensable proporcionarlo en todo caso sea necesario’: Manuel A. Molina, President of the Education Committee to Federal Inspector of Third School Zone, Finca El Retiro, 25 Oct. 1941, AHSEP-EA123, 80/470.

65 Alberto Galán Villanueva, ‘Census Escolar’, 17 Nov. 1938, Archivo Histórico de la Secretaría de Educación Pública-Escuelas Articulo 123 (hereafter cited as AHSEP-EA123), 80/445.

66 Estanislao Rohlado T. to Secretary of Public Education, 30 June 1935, AHSEP-DERDEF, 236/9.

67 Israel R. Vera to Jefe del Departamento Autónomo de Trabajo, 23 July 1938, Mexico City, Archivo General de la Nación, Departamento Autónomo de Trabajo (henceforth cited as AGN-DAT), 262/19; Alfonso Vargas Espinosa to President Cárdenas, 2 Nov. 1938, AGN-LC, 432/817; ‘Información que se rinde a la Dirección General de Educación Primaria Urbana y Rural’, AHSEP-Dirección General de Educación Primaria de los Estados y Territorios, Dirección de Educación Federal, Chiapas (henceforth cited as AHSEP-DEFC), 282/35.

68 Humberto Córdova C. to Municipal President of San Antonio Chicharras, 27 Sep. 1938, AHSEP-EA123, 80/475.

69 ‘Información que se rinde a la Dirección General de Educación Primaria Urbana y Rural’, AHSEP-DEFC, 282/35; ‘Plan General de Trabajo que desarrollará la Dirección de Educación Federal del Estado de Chiapas, durante el año escolar de 1935’, AHSEP-DERDEF, 236/10.

70 ‘Programa: Fiesta de 16 Sept. 1938’, 16 Sep. 1938, AHSEP-EA123, 80/470.

71 ‘Informe’, 18 Nov. 1938, AHSEP-EA123, 80/445; Dr. Jesús Diaz Barriga to Secretary of Public Education, 20 June 1936, AHSEP-DEFC, 280/20.

72 M. Gálvez to R. Vela, 25 Nov. 1935, AHSEP-DERDEF, 236/7.

73 Absalon Gómez to Director of Federal Education, undated (stamped 1935), AHSEP-DERDEF, 236/7.

74 Luis López Ricoy to Director of Federal Education, 11 May 1936, AHSEP-EA123, 82/404.

75 Benjamín Martínez Palma to Director of Federal Education, 17 May 1940, AHSEP-EA123, 80/470.

76 Amadeo Tercero to Director of Primary Education in States and Territories, 17 Nov. 1938; Amadeo Tercero to Inspection Manager, 3 Aug. 1938, both in AHSEP- EA123, El Retiro, 80/470.

77 ‘Acta’, Education Committee, 27 Aug. 1938, AHSEP-EA123, 80/480.

78 ‘Informe’, Alberto Galván Villanueva, 18 Nov. 1938, AHSEP-EA123, 80/445.

79 Domingo Martínez P. to Rural Teachers of Tapachula, 27 Sept. 1938, AHSEP-EA123, 80/475.

80 J. Mariano Herrera to President Cárdenas, 10 June 1940, AGN-LC, 543.21/368.

81 Juan Pohlenz to President Cárdenas, 24 April 1934, AGN-DGG, caja 5, 2.382(5)56.

82 Amado López to President Cárdenas, 30 Jan. 1935; Porfirio Mena Flores to President Cárdenas, 14 April 1936, AGN-LC, 542.2/117.

83 Lázaro Avila to President of CAM, 28 Aug. 1939, SEDA, exp. El Retiro, 1099; Teodoro Villetoro to Agrarian Department, 1 Dec. 1936, ASRA, exp. Santa Rita, 947; Mauro Pérez to President Cárdenas, 2 Dec. 1938, AGN-LC, 551.2/35; Jorge Elorza Flores to Minister of Public Prision, 30 Sep. 1940, Archivo Municipal de Tapachula (henceforth cited as AMT), caja 1940–1949, exp. 1940. Note that Tapachula's municipal archives were being organised at the time of writing, and classifications may change.

84 Knight, ‘The Rise and Fall of Cardenismo’, pp. 288–91; Toledo, ‘La ruptura cardenista’, pp. 34–8.

85 Juan Huthoff to Governor Gutiérrez, 9 Nov. 1937, AGN-DGG, caja 6, 2.382(5)16030; Ernesto W. Reinshagen to President of JCCA, 7 Feb. 1938, Archivo de Concentración de Chiapas, Junta de Conciliación y Arbitraje (henceforth cited as ACCh-JCCA), exp. Finca San Cristóbal, 1938.

86 Spenser, ‘Economía y movimiento laboral’, pp. 273–5; García de León, Resistencia y utopía, vol. 2, p. 160.

87 Otto Pohlenz to President of JCCA, 15 Jan. 1938, ACCh-JCCA, exp. Finca El Rincon, 1938; Ernesto W. Reinshagen to President of JCCA, 7 Feb. 1938, ACCh-JCCA, exp. Finca San Cristóbal, 1938; Herbert Luttman to President of JCCA, 17 Dec. 1937, ACCh-JCCA, exp. Finca La Alianza, 1938.

