Editing Decree 900 (section)

==Effects on Guatemala==
===Land and farming===
By 1954, {{cvt|1400000|acres|disp=flip}} had been reappropriated and 100,000 families (about 500,000 people, one sixth of the population) had received land as well as bank credit and technical aid.<ref>Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), pp. 465–466.</ref><ref>Harbour, ''Creating a New Guatemala'' (2008), p. 17.</ref> The law affected about 1,700 estates of the country's richest and most conservative people and groups<ref>{{cite book |last=Karabell |first=Zachary |title=Architects of intervention: the United States, the Third World, and the Cold War |year=1999 |pages=105 |publisher=LSU Press |isbn=9780807141120 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IFqVhFSGcTMC&pg=PA98}}</ref>

Production of corn, coffee, and bananas increased while the law was in effect in 1953 and 1954.<ref>Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), pp. 468–469. "Contrary to the hopes of the government's detractors, Decree 900 did not result in the collapse of agricultural output. Rather, notes an Amiercan scholar, the existing data, 'seem to indicate that agrarian reform...unleashed new productive energies from which both the peasants and those ''finqueros'' whose previously idle land was put to use."</ref> High coffee prices bolstered the national economy and offset the flight of foreign capital.<ref>Harbour, ''Creating a New Guatemala'' (2008), pp. 19–20.</ref> According to a report by the U.S. Embassy in 1954, "A preliminary analysis of the President's report left little doubt, as long as coffee prices are at their present high level, that the Guatemalan economy was basically prosperous."<ref>Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), pp. 476–477.</ref>

Decree 900 led to the expropriation of {{cvt|1700|acres|disp=flip}} of Árbenz's own land and {{cvt|1200|acres|disp=flip}} belonging to foreign minister Guillermo Toriello.<ref name=UFHS/><ref>Al Argueta, ''Living Abroad in Guatemala'' (Moon), Avalon Travel (2009), p. 41. {{ISBN|9781598802078}}. "Arbenz himself was not immune from land expropriation, giving up {{cvt|1700|acres|disp=flip}} of his own land in the process."</ref><ref>Gordon, "Case History of U. S. Subversion" (1971), p. 138. "Among the lands expropriated were 1700 acres owned by President Arbenz and 1200 acres owned by Foreign Minister Guillermo Toriello."</ref> Minister of Agriculture Nicolás Brol also had some of his land redistributed.<ref>Handy, ''The Most Precious Fruit of the Revolution'' (1988) p. 688.</ref>

===Conflicts over implementation===
Various sources (including Árbenz and the government) reported conflicts over implementing the law. Decree 900 triggered domestic opposition from landowners and some elements within the military.<ref>Bowen, "U.S. Foreign Policy toward Radical Change" (1993), p. 91. "Domestic resistance to the Arbenz regime became more violent after Decree 900 became law, with incidents of antigovernment violence tripling between the first and third quarters of 1952. While nearly all violent antigovernment incidents (bombings, assassinations, etc.) before the reform occurred in the capital, two-thirds of the incidents after the reform were outside the capital.</ref> The reforms were also opposed by the Catholic Church and the business class.<ref name=Wittman>Hannah Wittman with Laura Saldivar-Tanaka, "[http://ruta.org:8180/xmlui/handle/123456789/708 The Agrarian Question in Guatemala] {{Webarchive |url=https://archive.today/20130416000202/http://ruta.org:8180/xmlui/handle/123456789/708 |date=16 April 2013 }}"; in ''Promised Land: Competing Visions of Agrarian Reform'', ed. Peter Rosset, Rajeev Charles Patel, Michael Courville, New York: Food First Books (2006).</ref><ref name=Davis/>

