Poop
From Roach Busters
Preamble In the name of God and by the authority of the Mexican people The representatives of the different States of the District and of the Territories which compose the Republic of Mexico called upon by the provisions of the Plan proclaimed in Ayutla the first of March eighteen hundred and fifty four amended in Acap ulco the eleventh day of the same month and year and by the call issued the seventeenth of October eighteen hundred and fifty five to convene for the purpose of framing a constitution for the nation and making it a popular representative democratic republic exercising the powers with which they are vested do hereby comply with the requirements of their high office by decreeing the following political Constitution of the Mexican Republic on the indestructible basis of its legitimate independence proclaimed the sixteenth of September eighteen hundred and ten and consummated the twenty seventh of September eighteen hundred and twenty one.
Contents |
Title I
SECTION I
Of the Rights of Man
Article 1. The Mexican people recognize that the rights of man are the basis and the object of social institutions. Consequently they declare that all the laws and all the authorities of the country must respect and maintain the guarantees which the present constitution grants.
Art. 2. In the Republic all are born free. Slaves who set foot upon the national territory shall recover, by this act alone, their freedom and enjoy the protection of the law.
Art. 3. Instruction is free. The law shall determine what professions shall require licenses for their exercise, and what requisites are necessary to obtain said licenses.
Art 4. Every one is free engage in any honorable and useful profession, industrial pursuit, or occupation suitable him, and to avail himself of its products. The exercise of liberty shall not be hindered except by judicial sentence when such exercise infringes the rights of a third party, or by executive order, issued in the manner specified by law, when it offends the rights of society.
Art. 5. No one shall be compelled to render personal services without due compensation and without his full consent, excepting labor imposed as a penalty by judicial decree.
Subject to the conditions set forth in the respective laws, only military service shall be obligatory; and municipal service, service in connection with elections, and jury service shall be obligatory and without compensation.
The State shall not permit any contract, covenant, or agreement to be carried out having for its object the abridgment, loss or irrevocable sacrifice of the liberty of man. whether by reason of labor. education or religious vows. The law, therefore, does not recognize, nor consent to the establishment of, monastic orders, of whatever denomination or for whatever purpose contemplated. Nor shall any person legally agree to his own proscription or exile.
Art. 6. The expression of ideas shall not be the subject of any judicial or executive investigation, unless it offend good morals, impair the rights of third parties, incite to crime or cause a breach of the peace.
Art. 7. Freedom of writing and publishing writings on any subject is inviolable. No law or authority shall have the right to establish censorship, require bond from authors or printers, nor restrict the liberty of the press, which shall be limited only by the respect due to private life, morals, and public peace. Cases of offenses committed through the public press shall be tried by the competent courts of the Union, the States, the Federal District or the Territory of Lower California, according to penal law.
Art. 8. The right of petition, exercised in writing in a peaceful and respectful manner, is inviolable; but in political matters only citizens of the Republic may exercise it. To every petition an answer shall be given in writing, in the form of a decision by the official to whom it may have been addressed, and the said official shall be bound to make the petitioner acquainted with the result.
Art. 9. No one shall be deprived of the right peaceably to assemble or to come together for any lawful purpose; but only citizens shall be permitted to exercise this right for the purpose of taking part in the political affairs of the country. No armed assembly shall have the right to deliberate.
Art. 10. Every one has the right to possess and carry arms for his safety and legitimate defense. The law shall designate what arms are prohibited, and the punishment to be incurred by those who carry them.
Art. 11. Every one has the right to enter and leave the Republic, to travel through its territory and change his residence without necessity of a letter of security, passport, safe conduct or any other similar requirement. The exercise of this right shall be subordinated to the powers of the judiciary, in the event of civil or criminal responsibility, and to those of the executive, in so far as relates to the limitations imposed by law in regard to emigration, immigration, and the public health of the country.
Art. 12. No titles of nobility, or prerogatives, or hereditary honors exist in the Republic nor shall they be recognized therein. Only the people, legally represented, may decree recompenses in honor of those who have rendered or may render eminent services to the country or to humanity.
Art. 13. In the Mexican Republic no one shall be tried according to private laws or by special tribunals. No person or corporation shall have privileges nor enjoy emoluments which are not in compensation for a public service and established by law. Military jurisdiction shall be recognized only for the trial of criminal cases having direct connection with military discipline. The law shall clearly define cases included in this exception.
