554 



MEXICO. 



vested of English capital : In railways, $56,- 

 500,000 ; public debt, $56,000,000 ; banks and 

 companies, $20,000,000; plantations and cat- 

 tle, $50,000,000 ; city real estate, $5,200,000; 

 total, $187,700,000. The projected Tuxpan 

 Kail way will take $25,000,000 more, and an 

 English mortgage-bank $5,000,000, making the 

 total $217,700,000. 



Capital and Taxes. The correspondent of a 

 Boston journal writing from the capital, draws 

 the folio wing curious but no doubt faithful pict- 

 ure : " A leading Mexican statesman estimates 

 the uninvested capital here in the city of Mex- 

 ico alone at $50,000,000, a sum big enough 

 to have built the Central Railway and left 

 enough to drain the valley of Mexico in the 

 most thorough manner and after the costliest 

 plans. All through the large cities of the re- 

 public this strange fact appears again and 

 again, the actual possession of large sums with 

 no disposition to invest. This lack of the de- 

 sire to co-operate, to get up stock companies 

 for the development of the national resources, 

 may be attributed to several causes. We know 

 that in Spain, from which country Mexico has 

 inherited some very bad financial traditions, 

 the spirit of co-operation does not exist, and 

 that Spanish railways, mines, and banks are 

 largely owned by English and other foreign 

 capitalists. I do not assert this as an abso- 

 lutely universal fact, but admit cheerfully that 

 some Spaniards have a genius for business, as 

 the commercial success of many of them here 

 shows unmistakably. But in Spain it is still 

 quite the correct thing to do one's own bank- 

 ing, and to make one's deposit in a strong box 

 or under the tiled floor. Then another bad leg- 

 acy from Spain to Mexico is the absurd taxa- 

 tion system, which has for its aim to hit every 

 dollar in process of transfer in trade, and knock 

 a bit out of it as a percentage for the Federal, 

 State, or municipal government. Land is in- 

 sufficiently taxed, houses are not taxed as they 

 should be, but the burden rests on imported 

 goods, and on sales of merchandise and coun- 

 try produce. The man rich in lands and es- 

 tates gets off with a comparatively light bur- 

 den. Here in the city of Mexico, stores and 

 houses are not taxed only when rented. That 

 is, the lease has to pay a certain percentage 

 monthly to the municipal government. What 

 is the result ? That rents are extortionate, for 

 the landlord with an empty house or store only 

 loses the interest on his investment when his 

 premises are vacant, and has no taxes to pay 

 until a tenant comes along. Naturally the 

 landlord is stiff in his prices. These high 

 rents add materially to the cost of living here, 

 and I should estimate that maintaining a house- 

 hold at this capital is 33 per cent, more expen- 

 sive than in Boston. There is abundant room 

 in the valley of Mexico for town sites for de- 

 lightful suburbs, but the suburban towns are 

 few, and the city landlords have the whip in 

 their hands. Rents have materially advanced 

 since the completion of the Central Railway. 



There are many quite extensive landlords here 

 now, but in the old days, before that iron- 

 handed reformer, Juarez, drove his way 

 through the old convents, literally blowing the 

 streets right through their walls, the Church 

 was the biggest landlord here, and, as the low- 

 er-class people say, not a bad landlord, and 

 rather inclined to mercy when a tenant was 

 poor and unable to pay. But the Church, as a 

 big landlord, is no more, and lives on the toler- 

 ance of the Government, between which and 

 it there is an irreconcilable feud." 



Rights of Foreigners. A new law was promul- 

 gated on July 7, relating to the rights of for- 

 eigners, the principal provisions of which are : 

 "In the acquirement of waste and government 

 lands, of real estate and ships, foreigners are 

 not obliged to reside in the republic, but are 

 subject to the restrictions imposed by the laws 

 now in force, with the understanding that all 

 leases of real estate made to a foreigner shall 

 be considered as sales if the term of the con- 

 tract exceeds ten years. The laws establishing 

 the matriculation of foreigners are repealed. 

 The Department of Foreign Affgirs alone can 

 issue certificates of determined nationality to 

 foreigners soliciting the same. These certifi- 

 cates constitute a legal presumption of foreign 

 citizenship, but proofs to the contrary are not 

 barred. The definite proof of determined na- 

 tionality is presented before the competent 

 courts and by the means established by laws 

 or treaties. 



During the summer an English syndicate, 

 headed by Baron Rothschild, purchased 200,- 

 000 acres of excellent farming-land in the State 

 of Chihuahua. 



Commerce. The following tabular statement 

 exhibits Mexican importation of merchandise, 

 and specie, and bullion, during the fiscal year 

 ended June 30, 1884: 



COUNTRIES. Value. 



To England $19,340.152 



To the United 



States 21,824,401 



To France 2,881,999 



To Spain 1,016,157 



To Germany 1,218,276 



COUNTRIES. Value. 



To South Amer- 

 ica |858,578 



To other coun- 

 tries 



Total |46,725,496 



The precious metals figured in the above to- 

 tal to the extent of $33,473,283. During the 

 first six months of the following fiscal year, 

 1884-'85, the total export amounted to $21,- 

 236,975, including specie and bullion, against 

 $22,052,870 during the corresponding period of 

 the preceding year ; there was, consequently, 

 a decrease of $815,904, or about 3f per cent. 

 The precious metals were comprised in the ex- 

 port movement to the amount of $12,437,468, 

 against $16,219,494 in 1883-'84. Of silver 

 alone there were shipped $1,424,230 less, 

 whereas there was a slight increase in the 

 amount of gold shipped as well as in merchan- 

 dise, the latter representing $5,799,507 against 

 $5,733,336 the previous year. Since Mexico 

 became attached to the American railroad sys- 

 tem, a good many commercial changes have 

 occurred. 



