10 Mexico: Archivo General 
From Sefior Lucas Alaman’s report of January, 1825, we learn that the 
archives of the royal Oficio de Gobierno had, according to the original plan, 
been secured. In them were included 4596 expedientes of the sections of 
Cruzada, Hacienda, and Real Patronato. The same official’s report of 1830 
shows that subsequent acquisitions were the archives of the ancient tribunals 
of the Audiencia, the Sala del Crimen, and the Juzgados de Naturales, Acor- 
dada, Intestados, and Desagiie de Huehuetoca. Two years later the archive 
of the Escribania y Juzgado Privativo de la Aduana de México was received. 
Doubtless other collections, not here noted, were acquired during this period. 
It was unfortunate that most of the work of classifying these acquisitions 
should, according to the original arrangement, be done by retired or pensioned 
officers, most of them, it seems, soldiers without archive training. The 
Archivo General y Publico has to this day suffered sadly from this kind of 
economy in its working force. 
As this period between 1823 and 1846 had begun with disaster, so it ended. 
The charge is made that during its lapse many documents were extracted by 
private parties or corruptly sold by dishonest employees. “ Finally’, says 
La Fragua, ‘ condemned to abandonment or to contempt, that unfortunate 
institution succumbed to the havoc which it suffered by the revolution of 
1840; for then it lost a large part of what it had preserved, while the rest re- 
mained in absolute disorder.” * In the course of this disturbance, according to 
another, the soldiers took possession of the National Palace, threw legajos 
into the street, sold them for wrapping paper in the stores, or used them for 
trenchers (trincheros), wadding, or even more foreign purposes.” 
When La Fragua, the official quoted above, became minister of relations, 
he dedicated himself with zeal to the restoration and reorganization of the 
Archivo General y Publico. As a result the reglamenio (regulation) of 
November 19, 1846, which is still the fundamental law governing the archive, 
was drawn up.” This regulation provided a formal scheme of classification 
into titles, departments, sections, and branches (titulos, departamentos, sec- 
ciones, and ramos). For materials bearing dates subsequent to the revolution, 
the classification was to follow the organization of the various ministries of 
government, as Foreign Relations, Justice, Finance, and War. The older 
records were to be classified into Ancient Archives (to be preserved inte- 
erally), History, Printed Matter, and Secret Affairs. New efforts were to be 
made to secure the archives of the extinguished offices of the old régime, and 
provision was made for gathering completed public records (expedientes 
concluidos) and certified copies of many kinds of current public records from 
all over the country. 
If this law had been carried out in a fair measure, the Archivo General y 
Publico would have been much superior to what it is today. But it was not. 
The scheme of classification which it provided has been only partially fol- 
lowed, and, while numerous additional old archives have been acquired since 
1846,” an examination of the archive itself, together with numerous circular 
orders issued subsequent to that date, furnishes evidence that neither central 
nor local offices have in a systematic way complied with the requirement con- 
%Ta Fragua, op. cit. 
eye oe in Diccionario Universal de Historia y de Geografia (Mexico, 1854), V. 
975-963. 
“It is printed in Dublan y Lozano, Legislacién Mexicana, V. 196-210. 
* A few others have been acquired and then remanded by special orders. 
