Cardona
MPSA 2004
12
79 years between independence and 1900, 6 of there were concentrated in a 33-year
period between 1830 and 1863. The content of the struggles that led to this rapid change
in the republic’s basic juridical framework had to do with two elements of governance:
the design of legislative institutions as federalist or centralist, and the position of the state
with respect to the Catholic Church. Two sets of positions gradually crystallized: one
combined strong pro-clericalism with a belief in the primacy of central state authority,
which fell under the rubric of the Conservative Party, while another view combined a
strident anti-clericalism with a tendency to favor federalist power-sharing arrangements.
The struggle between these two positions is reflected in the character of the
constitutions written between 1830 and 1863, and in the frequent civil wars that took
place in this same period. Table 1 tracks the type of constitution (federalist vs. centralist)
over the period 1830-1910 and compares it with the incidence of civil wars and the party
affiliation of the President for each year. (These affiliations only begin to become
meaningful in the early 1840s, according to Bushnell (1993: 288)). The table documents
the frequent alternation between Liberals and Conservatives during this period. We can
track the sequence of events roughly as follows:
1842:
Conservative forces prevail in civil war with Liberals
1843:
Conservative government imposes highly centralist constitution
1849:
Liberals gain power peacefully
1851:
Conservatives revolt against Liberal government, fail
1853:
Liberal government adopts less centralist constitution
Convention