The Roots of Conservatism in Mexico: Catholicism, Society, and Politics in the Mixteca Baja, 1750-1962

3: For a “government of Mexico, which protects our religion, our persons, and our families”: The Counternarrative of Provincial Conservatism, 1821–1867

120 Chapter 3 For a “government of Mexico, which protects our religion, our persons, and our families” The Counternarrative of Provincial Conservatism, 1821–1867 v On August 20, 1859, the villagers of Tequixtepec met in the community’s municipal palace. Here they read out the liberal government ’s recent prohibition of cofradía properties. In response, the councilors condemned the decrees, claiming that they sought to “destroy cofradías . . . and brotherhoods and appropriate their capital.” They argued that the policy was “a sacrilege against the Mexican church, an attack on the Catholic cult, and an atrocious blow to Mexican society.” As a result they “denounce[d] the law and its authors and adhere[d] to the [conservative] government of Mexico,whichprotectsourreligion,ourpersonsandourfamilies.”Endingon nationalist note, they claimed that the liberal statesmen were “traitors to our Independence,”whereastheconservativeleaderswere“defendersoftheinterests of our beloved Patria.” They concluded by pledging their allegiance to the conservative general José María Cobos.1 Throughout the postcolonial period, in response to perceived or real anticlerical attacks, communities throughout the Mixteca Baja defended the status of the church, writing petitions, signing pronunciamientos, or plans, and mobilizing armed forces. As U.S. armies threatened and the liberals took power, defending what villagers termed “religion” or “cult” shifted from a regional to a national affair, pulling local parishioners into broad alliances with conservative leaders. The story of the emergence of this broad national coalition forms the basis of this chapter. “Government of Mexico, which protects our religion, our persons, and our families” 121 , . Between 1830 and 1867 provincial conservatives throughout Mexico’s regions politicked, fought, and spilled blood for centralist and conservative causes. When radical federalists rose up to secure community autonomy , local land tenure, and low taxation in the Huasteca, Sierra Gorda, and Guerrero, provincial conservatives formed local military units, linked up with the regular army, and defended their towns and villages against incursion. When federalist governments attempted to pass anticlerical legislation in 1834 and 1847, provincial conservatives rushed to support diocesan demands, launched critical pronunciamientos, and took up arms. As the rhythm of caste war and foreign intervention quickened, they gradually moved along the political spectrum, shifting from selective support for centralism toward a more out-and-out backing for conservatism, which sacrificed political freedoms in the hope of securing stability, order, and a revival of Catholic morality. By the 1850s many were even prepared to support Santa Anna’s last disastrous dictatorship and its fruitless promise of political permanence. Even when radical federalists forged a cross-party alliance under the Plan of Ayutla to unseat the faltering caudillo, many provincial conservatives held firm and refused to embrace the plan’s liberating assurances . Finally, when radical liberals passed a raft of measures designed to curtail church power, alienate church property, and introduce religious tolerance three years later, provincial conservatives rebelled. Over the next decade, merchants, artisans, peasants, and peons from throughout Mexico formed regional battalions, volunteered for the conservative army, and fought a series of increasingly brutal battles against liberal forces. Even when metropolitan conservatives and a handful of moderate liberals allied with Napoleon III and his faintly ludicrous puppet emperor, Maximilian, provincial conservatives continued to seek to impose a stable, Catholic political system on Mexico. Discerning and describing a conservative political narrative beneath the teleological pull of liberalism’s eventual triumph is extremely hard. Political conservatism in a former colony smacks of treason, whereas the “liberal synthesis and its attendant heroes and holidays form the core of the Religion of the patria.”2 Until recently the telling of this story was left almost entirely to conservative apologists, whose hagiographies of individual leaders tended to dismiss liberal motives and play down the taint of mass support.3 In Oaxaca, the “cuna del liberalismo,” the task is doubly difficult. The national predominance of men like Benito Juárez, Porfirio Díaz, Matías Romero, and Ignacio Mejía obscures regional variation and Chapter 3 122 , . pockets of provincial conservative support. Instead, the allure of these liberal luminaries has driven generations of historians to scour Oaxaca’s early nineteenth century in a search for the deep regional roots of liberalism in the classrooms of the state capital’s secular university, in the haciendas and merchant houses of the region’s aspirant bourgeoisie, and in streets, markets, and village squares frequented by the state’s popular classes.4 Although liberalism in Oaxaca did have a protracted heritage—reaching back...