Landowners complained of unfair practices, but so did others who felt excluded or that they were getting a bad deal. Some peasants seized land without going through the legal channels, believing that the law provided them with a mandate.<ref>Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), p. 464.</ref><ref>Handy, ''Revolution in the Countryside'' (1994), pp. 146–147.</ref> Sometimes the expropriators fought each other over who would get a certain piece of land.<ref>Handy, ''The Most Precious Fruit of the Revolution'' (1988) p. 694.</ref> Other violent incidents among peasants were self-defense or retaliation against landowners who sought to disobey the law or intimidate them. In some places, peasants organized groups for self-defense and requested (usually without success) arms permits from the government.<ref name="Handy 1988 p. 693">Handy, ''The Most Precious Fruit of the Revolution'' (1988) p. 693.</ref> According to Neale Pearson, there were instances where "peasants illegally occupied lands and a few in which they burned pastures or crops in order to have land declared uncultivated and subject to expropriation. But these cases were isolated and limited in number".<ref>Pearson, "Confederación Nacional Campesina", p. 180; quoted in Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), p. 464.</ref>

Sometimes legal councils had difficulty measuring land, or determining how much land on an estate was really unused.<ref>Handy, ''The Most Precious Fruit of the Revolution'' (1988) p. 691.</ref>

Union representatives began to travel through the countryside, informing people of the new law. Landowners closed private roads going through their property in order to prevent peasants from becoming informed of the changes. The government announced that all road would become public.<ref>Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), p. 462.</ref> Some local police forces (and other government officials) initially sanctioned some landowner retaliation. These groups, too, responded to government pressure to implement the reforms.<ref>Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), p. 473.</ref>

===Changes in political power===
By 1954, more than 3000 CALs had been formed.<ref>Harbour, ''Creating a New Guatemala'' (2008), p. 15.</ref> These organizations, which controlled the distribution of land at a local level, represented a substantial increase in political power for ordinary people and people's organizations such as unions. However, the law also increased the power of the President and of the new national council, the DAN.<ref>Handy, ''The Most Precious Fruit of the Revolution'' (1988) p. 686.</ref>

In 1953, the Supreme Court ruled that the lack of judicial oversight for the reform was unconstitutional, and it blocked any further implementation. Congress, with Árbenz's urging, voted to impeach four judges.<ref>Gleijeses, ''The Agrarian Reform of Jacobo Arbenz'' (1989), pp. 464–465.</ref> This decision provoked anti-government demonstrations, in the course of which one person was killed.<ref name="Handy 1988 p. 693"/>

Historian Douglas Trefzger has reported that the land reform disproportionately benefited [[Ladino people|Ladinos]], relative to [[Amerindian|Indians]].<ref name=Trefzger/> It seems that although the short-lived policies of Decree 900 had a positive effect on indigenous Guatemalans—particularly on their political consciousness—poverty and associated problems persisted.<ref name=Davis>Shelton H. Davis, "The Mayan Movement and National Culture in Guatemala"; in ''Culture and Public Action'', ed. Vijayendra Rao and Michael Walton, Stanford University Press (2004).</ref>

The CNCG peasant league, founded in 1950 by activists and members of the teachers' union, grew rapidly during this time and by 1945 was the largest peoples' organization in the country. The second largest was the CGTG, a rural labor union.<ref>Handy, ''The Most Precious Fruit of the Revolution'' (1988) pp. 694–695.</ref>

Efforts were made to win military support for Decree 900. These included the provision of incentives for peasants to join the army, as well as attempts to foster ties between the armed forces and the DAN. Some conflicts did emerge around the country as military leaders and peasant organizers competed for local power. These were ameliorated by new appointments to military positions. But these changes in military structure further upset some officers and contributed to the desertions and defections that allowed the coup to succeed.<ref>Handy, ''The Most Precious Fruit of the Revolution'' (1988) pp. 701–704. "The increasing strength of the peasant league and workers' federation in rural areas, coupled with the disarray apparent in the military's rural apparatus, raised grave fears among many officers over their ability to control these organizations. The support they received from the president and the apparent impunity with which local affiliates of these organizations broke the law, invaded property not affected by Decree 900, and provoked escalating unrest in the army's traditional domain prompted much bitterness."</ref>