Adolfo de la Huerta was a Mexican politician who became provisional president of the country on July 1, 1920. His mandate lasted until November 30 of that same year and was marked by his attempts to pacify the country, still involved in the revolutionary process that began in 1910.
During the first stage of the Mexican Revolution, De la Huerta supported Francisco Madero in his fight to end the Porfiriato. During the following years, he held various political positions: governor of Sonora, senator in the same state and consul in New York, among them.
In 1920, Plutarco Elías Calles and Pascual Orozco proclaimed the Agua Prieta Plan, which sought to end the government of Venustiano Carranza. After the plan succeeded, the country's Congress appointed Adolfo de la Huerta as interim president, who was to hold office until new elections were called..
Although brief, his main objective was to end the continuous internal struggles that Mexico had lived through for decades. To do this, he rejected all kinds of reprisals against dissidents and formed a government cabinet in which various revolutionary groups were represented..
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Felipe Adolfo de la Huerta Marcor, full name of the future president, was born in Guaymas, Sonora, on May 26, 1881.
His first studies were carried out at El Colegio de Sonora, located in Hermosillo. In 1896 he entered the National Preparatory School of Mexico City to study accounting and singing..
De la Huerta was studying at that institution until 1900, when his father died. The young man was forced to return to Guaymas and look for a job, since the store run by his father had to close.
His first job was at the Banco Nacional de México branch in his hometown. There he worked as an accountant (a trade that is also called "bookkeeper"), that is, the person in charge of recording the company's accounting.
His first foray into politics occurred in 1906, when he joined the Mexican Liberal Party of the Flores Magón brothers. At that time he also began to collaborate financially with the newspaper Regeneración.
De la Huerta began to make a name for himself in the city, both in the social gatherings and in the parties he attended as a singer..
About 1908 he became involved in the Anti-reelection Club of his city, which was in charge of José María Maytorena. De la Huerta became the group's secretary and, in 1909, he was part of the committee in charge of receiving Francisco Madero when he visited Guaymas during his electoral campaign..
When the Revolution broke out, De la Huerta became president of the Revolutionary Party of Sonora, which supported the struggle to overthrow Porfirio Díaz.
After the revolutionary triumph, De la Huerta was elected representative of his locality in the state Congress. In addition, during the years that Madero was president, he fought against the Orozquista revolt and played an important role in the attempt to pacify the Yaquis, an indigenous people who sought to recover their lands..
In 1913, a coup d'etat broke out that sought to overthrow the Madero government and De la Huerta organized resistance to Victoriano Huerta, who was leading the coup. In his memoirs, he said about those acts that "I had the satisfaction of being the first civilian who appeared in Chapultepec on February 9 to place himself under the command of Don Francisco I. Madero.".
However, Huerta's coup was successful and President Madero was assassinated. After receiving the news, De la Huerta moved to Hermosillo and contacted Venustiano Carranza and Francisco Villa, who would soon rise up in arms against to restore constitutional legality to the country..
In the midst of the war against Huerta, the politician managed to get the Sonora Congress to recognize Carranza as the highest authority in the country on August 18, 1912, making state resources available to him..
Carranza and the rest of the revolutionaries overthrew Huerta in July 1914. A year later, De la Huerta took over the Ministry of the Interior, a position in which he remained until April 1916..
Adolfo de la Huerta served as governor of Sonora on two occasions. The first, provisionally, in May 1916, when Carranza elected him to the position. In June 1917, he called elections and left office.
His second stage as governor of the state began in 1919. On that occasion, he acceded to the position after winning the elections, to which he ran as a candidate for the Sonoran Revolutionary Party. Although his mandate was to last four years, De la Huerta resigned soon, since Álvaro Obregón appointed him Secretary of the Treasury.
Between both periods, the politician maintained an intense activity. First, he spent time in the Mayor's Office of the Interior and, in 1918, he became a senator for the state of Sonora. His next destination was New York (USA), where he served as Consul General.
The relationship between De la Huerta and Carranza began to deteriorate in 1920. The first reason for their confrontation was the president's opposition to the agreements that De la Huerta had reached with the Yaquis..
In addition, De la Huerta supported the intention of his friend, Ignacio Bonillas, to run for president, which Carranza did not like..
The estrangement between the two politicians made, on April 23, 1920, De la Huerta joined the Agua Prieta Plan, proclaimed by Álvaro Obregón and Plutarco Elías Calles in order to overthrow Carranza.
Following the postulates of the Plan, De la Huerta assumed the supreme leadership of the so-called Constitutionalist Liberal Army. Carranza was finally defeated and, in May 1920, assassinated while trying to escape from his enemies..
The Agua Prieta Plan established that, after overthrowing Carranza, Adolfo de la Huerta should assume the provisional presidency.
The politician assumed office on June 1, 1920 and remained in it until November 30 of the same year, when Álvaro Obregón replaced him. Its objectives were to pacify the country, reorganize the governmental structure and, finally, call elections.
At first, De la Huerta maintained a good relationship with Obregón and participated in his cabinet with the position of Secretary of the Treasury. From that position, he signed the De la Huerta-Lamont treaties, related to the Mexican foreign debt..
However, the relationship began to deteriorate after Obregón signed the Treaty of Bucareli with the United States, in 1923..
