The Social Evolution of the Argentine Republic

by Ernesto Quesada

The idea of nationality was observed by party passion and the factions were ready to launch out upon some fight upon the slightest pretext. Social classes were divided into irreconcilable parties, the reds or federalists, and the blues or centralists, those who believed in the local leader, and those who detested him. The former were called federalists, because they believed that each locality ought to adopt the kind of government which best suited it; the latter were called the centralists, because in their weakness they leaned upon the influence of the national government in order to give to the whole country a common unified administration of which the local government would be the agent.

Rosas met this situation and put an end to it. After the dismemberment of the ephemeral republic of 1825, and the national convention, and following upon the Brazilian war, the centralist party, deceived in its principles and in its men, closed its doors to counsel and committed the error of executing Dorrego at Navarro. The mass of the rural population resisted the straight jacket proposed by the doctrinaires of the centralist party and in this they showed themselves unrelenting. Then Rosas came into power in the government of Buenos Ayres and also secured control of the situation in the provinces. He succeeded in bringing about the organization of each province with a view to forming the Argentine Confederation. He was entrusted by the federation with the management of foreign relations. He left the interior provinces to organize themselves after the pattern of the government of Buenos Ayres. Doubtless, during the long quarter of a century while he was dictator, real security and peace were never enjoyed, for the centralist party was ambitious, arrogant and factious, plotting within itself, and when it was not exciting to rebellion, or leading an invasion it was provoking foreign intervention. Finally the terrible and merciless war between the centralists and the federalists developed a state of terror which culminated in the excesses of the year 1840. The dictator treated his adversaries without mercy and they in their turn had none for him. To be strictly truthful, neither party can be absolved from wicked and culpable action. Nor can I shut my eyes to the fact that the great power bred pride, and that pride bred hatred of the subject class. But this prolonged dictatorship saved the country from the anarchy of the petty republics of 1820, it solidified the country into a sovereign entity and it gave to the different parts the cohesion of a nation capable of victoriously resisting the French and Anglo-French interventions. This much is owed definitely to the centralist party, who in this way solved the difficulty traditional to our national organization and so guided along the right road the severest crisis of Argentine history, not only from a political but also from a sociological point of view. The chasm that separated the social classes of the capital city from those of the provincial districts was bridged; the prejudices of blood, of caste and fortune were destroyed and there was established complete equality, where every man was the heir of his own labor and depended only upon his own hands.

After the battle of Caseros, in 1852, the government which had so used and abused oppression and patronage fell, leaving the country, however, in such a condition of stability and internal organization that the different provinces grouped themselves logically under the Convention of San Nicolas. The Argentine Federation was maintained and Urquiza was placed at the head of the government. Despite the local character of the revolution of Buenos Ayres, on the eleventh of September the country at large adopted the fundamental constitution of 1853, at the Congress of Santa Fé. The government of the recalcitrant province of Paraná realized but slowly the new organization, with which it finally incorporated itself, while the nation continued developing in the path established by its constitution. Without losing sight, therefore, of the bitter lessons of this phase of our evolution, it is but fair to show an appreciation of its benefits.

The characteristic of this intermediate epoch is the very slight introduction of the foreign element. To-day this element is scattered over the land, but at that time such as were firmly rooted in the country, principally in Buenos Ayres, were very few. Of these the English formed the greater part, for the infusion of German blood, which resulted from the distribution of prisoners taken from the German regiments at Ituzaingo, though they included some estimable families constituted a very subordinate factor. English commerce was always respected and in spite of the bitterness produced by the naval interventions, it was left to develop peacefully. But as it did not increase in volume and was never reinforced by that of other nations, it did not become great. The path of social evolution was in the direction of the commingling of the city and rural population, and of the participation of the gauchos in public life, either by forming a large and worthy element in the army or by becoming the active nucleus of the popular civic movements. The democratization of the country was complete, for in general, the upper classes of society in the cities affiliated themselves with the centralist party, while the populace supported the federal party. Hence the bloody triumph of the latter brought about its complete predominance and from this period the social and political problems remained more enduring in nature, while differences of blood and tradition were put aside.

