Page:Vol 5 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/276

256 The result was the installation on January 6, 1843, of a body of eighty prominent centralists, who proceeded energetically to work and produced bases for the political organization of the republic, which was formally sanctioned by the government on June 12th, and adopted with imposing ceremonies — the sugar coating of the pill. xxx representative system, yet the franchise, limited to an income of not less than $200, excluded a great part of the population; the election was subjected to a triple filtering process, during which the government could find ample opportunity to influence it, and the departments continued to be left almost wholly at the mercy of a central government, which appointed the governors and indirectly the subordinate officials, the departmental assemblies being merely councils with the power of a municipal police. Deputies for congress were required to possess an income of $1,200 and senators $2,000. Of the senate, one third was chosen by the three supreme powers and the rest by the departmental assemblies, which also elected the It declared for a popular