File No. 812.00/12634.
Vice Consul Silliman to the Secretary of State.
Tampico, July 26, 1914, 3 p.m.
* * * Attitude of the revolution towards the Eoman Catholic priesthood. It is claimed that the priesthood, in forgetfulness of its spiritual mission, its disregard of the reform laws, has actively concerned itself in the political intrigues and has connived with the aristocrats and property holders to support Huerta against the interests of the people and against their civil and religious liberty, that the tendency of the priesthood has been in various ways to propagate error, to corrupt the people and to injure the State. Though the Department may have been furnished with a copy of the decree of Governor Villareal, of the State of Nuevo Leon, dated July 14, 1914, I have not seen it in print until to-day. I am sending copy by mail and quote here only the conclusions of the edict. The translation is my own.
- 1.
- All foreign Catholic priests are expelled and all Jesuits of whatever nationality.
- 2.
- Of the Catholic priests who remain all will be required to formally obligate themselves to abstain from taking any part in political questions.
- 3.
- The churches will be open every day from six a.m. until one p.m.; only those priests will be allowed to officiate in them who have permission to do so and who have complied with the obligation referred to in the preceding article.
- 4.
- Confessions and confirmations are prohibited.
- 5.
- The public is not permitted to enter the sacristy.
- 6.
- The church bell will not be allowed to ring except on national holidays and for the triumph of the Constitutionalist army.
- 7.
- All Catholic schools which do not strictly agree to obey the official regulations and which do not have as a director a professor from the normal schools of this country shall be closed; the director shall be responsible to the Government for any infraction committed.
- 8.
- The infraction of any of these orders shall be punished by a fine of from one to five hundred pesos or of imprisonment of from two to four months or both. In case of repetition the establishment where the infraction was committed shall be closed and the one responsible expelled.
In this matter also the revolution desires the United States and the world to let it be judge of what it considers necessary for the best interest of the country as was done in the period of the reform laws in Mexico and following recent precedents in Italy, France and Portugal.