MEXICO: The Next President

A hundred bands blared. The yells of 70,000 partisans volleyed and thundered across Mexico City’s Olympic stadium. When the tumult died down, a small man spoke into the mike. “Accepting the candidacy of the Party of Revolutionary Institutions (PRI), I understand fully the grave responsibility of this nomination,” said Adolfo Ruiz Cortínez.

Mexicans understood too. Interior Minister Ruiz Cortínez had been nominated by the official party convention as the government’s candidate to succeed President Miguel Alemán. In present-day Mexico, that assures election. Barring death or accident, Adolfo Ruiz Cortínez will be

Mexico’s President for six years starting December 1952.

With the nomination of Ruiz Cortínez, the solid citizens of PRI’s leadership swung away from the flashy playboyism of handsome Miguel Alemán. Greying, frail and 58, with a strong facial resemblance to Boris Karloff (his nickname is Cara de Calavera—Skullface), Ruiz Cortínez is a far cry from the magnetic type traditionally admired by Mexicans. Said a political reporter last week, “Mexico is now going to get a Coolidge.”

Ruiz Cortínez is a staid standard-bearer for Mexico’s “revolutionary” party. He hates publicity, speaks rarely, lives modestly in one of the capital’s more conservative neighborhoods. His favorite relaxation is playing dominoes. After thirteen years in the revolutionary army without rising above the rank of major and eleven years in government bureaus without rising above the rank of clerk, he joined young Mike Alemán and rode the escalator right behind him—first to the governorship of his native Veracruz, then to the Ministry of Interior, the job from which Alemán also stepped to the top. Through it all, he made no important enemies. “I was poor as a boy, and still am,” he murmured. “I have always lived on my salary” (as Interior Minister, about $16,000 a year).

Ruiz Cortínez’ friends say that as President he will run his own show and will clean out the fat-contract men who surround the present administration. A middle-of-the-roader in domestic politics, he promises to continue Alemán’s foreign policy of close friendship with the U.S. In the PRI tradition, he will not accept victory without putting up a show for it. Between now and July, he will tour the country in what he says will be a “gentlemanly and principally patriotic” campaign.