Art. 14. No retroactive law shall be enacted. No person shall be tried or sentenced except under laws previously enacted, exactly applicable to the case, and by a tribunal previously established by law.
Art. 15. No treaty shall ever be made for the extradition of political offenders, or of offenders of the common class, who have been slaves in the country where the offense was committed; nor shall any agreement or treaty be entered into which abridges or modifies the guarantees and rights which this constitution grants to the individual and to the citizen.
Art. 16. No one shall be molested in his person, family, domicile, papers or possessions, except by virtue of an order in writing of the competent authority, setting forth the legal grounds upon which the measure is taken. In cases in flagrante delicto any person may apprehend the offender and his accomplices, placing them without delay at the disposal of the nearest authorities.
Art. 17. No one shall be imprisoned for debts of a purely civil character. No one shall resort to violence in the enforcement of his rights. The tribunals shall always be open for the administration of justice, which shall be gratuitous, judicial costs being consequently abolished.
Art. 18. Imprisonment shall take place only for crimes deserving corporal punishment. In any stage of the case in which it shall appear that such a punishment can not be imposed upon the accused, he shall be set at liberty on bail. In no case shall the imprisonment or detention be prolonged for failure to pay fees, or any other pecuniary charge.
Art. 19. No detention shall exceed three days, unless justified by a warrant, issued in accordance with law, and giving the grounds for the imprisonment. The mere lapse of this time shall render the authority that orders or consents to it and the agents, ministers, wardens, or jailers who execute it responsible therefor. Any maltreatment during apprehension or confinement; any molestation inflicted without legal justification; or any exaction or contribution levied in prison, is an abuse which the laws must correct and the authorities severely punish.
Art. 20. In every criminal trial the accused shall enjoy the following guarantees:
I. The grounds of the proceedings and the name of the accuser, if there be such, shall be made known to him.
II. His preliminary examination shall be made within forty eight hours, to be counted from the time he is placed at the disposition of the judge.
III. He shall be confronted with the witnesses who testify against him.
IV. He shall be furnished with all information of record, which he may need for his defense.
V. He shall be heard in his defense, either personally or by counsel, or by both, as he may desire. In case he shall have no one to defend him, a list of public counsel shall be shown to him, in order that he may choose one or more to act as his counsel.
Art. 21. The imposition of penalties properly so called pertains exclusively to the judiciary. The political or executive authorities shall only have power to impose fines and imprisonment, as disciplinary measures, the former of no more than five hundred dollars, and the latter for no more than one month, in the cases and in the manner which the law shall expressly determine.
Art. 22. Punishments by mutilation and infamy, by branding, flogging, beating with sticks, torture of whatever kind, excessive fines, confiscation of property, or any other penalties, unusual or working corruption of the blood, shall be forever prohibited.
Art. 23. Capital punishment is abolished for political offenses; in the case of offenses other than political it shall only be imposed for high treason committed during a foreign war, parricide, murder with malice aforethought, arson, highway robbery, piracy, and grave military offenses.
Art. 24. No criminal case shall have more than three instances. No person, whether acquitted or convicted, shall be tried again for the same offense. The practice of discharging in one instance is abolished.
Art. 25. Sealed correspondence sent through the mails shall be free from search. The violation of this guarantee is an offense which the law will punish severely.
Art. 26. In time of peace no soldier may demand quarters, supplies, or other real or personal service, without the consent of the owner. In time of war he may do so, but only in the manner prescribed by law.
Art. 27. Private property shall not be taken without the consent of the owner, except for reasons of public utility, indemnification having been made. The law shall determine the authority to make the expropriation and the conditions on which it shall be carried out.
No religious corporations and institutions of whatever character, denomination, duration or object, nor civil corporations, when under the patronage, direction or administration of the former, or of ministers of any creed shall have legal capacity to acquire title to, or administer, real property other than the buildings immediately and directly destined to the services or purposes of the said corporations and institutions. Nor shall they have legal capacity to acquire or administer loans made on such real property.
Civil corporations and institutions not comprised the above provision, may acquire and administer, in addition to the buildings mentioned, real property and loans made on real property required for their maintenance and purposes, subject to the requisites and limitations to be established by Federal law to be enacted by Congress on the subject.
Art. 28. There shall be no private nor governmental monopolies of any kind whatsoever, nor any prohibitions even under cover of protection to industry, excepting only those relating to the coinage of money, the postal service, and the privileges which, for a limited time, the law may concede to inventors or improvers of inventions.
