Belisario Domínguez Medal of Honor

Belisario Domínguez Medal of Honor Medalla de Honor "Belisario Domínguez" del Senado de la República
Awarded for	contribution "toward the welfare of the Nation and mankind"
Presented by	Mexico
Eligibility	Mexican entities representing "the cultural spirit of the time"
Status	currently constituted
Ribbon bar of the medal

Carlos Canseco González is awarded the Belisario Domínguez Medal by President Vicente Fox

The Belisario Domínguez Medal of Honor (Spanish: Medalla de Honor "Belisario Domínguez" del Senado de la República) is the highest award bestowed by the Mexican Senate.

It forms part of the Mexican Honors System and is currently Mexico's highest active award since there are no records of the Condecoración "Miguel Hidalgo" being presented since 1979.^[1] The award has been given every year since 1954 by the Senate of Mexico to eminent Mexicans with a distinguished lifetime career who contributed most "toward the welfare of the Nation and mankind".

Only Mexican entities representing "the cultural spirit of the time" are allowed to submit nominations for this award. This provision typically allows universities, newspapers, learned societies, non-governmental organizations and government entities to nominate candidates.

Background

The award is named after politician Belisario Domínguez (1863–1913). Domínguez was a Senator for the state of Chiapas at the time of the Mexican Revolution. After Victoriano Huerta's coup d'état, which ousted President Francisco I. Madero, Domínguez circulated a speech as a letter to fellow members of congress in which he denounced Huerta's actions and encouraged Congress to depose him. At the end of his letter he also encouraged readers to make copies of it and distribute them around the country. The speech was not taken well in Huerta's circles and Domínguez was assassinated a few days later, on October 7, 1913.

In 1953, President Adolfo Ruiz Cortines signed the decree establishing the award in remembrance of this "martyr of democracy". That same year the Senate decided to bestow the first medal on the bust of Belisario Domínguez that already existed in the Senate Chamber as a symbolic act. It is for this reason that the medal was awarded twice in 1954.

Description

The medal consists of a single class and is awarded to a single recipient during a solemn ceremony in the Senate Chamber on October 7. A gold medal hanging from a silk ribbon with the colors of the Mexican flag is given together with a diploma signed by the President of the Republic and the leader of the Senate.

The medal has the national coat of arms on one side together with the inscription "Estados Unidos Mexicanos, H. Cámara de Senadores 1952-1958" ("United Mexican States, Honourable Chamber of Senators 1952-1958"). The reverse side of the medal has an image of Domínguez' bust together with the inscription "Ennobleció a la Patria, 7 de octubre de 1913" ("Ennobled the Nation, October 7, 1913").

Recipients

The following is a complete list of people who have been recipients of the Belisario Domínguez Medal. Only in 1954 and 2012 the medal has been awarded twice.

• 1954 – Rosaura Zapata^[2] and Erasmo Castellanos Quinto^[3]
• 1955 – Esteban Baca Calderón
• 1956 – Gerardo Murillo, "Dr. Atl"
• 1957 – Roque Estrada Reynoso
• 1958 – Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama
• 1959 – Heriberto Jara Corona
• 1960 – Isidro Fabela
• 1961 – José Inocente Lugo
• 1962 – María Tereza Montoya
• 1963 – María Hernández Zarco^[2]
• 1964 – Adrián Aguirre Benavides
• 1965 – Plácido Cruz Ríos
• 1966 – Ramón F. Iturbe
• 1967 – Francisco L. Urquizo
• 1968 – Miguel Angel Cevallos
• 1969 – María Cámara Vales, widow of Pino Suárez, Francisco I. Madero's vice president^[2]
• 1970 – Rosendo Salazar
• 1971 – Jaime Torres Bodet
• 1972 – Ignacio Ramos Praslow
• 1973 – Pablo E. Macías Valenzuela
• 1974 – Rafael de la Colina Riquelme
• 1975 – Ignacio Chávez Sánchez
• 1976 – Jesús Romero Flores
• 1977 – Juan de Dios Bátiz Peredes
• 1978 – Gustavo Baz Prada
• 1979 – Fidel Velázquez Sánchez
• 1980 – Luis Padilla Nervo
• 1981 – Luis Alvarez Barret
• 1982 – Gen. Raúl Madero González
• 1983 – Jesús Silva Herzog
• 1984 – Salomón González Blanco
• 1985 – María Lavalle Urbina^[2]
• 1986 – Salvador Zubirán
• 1987 – Eduardo García Maynez
• 1988 – Rufino Tamayo
• 1989 – Raúl Castellano Jiménez
• 1990 – Andrés Serra Rojas
• 1991 – Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrán
• 1992 – Ramón G. Bonfil
• 1993 – Andrés Henestrosa Morales
• 1994 – Jaime Sabines Gutiérrez
• 1995 – Miguel León-Portilla
• 1996 – Griselda Álvarez Ponce de León^[2] and Alí Chumacero^[4]
• 1997 – Heberto Castillo Martínez
• 1998 – José Angel Conchello Dávila (posthumous)^[5]
• 1999 – Carlos Fuentes^[6]
• 2000 – Leopoldo Zea Aguilar^[7]
• 2001 – José Ezequiel Iturriaga Sauco^[8]
• 2002 – Héctor Fix Zamudio^[9]
• 2003 – Luis González y González^[10]
• 2004 – Carlos Canseco González^[11]
• 2005 – Gilberto Borja Navarrete^[12]
• 2006 – Jesús Kumate Rodríguez
• 2007 – Carlos Castillo Peraza (posthumous)
• 2008 – Miguel Ángel Granados Chapa
• 2009 – Antonio Ortiz Mena (posthumous)
• 2010 – Javier Barros Sierra (posthumous)
• 2010 – Luis H. Álvarez
• 2011 – Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas Solórzano
• 2012 – Ernesto de la Peña (posthumous)^[13]
• 2013 – Manuel Gómez Morín (posthumous)^[14]
• 2014 – Eraclio Zepeda^[15]
• 2015 – Alberto Bailleres^[16]
• 2016 – Gonzalo Rivas (posthumous)^[17]
• 2017 – Julia Carabias Lillo^[18][2]
• 2018 – Carlos Payán^[19]
• 2019 – Rosario Ibarra de Piedra^[20]
• 2020 – Personnel of the National Health System on the occasion of the COVID-19 pandemic^[21]
• 2021 – Manuel Velasco Suárez (posthumous)^[22] and Ifigenia Martínez Hernández^[23]
• 2022 – Elena Poniatowska^[24]

