Page:Mexico and its reconstruction.djvu/73

Rh are to continue as up to the present,. . . it will neither be possible to establish a durable government nor to restrain crime which, under a thousand forms, may invade society, the country being condenmed as it seems to inevitable dissolution.

One cannot study the political history of Mexico without reaching the conviction that the political leaders have not faced the facts with which they have had to deal. There has never been a determined and united effort to raise the people to that status in which true enthusiasm and ability for self-government is born. The better educated have made sporadic efforts to do so but those efforts have broken down almost as soon as made. Great advance has occurred in economic lines through the cooperation of the foreigner. Mexicans have not had cooperation from outside the country in political affairs and have indicated their unwillingness to accept it. If Mexico is to work out her own political salvation, as all her friends hope she may, a great responsibility rests on that small class which, by its wealth, social position, and education, is free from the limitations that surround the electorate as a whole. Orderly government has heretofore meant one-man rule in Mexico. That basis must be broadened, to include de jure and de facto at least those who, by education and experience, have the intellectual equipment for self-government.

Before those to whom Mexico has given advantages lies this opportunity for patriotic service and upon them rests the responsibility of learning the lesson of cooperation—cooperation with those of like and of unlike political faiths. They must lead their country and must