Art. 29. In cases of invasion, grave disturbance of the public peace, or any other emergency which may place society in grave danger, the President of the Republic, and no one else, shall have the power to suspend, with the advice of the council of ministers and with the approval of the Congress, and in the recess thereof, of the Permanent Committee, the guarantees granted by this Constitution excepting those ensuring the life of man; but such suspension shall in no case be confined in its effects to a particular individual, but shall be made by means of a general decree, and only for a limited time.
If the suspension occur while the Congress is in session, this body shall grant such powers as in its judgment the executive may need to meet the situation; if the suspension occur while the Congress is in recess, the Permanent Committee shall forthwith convoke the Congress for the granting of such powers.
SECTION II
Of Mexicans
Art. 30. Mexicans are:
I. All persons born, within or without the Republic, of Mexican parents.
II. Aliens naturalized in conformity with the laws of the Federation.
III. Aliens who acquire real estate in the Republic, or have Mexican children, if they do not declare their intention to retain their nationality.
Art. 31. It shall be the duty of every Mexican:
I. To defend the independence, the territory, the honor, the rights and interests of his country.
II. To serve in the army or the national guard pursuant to the respective organic laws.
III. To contribute in the proportional and equitable provided by law, toward the public expenses of the Federation, the State and the municipality in which he resides.
Art. 32. Mexicans shall be preferred under equal circumstances to foreigners for all public employments, offices, or commissions, when citizenship is not indispensable. Laws shall be enacted to improve the condition of industrious Mexicans, by rewarding those who distinguish themselves in any science or art, to foster labor, and to found colleges and manual training schools.
SECTION III
Of Aliens
Art. 33. Aliens are those who do not possess the qualifications prescribed by Article 30. They shall be entitled to the guarantees granted by Section I, Title I, of the present Constitution, except that in all cases the Government has the right to expel undesirable foreigners. They are under obligation to contribute to the public expenses as the law may provide, and to obey and respect the institutions, laws, and authorities of the country, subjecting themselves to the decisions and sentences of the tribunals, and shall not be entitled to seek other redress than that which the laws concede to Mexicans.
SECTION IV
Of Mexican Citizens
Art. 34. Mexican citizenship shall be enjoyed only by those Mexicans who have the following qualifications:
I. Are over 21 years of age, if unmarried, and over 18, if married.
II. Have an honest means of livelihood.
Art. 35. The prerogatives of citizens are:
I. To vote at popular elections.
II. To be eligible for any elective office and be qualified any other office or commission, provided they have the other qualifications required by law.
III. To assemble for the purpose of discussing the political affairs of the country.
IV. To serve in the army or national guard for the defense of the Republic and its institutions, as by law determined.
V. To exercise the right of petition in any matter whatever.
Art. 36. It shall be the duty of every Mexican citizen:
I. To register in the polls of the municipality in which he lives, setting forth the property which he owns, if any, or the industry, profession, or labor by which he subsists.
II. To enlist in the national guard.
III. To vote at popular elections in the district to which he belongs.
IV. To fill the elective federal offices to which he may be chosen, and which in no case shall be gratuitous.
Art. 37. Citizenship shall be lost:
I. By naturalization in a foreign country.
II. By officially serving the government of another country or accepting its decorations, titles, or employment without previous permission of the Federal Congress, excepting literary, scientific, and humanitarian titles, which may be accepted freely.
Art. 38. The law shall determine the cases and the form in which the rights of citizenship may be lost or suspended, and the manner in which they may be regained.
Title II
SECTION I
Of the National Sovereignty and Form of Government
Art. 39. The national sovereignty is vested essentially and originally in the people. All public power emanates from the people, and is instituted for their benefit. The people have at all times the inalienable right to alter or modify the form of their government.
Art. 40. It is the will of the Mexican people to constitute themselves into a democratic, federal, representative republic, consisting of States, free and sovereign in all that concerns their internal affairs, but united in a federation according to the principles of this fundamental law.
Art. 41. The people exercise their sovereignty through the federal powers in the matters belonging to the Union, and through those of the States in the matters relating to the internal administration of the latter. This power shall be exercised in the manner respectively established by the Constitutions, both Federal and State. The constitutions of the States shall in no case contravene the stipulations of the Federal constitution.
