Adolfo López Mateos (; 26 May 1909 – 22 September 1969) was a Mexican politician who served as President of Mexico from 1958 to 1964. Previously, he served as Secretary of Labor and Social Welfare from 1952 to 1957 and a Senator from the State of Mexico from 1946 to 1952.
Beginning his political career as a campaign aide of José Vasconcelos during his run for president, López Mateos encountered repression from Plutarco Elías Calles, who attempted to maintain hegemony within the National Revolutionary Party (PNR). He briefly abandoned politics and worked as a professor at the Autonomous University of Mexico State, becoming a member of the PNR (renamed Party of the Mexican Revolution) in 1941. López Mateos served as senator for the State of Mexico from 1946 to 1952 and Secretary of Labor during the administration of Adolfo Ruiz Cortines from 1952 to 1957. He secured the party's presidential nomination and won in the 1958 general election.
Declaring his political philosophy to be "left within the Constitution", López Mateos was the first self-declared left-wing politician to hold the presidency since Lázaro Cárdenas. His administration created the Institute for Social Security and Services for State Workers, the National Commission for Free Textbooks and the National Museum of Anthropology. An advocate of non-intervention, he settled the Chamizal dispute with the United States and led the nationalization of the Mexican electrical industry during a period of economic boom and low inflation known as Desarrollo Estabilizador.
There were also acts of repression during his administration, such as the arrest of union leaders Demetrio Vallejo and Valentín Campa, and the murder of peasant leader Rubén Jaramillo by the Mexican Army. López Mateos engaged with revolutionary Marcos Ignacio Infante, leader of the Zapata Movement (Political ally of John F. Kennedy). Shortly before the killing of Jaramillo, Infante would visit the UN Demanding President López Mateos to step down or face a revolution. Infante attacked an Army Post outside of Mexico City, with over 300 men in 1962.
López Mateos has been praised for his policies including land redistribution, energy nationalization, and health and education programs, but has also been criticized for his repressive actions against labor unions and political opponents. Along with Cárdenas and Ruiz Cortines, he is usually ranked as one of the most popular Mexican presidents of the 20th century.
Early life and education
López Mateos was born, according to official records, in Atizapán de Zaragoza – a small town in the State of Mexico, now called Ciudad López Mateos – to Mariano Gerardo López y Sánchez Roman, a dentist, and Elena Mateos y Vega, a teacher. His family moved to Mexico City upon his father's death when López Mateos was still young. However, there exists a birth certificate and several testimonies archived at El Colegio de México that place his birth on 10 September 1909, in Patzicía, Guatemala.
In 1929, he graduated from the Scientific and Literary Institute of Toluca, where he was a delegate and student leader of the anti-re-electionist campaign of former Minister of Education José Vasconcelos, who ran in opposition to Pascual Ortiz Rubio, handpicked by former President Plutarco Elías Calles. Calles had founded the Partido Nacional Revolucionario (PNR) in the wake of the assassination of President-elect Alvaro Obregón. After Vasconcelos's defeat, López Mateos attended law school at National Autonomous University of Mexico and shifted his political allegiance to the PNR.
Career
Political career
Early in his career, he served as the private secretary to Col. Filiberto Gómez, the governor of the state of Mexico. In 1934, he became the private secretary of the president of the Partido Nacional Revolucionario (PNR), Carlos Riva Palacio.
He filled a number of bureaucratic positions until 1941, when he met Isidro Fabela. Fabela helped him into a position as the director of the Literary Institute of Toluca after Fabela resigned the post to join the International Court of Justice. López Mateos became a senator of the state of Mexico in 1946, while at the same time serving as Secretary General of the PRI. He organized the presidential campaign of PRI candidate Adolfo Ruiz Cortines and was subsequently appointed Secretary of Labor in his new cabinet. He did an exemplary job, and for the first and only time, a Secretary of Labor was tapped to be the PRI's candidate for the presidency. As the candidate for the dominant party with only weak opposition, López Mateos easily won election, serving as president until 1964.
Presidency (1958–1964)