Mexican War of Independence

Viceroy Juan Ruiz de Apodaca sends a force led by a royalist criollo officer, Augustin de Iturbide, to defeat Guerrero's army in Oaxacan in December 1820 in what is supposed to be the final government campaign against the insurgents.

Iturbide, a native of Valladolid, has gained renown for the zeal with which he had persecuted Hidalgo's and Morelos's rebels during the early independence struggle.

A favorite of the Mexican church hierarchy, Iturbide is the personification of conservative criollo values, devoutly religious, and committed to the defense of property rights and social privileges; he is also disgruntled at his lack of promotion and wealth.

The eleven-year period of civil war that marks the Mexican wars of independence is largely a byproduct of the crisis and breakdown of Spanish royal political authority throughout the American colonies.

A successful independence movement in the United States has demonstrated the feasibility of a republican alternative to the European crown.

For most politically articulate criollos, however, a strong cultural affinity with the mother country, a preference for stability and continuity, and alienation from Mexico's native and poor mestizo populations are significant disincentives to a radical break with the established order.

Dissatisfaction with peninsular administrative practices and anti-criollo discrimination at many levels of the colonial government and society are important foci of discontent, but beyond small pockets of radical conspirators, these grievances have not yet spawned a pronounced wave of pro-independence criollo sentiment at the beginning of the nineteenth century.

The French occupation of Spain and the overthrow of the Iturrigaray junta creates a vacuum of legitimacy, as it is no longer clear that the ad hoc peninsular administration represents any authority or interests other than its own.

A revolt will no longer necessarily be a challenge to the paternal crown and the faith that it ostensibly defends, but will instead shake off the rule of the increasingly despised gachupines, as the peninsulares are derisively called.

It is in this context that a radical criollo parish priest, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, is able to lead the first truly widespread insurrection for Mexican independence.

Manuel Hidalgo, soon after being named parish priest in the small town of Dolores, begins to promote the establishment of various small manufacturing concerns.

He realizes the need for diversification of industrial activities in an area that has the mines of Guanajuato as its major business.

At the same time, during his seven years at Dolores, Hidalgo promotes discussion groups at his house, where natives, mestizos, criollos, and peninsulares are welcomed.

The themes of these discussions are current events, to which Hidalgo adds his own input of social and economic concerns.

The independence movement is born out of these informal discussions and is directed against Spanish domination of political and economic life in New Spain.

The beginning of the uprising is set for December 8, 1810.

The plans for the revolt are disclosed to the central government, and the conspirators are alerted that orders have been sent for their arrest.

Hidalgo, pressed by this new development, decides on September 16, 1810, to strike out for independence without delay (this date is celebrated as Mexico's independence day).

The church bells summon the people, and Hidalgo asks them to join him against the Spanish government and the peninsulares in the famous Grito de Dolores (Cry of Dolores): "Long live Our Lady of Guadalupe! Death to bad government! Death to the gachupinesl"

The crowd responds enthusiastically, and soon an angry mob is marching toward the regional capital of Guanajuato.

The miners of Guanajuato join with the native workers of Dolores in the massacre of all peninsulares who resist them, including the local intendente.

From Guanajuato, the independence forces march on to Mexico City after having captured Zacatecas, San Luis Potosf, and Valladolid.

They encounter resistance at Monte de las Cruces on October 30, 1810, and, despite a rebel victory, lose momentum and do not take Mexico City.

After a few more victories, the revolutionary forces move north toward Texas.

The insurgents are ambushed in March of the following year and taken prisoner in Monclova (in the present-day state of Coahuila).

Hidalgo is tried as a priest by the Holy Office of the Inquisition and found guilty of heresy and treason.

He is later condemned to death.

Hidalgo is executed by firing squad on July 31, 1811.

His body is mutilated, and his head is displayed in Guanajuato as a warning to other would-be insur- gents.

Jose Maria Morelos Pavon assumes the leadership of the revolutionary movement after the death of Hidalgo.

Morelos takes charge of the political and military aspects of the insurrection and further plans a strategic move to encircle Mexico City and to cut communications to the coastal areas.

In June 1813, Morelos convokes a national congress of represen tatives from all of the provinces, which meets at Chilpancingo in the present-day state of Guerrero to discuss the future of Mexico as an independent nation.

The major points included in the document prepared by the congress are popular sovereignty, universal male suffrage, the adoption of Roman Catholicism as the official religion, abolition of slavery and forced labor, an end to government monopolies, and an end to corporal punishment.

Despite initial successes by Morelos's forces, however, the colonial authorities break the siege of Mexico City after six months, capture positions in the surrounding areas, and finally invade Chilpancingo.

Morelos is captured in 1815 and meets the same fate as Hidalgo.

Most of the fighting by those seeking independence from Spain is done by isolated guerrilla bands from 1815 to 1821.

Out of these bands rise two men, Guadalupe Victoria (whose real name is Manuel Felix Fernandez) in Puebla and Vicente Guerrero in Oaxaca, both of whom are able to command allegiance and respect from their followers.

The Spanish viceroy, however, feels the situation is under control and issues a general pardon to every rebel who will lay down his arms.

The independence movement is stalemated and close to collapse by early 1820, after ten years of civil war and the death of two of its founders.

The rebels face stiff Spanish military resistance and the apathy of many of the most influential criollos.

The violent excesses and populist zeal of Hidalgo's and Morelos's irregular armies have reinforced many criollos' fears of race and class warfare, ensuring their grudging acquiescence to conservative Spanish rule until a less bloody path to independence can be found.

It is at this juncture that the machinations of a conservative military caudillo, coinciding with a successful liberal rebellion in Spain, makes possible a radical realignment of the pro-independence forces.

Iturbide's assignment to the Oaxaca expedition coincides with a successful military coup in Spain against the new monarchy of Ferdinand VII.

The coup leaders, who had been assembled as an expeditionary force to suppress the American independence movements, compel a reluctant Ferdinand to sign the liberal Spanish constitution of 1812.

When news of the liberal charter reaches Mexico, Iturbide sees in it both a threat to the status quo and an opportunity for the criollos to gain control of Mexico.

Ironically, independence is finally achieved when conservative forces in the colonies choose to rise up against a temporarily liberal regime in the mother country.

After an initial clash with Guerrero's forces, Iturbide switches allegiances and invites the rebel leader to meet and discuss principles of a renewed independence struggle.