Miller (1982) The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics, 1895-1919 PDF

The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics, 1895-1919
Author(s): Rory Miller

Source: Journal of Latin American Studies, Vol. 14, No. 1 (May, 1982), pp. 97-120
Published by: Cambridge University Press
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J. Lat. Amer. Stud. 14, I, 97-I20 97
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian

Politics, I895-I9I9*
by RORY MILLER
For the foreign scholar, especially, an understanding of Peruvian politics

between 1895 and I919, the period of the so-called Republica Aristocrdtica,
is difficult to obtain. This quarter-centuryis considered an era of rapid social
and economic change: in the words of one scholar, it completed 'the dis-
appearance of colonial Peru'.1 An important element in this transition was
the growth on the coast of the ruling group connected with the expanding
export economy, known in the literature variously as the 'oligarchy',
'bourgeoisie', or the 'plutocracy', which supposedly obtained control over the
meagre resources of the state and directed them to its own ends.2 Political
narrativesof the period are not lacking. Every Peruvianist must reckon with
the magisterial work of Jorge Basadre, and recent histories in English have
narrated and summarised for the student the political events of these years.3
However, the extent and the means of the coastal elite's control and cohesion,
as well as the ways in which its power changed and the underlying reasons
for the fall of the Republica Aristocrdtica in I9I9, are still questions on
which there is considerablespeculation.
In the I96os social scientists in Peru were actively debating the nature of
the contemporary oligarchy. Rarely did they look back in any detail to the
beginning of the century, being content to share the assumption that 'the
heyday of the Peruvian oligarchy was long before [ the I950S and i96os], in
the first decades of this century, when the Republica Aristocrdticaheld sway
* Research for this article, which included fieldwork in Peru in 1977 and I979, was
financed by the Research Fund of Liverpool University and by the Nuffield
Foundation. I am grateful to these institutions, and to Alan Angell and members
of the Peru seminar at St Antony's College, Oxford, for written and verbal com-
ments on an earlier draft.
1Jesus Chavarria, 'La desaparici6n del Peri colonial, I870-I919', Aportes 23
(Jan., 1972), pp. I21-53.
2
'Oligarchy' used to be the common term, but some authors, as will be clear from
later citations, have recently preferred others. References to their work in this paper
have tried to respect their preferred terminology.
3 In
particular Fredrick B. Pike, The Modern History of Peru (London, i967), and
David P. Werlich, Peru: a short history (Carbondale, Illinois, I978).
0022-216X/82/JLAS-1333 $02.00 ( 1982 Cambridge University Press
98 Rory Miller
through its political instrument, the Civilista party, and the oligarchy's rule
was direct and effective'.4 At a time when modern Peruvian history was very
largely the work of Jorge Basadre, before the recent florescence of interest on
the part of able Peruvian scholars and interested foreigners, this assumption
was perfectly comprehensible. The social scientists of the I960s did not
undertake any detailed analysis of the period in which they saw the for-
mation of oligarchic power early in the century. Since the political changes
induced by the military revolution of 1968, however, the focus has moved
back towards the beginning of the century in the light of contemporary
interest in the history of class formation and the development of the state in
Peru. The result has been a rather bewildering succession of books and
articles on the period, exhibiting in particular a renewed concern with the
political relationship between the developing coastal elite and the landowners
of the Peruvian sierra.5
This has been the subject of some dispute. There is little consensus either
on the extent of the coastal elite's power or the nature of its relationship with
the gamonales of the sierra. Julio Cotler, for example, suggests that the
triumph of Nicolas de Pierola in 1895 signified the political weakness of the
bourgeoisie and the continued strength of the precapitalist landowners,
equating these with the civilistas and the Democrats respectively. Thereafter,
he argues that the latter were displaced and that 'the group that represented
the interests of the exporters directed government policy and had sufficient
influence to make the State its political instrument of development.'6 How-
ever, he later stresses the heterogenous nature of the ruling coalition at the
turn of the century to claim that the ruling group never possessed a common
and autonomous set of interests.7Manuel Burga and Alberto Flores Galindo
concur in the 'absolute and permanent control of the State by the civilista
oligarchy' (with the brief interruption of Billinghurst), having earlier noted
that oligarchic power depended on a confluence of interests between it and
4 Shane J. Hunt, 'Distribution, growth, and government economic behaviour in
Peru' in Gustav Ranis (ed.), Government and Economic Development (New Haven
and London, I971), p. 38I.
5 See, for example, on this period Julio Cotler, Clases, estado, y nacion en el Peru
(Lima, 1978); Dennis L. Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy and the Old Regime in Peru'
(Ph.D. thesis, Cornell U., 1977); William Bollinger, 'The Bourgeois Revolution in
Peru: a conception of Peruvian history', Latin American Perspectives 4, No. 3
(I977), pp. I8-56; Sinesio L6pez J., 'El estado oligarquico en el Peru: un ensayo de
interpretaci6n', Revista Mexicana de Sociologia 40, No. 3 (I978), pp. 99I-I007;
Manuel Burga and Alberto Flores Galindo, Apogeo y crisis de la repzublica aristo-
crdtica (Lima, I979); Ernesto Yepes, 'Burguesia y gamonalismo en el Peru',
Andlisis 7, (Jan.-April 1979), pp. 31-66.
6
Cotler, Clases, estado, y nacion, p. 128.
7
Ibid., p. I85.
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics 99
the serrano hacendados, and that the oligarchy continued to be fragmented
along regional lines.8 Other writers have also recently introduced qualifica-
tions to their discussion of the power and cohesion of the oligarchy. Laura
Madalengoitia talks of a political alliance based on the complementarity of
interests between the exporting fractions of the bourgeoisie and the sierra
landlords, the former controlling the executive while the latter were left in
power in the legislature.9 Ernesto Yepes argues that the dominant class
became more heterogenous as production became more complex, and that
civilismo developed three distinct ideological tendencies.10 Rather than
emphasising divisions based on economic interest or policy differences, Steve
Stein notes also the role of personal enmities and ambition, stating: 'Even
the Repablica Aristocrdtica was hardly a period of unruffled elite political
hegemony. From its very initiation internal party fissures - the product of a
lack of cohesion among political leaders who frequently refused to place
loyalty to the system above their personal ambitions - produced periodic
crises."'
Despite the differences in terminology, often arising from each author's
ideological or theoretical considerations, there would be little disagreement
that whether it be called an oligarchy, a bourgeoisie, or a plutocracy, the
group that is assumed to dominate the government of Peru between I895
and 19I9 is the same: the conglomeration of exporters and Lima business-
men connected with the export economy typified by the Partido Civil and by
families like the Pardos, the Aspfllagas, or the Prados. Nevertheless, the
present trend appearsto be towards qualifying earlier assumptions of civilista
omnipotence. With only a handful of exceptions, however, of whom the
most important are Jorge Basadre and Dennis Gilbert, very few authors have
examined the primary sources available on the political life of this period to
explore the nature of politics during the Republica Aristocratica.The purpose
of this paper is to examine what the various primary sources - the press,
memoirs, contemporary political analyses, and private correspondence- can
contribute to an understanding of three problems: the composition and
and its relationship with other influential groups, particularly the land-
homogeneity of interests of the coastal elite, the extent of its political power,
8
Burga and Flores Galindo, Apogeo y crisis, pp. 87-99 and I30. Their argument is
very much more subtle than representedhere.
9 Laura Madalengoitia U., 'El estado
oligarquico y la transici6n hacia una nueva
forma de estado en el Peru', in Enrique Bernales B. et al., Burguesia y estado
liberal(Lima, I979), pp. 280-I and 285-6.
10 Ernesto Yepes, 'El desarrollo
peruano en las primeras decadas del siglo XX', in
L. G. Lumbreraset al., Nueva historiageneral del Peru'(Lima, 1979), pp. I50-I.
11 Steve Stein, Populism in Peru: the
emergence of the masses and the politics of
social control (Madison,Wisconsin, 1980), p. 48.
Ioo RoryMiller
owners of the sierra. Much of the material comes from the I914-I9I9
period, the aim being to present some preliminary conclusions on the reasons
for the breakdown of the Republica Aristocratica as a prelude to further
researchon the period as a whole.
I. The Age of a Civilista Oligarchy?

