ABSTRACT
In 1909, villagers elected Zapata to a board of defense for their village, and he began to negotiate for the return of confiscated lands. In 1910 and 1911, during the violent transition of power from Mexico's longtime dictator Porfirio Diaz to a new leader, Zapata's tiny peasant organization supported for president Francisco Madero, a populist landowner of the north. In April 1911, Zapata asked Madero to return Mexico to the ejido system of communal land ownership; Madero refused. Even worse, Madero offered Zapata money with which to buy land if he would disarm his troops and stop pressing peasant claims. After the presidential elections of October 1911, in which Madero won 98% of the vote, Zapata had begun to disarm as part of a larger treaty that had facilitated Diaz's resignation, but stopped when Madero sent the army against him for not disarming quickly enough. In reaction, Zapata and his followers struck back against Madero's army, eventually capturing several states.
