Benito juarez's goals for la reforma?

Answer 1

The reforms that occurred during Juarez's stewardship radically changed the face of Mexican politics. It is a testament to the strength of his vision that, already owing his education and livelihood to the Oaxaca Council Seminary, Juarez spent his political career at loggerheads with the clergy and establishment.

"He was a god in Mexico to me," explains Yolanda Garcia, a teacher on the shopping street, Macedonio Alcalá. "He was very liberal and advanced for his time. He came out at a time when the future wasn't set and he could see it [the future] very clearly."Following the liberal revolt and the resignation of Santa Anna in 1855, a new government was formed with Juarez as, first, Minister of Justice and then President. The reforms of the new liberal government released the country from the social and economic stranglehold of the Church and aristocracy. The clergy and military were now subject to the secular courts and all institutions were forced to divest themselves of property deemed operationally expedient.The Constitution of 1857, moreover, enacted a comprehensive bill of rights. Among its new democratic principles were freedom of the press, freedom of education and freedom of conscience - this last broadside spelt the end for Roman Catholicism as the official state religion. The Church, for its part, "condemned, reproved, and declared null and void" the Constitution of 1857. Through these reforms, Juarez dragged Mexico into a new political era."He fought hard to achieve his position and did a lot for Mexico through the reform laws," says Oaxacan Norma Leon. "He was concerned with the well-being of the people and his reforms allowed for a better quality of life in Mexico."Juarez is a sacred piece of the Mexican political jigsaw. "He has been one of the few people in politics who did not allow himself to be led by his own ambition for self-enrichment," says Carmen Alcazar, a waitress in the city center. Miguel Ramirez, a student, cites Juarez's rise from poverty: "He demonstrated that, however meager your circumstances, you can achieve your goals." But the idolatry he receives (there was hardly a dissenting voice among those polled) is, perhaps, disingenuous. For many, Juarez is as much an emblem of a nation's ideals, of personal hopes, as a political figure grounded in historical fact.Juarez Monument on the Oaxaca city limit. From here, highway #175 leads to the montain village of San Pablo Quelatao (55 KM/ 35 miles), home of the belovbed Benito Juarez."He was a good politician, though not everyone agreed with his policies and he didn't actually help his own people [the indigenous Zapotecs] as much as he could have," says Cecilia Heredia Mariche, a Spanish teacher from Mexico City. Juarez's reforms, which provoked a civil war that cost the lives of 50,000 Mexicans (mostly indigenous Indians and poor mestizos) was a necessary, but double-edged, sword for Mexico."For the Indian villages, the laws were a disaster," says historian Kenneth Pearce. "Like the Church and the town, the villages were classed as institutions, and their ejidos, the community lands, were gobbled up by speculators and hacendados." Nevertheless, public opinion holds sway and his reputation remains, justifiably, in tact."Benito Juarez showed each Mexican that they have the chance to be a part of their own country's history, that each is master of his own destiny-that the environment does not determine the man but the opposite is true: that each man can make his own luck in the world," say Andrea Ibarrea, a student from Mexico City. "Furthermore, sometimes a 'hostile' environment can actually invigorate the conscience and the spirit-and why not with nations too?"Also, I believe that if each and every human-being followed his maxim ('Respect for Rights is Peace') to the letter, the world would not be on the point of catastrophic international collapse."