A picture of the oligarchy at this time, drawn by both Jorge Basadre and
Dennis Gilbert, has passed into the text-books: a small group of thirty or
forty families which controlled the presidency (although only the Pardos of
Gilbert's thirty families, in fact, provided a president in this period), inter-
married, lived closely together in a small barrio, educated their children at
the same schools, and dominated key organisationsof Peru: the Partido Civil,
the Club Nacional, the Beneficencia, Congress, the University of San Marcos,
the banks, the press, the Cdmara de Comercio, and the Sociedad Nacional
Agraria.l2 A considerable degree of continuity between the membership of
this elite and that of the oligarchy of the I96os is also assumed, for in both
periods families like the Aspillagas, the Pardos, the Prados, and the Mir6
Quesadas played significant roles. This impression received some confirma-
tion from Denis Gilbert's work, for he noted that of the thirty families named
by his informants in the mid-I97os as constituting the core of the oligarchy
all but five had achieved one important sign of entry into the elite, member-
ship of the Club Nacional, by I9I9.13 He also remarked on the origins of
many families in export activities at the turn of the century.14
As both these authors would recognise, Peruvian political life during the
ReptublicaAristocratica cannot be so easily depicted. Such an analysis is far
too static. The period between 1895 and I9I9 was one of economic tran-
sition, involving not only the rapid growth of agricultural and mineral
exports, and the broadening of their range away from dependence on sugar
and silver, the mainstays of the postwar decade, but also the growth of banks
and insurance companies in Lima, which were almost non-existent in 1895,
and the development of an industrial sector.l5 Symbolic of the transitional
nature of the period is the fact that approximately half of Gilbert's thirty
families entered the Club Nacional between I895 and I919.16 Moreover,
12 Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy', pp. 56-8; Jorge Basadre, Historia de la Republica del
Peru (5th edition, Lima, I963), pp. 4732-4.
13 Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy', pp. 76-9.
14 Ibid., pp. 39-53. These criticisms should not detract from the value of Gilbert's
thesis for the analysisof twentieth-centuryPeru.
15 On the economic changes of the period, see Rosemary Thorp and Geoffrey
Bertram,Peru, I890-I977: growth and policy in an open economy (London, I978),
Part II.
16 Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy',pp. 77-80.
The CoastalElite and PeruvianPolitics oi
this description closely resembles that used to depict the oligarchy in the
I95os and I960s. It seems doubtful that the composition of the elite and the
methods it might use to maintain its dominance would not be altered by forty
or more years of continuing economic change as well as the appearance of
mass politics, radical political movements, and changes in the military's
attitude to politics. Finally, on reading the political histories of the period as
well as the contemporarypress and memoirs, one is struck by the number of
personalitieswho played leading roles in the politics of the RepuiblicaAristo-
crdticabut do not appear in such a list of elite families compiled in the I96os
or I970s.
Jorge Basadre himself noted that, whereas it was often believed in Peru
that the Partido Civil was led only by members of the plutocratic aristocracy
of the coast, it, in fact, contained large numbers of politicians from the regions
and from the Lima middle class such as Manuel Bernardino Perez, Amador
del Solar, and German Arenas.17Other influential families and individuals
besides the oligarchic clans which maintained their position until the i96os
can be identified as leading figures in Peru's political and economic life before
I919. One group consists of the remnants of the old regional elites and the
guano and nitrate oligarchy which had dominated Peru's politics immedi-
ately before the Pacific War. This provided, in fact, more presidents during
the Republica Aristocratica than the new coastal elite, Pierola and L6pez de
Romafia coming from the south, and Manuel Candamo and Guillermo
Billinghurst from the guano and nitrate oligarchy. Secondly, there are the
families which had wealth and status in the first twenty years of the century
but have subsequently declined or disappeared, although they would doubt-
less have been considered members of the coastal elite in a sociological survey
of the time: the Solar family, the Garlands, Pedro Gallagher, Pablo La Rosa,
and Jose Payan. Thirdly, one must also note the lawyers and other upwardly
mobile individuals to whom Jorge Basadre has drawn attention, some of
whom like Francisco Tudela y Varela or German Arenas effectively formed
part of the Pardo or other civilista clans, while others, such as Jose Matias
Manzanilla, Victor M. Maurtua, Mariano H. Cornejo, and particularly
Augusto B. Legufa, were independent and potentially maverick figures.l8
17
JorgeBasadre,La vida y la historia:ensayossobrepersonas,lugares,y problemas
(Lima, I975), pp. 124-5.
18
Jorge Basadre,Eleccionesy centralismoen el Peru'(apuntespara un esquema
historico) (Lima, i980), pp. I5-I6 and 56. Biographical information on such
figures can be found in Juan Pedro Paz Soldan, Diccionario biogrdficode peruanos
contempordneos (Lima, 1921), Neptali Benvenutto, Parlamentarios del Peru
contemporaneo, 1904-I924 (3 vols., Lima, 1921-24), and William Belmont
Parker,Peruviansof Today (Lima, 1919).
102 RoryMiller
The major families of the oligarchy, such as the Pardos and the Aspillagas,
had to share their power with the other politicians who formed part of the
coastal elite, as well as with the landowners who dominated the sierra.
Other common assumptions about the oligarchy can also be questioned.
One is the importance of the elite's interest groups in influencing policy, in
particular the C'dmara de Comercio de Lima, founded in I888, and the
semi-official bodies organised by Pierola in 1896: the Sociedad Nacional de
Agricultura, Sociedad Nacional de Industrias, and Sociedad Nacional de
Mineria.9 It can easily be assumed that these organisations fulfilled the
functions for which they were established, and that the importance similar
ones possessed later in the twentieth century had a parallel in the first twenty
years. Pablo Macera, for example, comments that the Sociedad Nacional
Agraria, whose founding he puts at I905, 'has been until the present day
one of the most powerful private institutions in the country' and that it inter-
vened in all the major decisions taken by the state over agriculture.20An
organisation with influence at one point in the period did not necessarily
maintain it throughout. The case of the agricultural pressure groups will be
examined later, but one might also cite that of all the '24 Amigos', meeting
regularly in the Club Nacional around I900, who are often assumed to have
remained powerful throughout the civilista period.21Another problem con-
cerns the diversity of the elite's economic interests and the preference shown
for exporting and financial activities. Possibly the example of the most
successful - the Aspfllagas (sugar, cotton, mining, banking, insurance, ship-
ping) or the Pardos (sugar, banking, insurance, property, manufacturing)-
has been allowed to obscure others who, in the early twentieth century, were
involved only in one export product, or in non-export agriculture, or only in
the Lima business world, or in other activities. With a few exceptions most
families or individuals maintained a base in one activity. The Aspillagas'
most important possessionwas always Cayalti.22JosePayan, although involved
in many Lima business ventures, never directly managed any agricultural
enterprise and mantatined his base firmly in the Banco del Peru y Londres.
The Miro Quesada family, despite an interest acquired through marriage in
19 Cotler, Clases, estado, y nacion, p. I30.