SECTION II
Of the Integral Parts of the Federation and the National Territory
Art. 42. The national territory comprises the integral parts of the Federation and the adjacent islands in both oceans.
Art. 43. The integral parts of the Federation are the States of Aguascalientes, Campeche, Coahuila, Colima, Chiapas, Chihuahua, Durango, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Hidalgo, Jalisco, Mexico, Michoacan, Morelos, Nuevo Leon, Oaxaca, Puebla, Queretaro, Luis Putosi, Sinaloa, Sonora, Tabasco, Tamaulipas, Tlaxcala, Valle de Mexico, Vera Cruz, Yucatan, Zacatecas, the Territory of Lower California, the Territory of Tepic, formed from the seventh canton of Jalisco, and the Territory Quintana Roo. The Territory of Quintana Roo shall be formed by the eastern portion of the Peninsula of Yucatan; it shall be bounded by a line which, drawn from the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico, follows the arc of the meridian 87 32 (Longitude West of Greenwich) to its intersection with parallel 21, and thence till it meets the parallel passing through the Southern Tower of Chemax, twenty kilometers to the east of this town; and reaching the vertex of the angle formed by the boundaries between the States of Yucatan and Campeche, near Put, southward to the parallel dividing the Republics of Mexico and Guatemala.
Art. 44. The States of Aguascalientes, Chiapas, Chihuahua, Durango, Guerrero, Mexico, Puebla, Quertaro, Sinaloa, Sonora, Tamaulipas, and the Territory of Lower California shall preserve the limits which they now have.
Art. 45. The States of Colima and Tlaxcala shall preserve in their new character of States the limits which they had as Territories of the Federation.
Art. 46. The State of the Valley of Mexico shall consist of the territory constituting at present the Federal District, but it shall not be a State until after the Supreme Federal Powers move to some other place.
Art. 47. The State of Nuevo Leon and Coahuila shall comprise the territory formerly belonging to the two separate States of which it now consists, except a part of the Bonanza Hacienda which shall be added to Zacatecas, exactly as it was before its annexation to Coahuila.
Art. 48. The States of Guanajuato, Jalisco, Michoacan, Oaxaca, San Luis Putosi, Tabasco, Vera Cruz, Yucatan, and Zacatecas shall recover the extent and limits which they had on the thirty-first of December, eighteen hundred and fifty-two, with the alterations established in the following article.
Art. 49. The town of Contepec, now belonging to Guanajuato, shall be annexed to Michoacan. The municipality of Ahualulco, belonging to Zacatecas, shall be annexed to San Luis Putosi. The municipalities of Ojo Caliente and San Francisco de los Adames, belonging to San Luis, as well as the towns of Nueva Tlaxcala and San Andres del Teul, belonging to Jalisco, shall be annexed to Zacatecas. The department of Tuxpam shall continue to form a part of Vera Cruz. The canton of Huimanguillo, belonging to Vera Cruz, shall be annexed to Tabasco.
TITLE III
Of the Division of Powers
Art. 50. The supreme power of the Federation is divided for its exercise into legislative, executive, and judicial. Two or more of these powers shall never be united in one person or corporation, nor shall the legislative power be vested in one individual.
SECTION I
Of the Legislative Power
Art. 51. The legislative of the United States of Mexico is vested in a general Congress which shall consist of a House Representatives and a Senate.
PARAGRAPH 1
Of the Election and Installation of Congress
Art. 52. The House of Representatives shall consist of representatives of the Nation, all of whom shall be elected every two years by the citizens of Mexico.
Art. 53. One representative shall be chosen for each 60,000 inhabitants or for any fraction thereof exceeding 20,000, on the basis of the general census of the Federal District and of each State and Territory. Any State or Territory in which the population shall be less than that fixed by this article shall, nevertheless, elect one representative.
Art. 54. There shall be elected an alternate for each representative.
Art. 55. The election of representatives shall be direct, in accordance with the provisions of the electoral law.
Art. 56. Representatives shall have the following qualifications: To be Mexican citizens in the enjoyment of their rights; to be twenty-five years of age on the day of the opening of the session; to be domiciled in the State or Territory in which the election is held, and not to belong to the ecclesiastical state. The domicile shall not be lost through absence in the discharge of any elective office.
Art. 57. The offices of senator and representative are incompatible with any other office or commission of the Federal Government for which any emolument is received.
Art. 58. Representatives and senators are disqualified from the day of their election until the day on which their term expires, from accepting from the Federal executive without previous permission of the respective House any salaried office.
