On David Siqueiros: A Dilemma For Artists

I have been asked several times during the last years to sign a statement requesting the Mexican government to release the painter Siqueiros from prison. He has been sentenced for a long term because he led a violent demonstration against the government and thus exposed himself to the penalties of a law which classifies such acts as crimes of “social dissolution.” From what I have heard of this law, it seems to me unjust; at any rate, the penalty of eight years in prison for leading a demonstration and inciting to violence is barbaric. This law was enacted, supposedly, to strike at fascists and others who plotted to overthrow the Mexican government which prided itself upon being a revolutionary regime committed to the welfare of the Mexican people. Like the Smith Act in our own country, this law was once supported by the Communist party, which saw in it no threat to its own members. It is like the laws in the Soviet Union that punish severely any public demonstration aga...