See also

• Condecoración Miguel Hidalgo
• Orders, decorations, and medals of Mexico

References

1. "LEY DE PREMIOS, ESTÍMULOS Y RECOMPENSAS CIVILES: Nueva Ley publicada en el Diario Oficial de la Federación el 31 de diciembre de 1975: TEXTO VIGENTE: Última reforma publicada DOF 26-12-2013" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-04-08. Retrieved 2014-11-03.
2. "Ellas son las únicas seis mujeres ganadoras de la Belisario Domínguez". El Universal (in Spanish). 30 September 2019. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
3. "Medalla Belisario Domínguez" (in Spanish). Senado de la Republica. 7 Oct 1954. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
4. "Alí Chumacero, poesía multipremiada". Vanguardia (in Spanish). 23 October 2010. Archived from the original on 2020-08-21. Retrieved 2020-08-21.
5. "DIARIO DE LOS DEBATES" (PDF) (in Spanish). Senado de la Republica. 8 Oct 1998. p. 5. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
6. "Medalla Belisario Domínguez" (in Spanish). Senado de la Republica. 7 Oct 1999. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
7. "Medalla Belisario Domínguez" (in Spanish). Senado de la Republica. 31 Oct 2000. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
8. "El Universal - - Fallece el historiador José Iturriaga Sauco". archivo.eluniversal.com.mx (in Spanish). El Universal. 19 Feb 2011. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
9. Zárate Vite, Arturo (7 Oct 2002). "Dará Senado presea a Héctor Fix Zamudio". El Universal (in Spanish). Retrieved August 28, 2020.
10. "DICTAMEN POR EL QUE SE POSTULA AL C. MAESTRO LUIS GONZÁLEZ Y GONZÁLEZ COMO CANDIDATO A RECIBIR LA MEDALLA DE HONOR BELISARIO DOMÍNGUEZ DEL SENADO DE LA REPUBLICA, CORRESPONDIENTE AL AÑO 2003" (PDF) (in Spanish). Senado de la Republica. 2 Sep 2003. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
11. "Galardona Fox a Carlos Canseco". El Siglo de Torreón (in European Spanish). 8 Oct 2004. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
12. "Para Borja Navarrete, la medalla Belisario". El Universal (in Spanish). 7 Oct 2005. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
13. "Medalla de Honor Belisario Domínguez 2012". Senado de la Republica. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
14. "Senado entrega la medalla Belisario Domínguez a Gómez Morín". Excélsior (in Spanish). 6 November 2013. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
15. "Senado entrega Medalla Belisario Domínguez 2014 a Eraclio Zepeda". Animal Político (in Spanish). 15 December 2014. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
16. "La Medalla de Honor Belisario Domínguez 2015: un premio a la desigualad". La Jornada de San Luis (in Spanish). 12 November 2015. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
17. "Comisión de Belisario Domínguez otorga medalla a Gonzalo Rivas". eluniversal.com.mx. El Universal.
18. "Julia Carabias reconocida con la Belisario Domínguez (Nota, Fotos y Video)". aristeguinoticias.com. Aristegui Noticias.
19. "Medalla de Honor Belisario Domínguez 2018". El Universal (in Spanish). 19 December 2018. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
20. "Rosario Ibarra de Piedra da medalla a AMLO hasta que dé con la verdad sobre desaparecidos" [Rosario Ibarra de Piedra gives AMLO a medal until he finds the truth about missing persons]. El Financiero (in Spanish). Oct 23, 2019.
21. "Medalla Belisario Domínguez".
22. "Medalla Belisario Domínguez".
23. "Medalla Belisario Domínguez".
24. "Senado ratifica entrega de Medalla Belisario Domínguez a Poniatowska".

• Senado de la República (2005). Senado de la República - Medalla Belisario Domínguez. Retrieved November 20, 2005.
• Senado de la República. Reglamento de la Medalla de Honor Belisario Domínguez. Diario Oficial de la Federación, December 12, 1953.
• Senado de la República. Decreto por el cual se crea la Medalla de Honor “Belisario Domínguez” del Senado de la República, January 3, 1953
• Jeffrey Kent Lucas. The Rightward Drift of Mexico's Former Revolutionaries: The Case of Antonio Díaz Soto y Gama. Lewiston, NY, USA: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.