20 Pablo Macera, Trabajos de Historia (4 vols., Lima, 1977), IV, 426.
21 Howard L.
Karno, 'Augusto B. Leguia: the oligarchy and the modernisation of
Peru, I870-1930' (Ph.D. thesis, UCLA, 1970), pp. 66-9; Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy',
P. 55-
22
Burga and Flores Galindo, Apogeo y crisis, pp. 90-2; Carlos Malpica, Los duenos
del Peru (9th edition, Lima, I976), pp. 90-I and II9-20; Jose Carlos Martin, Jose
Pardo y Barreda: el estadista (Lima, 1948), p. 2I.
The CoastalElite and PeruvianPolitics 103
the San Nicolas plantation, always depended on control of El Comercio.23

Without doubt a relatively small number of men governed Peru during
the Republica Aristocrdtica, excluding the mass of the population from
formal politics. Furthermore, many had close links to the Partido Civil, and
the thriving economy of the coast, whether through the production of
exports or through their involvement in the expansion of business activity
which it generated in the capital. Members of the coastal elite, rather than
the military or the Andean caciques, dominated the national government in
Lima. But that generalisation, as recent writers have noted, is not a sufficient
explanation of Peruvian politics in the RepuzblicaAristocratica. It overlooks
the elite's failure to develop a structured ideology or national consensus, it
does not account for the bitter political conflict within the elite, which raises
doubts as to the validity of any generalisation about civilista control of the
country, and it does not explain the civilistas' leaders' relationship with local
elites and their failure to exercise any control over much of the country out-
side the capital and the coast.24
The political history of Peru between i895 and I9I9 is not one of un-
challenged control by a small group of rich civilista businessmen, as a cursory
narrative makes clear. The return of the civilistas to political power in Peru
depended on their alliance with the Democrats led by Pierola in I895, and
only in 1902 did they ensure their dominance over their erstwhile allies.25
Almost immediately, however, the party split into warring factions, intensi-
fied by the preferencegiven to Jose Pardo over Isaac Alzamora as presidential
candidate for I904.26 During Pardo's government the splits began to heal,
but the direction taken by Legufa's government after 1908 brought a
fissure between the leguiista wing and a group, known as El Bloque,
led by Manzanilla and Luis Mir6 Quesada, which opposed Aspillaga's
presidential candidacy in I912, and allowed into power the populism of
Guillermo Billinghurst.27Billinghurst was removed from power in February
23 On Payan, see Carlos Camprubi Alcaizar, Jose Payan y de Reyna (i844-I919): su

trayectoria peruana (Lima, I967); on the Aspillagas and Mir6 Quesadas, Gilbert,
'The Oligarchy', chapters 3 and 5.
24 The
question of oligarchic ideologies and mentalities has recently been raised by
L6pez, 'El estado oligarquico', and interestingly developed by Burga and Flores
Galindo, Apogeo y crisis, especially pp. 87-99.
25 Jorge Basadre, 'Para la historia de los partidos: el desplazamiento de los dem6cratas
por el civilismo', Documenta 4, (I965), pp. 297-300. This argument is repeated in
Elecciones y centralismo, pp. 6I-6.
26 Pedro Davalos y Lisson, Diez anos de historia contempordnea del Peru, 1899-i9o8
(Lima, I930), pp. 88-I22.
27
Martin, Jose Pardo, pp. 35-6; Peter Blanchard, 'A Populist Precursor: Guillermo
Billinghurst', Journal of Latin American Studies, Vol. 9, Part 2 (I977), pp. 25I-73.
o04 Rory Miller
I914 by a military coup supported by representatives of all four major

political parties, but this did not solve the civilistas' problems for the party
remained divided into three groups at the time of the presidential convention
of 19I5.28 The succeeding years were marked by intensified political conflict.
Pardo's attempts to solve the disunity of the party by nominating Antero
Aspillaga first as its chief, and then as presidential candidate for I9I9 merely
provoked further desertions and Aspillaga's consequent defeat by Legufa.
In the subsequent decade the party disappeared.29To talk, therefore, of
control of the state by the civilista oligarchy underestimates the conflicts
within civilismo, and does not explain how Peru was governed at a time of
deep divisions within the political elite.
A preliminary reading of primary sources on Peruvian politics between
1895 and 19I9 thus provokes serious doubts about textbook interpretations
of the country's politics which stress the power of the major families in the
Partido Civil, misgivings shared by other writers who have recently written
on the period. The remainder of this paper attempts to assemble a more
realistic picture of Peru's political life during the Republica Aristocrdtica,by
considering first, issues such as party, personal, and family loyalties, and
economic interests and conflicts, and, second, the relationship between the
coastal elite, sierra landowners, and Congress. This, of course, is no more
than a partial contribution to a more extensive reinterpretationof the period,
for little attention will be paid here to such matters as the role of working
class or military in politics, intellectual and ideological changes, and the
growth of the bureaucracy.
2. The homogeneity of the coastal elite

