Plan of San Luis Potosí in the context of "1910 Mexican general election"

The Mexican Revolution (Spanish: Revolución mexicana) was an extended sequence of armed regional conflicts in Mexico from 20 November 1910 to 1 December 1920. It has been called "the defining event of modern Mexican history". It saw the destruction of the Federal Army, its replacement by a revolutionary army, and the transformation of Mexican culture and government. The northern Constitutionalist faction prevailed on the battlefield and drafted the present-day Constitution of Mexico, which aimed to create a strong central government. Revolutionary generals held power from 1920 to 1940. The revolutionary conflict was primarily a civil war, but foreign powers, having important economic and strategic interests in Mexico, figured in the outcome of Mexico's power struggles; the U.S. involvement was particularly high. The conflict led to the deaths of around one million people, mostly non-combatants.

Although the decades-long regime of President Porfirio Díaz (1876–1911) was increasingly unpopular, there was no foreboding in 1910 that a revolution was about to break out. The aging Díaz failed to find a controlled solution to presidential succession, resulting in a power struggle among competing elites and the middle classes, which occurred during a period of intense labor unrest, exemplified by the Cananea and Río Blanco strikes. When wealthy northern landowner Francisco I. Madero challenged Díaz in the 1910 presidential election and Díaz jailed him, Madero called for an armed uprising against Díaz in the Plan of San Luis Potosí. Rebellions broke out first in Morelos (immediately south of the nation's capital city) and then to a much greater extent in northern Mexico. The Federal Army could not suppress the widespread uprisings, showing the military's weakness and encouraging the rebels. Díaz resigned in May 1911 and went into exile, an interim government was installed until elections could be held, the Federal Army was retained, and revolutionary forces demobilized. The first phase of the Revolution was relatively bloodless and short-lived.

The United States involvement in the Mexican Revolution was varied and seemingly contradictory, first supporting and then repudiating Mexican regimes during the period 1910–1920. For both economic and political reasons, the U.S. government generally supported those who occupied the seats of power, but could withhold official recognition. The U.S. supported the regime of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1880; 1884–1911) after initially withholding recognition since he came to power by coup. In 1909, Díaz and U.S. President Taft met in Ciudad Juárez, across the border from El Paso, Texas. Prior to Woodrow Wilson's inauguration on March 4, 1913, the U.S. Government focused on just warning the Mexican military that decisive action from the U.S. military would take place if lives and property of U.S. nationals living in the country were endangered. President William Howard Taft sent more troops to the US-Mexico border but did not allow them to intervene directly in the conflict, a move which Congress opposed. Twice during the Revolution, the U.S. sent troops into Mexico, to occupy Veracruz in 1914 and to northern Mexico in 1916 in a failed attempt to capture Pancho Villa. U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America was to assume the region was the sphere of influence of the U.S., articulated in the Monroe Doctrine. However the U.S. role in the Mexican Revolution has been exaggerated. It did not directly intervene in the Mexican Revolution in a sustained manner.

During Díaz's long rule, he implemented policies aimed at modernization and economic development, inviting foreign entrepreneurs to invest in Mexico. The regime passed laws favorable to investors. American business interests invested large amounts of capital, particularly along the U.S.-Mexico border, during the decades of Díaz's rule. There was close economic cooperation between the two governments, which was predicated on Diaz's cooperation with US investors. In 1908 Díaz stated he would not run for re-election in 1910; the statement gave rise to politicking of potential candidates. Díaz reversed himself, ran for re-election, and jailed the leading opposition candidate, Francisco I. Madero. Madero escaped Mexico and took refuge in San Antonio, Texas, and called for nullification of the 1910 elections, declared himself as provisional president, and asked for support from the Mexican people. His Plan of San Luis Potosí sparked revolutionary uprisings, particularly in Mexico's north. The U.S. stayed out of the unfolding events until March 6, 1911, when President William Howard Taft mobilized forces on the U.S.-Mexico border. "In effect this was an intervention in Mexican politics, and to Mexicans it meant the United States had condemned Díaz."

Francisco Ignacio Madero González (Spanish pronunciation: [fɾanˈsisko jɣˈnasjo maˈðeɾo ɣonˈsales]; 30 October 1873 – 22 February 1913) was a Mexican businessman, revolutionary, writer, politician and statesman who served as the 37th president of Mexico from 1911 until he was deposed and assassinated in a coup d'état in February 1913. He came to prominence as an advocate for democracy and as an opponent of President and dictator Porfirio Díaz. After Díaz claimed to have won the fraudulent election of 1910 despite promising a return to democracy, Madero started the Mexican Revolution to oust Díaz. The Mexican revolution would continue until 1920, well after Madero and Díaz's deaths, with hundreds of thousands dead.

A member of one of Mexico's wealthiest families, Madero studied business at the École des Hautes Études Commerciales de Paris. An advocate for social justice and democracy, his 1908 book The Presidential Succession in 1910 called for Mexican voters to prevent the reelection of Porfirio Díaz, whose regime had become increasingly authoritarian. Bankrolling the opposition Anti-Reelectionist Party, Madero's candidacy garnered widespread support in the country. He challenged Díaz in the 1910 election, which resulted in his arrest. After Díaz declared himself winner for an eighth term in a rigged election, Madero escaped from jail, fled to the United States, and called for the overthrow of the Díaz regime in the Plan of San Luis Potosí, sparking the Mexican Revolution.

Gildardo Magaña Cerda (March 7, 1891 – December 13, 1939) was a Mexican general, politician and revolutionary.

Born on March 7, 1891, in Zamora, Michoacán to a Liberal trading family, Magaña was sent to study economics in the United States at the Temple College in Pennsylvania. Back in Mexico he was involved in the anti-reelectionist movement and had to flee to the insurrectionist Zapatista country people in Morelos in 1911. He was immediately made use of as emissary to various revolutionaries in different parts of Mexico, among others to Pancho Villa whom he is reported to have taught reading. In 1916 he was appointed chief of staff to Emiliano Zapata, because he was the only one who was able to make unruly sub-commanders of the movement cooperate instead of quarrel, using his personal charm as well as his outstanding diplomatic skill for the task.