This agreement obliged Mexico to pay compensation for the damages suffered by US citizens during the revolution, but it also forced the resumption of debt payments and consolidated the rights of US companies engaged in oil exploitation..
De la Huerta considered this treaty as very negative for the country and, as a result of the signing, he resigned. The politician announced his decision to face Plutarco Elías Calles in the following presidential elections, for which he had the support of conservative sectors fearful of the reformist policies of Obregón and Calles.
On December 6, 1923, from Veracruz, he launched a manifesto calling for a revolt against the government. The main bastion of the rebellion was in Tabasco, where De la Huerta remained until May 11, 1924, when he traveled to the United States before the bad progress of the war..
From that moment on, the rebellion weakened and the government army took Tabasco without much difficulty. The last place the delahuertistas kept, Villahermosa, was conquered on June 17.
The first moments of the American exile of Adolfo de la Huerta, along with his wife, were very hard, since they had great economic problems.
The solution he found was to open a singing school near Hollywood. De la Huerta soon made a name for himself in the city, allowing his standard of living to grow..
The former president did not return to Mexico until 1935, during the presidency of Lázaro Cárdenas. Already in his country, he was again called by several governments to occupy some political positions.
Adolfo de la Huerta died on July 9, 1955, in Mexico City.
The stage as provisional president of this politician was very short and his government focused on trying to pacify a country that had a decade of continuous internal confrontations.
Aware of the mandatory brevity of his mandate, De la Huerta set three clear objectives: the aforementioned pacification, restructuring the governing bodies and, finally, organizing elections.
The main characteristic of the government chaired by De la Huerta was its eagerness to try to pacify the country. In his cabinet he incorporated some of the rebel leaders who, until recently, had been at odds, while others preferred to abandon politics.
The government that emerged from the Agua Prieta Plan sought conciliation between the different factions that existed in the country. With them he negotiated an educational reform and made sure that the work tension did not explode.
The first measure taken by De la Huerta to end the internal confrontations was to relieve some of the military followers of Carranza from command. In addition, he incorporated the Carrancista troops into the federal army.
After achieving his first goal, De la Huerta set out to negotiate with Francisco Villa and the followers of the murdered Emiliano Zapata. These latter received the offer to enlist in the army, specifically in the Southern Division, created for this purpose..
The negotiation with the villistas was more complicated. To begin with, Obregón had put a price on Villa's head, so the revolutionary led a march of almost 800 kilometers between Chihuahua and Coahuila, where he took the town of Sabinas.
De la Huerta, instead of responding with violence, offered Villa a rather advantageous deal: land for his soldiers in exchange for them to lay down their arms..
On the other hand, De la Huerta established strict control of the budget that he had dedicated to achieving national reconciliation. That same control allowed him to reform the public finances and even achieve a surplus in the accounts.
The relationship with the United States was one of the great problems that the brief government of De la Huerta had to face.
As interim president, he tried to get US oil companies to abide by federal law. On July 10, 1920, he promulgated a decree in which he established the conditions for granting concessions to exploit Mexican oil fields..
De la Huerta sent representatives to the US capital to directly negotiate these matters. In addition, he also tried, without success, to get the US to recognize his government..
Despite the fact that De la Huerta was not in favor of ending the large estates, he agreed to enact some measures favorable to small farmers, as well as workers.
His agrarian policy included the distribution of land to more than 100 towns. In addition, he returned more than 40,000 hectares of land to some indigenous peoples, including Yaquis, whom he knew well..
Another of his measures was to offer governors the power to divide large estates and to create new populations. In order to increase the exploitation capacity, it approved the Law of Unused Lands, with which it forced to take advantage of all arable land.
As part of his agreement with the Zapatistas, the politician allowed the creation of the National Agrarian Party.
Apart from this impulse to agrarian organizations, De la Huerta also supported the formation of labor movements. In this area, his government even incorporated some union leaders into the administration.
During his time in government, the Department of Labor and Social Security was created. Finally, he reformed the Conciliation and Arbitration Board, with such success that he did not have to face any strike.
In addition to his contributions as provisional president of Mexico, De la Huerta also stood out for his work at the time he was governor, also provisional, of Sonora.
During this stage, which began in April 1916, the politician reached an agreement with the Yaqui Indians to end the confrontation they had against the government to try to get the return of their ancestral lands..
Another important measure was the creation of the Workers' Chamber, which included in its statutes the introduction of the 8-hour working day, a minimum wage and a 14-year limit to start working. Likewise, it approved the weekly rest and that it was the companies and not the workers who paid the taxes.
On the other hand, De la Huerta had to face American troops who had entered Mexican territory to pursue Francisco Villa, who had previously entered the United States to attack a town in New Mexico..
After his presidential period, De la Huerta was appointed Secretary of Finance and Public Credit in the government of Álvaro Obregón.
From that position, the politician owed the International Committee of Bankers with interests in Mexico, made up of the creditors of the Mexican foreign debt. On the part of the latter body, the negotiator was its president, Thomas W. Lamont.
The result was the De la Huerta-Lamont Treaty, considered key to normalize Mexico's relations with other countries, especially with the United States..
This agreement, signed on June 16, 1922 in New York, committed Mexico to pay all the debt contracted with the United States, half of which corresponded to the railroads..
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