The leaders of the Mexican revolution shall seize upon the control of the capitalistic forces of the country. This can be done by improvising--perhaps by executive decree, perhaps otherwise--a central bank and a banking system that shall monopolize the banking function. The existing banking systems of the world are in general based upon public debts and are motived in their operation by the interest of a creditor class. Mexico should have a banking system based first, upon the property rights of the nation--the sum of the material values that belong not to individuals but to the Commonwealth; second, upon a capitalization of the productive powers of the people to the extent that these can be developed by the civilizing projects of the bank. Under existing banking systems the National estate is either not represented at all or else stands as debtor or claimant on a footing no higher than that of private estates. But the bank of the revolution should be the responsible legal trustee of the public estate, exclusively devoted to the improvement of that estate--_i.e._, to the betterment of the material status of common citizenship. Under most banking systems the bankers have no direct interest or concern with the development of the natural and creative resources of a country. Their interest in the processes of production is at best indirect and incidental. What the bankers aim at is the accumulation of certificates of indebtedness against society at large. They are indeed concerned that the assets of Society at large shall equal its liabilities. But they make no effort and take no risk for the enrichment of society beyond bare solvency. The general tendency of their finance is to load the working organization of the world with as heavy a weight of bond and mortgage as it will stand, and to vest the ownership of the securities in a comparatively small class of creditors. The unsocial and unscientific character of the world’s banking systems is the main cause of that universal conflict between the business organization and the democratic state, which has reached its most poignant crisis in Mexico. If Mexico can work out a congruity between modern business organization and the economic rights of the people, it will solve the essential social problem of our times. It will win economic leadership in the family of nations. It will achieve unparalleled wealth and power. The bank of the revolution should be governed by a board of directors, got together with a minimum of racial bias in the spirit--let us say--of the university--that is, of the arts and sciences. There should be a dozen men, more or less, having the highest reputation and credit as engineers, agriculturists, sanitarians, administrators, and so on. They should be paid perhaps on the scale of Cabinet Ministers, but should derive no other income from Mexican sources. Their control of the bank should be disinterested and impersonal--like that of men in high public office.