operation, of course, go to the stockholders abroad. Yet, any citizen of the United States who would complain that the Shell Oil Company has done a deadly wrong by acquiring and exploiting oil lands in this country, and should demand therefore, that its property be confiscated, would be regarded as either a lunatic or a criminal. However, the Carranza party finding that foreigners, by their intelligence and enterprise and the investment of millions of dollars, have developed a natural resource into a valuable economic asset, decides that those foreigners have imposed a grievous wrong upon the country which it has attempted to cure by adopting Article 27 of the Constitution of 1917, which provides:
"In the nation is vested direct ownership of all
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solid mineral fuels; petroleum and all hydrocarbons solid, liquid or gaseous."
Under the authority of that article the Carranza government is now attempting to make the petroleum companies pay it "rentals and royalties" for the privilege of taking the oil from lands that have been in the possession of private owners for nearly four hundred years, and were acquired for a price supposed to be full value paid by the foreigners as the first step in creating an enterprise which has benefited the people of Mexico in a
