Venustiano Carranza in the context of "Sham election"

The history of the Catholic Church in Mexico dates from the period of the Spanish conquest (1519–21) and has continued as an institution in Mexico into the twenty-first century. Catholicism is one of many major legacies from the Spanish colonial era, the others include Spanish as the nation's language, the Civil Code and Spanish colonial architecture. The Catholic Church was a privileged institution until the mid nineteenth century. It was the sole permissible church in the colonial era and into the early Mexican Republic, following independence in 1821. Following independence, it involved itself directly in politics, including in matters that did not specifically involve the Church.

In the mid-nineteenth century the liberal Reform brought major changes in church-state relations. Mexican liberals in power challenged the Catholic Church's role, particularly in reaction to its involvement in politics. The Reform curtailed the Church's role in education, property ownership, and control of birth, marriage, and death records, with specific anticlerical laws. Many of these were incorporated into the Constitution of 1857, restricting the Church's corporate ownership of property and other limitations. Although there were some liberal clerics who advocated reform, such as José María Luis Mora, the Church came to be seen as conservative and anti-revolutionary. During the bloody War of the Reform, the Church was an ally of conservative forces that attempted to oust the liberal government. They also were associated with the conservatives' attempt to regain power during the French Intervention, when Maximilian of Habsburg was invited to become emperor of Mexico. The empire fell and conservatives were discredited, along with the Catholic Church. However, during the long presidency of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1911) the liberal general pursued a policy of conciliation with the Catholic Church; though he kept the anticlerical articles of the liberal constitution in force, he in practice allowed greater freedom of action for the Catholic Church. With Díaz's ouster in 1911 and the decade-long conflict of the Mexican Revolution, the victorious Constitutionalist faction led by Venustiano Carranza wrote the new Constitution of 1917 that strengthened the anticlerical measures in the liberal Constitution of 1857.

The military history of Mexico encompasses armed conflicts within that nation's territory, dating from before the arrival of Europeans in 1519 to the present era. Mexican military history is replete with small-scale revolts, foreign invasions, civil wars, indigenous uprisings, and coups d'état by disgruntled military leaders. Mexico's colonial-era military was not established until the eighteenth century. After the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire in the early sixteenth century, the Spanish crown did not establish on a standing military, but the crown responded to the external threat of a British invasion by creating a standing military for the first time following the Seven Years' War (1756–63). The regular army units and militias had a short history when in the early 19th century, the unstable situation in Spain with the Napoleonic invasion gave rise to an insurgency for independence, propelled by militarily untrained men fighting for the independence of Mexico. The Mexican War of Independence (1810–21) saw royalist and insurgent armies battling to a stalemate in 1820. That stalemate ended with the royalist military officer turned insurgent, Agustín de Iturbide persuading the guerrilla leader of the insurgency, Vicente Guerrero, to join in a unified movement for independence, forming the Army of the Three Guarantees. The royalist military had to decide whether to support newly independent Mexico. With the collapse of the Spanish state and the establishment of first a monarchy under Iturbide and then a republic, the state was a weak institution. The Roman Catholic Church and the military weathered independence better. Military men dominated Mexico's nineteenth-century history, most particularly General Antonio López de Santa Anna, under whom the Mexican military were defeated by Texas insurgents for independence in 1836 and then the U.S. invasion of Mexico (1846–48). With the overthrow of Santa Anna in 1855 and the installation of a government of political liberals, Mexico briefly had civilian heads of state. The Liberal Reforms that were instituted by Benito Juárez sought to curtail the power of the military and the church and wrote a new constitution in 1857 enshrining these principles. Conservatives comprised large landowners, the Catholic Church, and most of the regular army revolted against the Liberals, fighting a civil war. The Conservative military lost on the battlefield. But Conservatives sought another solution, supporting the French intervention in Mexico (1862–65). The Mexican army loyal to the liberal republic were unable to stop the French army's invasion, briefly halting it with a victory at Puebla on 5 May 1862. Mexican Conservatives supported the installation of Maximilian Hapsburg as Emperor of Mexico, propped up by the French and Mexican armies. With the military aid of the U.S. flowing to the republican government in exile of Juárez, the French withdrew its military supporting the monarchy and Maximilian was caught and executed. The Mexican army that emerged in the wake of the French Intervention was young and battle tested, not part of the military tradition dating to the colonial and early independence eras.