The same provision is applicable to alternates when in active service.
A. The Senate shall consist of two Senators for each State and two for the Federal District. The election of senators shall be direct in the first degree. Each State legislature shall declare the candidate elected who shall have obtained a majority of the votes cast or it shall choose, in the manner prescribed by the electoral law, from among those obtaining a plurality. There shall be elected an alternate for each Senator.
B. The Senate shall be renewed by half every two years. Senators occupying the second place in the representation of each State, shall vacate their seats at the end of the first two years. After the second year the withdrawal shall be according to seniority.
C. The qualifications necessary to be a senator shall be the same as those necessary to be a representative, except as to the age, which in the case of a senator who shall be at least thirty years of age on the day of the opening of the session.
Art. 59. Representatives and senators are inviolable for opinions expressed by them in the discharge of their duties, and shall never be called to account for them.
Art. 60. Each House shall be the judge of the election of its members, and shall decide questions arising therefrom.
Art. 61. The Houses shall not open their sessions nor exercise their functions without a quorum, in the Senate of two-thirds, and in the House of Representatives of a majority of the total of its members; but the members present of either House shall meet on the appointed day and compel through the proper penalties the attendance of the absentees.
Art. 62. The Congress shall hold two ordinary sessions each year: the first shall begin on the sixteenth of September and end on the fifteenth of December; but this period may be extended for thirty working days. The second shall begin on the first of April and end on the last day of May, but may be extended for fifteen working days.
Art. 63. At the opening of the sessions of the Congress the President shall be present and make an address in which he shall give information on the state of the country. The President of the Congress shall reply in general terms.
Art. 64. Every measure of Congress shall be in the form of a law or decree. The laws or decrees shall be communicated to the Executive after having been signed by the Presidents of both Houses and by one the secretaries of each. When promulgated, the enacting clause shall read as follows:
“The Congress of the United States of Mexico decrees (text of the law or decree.”
PARAGRAPH II
Of the Origin and Formation of Laws
Art. 65. The right to originate legislation pertains:
I. To the President of the Republic
II. To the Representatives and Senators of the Congress
III. To the State Legislatures.
Art. 66. Bills submitted by the President of the Republic, by State Legislatures or delegations thereof, shall be at once referred to committee. Those introduced by representatives or senators shall be subject to the rules of procedure.
Art. 67. No bill rejected in the House of origin before passing to the other House shall be reintroduced during the session of that year.
<u>Art. 68. The second period of sessions shall be devoted with preference over all other matters, to the making of the necessary appropriations for the support of the Government in the following fiscal year, the levying of the taxes necessary to meet the expenses, and the examination of the accounts of the past year submitted by the Executive.
Art. 69. The Executive shall transmit to the House of Representatives, on the eve of the last day of the session, the accounts of the year and the budget for the next. They shall be referred to a special committee, which shall be appointed on that day, consisting of five members, whose duty it shall be to examine both documents and report thereon at the second meeting of the second period.
Art. 70. Legislative measures may be originated in either House, excepting bills dealing with loans, taxes or imposts, or with the raising of troops must have their origin in House of Representatives.
Art. 71. Bills, action on which shall not pertain exclusively to one of the Houses, shall be discussed first by one and then by the other, according to the rules of procedure as to the form, time of presentation and other details relative to discussions and votes.
A. After a bill has been approved in the House where it originated it shall be sent to the other House for consideration. If passed by the latter it shall be transmitted to the President who, if he has no observations to make thereto, shall immediately promulgate it.
B. Bills not returned by the Executive within ten working days with his observations to the House in which they originated, shall be considered approved, unless during the said ten days the Congress shall have adjourned or suspended its sessions, in which event they shall be returned on the first working day after the Congress shall have reconvened.
C. Bills rejected in whole or in part by the Executive shall be returned with his observations to the House where they originated. They shall be discussed anew by the latter and if passed by a majority vote shall be sent to the other. If approved by it, also by the same majority vote, the bill shall become a law and shall be sent to the Executive for promulgation. In such cases the voting in both Houses shall be by yeas and nays.
D. Bills totally rejected by the House not originating them shall be returned with the proper observations to the House of origin. If examined anew and approved by a majority of the members present, they shall be returned to the House rejecting them, which shall once again take them under consideration, and if approved by it, likewise by the same majority vote, they shall be sent to the Executive for the purposes of Clause A; but if the said House fail to approve them, they shall not be reintroduced in the same session.