Contemporary commentators agree that little importance should be ascribed
to the political parties representing elite interests in early twentieth century
Peru. Neptali Benvenutto talked in the early I920S of the 'personal tinge of
our political groupings', continuing: 'In Peru there are no seriouslyorganised
parties of firm principles: alliances in politics are determined by accidental
causes which have nothing to do with the programmesor the traditions of the
men intervening in political debate.'30Victor Andres Belaunde noted: 'The
28
Basadre, Historia, p. 3799.
29 Antero Aspillaga had a meeting with Jose Pardo in February i918 at which he was
asked to undertake the regeneration of the party with the ultimate prospect of
running for president: Antero Aspillaga to Ram6n Aspillaga, 25 February 1918,
Vol. 244, Cayalti archive, Archivo del Fuero Agrario, Lima; El Comercio, i6 March
1918, a; McMillin to Secretary of State, 20 November 1918, U.S. State Department
file 823.0o/239; Victor Andres Belaunde, Planteamiento del problema nacional:
memorias, tercera parte (Lima, I962), p. I34.
30 Benvenutto, Parlamentarios del Perui, III, 93.
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics I05
political parties ought not to be taken seriously into account; even less so
what is attributed to them by way of programme or characteristics. Our
parties are...abstract nouns, inconsistent and ephemeral personal group-
ings.'31 The distinctions between the political parties of the early twentieth
century, Carlos Mir6 Quesada argued, was 'in the men rather than the ideas
thrown into the wind during election campaigns.'32 From a contrasting
standpoint, Jose Carlos Mariategui wrote in I918 that all the parties were in
eclipse: the civilistas lacked cohesion, the Constitutionalists were weak, the
Democrats had died with Pierola, the Liberals had destroyed themselves by
entering the government.33 The latter three were all based on personal
loyalties to a caudillo - Caceres, Pierola, and Durand respectively - and the
former was faction-ridden. Membershipof the Partido Civil was not confined
to the coastal elite, and members of the contemporary oligarchy could be
found elsewhere: Pedro de Osma and Ricardo Bentin with the Democrats,
Aurelio Sousa between 1912 and I914 with Billinghurst, and Victor Larco
in an independent position.34
It is more useful, perhaps, to see the politics of the elite not in terms of
party strife, but rather of antagonism between familial and personal group-
ings. The Partido Civil, for example, nurtured factions based around
Augusto Legufa, Rafael Villanueva, and the Prados, as well as party stal-
warts like Manuel B. Perez and fiercely independent politicians like the
Mir6 Quesadas and Jose Matias Manzanilla. It also attracted, at convenient
times, political opportunists like Mariano H. Cornejo.35The importance of
personal and family loyalties may be illustrated by the fact that Pierola,
Legufa, and Pardo all found it necessary to place their brothers, in crucial
parliamentarysessions, in the post of President of the Chamber of Deputies.36
Indeed, familial politics could reach extreme lengths. Gonzalez Prada's
characterisationof Jose Pardo's first administrationis irresistible: 'Jose Pardo
31 Victor Andres Bela6lnde,Meditacionesperuanas (Lima, p. II3. The essay
1932),
cited was written in I917.
32 Carlos Mir6 QuesadaLaos, Radiografiade la politica peruana (Lima, I959), p. 67.
33 Gary R. Garett, 'The Oncenio of Augusto B. Legufa: middle sector government and
leadership in Peru, I919-I930' (Ph.D. thesis, University of New Mexico, I973),
p. 40.
34 Alaine M. Low, 'The effect of foreign capital on Peruvian entrepreneurship'
(B.Phil. thesis, Oxford University, I975), pp. 75-6. Sousa's alignment with Billing-
hurst caused great problems for the Aspillagas for he was also a landowner in the
valley where Cayaltiwas located: Ram6n Aspillaga to Antero Aspillaga, 6 February
1914, Vol. 204, Cayalti archive; Basadre, Historia, p. 3765.
35 Ramon Aspillaga to Antero Aspillaga, 7 March I9I4, Vol. 204, and Ram6n
Aspillaga to Antero Aspillaga, 7 March I917, Vol. 234, Cayaltiarchive;Benvenutto,
Parlamentariosdel Perui,I, 47-8.
36 Martin, Josd Pardo,
p. 15; Basadre, Elecciones y centralismo, p. I30.
0o6 RoryMiller
in the Presidency, Enrique de la Riva Agiiero as chief of the cabinet, a Felipe
de Osma y Pardo in the supreme court, a Pedro de Osma y Pardo in the post
of the mayor of the municipality, a Jose Antonio de Lavalle y Pardo in a
fiscal's post, a Felipe Pardo y Barreda in the legation in the United States, a
Juan Pardo y Barredain congress.. .' The dynasty, Gonzalez Prada claimed,
offered an example of retroactive evolution, the intelligence of its members
decreasing from one generation to another while vanity and pride increased.37
There are countless examples of the ways in which family and personal
antagonisms permeated and exacerbatedconflicts within the elite. The Mir6
Quesadas, even in the 1950S and i960s, hated the Prados.38 Vlctor Larco
alienated not only his own brothers, but at one time or another every other
sugar producer in the Trujillo region.39 The relationship between the
Aspfllagas and the Prados in the crucial decade before the 1919 coup is
instructive. The American minister could argue in I9I0 that 'Mr Prado...
is a strict Pardista, as is Mr Aspillaga, president of the Senate.'40In the last
years of the Legufa presidency the two families, however, became distanced
from the civilista bloc in opposition, amongst whose leaders were the Miro
Quesadas, and the Prados supported Antero Aspillaga in the 1912 election
campaign. At this time the Prados and Aspillagas could be considered
political allies. In I914, the Prado brothers, much to the Aspillagas' delight,
figured in the coup which overthrew Billinghurst but the families drew apart
after Jose Pardo, rather than Javier Prado, was selected as president in 1915.
The final break approached when Antero Aspillaga was invited by Pardo to
replace Javier Prado at the head of the Partido Civil in 1918, and in the
following year the Prados backed the presidential candidacy of Leguia
against Aspillaga, and Legufa's subsequent coup in July 19 9.41
37 Manuel Gonzalez Prada, Figuras y figurones (Lima, I969), pp. Ioo-I.
38
See, for example, the treatment of the Prados in Mir6 Quesada, Radiografia, pp. 5,
27-8, 36, 94-5, 104.
39 Peter F. Klaren, Modernization, dislocation, and Aprismo: origins of the Peruvian
Aprista Party, 1870-1932 (Austin, I973), pp. I3-I4, I6-20, discusses Larco's
character and fortunes. On Larco's opposition to the Benavides regime, see Basadre,
Historia, p. 3765.
40 Leslie Combs to Secretary of State, i August 910o, State Department, Decimal File
823.00/8I.
41
Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy', pp. 234-5; Chavarrfa, 'La desaparici6n', pp. I44-52; for
the Aspfllagas' views on the political situation created by the fall of Billinghurst, see
Ram6n Aspillaga to Antero Aspillaga, 5 February I914, Vol. 204, Cayalti archive.
Despite their friendship with the Prados, there does not appear to be evidence in
the Cayalti archive that the Aspillagas had prior knowledge of the coup against
Billinghurst. Antero Aspfllaga wrote four days before the coup that 'the army will
stay in its barracks': Antero Aspillaga to Ram6n Aspillaga, 31 January I914,
Vol. 205, Cayaltf archive.
The CoastalElite and PeruvianPolitics 107
Such observations raise questions about the cohesion of the so-called

