The new Mexican government should take its bank managers from any quarter--as one might choose world-famous engineers or physicians to conquer a devastating plague, or to accomplish a constructive public work of extraordinary difficulty. These men should be chartered as directors of a corporation to set up a central banking institution in the City of Mexico and a system of branch banks in provincial towns. The basic capital of the bank should be a trust deed executed by the Mexican Government and conveying to the banking corporation such portions of the national estate as are not needed for the administrative uses of the government. The State would, of course, retain its right to annul if necessary the bank charter and trust deed--after reasonable notice and with due adjustment of the equities involved. The Bank should be the general fiscal and economic agent of the Government for the enhancement of its revenues, the funding and amortizing of outstanding public debts and the development of the wealth of the country. Through the bank, the government should take good care of the soldiers of the revolution--giving them possession of lands on easy terms and assistance in capitalizing farms and small business undertakings. Legal means should be taken to cancel or compound uneconomic commercial concessions made to foreigners and other private persons by reactionary governments in the past. The inordinate foreign profits derivable from such concessions might be scaled down by a system of export duties. It should be understood that the new bank in all its branches is not to be regarded as a passive or merely regulative factor in the economics of Mexico. It should, on the contrary, embody the highest possible organization of intelligence and will for the expansion of the productive life of the people. Much may be learned for this purpose from a study of the working methods of the Deutsche Bank of Berlin. CHAPTER XX CARRANZA’S FOREIGN POLICY REPRESENTATIVE OF THE NATIONAL SPIRIT From the beginning of the Constitutionalist revolution the attitude of Carranza as the first Chief toward the Foreign Powers, was very bitterly criticised. His uncompromising stand as regards the European nations was corroborated by interviews given out to the press. Several reasons can be given for Carranza’s conduct as well as for the criticisms. The first one is that Foreign Cabinets, Ministers and Consuls have been so used to the servile, cowardly and undignified behavior of Diaz and his Ministers toward Foreign Representatives that the proud, independent behavior of Carranza and his Ministers was a shock to European courts.