E. Bills rejected in part or modified or amended by the House of revision shall be discussed anew in the House of origin, but the discussion shall be confined to the portion rejected or to the amendments or additions, without the approved articles being altered in any respect. If the additions or amendments made by the House of revision be approved by a majority vote of the members present in the House of origin, the bill shall be transmitted to the Executive for the purposes of Clause A; but if the amendments or additions by the House of revision be rejected by a majority vote of the House of origin they shall be returned to the former House in order that the reasons set forth by the latter may be taken into consideration. If in this second revision the said additions or amendments be rejected by a majority vote of the members present the portion of the bill which has been approved by both Houses shall be sent to the Executive for the purposes of Clause A. If the House of revision insist by a majority vote of the members present upon the additions or amendments, no action shall be taken on the whole bill until the next session, unless both Houses agree, by a majority vote of the members present, to the promulgation of the law without the articles objected to, which shall be left till the next session, when they shall be then discussed and voted upon.
F. The same formalities as are required for the enactment of laws shall be observed for their interpretation, amendment or repeal.
G. Both Houses shall hold their meetings at the same place, and shall not move to another without first having agreed upon the moving and the time and manner of accomplishing it, as well as upon the place of meeting which shall be the same for both Houses. If both Houses agree to change their meeting place, but disagree as to the time, manner or locality, the Executive shall settle the question. Neither House shall adjourn for more than three days without the consent of the other.
H. When Congress meets in extra session it shall deal exclusively with the matter or matters specified in the call. If the object of the extra session has not been accomplished at the time in which the ordinary session begins, there shall be, nevertheless, a formal closing of the extra session, and the unfinished business shall be taken up and discussed in the ordinary session.
The Executive shall not make any observations touching the resolutions of the Congress providing for an adjournment of its sessions, or passed by it when sitting as an electoral body or as a grand jury.
PARAGRAPH III
Of the Powers of the Congress
Art. 72. The Congress shall have power:
I. To admit new States or Territories into the Federal Union, incorporating them into the Nation.
II. To grant statehood to Territories which have a population of eighty thousand inhabitants and the necessary means to provide for their political existence.
III. To form new States within the boundaries of existing ones, provided the following requisites are complied with:
1. That the section or sections aspiring to statehood have a population of one hundred and twenty thousand inhabitants at least;
2. That proof be given to the Congress that it has sufficient means to provide for its political existence;
3. That the legislatures of the States affected be heard as to the advisability or inadvisability of granting such statehood, which opinion shall be given within six months reckoned from the day on which the respective communication is forwarded;
4. That the opinion of the Executive of the Federal Government be also heard on the subject; this opinion shall be given within seven days after the date on which it was requested.
5. That the creation of the new State be voted upon favorably by two-thirds of the Representatives and Senators present in their respective Houses.
6. That the resolution of the Congress be ratified by a majority of the State Legislatures, upon examination of a copy of the record of the case, provided that the Legislatures of the States to which the section belongs shall have given their consent.
7. That the ratification referred to in the foregoing clause be given by two-thirds of the legislatures of the other States, if the legislatures of the States to which the Section belongs have not given their consent.
IV. To settle finally the limits of the States, terminating the differences which may arise between them relative to the demarcation of their respective territories, except when the differences be of a litigious nature.
V. To change the residence of the supreme powers of the Federation.
VI. To legislate in all matters relating to the Federal District and the Territories.
VII. To lay the taxes necessary to meet the expenditures of the budget.
VIII. To establish the bases upon which the Executive may make loans on the credit of the nation; to approve the said loans and to acknowledge and order the payment of the national debt.
IX. To enact laws fixing the duties to be levied on foreign commerce, and to prevent by general provisions, onerous, restrictions from being imposed on interstate commerce.
X. To promulgate mining and commercial codes, which shall be binding throughout the whole Republic. The banking law shall form a part of the code of commerce.
XI. To create or abolish Federal offices, and to fix, increase, or decrease the compensations assigned thereto.
XIV. To declare war, upon examination of the facts submitted by the Executive.
XV. To regulate the manner in which letters of marque may be issued; to enact laws according to which prizes on sea and land shall be adjudged valid or invalid; and to frame the admiralty law for times of peace and war.