civilista oligarchy, but it might still be argued that over economic and social
issues their interests coincided sufficientlyto overcome their personaldivisions.
Recent authors have differed on the importance of splits caused by distinct
economic interests within the coastal elite. Burga and Flores Galindo, for
example, note the continued regional fragmentation of the oligarchy,
differentiating one group based on sugar, another from the central sierra,
and a quite distinct one from the south. Only the first, they argue, approached
the position of a national oligarchy.42Flores Galindo claims elsewhere that
the sugar planters, allied with the businessmen and bankers of Lima,
'managed clearly to control political power'.43For Burga and Flores Galindo,
therefore, the 'oligarchy' was wider than the coastal elite, but that elite was
both dominant and homogeneous, a result, perhaps, in part of the diversity
of interests which the most important families are assumed to have possessed.
Stephen Gorman, on the other hand, writes: 'The multiplication of sectoral
elites after 1895 engaged in heterogenous industries demanding particular-
istic policies to guarantee their success began to overtax the patronage
resources of the state.' The political parties which should have been able to
adjust interests within the elite failed absolutely to do so.44 In part, of course,
the problem is one of balance. In their attitudes to the importance of exports,
the role of the state in the economy, and the threat posed to their position by
the working class, members of the elite might share certain assumptions.
However, this should not be allowed to obscure the intensity of the conflicts
which weakened elite power and contributed to the collapse of the Republica
Aristocrdtica. Were these simply personal, or were economic rivalries an
important ingredient?
An alternative to the party as a means of mediating intra-elite conflicts
might have been the functional associations recognised by Pierola in I896.
Their influence, however, was reduced by the substantial changes in the
economy that occurred between i896 and the beginning of the First World
War. The Sociedad Nacional de Industrias fought, unsuccessfully, a battle
over tariff protection at the turn of the century, and as Peru's industrial
dynamism faded so did the pressure group.45 In 1915 the organisation,
42
Burga and Flores Galindo, Apogeo y crisis, p. 89.
43 Alberto Flores Galindo et al.,
'Oligarquia y capital comercial en el sur peruano,
1870-1930', Debates en Sociologia 3, (1978), p. 55.
44
Stephen M. Gorman, 'The State, Elite, and Export in Peru: toward an alternative
reinterpretationof political change', Journal of Inter-AmericanStudies and World
Affairs, Vol. 21, No. 3, (1979), pp. 4I0-II.
45 See Sociedad Nacional de Industrias, Los derechos de aduana y las industrias
nacionales (Lima, i9oo). On industry, see Thorp and Bertram, Peru, i89o-I977,
pp. 112-28.
io8 RoryMiller
'practically in recess' had to be reformed under the auspices of Jose Payan,
the leading figure in the banking world.46 The activity of the Sociedad
Nacional de Mineria also apparently declined with the influx of American
capital into the mining industry. By the end of the first decade of the century
the two dynamic sectors of the coastal economy which remained largely
under Peruvian control were export agriculture- sugar and cotton - and the
Lima financial and commercial community.
By then the Sociedad Nacional de Agricultura seems to have become
limited to an educational and propaganda organisation, unable either to
mediate between different agricultural sectors or to represent their interests
effectively at the national level. The initial project to put duties on sugar
exports in 1914 stemmed, the Aspillagas angrily claimed, from Francisco
Tudela and the Solar brothers, civilista politicians with interests primarily in
cotton.4 They noted the weakness of the agricultural pressure groups, com-
menting: 'It is necessaryto defend ourselves with all our strength against the
sugar duty: all agriculturalistsmust form a great league for the defence of
agriculture, not only against taxes, but against everything.'48The Sociedad
Nacional de Agricultura did still exist, but the directoratenamed in January
1914 contained none of the major coastal planters and appears to have been
dominated by representatives of sierra pastoral interests.49Thus the oppor-
tunity arose for the creation of a new organisation, the Asociacion de Defensa
Agraria, in September I914, whose directorate came to include representa-
tives of both sugar and cotton growers. This changed its name in December
1915 to the Sociedad Nacional Agraria.`0 It appears, however, when agricul-
tural interests faced challenges over export duties and guano prices, to have
been utterly ineffective, like its predecessor,in representing their interests to
government. La Agricultura complained in July 1920: 'Nobody can deny
that the SNA does not occupy today the place that it ought to in an essen-
tially agricultural country like Peru.'51Agricultural interests, unable to fight
against increases in export duties and guano prices during the First World
War, clearly did not control the civilista government of Jose Pardo, himself
a major sugar planter. Some complained of a political campaign against the
46 El Financista,9 / 6 November 19I5.

