Emiliano Zapata (born August 8,
1879, Anenecuilco, Mexico—died April 10, 1919, Morelos)
was a Mexican revolutionary, champion of agrarianism, who
fought in guerrilla actions during and after the Mexican
Revolution (1910–20)
Early career
Zapata was the son of a mestizo peasant who trained and
sold horses. He was orphaned at the age of 17 and had to
look after his brothers and sisters. In 1897 he was arrested
because he took part in a protest by the peasants of his
village against the hacienda that had appropriated their lands. After obtaining a
pardon, he continued agitation among the peasants, and so he was drafted into the
army. He served for six months, at which point he was discharged to a landowner
to train his horses. In 1909 his neighbours elected him president of the board of
defense for their village. After useless negotiations with the landowners, Zapata
and a group of peasants occupied by force the land that had been appropriated by
the haciendas and distributed it among themselves.
Francisco Madero, a landowner of the north, had lost the elections in 1910 to the
dictator Porfirio Díaz and had fled to the United States, where he proclaimed
himself president and then reentered Mexico, aided by many peasant guerrillas.
Zapata and his friends decided to support Madero. In March 1911 Zapata’s tiny
force took the city of Cuautla and closed the road to the capital, Mexico City. A
week later Díaz resigned and left for Europe, appointing a provisional president.
Zapata, with 5,000 men, entered Cuernavaca, capital of the state of Morelos.
Madero entered Mexico City in triumph. Zapata met Madero there and asked him
to exert pressure on the provisional president to return the land to the ejidos (the
former Indian communal system of landownership). Madero insisted on the
disarmament of the guerrillas and offered Zapata a recompense so that he could
buy land, an offer that Zapata rejected. Zapata began to disarm his forces but
stopped when the provisional president sent the army against the guerrillas.
The Plan of Ayala
Madero was elected president in November 1911, and Zapata met with him again
but without success. With the help of a teacher, Otilio Montaño, Zapata prepared
the Plan of Ayala, which declared Madero incapable of fulfilling the goals of the
revolution. The signers renewed the revolution and promised to appoint a
provisional president until there could be elections. They also vowed to return the
stolen land to the ejidos by expropriating, with payment, a third of the area of the
haciendas; those haciendas that refused to accept this plan would have their lands
expropriated without compensation. Zapata adopted the slogan “Tierra y Libertad”
(“Land and Liberty”).
In the course of his campaigns, Zapata distributed lands taken from the haciendas,
which he frequently burned without compensation. He often ordered executions
and expropriations, and his forces did not always abide by the laws of war. But
underneath his picturesque appearance—drooping moustache, cold eyes, big
sombrero—was a passionate man with simple ideals that he tried to put into
practice. The Zapatistas avoided battle by adopting guerrilla tactics. They farmed
their land with rifles on their shoulders, went when called to fight, and returned to
their plows at the end of a battle or skirmish. Sometimes Zapata assembled
thousands of men; he paid them by imposing taxes on the provincial cities and
extorting from the rich. Their arms were captured from federal troops.
