THE MEXICAN YEAR BOOK The Standard Authority on Mexico 1922-24 EDITED BY ROBERT GLASS CLELAND, Ph. D. LOS ANGELES TIMES-MIRROR PRESS 1924 PREFACE The 1922-24 edition of the Mexican Year Book is issued to accomplish the same purpose that lay behind the publication of its predecessor, the 1920-21 edition. This purpose is to make Mexico better known to the people of the United States and to furnish a source of unbiased and systematized information on recent Mexican affairs. Inasmuch as the 1920-21 edition of the Year Book was the first to be published in the United States, it was in large part necessarily devoted to a survey of such fundamental subjects as the History, Government, Geography, Educational System and Labor Problems of Mexico, while current developments in the various fields were given a relatively less important place. In this present number of the Year Book, however, the emphasis has been reversed, and much more space has been devoted to statistical and other matter of a current nature than to descriptions of Mexican institutions. In the gathering and organization of the statistics appearing in this volume, every effort has been made to avoid error. But here again, as in the Preface to the first edition of the Year Book, one can only say that "in dealing with Mexican figures absolute accuracy is an ideal to be striven for, but one never likely to be attained." For the most part the statistics have been taken from Mexican official sources; but the data furnished by one department of the government often varies widely from that furnished by another, though both deal with the same subject. The publications of the government of the United States have also been made use of, as well as other sources of information which need not here be enumerated. Professor Herbert I. Priestley, of the University of California, and Mr. Loring Olmsted, of Mexico City, have contributed special articles to the volume on the Land and Tax Systems of Mexico. The editor is under obligation to them for these articles. He is also under obligation to Mr. Claude I. Dawson, American Consul General; Mr. Clarence D. Bowman, American Consul; and Mr. Earnest E. Evans, American Vice Consul in Mexico City, for many courtesies, as well as for several very valuable tables which appear in this volume. He also wishes to express his very great appreciation to Señor Rafael H. Valle, Jefe de Redacción, of the Department of Education of the Mexican government. Los Angeles, California, May 16, 1924. ROBERT G. CLELAND. |