XVIII. To raise and maintain the army and navy of the Union, and to regulate their organization and service.
XIX. To make rules for the organization armament, and discipline of the national guard, reserving respectively to the citizens who compose it the appointment of the commanders and officers, and to the States the power of instructing it in conformity with the discipline prescribed by said regulations.
XXI. To enact laws on citizenship, naturalization, colonization, emigration, immigration and public health of the Republic.
XXII. To enact laws on the general means of communication and on post-roads and post offices, to define and determine the waters subject to Federal jurisdiction and to enact laws as to the use and development of the same.
XXIII. To establish mints, regulate the value and kinds of the national coin, fix the value of foreign moneys, and adopt a general system of weights and measures.
XXIV. To make rules for the occupation and alienation of public lands and the prices thereof.
XXV. To grant pardons for offenses subject to federal jurisdiction.
XXVI. To grant rewards and recompenses for eminent services rendered to the country or to humanity.
XXVII. To extend for thirty working days the first period of its ordinary sessions.
XXVIII. To make rules for its internal government and to enact the necessary provisions to compel the attendance of absent Representatives and Senators and to punish the acts of commission or omission of those present.
XXIX. To issue the organic law of the office of the Comptroller of the Treasury.
XXX. To make all laws necessary for carrying into execution the foregoing powers and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the several branches of the Government.
A. The House of Representatives shall have the following exclusive powers:
I. To sit as an electoral college to exercise the powers conferred by law regarding the appointments of constitutional President and Vice President of the Republic, justices of the supreme court and senators for the Federal District.
II. To pass upon the resignations and leaves of absence of the President and Vice President of the Republic and of the resignations of the justices of the supreme court.
III. To watch, by means of a special committee, over the faithful performance by the Comptroller of the Treasury in the discharge of his duties.
IV. To appoint all the higher officers and other employees of the office of the Comptroller of the Treasury.
V. To act as a grand jury and to formulate articles of impeachment against the functionaries mentioned in article 103 of the Constitution.
VI. To audit the accounts to be rendered yearly by the Executive, approve the annual budget, and originate taxation for the purpose of meeting the expenses of the Government.
B. The Senate shall have the following exclusive powers:
I. To approve the treaties and diplomatic conventions concluded by the Executive with foreign powers.
II. To confirm the nominations made by the President of diplomatic ministers or agents, consuls general, higher officials of the treasury, colonels and other superior officers of the army and navy, in the manner and form by law provided.
III. To authorize the Executive to allow national troops to go beyond the limits of the Republic, or to permit foreign troops to pass through the national territory, and to consent to the presence of fleets of another nation for more than one month in Mexican waters.
IV. To consent to the Executive disposing of the national guard outside of the limits of its respective States or Territories, and to fix the amount of the force to be used.
V. To declare, when all the constitutional powers of any State have disappeared, that the occasion has arisen to give the said State a provisional governor, who shall order elections to be held according to the constitution and laws of the State. The appointment of such governor shall be made by the Federal Executive with the approval of the Senate, or in its recess, of the permanent committee. The said functionary shall not be chosen constitutional governor in the elections to be held under the call which he shall issue.
VI. To adjust all political questions arising between the powers of a State whenever one of them shall appeal to the Senate or whenever by virtue of such differences a clash of arms has arisen to interrupt the constitutional order. In this event the Senate shall decide in accordance with the Federal Constitution and the Constitution of the State involved. The exercise of this power and of the foregoing shall be regulated by law.
VII. To sit as a court of impeachment, under article 105 of the Constitution.
C. Each House may, without the intervention of the other:
I. Pass resolutions upon matters exclusively relating to its own interior government.
II. Communicate with the other House, and with the Executive through committees appointed from among its members.
III. Appoint the employees in the office of its secretary, and make all rules and regulations for the said office.
IV. Issue a call for extraordinary elections to fill any vacancies which may occur in its membership.
PARAGRAPH IV
Of the Permanent Committee
Art. 73. During the recesses of the Congress there shall be a Permanent Committee consisting of twenty-nine members, fifteen of whom shall be Representatives and fourteen Senators, appointed by the respective Houses on the eve of the day of adjournment.
Art. 74. In addition to the powers vested in it by this Constitution, the Permanent Committee shall have the following powers:
I. To give its consent to the use of the national guard as provided in Article 72, Clause XX.
II. II To decide upon the call for extraordinary sessions of the Congress or of a single House thereof, either on its own initiative, in which event it shall hear the opinion of the Executive, or on the proposal of the Executive; in either event, the two-thirds' vote of the members present shall be necessary. The call shall stipulate the object or objects of the extraordinary session.
