ANARCHY IN MEXICO.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 31 December 1913, Page 4

ANARCHY IN MEXICO.

The description of the state of affairs ;in Mexico set forth in our cable columns of late is probably by no means exaggerated, says the Auckland Star. The Latin-Americans dp not easily acquire the elements of civi ilisation; and it must be remembered I that the prosperity,that Mexico has ■ experienced in recent years has been due largely to- the despotic character of its Government. President Diaz .was all autocrat endowed s with unus--aal cdurage and strength of will, and he reduced his country to a condition of discipline and order that rendered possible the development of its industries and the acquisition of great wealth by many of, . his sub? jecis. "But "when his guiding hand, wag withdrawn from "the reins of State, chaos came again. The idea of constitutional government, in Mexico is almost aa unthinkable as it would be in India; and the fact that the lower industrial classes there * have been practically .slaves for generations accounts for the frightful disorders "that . prevail everywhere now that the people are thoroughly out of hand. All this, of course, suggests that the first duty of the Powers concerned for, Mexico's future should be /to restore . order _at once; and so we Are confronted with the. Monroe Doctrine again. It. is a significant fact that Dr Martinez, the famous South American ' jurist, has just been maintaining, in-a debate against ex-President Roosevelt, at-.Santiago* that the Monroe Doctrine is a dead-letter. Roosevelt, of course, strenuously repudiates this view. But if the Other Powers are to be debarred from interfering in Mexico/and are thus compelled to stand idly by while ' their subjects are plundered and their interests are imperilled, it is surely incumbent on the Americans to assume the respon•sibilities connoted by the rights they claim, and undertake the restoration of law and order in Mexico themselves.