Francisco Vásquez Gómez | |
Office: | Minister of Public Instruction |
Term Start: | 26 May 1911 |
Term End: | 5 November 1911 |
President: | Francisco León de la Barra |
Birth Date: | 23 September 1860[1] |
Birth Place: | Tula, Tamaulipas, Mexico |
Death Place: | Mexico City, Mexico |
Alma Mater: | National School of Medicine (1889) |
Profession: | Physician and politician |
Francisco Vázquez Gómez (23 September 1860 – 16 August 1933) served as personal physician to Mexican president Porfirio Díaz,[2] as Minister of Public Instruction to President Francisco León de la Barra and as a running mate to Francisco I. Madero during the 1910 presidential elections. Prior to this Vázquez Gómez had been a supporter of Bernardo Reyes, another presidential hopeful with strong ties to Díaz' regime.[3]
Vázquez Gómez was born in Tula, Tamaulipas, into a rich Amerindian family. He studied Medicine in Mexico City and worked as a physician in Xalapa before returning to serve as the personal physician to long-time serving President Díaz. In 1909, he joined his brother Emilio in the anti-reelectionist movement but refused to join a national call to arms after the government illegally imprisoned former presidential candidate Francisco I. Madero, with whom he campaigned on a narrow, pro free-market and democratic government.[4]
After a short voluntary exile in El Paso, Texas, he returned to Mexico to assume the Ministry of Public Instruction in the presidential cabinet of Francisco León de la Barra (26 May - 5 November 1911).