filling several positions of honor and trust, he was chosen as one of the triumvirate which governed Oaxaca when it seceded from the monarchists under Paredes. Finally, when that rebellion was crushed and the republic again rose from the dust, he was sent to represent his State in the general Congress.
Juarez and his friends did not come a moment too soon to save their country from ruin. The selfish ambition of party-leaders overruled every other consideration. Public credit was at its lowest ebb. Nothing more could be drained from the overtaxed and poverty-stricken people, and, although the government repudiated its debts, it had been obliged to call on the Church to give money as well as prayers for the defence of the country. An appeal to the great banker of the nation was a necessity. At this time it held untaxable property in lands, plate, jewels and money worth three hundred millions, with an annual income of twenty-five millions, besides mortgages on real estate all over the country which yielded millions more.
In this time of national distress one of the purest patriots of Mexico, Farias, proposed that fourteen millions of dollars should be raised on this Church property— if possible, by a loan; but if that could not be obtained, to sell enough of it to raise that amount. The bill was fiercely attacked as a radical measure. Juarez and others pleaded eloquently in its behalf. We can imagine some of their arguments as they looked on thousands of lazy and dissolute monks fattening on the spoil of centuries, while poor laborers and mechanics forced to leave their families for the perils and hardships of the battlefield had been so long unpaid that the whole army was in a state of revolt. The burning words with which this bill