Liberal General Porfirio Díaz was part of the new Mexican military, a hero of the Mexican victory over the French on Cinco de Mayo 1862. He revolted against the civilian liberal government in 1876, and remained continuously in the presidency from 1880 to 1911. Over the course of his presidency, Díaz began professionalizing the army that had emerged. By the time he turned 80 years old in 1910, the Mexican military was an aging, largely ineffective fighting force. When revolts broke out in 1910–11 against his regime, a rebel forces scored decisive victories over the Federal Army in the opening chapter of the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920). Díaz resigned in May 1911, but Francisco I. Madero, on whose political behalf rebels rose against Díaz, demobilized the rebel forces and kept the Federal Army in place. "This single decision cost [Madero] the presidency and his life." Army General Victoriano Huerta seized the presidency of Madero in 1913, with Madero murdered in the coup d'état. Civil war broke out in the wake of the coup. Huerta's Federal Army racked up one defeat after another by the revolutionary armies, with Huerta resigning in 1914. The Federal Army ceased to exist. A new generation of fighting men, most of whom with no formal military training but were natural soldiers, now fought against each other in a civil war of the winners. The Constitutionalist Army under the civilian leadership of Venustiano Carranza and the military leadership of General Álvaro Obregón were the victors in 1915. The revolutionary military men were to continue to dominate Mexico's postrevolutionary period, but the military men who became presidents of Mexico brought the military under civilian control, systematically reining in the power of the military and professionalizing the force. The Mexican military has been under civilian government control with no President of Mexico being military generals since 1946. The fact of Mexico's civilian control of the military is in contrast the situation in many other countries in Latin America.

The Liberation Army of the South (Spanish: Ejército Libertador del Sur, ELS) was a guerrilla force led for most of its existence by Emiliano Zapata that took part in the Mexican Revolution from 1911 to 1920. During that time, the Zapatistas fought against the national governments of Porfirio Díaz, Francisco Madero, Victoriano Huerta, and Venustiano Carranza. Their goal was rural land reform, specifically reclaiming communal lands stolen by hacendados in the period before the revolution. Although rarely active outside their base in Morelos, they allied with Pancho Villa to support the Conventionists against the Carrancistas. After Villa's defeat, the Zapatistas remained in open rebellion. It was only after Zapata's 1919 assassination and the overthrow of the Carranza government that Zapata's successor, Gildardo Magaña, negotiated peace with President Álvaro Obregón.

The Constitutionalists (Spanish: Constitucionalistas) were a faction in the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920). They were formed in 1914 as a response to the assassination of Francisco Madero and Victoriano Huerta's coup d'etat. Also known as Carrancistas, taking that name from their leader, Venustiano Carranza the governor of Coahuila. The Constitutionalists played the leading role in defeating the Mexican Federal Army on the battlefield. Carranza, a centrist liberal attracted Mexicans across various political ideologies to the Constitutionalist cause. Constitutionalists consisted of mainly middle-class urbanites, liberals, and intellectuals who desired a democratic constitution under the guidelines "Mexico for Mexicans" and Mexican nationalism. Their support for democracy in Mexico caught the attention of the United States, who aided their cause. In 1914, the United States occupied Mexico's largest port in Veracruz in an attempt to starve Huerta's government of customs revenue. They crafted and enforced the Mexican Constitution of 1917 which remains in force today. Following the defeat of General Huerta, the Constitutionalists outmaneuvered their former revolutionary allies Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa becoming the victorious faction of the Mexican Revolution. However the Constitutionalists were divided amongst themselves and Carranza was assassinated in 1920. He was succeeded by General Álvaro Obregón who began enforcing the 1917 constitution and calming revolutionary tensions. His assassination and the subsequent power vacuum this created spurred his successor, Plutarco Elías Calles to create the National Revolutionary Party (PNR) which would hold uninterrupted political power in Mexico until 2000.

Plutarco Elías Calles (born Francisco Plutarco Elías Campuzano; 25 September 1877 – 19 October 1945) was a Mexican politician and military officer who served as the 47th President of Mexico from 1924 to 1928. After the assassination of Álvaro Obregón, Calles founded the Institutional Revolutionary Party and held unofficial power as Mexico's de facto leader from 1929 to 1934, a period known as the Maximato. Previously, he served as a general in the Constitutional Army, as Governor of Sonora, Secretary of War, and Secretary of the Interior. During the Maximato, he served as Secretariat of Public Education, Secretary of War again, and Secretary of the Economy. During his presidency, he implemented many left-wing populist and secularist reforms, opposition to which sparked the Cristero War.