88 Juan B. González to President Cárdenas, 15 June 1938, AGN-DAT, 262/17.

89 Brígida Morales to President Cárdenas, undated (received 17 May 1940), AGN-LC, 432/626; María Borraz to President Cárdenas, Finca El Retiro, 22 July 1940, AGN-DGG, caja 21A, 40.

90 Sindicato de Trabajadores del Campo, no. 29, to President Cárdenas, 6 June 1938, forwarded by Florencio Padilla, Labour Department to Governor of Chiapas, 21 June 1938, AGN-LC, 432/102.

91 ‘Resolución de Petición, Finca El Rincón’, 31 Jan. 1938, ACCh-JCCA, exp. Finca El Rincón, 1938; ‘Convenio’, Francisco Hernández G., Sindicato de Trabajadores del Campo, no. 2, Efraín Poumian, Labor Inspector, and Enrique Josephín, Finca Administrator, 8 Jan. 1938, ACCh-JCCA, exp. Finca La Alianza, 1938.

92 Angelino Olivares to Bernardo Parlange, 6 April 1940, AGN-DGG, caja 12, 54.

93 Octavio García to Labour Department, Finca El Retiro, 23 March 1938, AGN-DAT, 227/13; Octavio García to President of JCCA, 21 March 1938 and 28 March 1938, ACCh-JCCA, exp. Finca El Retiro.

94 Walter Pinto to President of the Senate, 1 April 1938, AGN-DAT, 262/16.

95 Juan Mérida to President Cárdenas, March 1940, AGN-LC, 432/1222.

96 Pablo Escobar to President Cárdenas, 14 May 1938, AGN-DAT, 181/V/332(727.4)/1s.

97 Angel Arévalo to Commander of 31st Military Zone, 2 Aug. 1939, AGN-DGG, caja 21A, 40.

98 Spenser, ‘La reforma agraria en Soconusco’, p. 297.

99 Lázaro Avila to Governor of Chiapas, 4 Jan. 1940, AGN-DGG, caja 21A, 40.

100 José Galindo Figueroa, interview with author, Ejido Ahuacatlán, 28 July 1997.

101 Gonzalo Guzmán to President Cárdenas, 6 June 1938, AGN-DAT, 181/V/332(727.4)/1; SUTICS, no. 7, to President Cárdenas, 18 March 1940, AGN-LC, 432/626; Sindicato de Trabajadores del Campo, no. 29, to President Cárdenas, 6 June 1938, forwarded by Florencio Padilla, Labour Department to Governor of Chiapas, 21 June 1938, AGN-LC, 432/102.

102 Luz Sánchez to Governor of Chiapas, 12 July 1940, SEDA, exp. 1099; Francisco Zetina to President Avila Camacho, 12 Feb. 1943, AGN-MAC, 110.1/9; Enrique Braun to Bernabe Acosta Ruíz, 18 July 1944, AHSEP-EA123, 86/443.

103 Luis Medina, Historia de la Revolución Mexicana, 1940–1952, vol. 18: Del cardenismo al avilacamachismo (Mexico City, 1988), pp. 229–36, 250–4.

104 Reyes Ramos, Conflicto Agrario en Chiapas, pp. 211–34; Lewis, Ambivalent Revolution, pp. 183–201; Blanca Torres, Historia de la Revolución Mexicana, 1940–1952, vol. 19: México en la segunda guerra mundial (Mexico City, 1988), pp. 301–9. For examples of village conflicts over land reform, see Benjamín Gómez and others to President of the Republic, Tapachula, undated (stamped 1943), AGN-DGG, caja 12 A, exp. 11; and Lázaro Avila to Lázaro Cárdenas, El Retiro, 20 February 1939, SEDA, exp. 1099.

105 Vaughan, Cultural Politics in Revolution; Bantjes, As if Jesus Walked on Earth; Becker, Setting the Virgin on Fire.

106 Rus, ‘The “Comunidad Revolucionaria Institucional” ’, pp. 267–77; Lewis, Ambivalent Revolution, p. 155; José Alejos García, ‘Los Choles en el siglo de café: estructura agraria y etnicidad’, in Juan Pedro Viqueira (ed.), Chiapas: los rumbos de otra historia (Mexico City, 1995), p. 326.

107 Benjamin, A Rich Land, a Poor People; Spenser, ‘La reforma agraria en Soconusco’.

108 Boyer, ‘Old Loves, New Loyalties’, pp. 422–3.

109 The Junta Central de Conciliación y Arbitraje (Labour Relations Board) archives show a flurry of labour complaints against landlords in Soconusco in 1942–3.

110 Bobrow-Strain, Intimate Enemies, introduction and chap. 5.

111 Interview with José Galindo Figueroa, Ejido Ahuacatlán, 8 Aug. 1997.