The Dominion. THURSDAY, MARCH 9, 1911. A REMARKABLE DESPOT.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1071, 9 March 1911, Page 4

The Dominion. THURSDAY, MARCH 9, 1911. A REMARKABLE DESPOT.

The news that President Diaz is on his deathbed will attract to Mexico an attention that even a long-drawn-out rebellion has failed to attract in any great measure. It is only during the past year or two that Mexico has becomc a topic in the periodicals of Britain and America ; for a generation most people have known nothing more about the country than that its President is a very remarkable man named Poitfikio Diaz. "Within the last year, however, a flood of articles has appeared in American and British newspapers and magazines, and it is a remarkable fact that for every representation of the famous President as a bcncvoLnfc despot who has made a peaceful, happy and prosperous land out of a mass of misery and barbarism one can find a picture of Diaz as an atrocious tyrant for whose original we must go back to the days of the Neros. The President, who is now'Bl years of age, waded through blood to his present post over forty years ago, and finally settled down in 1884 to a dictatorship that has continued- unbroken from that time until now. Tho Encyclopaedia Britannica says of him: ''Under Jiis vigorous rule the most anarchical of Spanish American States has become the most orderly; military revolts have disappeared; the laws arc executed without opposition ; industry has been stimulated, to the great increase of national wealth; roads and railways have been multiplied; foreign capital has been invested and rendered secure; and the financial credit of the coun-

try, which liacl sunk to the lowest ebb, has been entirely re-establish-ed." _ And this is the opinion of Britain and Europe at the present time; but it must.be kept in mind that the happiness of Mexico and the excellence of its President may, in Britain and Europe, bo no more than inferences from the good returns enjoyed by the proprietors of the great amount of foreign capital invested in Mexican industries. Speaking on November 10 last at a dinner in celebration of the centenary of tho independence of the Republic, Sin Edwakd Gkey painted a glowing picture of Mexico's "increasing' prosperity, progress, and strength," which he ascribed in great measure to the President, who was "one of the great'men of the world. Ho had displayed," Sir Edward Geey continued, "heroism and endurance in times of trouble as a soldier; he followed that up by displaying the highest gifts of statesmanship in times of peace. The world always liked to indulge in hero-worship, and when it could appreciate national success, and, combined with it, admiration of one who has shown the qualities of genius, it was a great satisfaction." Upon the financial skill of the President, and his unexampled genius for government, all his critics are agreed. They disagreo upon the uses he has made of his tremendous powers and upon the motives that have guided him. Amidst the con„flicting_ statements of American writers it is difficult to loarn the truth. It has been stated tliat every form of opposition to the Diaz Administration is treated as a criminal conspiracy, and it is undeniable that tho President has never been unwilling to repress free speech, tho freedom of the press and the freedom of assembly. The Judges of tho Courts arc said by some critics to bs "creatures of the President," who "wields discretionary powers ovor the property, freedom, and .life of every Mexican and is not accountable to anyone for any of his acts": "Governors of States, senators, deputies, and judges are merely his appointees, and he can remove them from office whenever he chooses." On the other hand, it is affirmed by well-known writers in the Americaii press that all the stories of slavery, massacre, and despotism are outrageous lies, circulated by Socialists, criminals, and plotters within, and by the Standard Oil Company outside. In the New York Independent, about a year ago, Mb, W. J. Ghent, a real authority on Mexican affairs, examined' a batch of rccent articles by the President's eulogists, and found even in these some evidence in support of the charge that the President has shed blood freely—3o,ooo men arc said to have died by his orders—that he dees not regard the peons as worthy of treatment according to the democratic idea, that ho can make or mar anyone's career, that imprisonmo t is his favourite retort against an opponent, that he suppresses newspapers and imprisons their editors, that he subsidises newspapers of his own, that his very shadow is- a,. rigid censorship, and that ho is responsible for the slavery in' Yucatan. _ There is as much confusion concerning the real origin of the present revolution. On the one haijd it has been represented as a revolt against the Diaz regime, and on tho other hand as a protest against abuses of local administration. But tho fact that is not disputed is that there is an increasing demand among Mexicans of all classes for more power in the Congress, a really independent judiciary, popular education, the breaking up of the large land holdings, and a general observance of constitutional rights. Even the London Times, which entertains as little doubt of the goodness and patriotism of the President as of his remarkable skill in government, admits that there! arc sonw serious de- ' fects to bo remedied if the reality of democratic control is to be substituted for its semblance.

By whatever means he has done it, President Diaz has accomplished what is of its kind a greater work —the creation of a strong economic state out of a bankrupt' anarchy— than almost any other man of which history preserves any record. He began life without any advantages —he was a cobbler's apprentice in 1845. It is easily credible that ho has always lived a clean and simple life. Tho question that lie will present to the future historian will be a simple one, and an old one: the old question whether the end can justify the means. One of the gravest charges _ brought against Diaz is his terrific treatment of the Yaquis, and upon this one of his admirers, in an article quite exceptionally fair and conscientious, observes :

It is doubtful whether Diaz will try to deny these things, for fairness force-'the statement that even in this lie has followed out his iron policies. As tho watered valleys of the Yaquis Wsre required to rouirl out hla emnomic plans, their reslsUnco to hi« tiggrMiioiiD plaeod them In UlO spme category with political crimia-

ills and lie moved against them with the same ruthlcssuoss, nor paused till tho last Yaciui was gone. Neither is it to bo expected that a man whose own iife was at hazard every day ot twii.ty years, and ,: i'en thousands of lives gu into lie foundations of the Republic. would host late to sacrifieo a few thousand prons in uin cause of the eounlrv.

Although most people can conceive unique and transcendent advantages in a benevolent cbspotism; although the vices and abuses that reside in democratic government often make men long, in the impatience of despair, for a supreme committee of one member, yet the thought is one that we must put away from us. The end docs not justify the means. Crimes against the principles of truth and justice, however splendid may be the material results, and however admirable the end for which they are committed, must ultimately bear their fruit, some way and some day, in national ruin or national diseases.