Born on 25 September 1877 in Sonora, Calles fought in Venustiano Carranza's Constitutional Army during the Mexican Revolution, which allowed him to rise in politics, joining the cabinets of Presidents Carranza, Adolfo de la Huerta, and Álvaro Obregón. Obregón selected him as the Laborist Party's candidate in the 1924 election. His campaign was the first populist presidential campaign in Mexico's history, as he called for land redistribution and promised equal justice, further labor rights, and democratic governance. He won the election and expanded education, implemented infrastructure projects, and improved public health. After this populist phase (1924–1926) he began to persecute the Catholic Church in Mexico (1926–1928), passing several anticlerical laws that resulted in the Cristero War. He allowed CROM's Luis N. Morones to consolidate unions under the Laborist Party, and launched a failed attempt to cancel the Bucareli Treaty. Obregón still held significant political sway and was Calles's main base of support.

The Constitutional Army (Spanish: Ejército constitucional), also known as the Constitutionalist Army (Spanish: Ejército constitucionalista), was the army that fought against the Federal Army, and later, against the Villistas and Zapatistas during the Mexican Revolution. It was formed in March 1913 by Venustiano Carranza, so-called "First-Chief" of the army, as a response to the murder of President Francisco I. Madero and Vice President José María Pino Suárez by Victoriano Huerta during La Decena Trágica (Ten Tragic Days) of 1913, and the resulting usurpation of presidential power by Huerta.

Carranza had a few military forces on which he could rely for loyalty. He had the theoretical support of Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata, but they soon turned against the Constitutionalists after Huerta's defeat in 1914.

Álvaro Obregón Salido (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈalβaɾo oβɾeˈɣon]; 19 February 1880 – 17 July 1928) was a Mexican general, inventor and politician who served as the 46th President of Mexico from 1920 to 1924. Obregón was re-elected to the presidency in 1928 but was assassinated before he could take office.

Born in Navojoa, Sonora, Obregón joined the Revolution after the February 1913 coup d'état that brought General Victoriano Huerta to the presidency. Obregón supported Sonora's decision to follow Governor Venustiano Carranza as leader of the northern revolutionary coalition, the Constitutionalist Army, against the Huerta regime. Obregón quickly became the Constitutionalist Army's most prominent general, along with Pancho Villa. Carranza appointed Obregón commander of the revolutionary forces in northwestern Mexico. The Constitutionalists defeated Huerta in July 1914, and the Federal Army dissolved in August. In 1915, the revolution entered a new phase of civil war between the Conventionists led by Emiliano Zapata and Villa versus Obregón and Carranza. Obregón was made leader of the Constitutionalist army and defeated Villa, but lost his right arm. In 1917, the Constitution of Mexico went into effect and the Conventionists forces were quickly getting defeated by Obregón and the Constitutionalist Army. Carranza stepped down from the presidency and designated Ignacio Bonillas to succeed him. Obregón and other Sonoran generals Plutarco Elías Calles and Adolfo de la Huerta ousted Bonillas and Carranza under the Plan of Agua Prieta. Obregón was elected to the presidency in 1920 with overwhelming popular support.

The Teoloyucan Treaties were signed on August 13, 1914, at Teoloyucan, State of Mexico, Mexico between the revolutionary army and forces loyal to Victoriano Huerta. The Constitutionalist Army of First Chief Venustiano Carranza was represented by Álvaro Obregón and Lucio Blanco. The Federal Army was represented by General Gustavo A. Salas and Admiral Othón P. Blanco, while Mexico City was represented by Eduardo Iturbe. The treaties established the surrender of the Federal Army and its dissolution.

Francisco "Pancho" Villa (UK: /ˈpæntʃoʊ ˈviːə/ PAN-choh VEE-ə, US: /ˈpɑːntʃoʊ ˈviː(j)ə/ PAHN-choh VEE-(y)ə, Spanish: [ˈpantʃo ˈβiʎa]; born José Doroteo Arango Arámbula; 5 June 1878 – 20 July 1923) was a Mexican revolutionary, guerrilla leader, and politician. He was a key figure in the Mexican Revolution, which forced out President and dictator Porfirio Díaz and brought Francisco I. Madero to power in 1911. When Madero was ousted by a coup led by General Victoriano Huerta in February 1913, Villa joined the anti-Huerta forces in the Constitutionalist Army led by Venustiano Carranza. After the defeat and exile of Huerta in July 1914, Villa broke with Carranza. Villa dominated the meeting of revolutionary generals that excluded Carranza and helped create a coalition government. Emiliano Zapata and Villa became formal allies in this period. Like Zapata, Villa was strongly in favor of land reform, but did not implement it when he had power. Villa served as provisional governor of Chihuahua from 1913 to 1914.

At the height of his power and popularity in late 1914 and early 1915, the U.S. considered recognizing Villa as Mexico's legitimate president. In Mexico, Villa is generally regarded as a hero of the Revolution who dared to stand up to the United States. Some American media outlets describe Villa as a villain and a murderer.