47 Antero
Aspillaga to Ram6n Aspillaga, I4 August I914, Vol. 209, Cayalti archive.
48
Cayaltf to Lima, I September I914, Vol. 215, Cayaltl archive.
49 El Financista,
23/30 January 19I4.
50 Sociedad Nacional Agraria to Director of La Patria, 23 December I915, SNA
archive; La Agricultura, Vol. i, No. 5, (October I915), 78.
51 La Agricultura, Vol.
5, No. 59, (July 1920), I. La Agricultura had been making
such complaints about the SNA for years: see Vol. 4, No. 40, (September I918), 6,
and Vol. 4, No. 41, (October 1918), 4.
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics o09
agricultural interests, clearly seen in Congress, which could not be more

unfavourable.52
Agricultural interests were greatly divided amongst themselves. Neither
sugar nor cotton planters could operate consistently an effective pressure
group and between the two there was considerable antagonism, as shown by
the 1914 attempt to tax sugar exports. Only this forced the sugar growers
into combination. Immediately before, complaining of high freights, Antero
Aspfllaga had commented: 'If the sugar planters were more united we would
be able to obtain many benefits, but here everyone acts for himself, with the
result that they devour each other.'53They were strong enough, however, to
obtain only a small fixed duty in the package of export taxes agreed in
September I9I5.54 Indeed, the Aspfllagas hoped that the president's own
economic interests would protect them against proposals to increase the
sugar duties through placing them on a sliding scale: 'Surely President
Pardo, with his interest in the matter, will defend as far as possible the sugar
producers... With his interest in Tuman and his relatives' other estates he
will help us to defend ourselves from the partisans of progressive taxation.'55
Their hopes were confounded. In the 19I5 debates cotton producers had
questioned the special treatment meted out to sugar, the fixed duty being
passed only after a second vote.56Sugar did obtain two years' respite, but in
1918, in a complete reorganisation of the export duties, a progressive tax
was levied on producers.57Moreover, the special concession given to the
Gildemeisters by the departing Benavides government in 1915 to construct
their own port at Malabrigo split the Chicama planters, the two senators for
La Libertad, Victor Larco and J. I. Chopitea, complaining of the damage it
would inflict on the commerce of the Trujillo region.58The sugar planters'
preference for fighting for their own special treatment rather than for export
agriculture as a whole put the numerous, smaller cotton planters into a weak
position. They, from the first, had to pay taxes on a sliding scale, and they
were further weakened in the 1918 debates by conflict between the larger
cotton growers of the Piura region and the small producers of Ica.59The
52 Alfredo Broggi to Amador del Solar, 24 August I918, SNA archive.
53 Antero Aspfllaga to Ramon Aspillaga, 8 July I914, Vol. 205, Cayaltf archive.
54 Aspillaga Hermanos to
Henry Kendall and Sons, i September 1915, Vol. K.2I4,
Cayaltfarchive.
55 Antero Aspfllaga to Ram6n Aspfllaga, 28 August
I9I7, Vol. 244, Cayaltf archive.
56 LegislaturaOrdinariade I915, Diario de los Debates de la H. Cmnarade
Diputados,
PP 3I0, 434, 458, 507
57 West CoastLeader, June
15 i918.
58 El Financista, 15 October I917; Klaren, Modernisation,Dislocation, and Aprismo,
pp. 70-9.
59 3 a
LegislaturaExtraordinariade I917, Debates, Diputados, pp. 308-o0.
Io Rory Miller
overall impression of the export agricultural interests, especially when they