III. To confirm the nominations referred to in article 85, Clause III.
IV. To administer the oath of office to the President of the Republic, and to the justices of the supreme court, in the cases provided for by this Constitution.
V. To report upon all pending matters, in order that the next legislature may immediately consider them.
SECTION II
Of the Executive Power
Art. 75. The exercise of the supreme executive power of the Union is vested in a single individual, who shall be called “President of the United States of Mexico.”
Art. 76. The election of President shall be direct, in accordance with the terms of the electoral law.
Art. 77. No person shall be eligible to the office of President who is not a Mexican citizen by birth, in the exercise of his rights, over thirty-five years old at the time of the election, not belonging to the ecclesiastical state, and a resident of the country at the time in which the election is held.
Art. 78. The President and Vice-President shall enter upon their duties on the first day of December, shall serve six years, and shall never be reelected.
The President shall never be elected Vice-President, nor the Vice-President be elected President for the ensuing term.
Nor may the Secretary of the Executive Department charged with the executive power at the time of the elections be elected President or Vice-President.
Art. 79. The electors who choose the President shall likewise, on the same day and in the same manner, choose a Vice-President who shall have the same qualifications as by Article 77 are required for the office of President.
The Vice-President shall be ex officio President of the Senate; he shall have no voice and shall only be entitled to a vote in the event of a tie. The Vice-President may, however, fill any appointive office of the Executive; in the event of disability caused by such appointment or by other causes, he shall be replaced as President of Senate, as provided in the respective law.
Art. 80. Whenever the President shall fail to present himself on the day set by law to assume office, or whenever a permanent disability occur during his term of office or he be granted permission to leave his office, the Vice-President shall assume the exercise of the Executive Power by operation of law, without the need of a new oath of office.
If the disability of the President be permanent the Vice-President shall complete the term for which he was elected; in all other cases, he shall serve until the President resume office.
Art. 81. If neither the President Elect nor the Vice-President Elect shall present himself at the beginning of any constitutional term, or the election not have been made and the result made known by the first of December, the outgoing President shall nevertheless vacate office and the Secretary of Foreign Affairs shall forthwith assume the executive power; in the absence or disability of the secretary of Foreign Affairs, one of the secretaries of the executive departments, in the order established by law, shall forthwith assume the executive power.
The same procedure shall be observed when in the event of the permanent or temporary disability of the President the Vice-President shall not present himself, when the latter shall be granted leave to resign, if he shall be in office, and when the permanent disability of both functionaries shall occur during the term of office.
In the event of the permanent disability of the President and Vice-President, the Congress, or in its recess the Permanent Committee, shall immediately issue a call for extraordinary elections.
Should the disability of both functionaries occur in the last year of the constitutional term, no call shall be issued, but the secretary who shall assume the executive power shall continue charged with the same until the new President, or the person to act in his stead according to the preceding provisions, shall take office.
The citizens chosen in the extraordinary elections shall assume office so soon as the corresponding declaration be made, and they shall continue in office for the balance of the constitutional term. Whenever a secretary of an executive department shall be called upon to assume the executive power, he shall discharge this office without need of an affirmation, until such time as he is able to make it.
Art. 82. Neither the President nor Vice-President shall resign office except for grave cause, upon which the Congress shall pass, to which body the resignations shall be presented.
Art. 83. The President, before entering upon the discharge of the duties of his office, shall make the following affirmation before the Congress, or in its recess before the Permanent Committee:
“I do solemnly affirm that I will defend and enforce the Constitution of the United States of Mexico and the laws arising thereunder and that I will faithfully and conscientiously perform the duties of President of the United States of Mexico, to which I have been chosen by the people, having ever in mind the welfare and prosperity of the Nation.”
The Vice-President shall in the same session make an affirmation in similar language to discharge the duties of Vice-President, or, should the occasion arise, those of President; if he shall be unable to make the affirmation at the same session as the President, he shall do so at another session.
Art. 84. The President and the Vice-President shall not absent themselves from the national territory, without the permission of the House of Representatives.
Art. 85. The President shall have the following powers and duties:
I. To promulgate and execute the laws enacted by the Congress, providing, within the executive sphere, for their faithful observance.
II.
