a call for the election of Congressmen. The record shows that he did nothing of the kind. To the contrary, as soon as he found himself in control of the City of Mexico in the summer of 1914 he declared a "preconstitutional period," setting aside the constitution he had claimed he fought to restore and in the fall of 1915 he issued a call for a constitutional convention whose functions it should be to enact for Mexico a constitution de novo in complete disregard of the constitution of 1857 to which he and his adherents had pledged unlimited fealty in communications addressed to our country and to the world.
To show just how completely this action of the Carranza party violated the rights of the Mexican people, it should be observed that the constitution of 1857 was adopted by the vote of representatives of all the Mexican people, whereas when General Carranza issued his call for the election of delegates to a constitutional convention several states of the republic were in no sense under his control and his writ calling the election did not run in those states.
This fact is well known to everyone acquainted with the conditions which obtained in Mexico at that time and if any additional proof were needed it is found in the fact that shortly after the constitution was adopted, Mr. Cabrera, the Secretary of Finance under Carranza, stated on the floor of the Mexican Congress that the five