Since the constitution of 1853, the social evolution of Argentine has been guided and carried forward by two factors, immigration and foreign capital. Under their influence, the characteristics of the prior period were gradually modified to a certain extent. The administration of Mitre struggled against the difficulties of inadequate means of communication between the distant cities and against traditional custom of guerilla warfare. Force was employed in order to remain master of the field and to break up the resistance which the men of the interior set up against the prominence of those of Buenos Ayres, and a cruel war against Paraguay was undertaken. The ability and consistency of this Argentine statesman was great.

When the passions of his contemporaries had been assuaged, he became the "grand old man" of the nation, growing in stature as posterity forms its judgment on his policy. That administration, like the following one of Sarmiento, had to cope with two factors, the great uninhabited tracts of land and the survival of ancient custom. On the one hand the different Argentine regions lived in isolation from one another, communication between them being difficult; on the other hand there still survived the custom of local chieftainship and of the constant and armed movements of different political factions, who would set out upon guerilla forays on any pretext whatsoever, raising their banners on high as though their behavior was patriotic and praiseworthy, whereas it was but the vicious habit of a barbaric and backward age.

The administration of Avellaneda continued the task of combating such tendencies by the establishment of the telegraph which would unite all these centers to each other; by the construction of railroads to facilitate communication; and by the encouragement of European immigration for purposes of settlement and in order to mix other races with that of Argentine and so modify its political idiosyncracies by more conservative standards and interests. The conquest of the Patagonian wilds, with the final subjugation of the warlike native tribes of the south, opened and ushered in an era in the Argentine evolution. This occurred contemporaneously with the historic solution of the problem of federalism versus centralism, which silenced forever the old antagonism between the inhabitants of the metropolis and those of the provinces.

From 1880 till the present, the work of multiplying the telegraphs and railway routes has gone on, as has also the increase of foreign immigration. These have produced the desired effect in the social transformation of the country. The telegraph and the railroad have definitely killed the seditious germs of guerilla warfare and of local chieftainship. Local uprisings are no longer possible. The city and rural populations have become convinced of this, and the popular mind is at peace since the generation has disappeared which saw the last revolts of the gauchos, and other forms of popular uprising. Foreign capital commenced and encouraged the exploitation of our natural resources. The sugar industry of the northern provinces, the wine culture of the Andes provinces, even the stock raising and agriculture of the river districts have been the combined work of these three progressive elements. Immigration has helped immensely toward this same end, but the settlement of new lands does not advance by leaps and bounds, but spreads gradually.

Starting from the port of arrival, the stream of immigration continues to spread clinging closely to the land and little by little it mixes with the existing population, inter-breeds with it, fuses with it, and gives a great surging impulse to agriculture, industry and commerce. The social transformation of the river provinces is due to this junction of the two currents as a result of which the gaucho of the metropolis of Santa Fé or of Entre Rios, who, formerly famous for his bold and lawless tendencies, has to-day been so fused with the different foreign elements that all but the memory of this ancient type has disappeared, and the country is covered over with populous settlements, laborious, prosperous and progressive. The great fertility of the soil has returned with interest the foreign capital which first watered it, and has enriched marvelously all who have engaged in its cultivation. The development of the national resources, in turn, has given birth to such conservative interests that it is incomprehensible to the new generation that the former generation could, at the signal of a semi-barbarous chief jump on their horses and, rushing over the fields, kill, pillage and destroy. It is true that the transition has been effected at the cost of producing a certain political indifference in the new generations, which no doubt, will be overcome in time.

The social evolution of the Argentine Republic has finally found its true channel and to-day is in full course of development. In proportion as the foreign immigration continues bringing therewith its happy complement of foreign capital, the country will continue to develop industrially. The astonishing increase in industries, with a total production out of all proportion to the growing population, is only explained by the use on a large scale of the most advanced machinery. But such a metamorphosis spreads from the river districts toward the interior of the country. It does not jump from one point to another without connecting links between them, but always preserves a channel through which a relation is maintained between the different zones already transformed or in process of transformation. The first effect of each infusion of foreign blood into creole veins is to appease the hot political passions of other times, abolish the old institution of the local chieftainship, even blot him from memory and replace it by an absorption in our growing material interests. These material interests appear to have conspired to bring about that indifference towards the state, as such, which makes men look mistakenly at a political career as a profession which thrives off the real working classes. For, our government both municipal, provincial and national appears to be the heritage of a well-defined minority—the politicians—who devote themselves to politics just as other social classes devote themselves to agriculture, stock raising, industry, commerce, etc.