“May the Virgin Protect Us, as the Supreme Court Won’t!” Judicializing Religious Life in Revolutionary Mexico, 1917–30

From 1917 to 1930 the Supreme Court faced strong challenges and became a major enabler for legally implementing the Revolution’s secularizing project. During those convulsed years amparo trials— the Mexican version of an injunction is a system of constitutional procedures protecting liberal individual rights—became the cornerstone to judicialize religious life under the 1917 Constitution. On October 29, 1924, the Supreme Court issued an amparo sentence, which reflected the deep and radical penetration of anticlericalism in the country’s public sphere of authority. That year, the authorities in a small town in the state of Coahuila, closed down a private chapel inside the house of Adelina Espinoza. Officials argued that the place was in direct violation of Article 130^th of the Federal Constitution. Espinoza’s counselor initiated the amparo procedure demanding protection from such an arbitrary closure. Although a federal district judge granted the protection, the local prosecutor demanded the escalation of the case to the Supreme Court. Backed by the federal prosecutor, such an apparently inoffensive case reached the highest court of the nation. Unexpectedly, all the Supreme Court justices unanimously moved to repeal the amparo protection. Having declared the closure of the chapel legal and constitutional, Mrs. Espinoza lost access to her own private chapel. We can say that with no more protection than the virgin, she was obliged to turn over the keys to the municipal mayor. By analyzing judicial cases litigating ordinary religious practices, this paper examines the Supreme Court’s role in the process of enacting the anticlerical and secularizing provisions brought about by the revolution.