Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume I.djvu/730

 694 ARGENTINE REPUBLIC ing chosen in his place, which he held till 1832. Two governments, the first under Balcarce, and the second under Viamont, now followed each other in the space of a few months, neither be- ing able to maintain itself, as Rosas held the ar- my under his control. After the fall of Viamont, Eosas was reflected governor of Buenos Ayres, a position which placed him at the head of the foreign relations of the country, and gave him a very general control of its internal aifairs. His term expired in 1835, when he refused to be again a candidate. Five times the honor was tendered to him, and as often refused. He was then offered the dictatorship for five years, which he accepted, and the appointment was twice renewed. He held the office till 1852, and was the sole and uncontrolled ruler of Buenos Ayres, and practically of the Argen- tine Republic, during the whole of that time. From 1827 to 1852 there was no meeting of the national congress or constituent assembly. It is difficult to characterize precisely the use which he made of these unlimited powers. He has been represented as an arbitrary and bloody tyrant, and accused of the treacherous mur- der of all the friends who placed him in power. He certainly ruled with a strong hand, and was neither slow nor scrupulous in his means of defending or of advancing himself; but he main- tamed a government under which his country increased in population and material prosperity, notwithstanding continual internal dissensions and foreign wars, and retained a strong and gen- erally triumphant party of friends till the last. With the idea that all the provinces of the former viceroyalty of Buenos Ayres belonged to the Argentine Republic, a contest was long kept up to attempt to bring into it the states of Paraguay and Uruguay. The former, pro- tected in part by its natural position, and more by the policy of isolation and the strong executive power of its singular dictator, Fran- cia, almost entirely escaped foreign conflict. But Brazil had ever in view the conquest of the latter, while the Argentine government saw the importance of that territory, and espe- cially the necessity of checking the ambition of the neighboring monarchy. The civil dis- sensions in the Banda Oriental exercised a marked influence on Argentine politics, and the movements headed by Oribe and Rivera served Rosas as a pretext for his intervention in Uruguayan affairs and for the aid given by Brazil to the enemies of the Argentine dicta- tor. Oribe was a partisan if not a creature and tool of Rosas. To him there was opposed a strong faction led by Rivera, a man who had raised himself to influence much in the manner employed by Rosas in Buenos Ayres. The matter came to a war, first of blockades and then of armies, between Oribe supported by Rosas on the one hand, and Rivera sustained by the Argentine exiles in Montevideo, and also by a French fleet, on the other. The inter- vention of the French was induced by a quar- rel which had arisen between a French vice consul and the dictator. The French difficulty was settled by the appointment of a new con- sul, and in 1840 peace was concluded between the confederation and Montevideo. This peace was not of long duration, and in 1845 Great Britain and France, at the special request of the emperor of Brazil, interfered, on the plea of enforcing the treaties of 1828 and 1840. The allies blockaded Buenos Ayres ; seized the Argentine fleet, then engaged in blockading Montevideo, and the island of Martin Garcia, which commands the entrances of the Parana and Uruguay ; opened the Parana, which Ro- sas had closed to vessels bound to Paraguay, and offered convoys as far as Corrientes, where in repeated attempts by the dictator to oppose the passage of the combined fleets the Argentines sustained heavy losses. This state of things lasted three years, at the end of which period England withdrew (July, 1848), but France continued hostilities six months longer. The rival factions in Uruguay, one of which was supported by Brazil and the other by Rosas, occupied the latter many years, while the opposition party in his own state was gradually becoming too powerful for him. This party, headed by Urquiza, governor of Entre-Rios, was now armed and acting in conjunction with the natural enemy, and at the battle of Monte Caseros, Feb. 3, 1852, Rosas was defeated; but, more fortunate than Dorrego had been, he was enabled to escape to England. Vicente Lopez now became provisional governor of the province of Buenos Ayres. But, by a sudden coup d'etat, Urquiza, having the army at his disposal, put himself at the head of the govern- ment as dictator, not five months after the deposition of Rosas. The first use of his power was to acknowledge the independence of Para- guay. He also secured the future free navi- gation of all the rivers flowing into the Plata, a wise measure which still remains in force. But this new assumption of dictatorial power pro- duced immediate irritation. Having to attend congress at Santa F6, he had hardly left the capital when (Sept. 11, 1852) a revolution broke out, and Valentine Alsina was chosen governor of Buenos Ayres. The province of Buenos Ayres, with this government, deter- mined to maintain itself as a state independent of the confederation, and another revolution in December, which temporarily changed the governor, did not alter this purpose. The con- gress of the confederation did not assemble till Nov. 20, all the states being then represented except Buenos Ayres, and Urquiza was instruct- ed to suppress the rebellion in that state. It again met Jan. 22, 1858, and went on with the work of forming a constitution. It also recom- mended the president to take all means to stop the civil war and bring Buenos Ayres back to the confederacy. The new constitution of the confederation, which is still in force, was pro- mulgated May 1, 1853. It was framed in the apparent expectation that Buenos Ayres, the richest and most important, as the only man-