really came under threat from the government during the First World War,
is one of weak and ineffective organisation, hindered by splits between sugar
and cotton planters and by regional and personal conflicts within each
group.
The planters had some connexions with the Lima business community.
The Aspillagas, for example, were involved in the Banco Internacional, the
Cia. de Seguros La Nacional, mining investments, and the Compainia
Peruana de Vapores, the Pardos with the Banco Popular, and other repre-
sentatives of both the sugar and cotton sectors could be found on the boards
of the major banks and insurance companies which developed in the last few
years of the nineteenth century.60The extent of overlapping interests may,
however, be distorted by a small number of wealthy families, for there was
also a Lima business community, including men like Jose Payan, Pedro
Gallagher, Aurelio Garcia y Lastres, whose primary interests lay in banking
and commerce and who possessed little direct control over agriculture,
though they might hold some directorships.An examination of the member-
ship of the board of the Cdmara de Comercio de Lima is impressive for the
lack of overlap with other sectors of the coastal economy, for it includes, in
this period, no Pardo, no Prado, no Aspillaga, no Gildemeister, no Larco.61
The Cdmara de Comercio, however, of all the interest group organisations
established late in the nineteenth century, continued longest to fulfill semi-
official functions. It carried out, for example, an enquiry into inflation in
Lima in I898; it recommended, in 90o6, to the advantage of some of its
members, the formation of a Peruvian shipping company, and during the
First World War it studied, for the government, the effects of the banking
crisis of 1914, the level of import tariffs, and the supply and demand for
foodstuffs in Lima, amongst many other projects.62
The relationships between the coastal planters and the banking com-
munity, and between the merchants and banking, are difficult to determine.
The planters' involvement as directors of the banks tended to be with the
smaller and less important ones. In 1914 over 60 per cent of the capital and
reserves of the five Lima banks was accounted for by the Banco del Peru y
Londres, whose guiding spirit, Jose Payan, a Cuban immigrant, had been an
60 See the list of directors in Ernesto Yepes del Castillo, Peruz, 1820-1920: un siglo de
desarrollo capitalista (Lima, I972), pp. 175-80.
61
Jorge Basadre and Romulo A. Ferrero, Historia de la Cdamarade Comercio de Lima
(Lima, 1963), pp. 363-5.
62
Ibid., pp. 57-60, 77; Camara de Comercio de Lima, Memoria presentadapor el
Consejo de Administracion ..., 1915 (Lima, 1915), pp. IO-I I, and Memoria, 1916,
pp. 12-14; Basadre, Historia, p. 3878.
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics II
influential figure in Peru for some thirty years. To him Pablo Macera attri-
butes the idea of the Compania Administradora del Guano, the Estancos del
Tabaco and de la Sal, and the Companigade Recaudacion de Impuestos.63At
various times during the Republica Aristocrdtica the banks' interests,
expressed through Payan, diverged from those of the planters. He, in the
early i89os, had pressed for measures to combat the fall in silver by a move
to the gold standard, but found himself thwarted by Antero Aspillaga and
Juan Gildemeister.64When Pierola did, with the support of Jose Payan, take
the measures in I897 which led to the adoption of the libra peruana, it was
against considerable opposition in Congress from agricultural (especially
sugar) and mining interests.65The bank was later reputed to use jobs and
loans to control a number of Congressmen.66When the war exacerbated a
monetary crisis in August 19I4, forcing the adoption of paper currency, the
banks acted, to some extent, as a unified pressuregroup, meeting together to
agree on a course of action before talking to the president.67They ran, how-
ever, into serious opposition from other members of the coastal elite, particu-
larly, in Congress, from Mir6 Quesada and Manzanilla. Mir6 Quesada
alleged that the country was under the control of an alliance of bankers and
merchants, and that the banks had not only broken the law about reserves
but had systematically utilised the situation to their own advantage. Other
congressmen claimed that the crisis of I9I4 had arisen from loose lending
policies on the part of the banks, and that the country was now being forced
into saving one or two private institutions, an opinion shared by Antero
Aspillaga who laid the blame firmly at the door of the Banco del Peru y
Londres.68Foreign observersconcurredon the power of the banking pressure
group led by the Banco del Peru y Londres in the face of strong opposition
from powerful members of the coastal elite.69In 19I4 the Lima banks, how-
ever much they were distrusted and blamed for the crisis, had to be pro-
tected.70
63
Macera,Trabajos,IV, 325-7. 64
Camprubi,JosePayan, pp. 33-4.
65 p. Ordinaria de
Ibid., 37; Legislatura I897, Debates, Diputados, pp. 397-419, 431-
44, 480-505.
66 H.
Clay Howard to Secretaryof State, 28 January 1913, U.S. State Department
Decimal File 823.5I/56.
67 El Economista
Peruano,April/May I915, p. 850.
68 Congreso Ordinario de
1914, Debates, Diputados, pp. 39-40, 65-6, 72, 507-18,
570-82; Antero Aspillaga to Ram6n Aspillaga, 13 August 1914, Vol. 209, Cayalti
archive; Victor Aspillaga to Ramon Aspillaga, 9 October I914, Vol. 215, Cayalti
archive;Basadre,Historia,pp. 3786-7.
69 Handley to Secretary of State, I6
September I9I4, 8 October 1914, 14 October
19I4, U.S. StateDepartmentalDecimal File 823.51/78, 8i, 82.
70 It is interesting to note that the banks were not
protectedin 1931 when the Banco
del Peru y Londreswas allowed to fail.
I 2 Rory Miller
It is, however, the exporting group within the coastal elite, and particu-
larly the sugar planters, which is assumed, in the end, to have held political
power during the Republica Aristocrdtica.71 The exporters did not really
need positive policies from government to encourage exports. They desired a
freedom from central government interference in matters like taxation, and
the ability to control the local officials who commanded troops and the police,
the local judiciary, and the distribution of water. This led them to become
involved in politics, for they could not permit the local sources of power to
fall into the hands of rivals. As Ram6n Aspillaga commented after the fall of
Billinghurst, when the family was debating Antero's return to political life:
'For the sake of our own interests we are agreed that we cannot afford to be
Don Nadie.'72 Increasingly, however, the internal dissensions caused by
personal, local, and economic antagonisms were leading the planters to
believe that power in Peru was slipping from them. Ram6n Aspillaga com-
plained in I9I7 of the jealousy with which the country viewed the sugar
planters, continuing: 'The landowners and men of property will therefore
have to take control of the state, and take it away from the politiqueros, not
just of the opposition, but even those who form the government, who waste
their time in political and personal issues.'73 His fear, it should be noted, was
directed not at the threat from below, but that from politicians and bureau-
crats. The question of export duties, particularly,had demonstratedthe limits
to the planters' control of the state. La Agricultura wrote in 1918: 'The one
thing we are fighting, because we do not think it patriotic, is the rise in
agricultural taxes, which is to increase the salaries of a useless plague of
bureaucrats,whose only merit is that they do not know how to do their job,
and who have made the budget their own property.'74The agricultural
exporters felt, in fact, that they had failed to bring the national political
system under their control, despite having a representativein the presidential
palace. This raises the question of the relationship between the coastal elite
and Congress, which in turn necessitatesa discussion of the Peruvian political
system.
71
See, amongst others, the comments of Cotler, Madalengoitia,and Flores Galindo
above, all of whom mention either the exportersor sugar planters as the dominant
group within the elite. BaltazarCaravedoMolinarialso talks of a 'system of govern-
ment in which predominated the agro-exporters,British capital, and the land-
owners'. Clases, lucha politica, y gobierno en el Peru, I919-I930 (Lima, I977),
P. 39.
72 Ram6n Aspillaga to Antero Aspillaga, I8 FebruaryI914, Vol. 204, Cayalti archive.
73 Quoted in William Albert, An Essay on the Peruvian Sugar Industry, 1880-I920
(Norwich, I976), p. I9 a.
74 La
Agricultura, Vol. 3, No. 34, (March I918), p. 527.
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics 113
3. Congress, the coastal elite, and Peruvian politics

The reward for a successful politician was the power to protect and advance
his own interests. Candidly, German Arenas stated, 'the reason I entered
politics was because my legal career was suffering through my lack of influ-
ence in the courts.'75The Cayalti archive contains several examples of the
Aspfllagas approaching the Minister of Government over the nomination of
a prefect or subprefect,or the Minister of Development over the appointment
of an engineer to supervise water allocation, not always successfully, for
other landowners in the valley were competing for the right to name
engineers, and ministers might have their own candidates for political
office.76The number of letters on the subject demonstrates the importance
of local control; indeed, in the deep political crisis of I914-1915 the
Aspfllagas often seemed more concerned with local issues than with national
affairs. The reward was the ability, as in September 1914, to call on the
prefect of the department to supply troops for strike-breaking purposes.77
The allocation of water, in limited supply in many coastal valleys, could be a
particularly bloody affair, with small, medium, and even large, landowners
losing out to the politically powerful.78 For the member of Congress, the
government's need for his support permitted him to settle debts and build up
his clientele through the use of official appointments. Abelardo Gamarra
satirised the system by telling the story of an honest deputy, who was
shocked on his arrival in Lima by the fact that political discussions concen-
trated not on the wellbeing of the nation but on the posts a politician wanted
for himself or his relations.79 Gamarra commented elsewhere: 'Public
administration is a chain of compadres', complaining that the Pardos had
had the opportunity to reform the system but had merely perfected the old
methods of patronage. 'For them', he said, 'Government is like an hacienda,
with a patron, empleados, and peones'.80 Government posts, of course,
75German Arenas, Algo de una vida (paradespuesde mi muerte)(Lima, 1941), p. I8.
76 Ram6n Aspillaga to Antero Aspillaga, 14 October I913, 15 October I913, 23 Octo-
ber 1913, 3 November I913, I7 January I914, 6 February I914, 9 February I914,
13 February I914, 28 February 19I4, 6 April I914, Vol. 204, Cayalti archive.
Other plantations' papers in the Archivo Agrario, such as those of San Nicolas,
contain similar requests.
77
Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy', p. I73.
78 See, for
example, the cases cited in debates over the C6digo de Aguas in Congreso
Ordinario de 1916, Debates, Senadores, pp. I8-68; El Economista Peruano, August
I9I7, p. II28.
79 Abelardo M. Gamarra,
Algo del Peru y nmuchode Pelagatos por El Tugante (Lima,
I905), pp. 63-70. I am grateful to Julio Cotler for directing me to Gamarra's essays,
one of the more entertaining ways of conducting historical research.
80 Abelardo M. Gamarra, Particulos de costumbres de El Tunante
(Lima, I9I0),
pp. 58 and I40.
I I4 Rory Miller
permitted private profit, whether for the congressman, members of his

