people, and laws and constitutions are equally disregarded under the impulse of passion or interest. Such was the case in the present juncture. The Yorkinos had been outvoted lawfully, according to the solemn record of congress, yet they resolved not to submit; and, accordingly, Lorenzo de Zavala, the Grand Master of their lodge, and Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, who was then a professed federalist, in conjunction with the defeated candidate Guerrero and Generals Montezuma and Lobato, determined to prevent Pedraza from occupying the chair of state. Santa Anna, who now appeared prominently on the stage, was the chief agitator in the scheme, and being in garrison at Jalapa, in the autumn of 1828, pronounced against the chief magistrate elect, and denounced his nomination as "illegal, fraudulent and unconstitutional." The movement was popular, for the people were in fact friendly to Guerrero. The prejudices of the native or Creole party against the Spaniards and their supposed defenders the Escocesses, were studiously fomented in the capital; and, on the 4th of December, the pronunciamiento of the Accordada, in the capital, seconded the sedition of Santa Anna in the provinces. By this time the arch conspirator in this drama had reached the metropolis and labored to control the elements of disorder which were at hand to support his favorite Guerrero. The defenceless Spaniards were relentlessly assailed by the infuriate mob which was let loose upon them by the insurgent chiefs. Guerrero was in the field in person at the head of the Yorkinos. The Parian in the capital, and the dwellings of many of the noted Escocesses were attacked and pillaged, and for some time the city was given up to anarchy and bloodshed. Pedraza, who still fulfilled the functions of minister of war previous to his inauguration, fled from the official post which he abandoned to his rival Santa Anna; and on the 1st of January, 1829, congress,—reversing its former act,—declared Guerrero to have been duly elected president of the republic! General Bustamante was chosen vice president, and the government again resumed its operation under the federal system of 1824.
Note. —Although a masked Indian slavery or peonage, is permitted and encouraged in Mexico, African slavery is prohibited by positive enactments as well as by the constitution itself. But as it may interest the reader to know the Mexican enactments relative to negroes, on this subject, the following documents are subjoined for reference:—
ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.
The President of the Mexican United States to the Inhabitants of the Republic.
Be it known—That, being desirous to signalize the anniversary of independence, in the year 1829, by an act of national justice and beneficence, which may redound