family, or his friends. Gamarra describedhow, when the subprefect, perhaps
the most notoriously venal official, visited his province, 'the people flee, as if
an emissary had said to them all - here comes the black death, accompanied
by yellow fever, cholera, malignant smallpox, and pulmonary tuberculosis.'81
Broadly, however, the effect of such a system was to intensify political con-
flicts through the resentment of those who felt themselves excluded from and,
indeed, harmed by the group in power. Since exclusion often affected their
local interests, this reinforced political rivalries within the province or depart-
ment.
At the centre of this web of patronage stood the president, with the power
to nominate all government officials, although in practice this devolved on to
ministers. The president named and could remove cabinet ministers.
Although there was an office of Presidente del Consejo, this was in practice
nominal, for the president saw ministers individually, not collectively.82
El Comercio, during the First World War, was accustomed to list all men
who had audiences with the president, for it was firmly understood that that
was the best way to get results. Davalos y Liss6n, particularly, attacked a
system where all appointments could be determined by the president, and all
negotiations of importance had to be with him.83 Individual ministers had
very little independent power, and were subject to censure by Congress.
'The situation of the minister', Davalos y Liss6n commented, 'in the months
when Parliament is in session is hazardous and full of uncertainty. The
cannibalism of the chambers is something which passes the limits of exag-
geration. Their greatest pleasure is to digest a minister.'84As congress sat
more frequently, meeting annually, and often continuing into one or more
extraordinary sessions, the executive's freedom of action diminished and
ministers became more vulnerable.85 Between I886 and 19I9 Peru had
57 ministers of Justice, 64 ministers of War, 65 ministers of Finance, and
70 ministers of Government.86
Ideally, the government's control of patronage and the electoral process, to
81
Ibid., pp. I8-45.
82 Manuel Vicente Villaran, Pdginas escogidas (Lima, 1962), pp. 88-9.
83 Pedro Davalos y Liss6n, La primera centuria (4 vols., Lima, I919-26), I, 60-2.
This featureintensifiedduring the oncenio.
84 Davalos y Lisson, La primera centuria, p. 63. See also Villaran, Pdginas escogidas,
pp. 66-9.
85 Davalos y Liss6n commented that one reason for this was the payment of Congress-
men, La primeracenturia,pp. 78-9.
86 Vincent J. Tufano, 'Politics, instability,and the rise of modern militarism in Peru'
(Ph.D. thesis, City University of New York, 1976), p. 98.
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics II
be discussed later, ought to have ensured the elite, through the president,
complete control of the political system. However, the number of ministers
overthrown by Congress would suggest that the coastal elite's control of the
legislature was deficient: it was itself divided, and depended on representa-
tives from the interior. The attacks on agricultural exports from within
Congress during the First World War have already been noted. The system
was then breaking down, but executive/legislative relations had never been
smooth. On some issues a president could never hope to take Congress with
him. In the case of relations with the British-owned Peruvian Corporation,
which had broken down shortly after the signing of the Grace Contract in
1889, no president until 1907 was strong enough, Davalos y Liss6n noted,
to obtain Congressional approval for a settlement.87The legislature rejected
budgets in 1901, 1903, 1911, I9I4, and I9I7. Jose Pardo's labour legis-
lation, introduced in 1904, suffered severe mutilation in Congress, only a
small part of it going into effect in 191 .88From the time Leguia alienated
the core of the civilistas in I909, relations always seemed bad. Billinghurst
was overthrown in 1914 out of fear that he intended to dissolve Congress
which had failed to pass his budget.89Leguia's coup against Pardo in I919
was, the latter claimed, aimed at reducing Congressional power by opening
the way for a new constitution under which both President and Congress
would be elected together for five-year terms.90Pardo had himself, however,
planned similar legislation to overcome the executive's powerlessness.91This
brings us to the question of the coastalelite and Congress.
The power of the oligarchy, Victor Andres Belauindeclaimed, was outside
Congress, being economic and subterranean.Congress was not 'the exclusive
incarnationof the oligarchy'.92Although members of the elite sat in Congress
- Gilbert found i6 of his 30 families with members there between I895 and
9 I9 - their representation was limited.93 In the 19 5 Congress only seven
members of I05 deputies came from these families; in the Senate five out of
49 senators did so. Including members of oligarchic families which have
87 Davalos
y Liss6n, Diez anos, p. 200.
88
Basadre, Historia, pp. 3872-3. Leguia's reputation was built on his struggle as
Minister of Finance to push a budget through Congress. See Davalos y Liss6n, Diez
anos, pp. 98-9.
89 Blanchard, 'A Populist Precursor', pp. 267-8.
90 Jose Pardo, Peru: cuatro anos de gobierno constitucional (New York, I9I9), p. 73.
This view is shared by several historians, amongst them Jorge Basadre, Elecciones y
centralismo, p. Ioo.
91 Congreso Ordinario de 1917, Debates, Congreso, p. 7. Proposals for such a reform
dated back to I912: Davalos y Liss6n, La Primera Centuria, p. 49.
92 Belaunde, Meditaciones peruanas, pp. I8-20.
93 Gilbert, 'The Oligarchy', pp. 54-5.
I16 Rory Miller
since declined or disappeared would not alter this conclusion markedly.94
Nor did the coast as a rule impose members on interior provinces, although
there were exceptions such as the prominent civilistas, German Arenas and
Manuel Bernardino Perez.95 The evidence of the I9I5 Congress would
suggest that local ties were necessary for election. Of 69 deputies who could
be traced, 46 were born in the department where their provinces were
located.96 Those who cannot be traced were probably more likely to be
obscure provincianos, unknown to the compilers of the bibliographical
dictionaries. Certain regions, however, might have been more likely to be
represented by prominent limenfos:the Ancash representation, for example,
included both Arenas and Francisco Tudela y Varela, both political allies of
the Pardos. In areas like Cajamarca, Huancavelica, and the whole of the
south, the regional elites were strong enough to provide their own Congres-
sional representatives,however.97
This would confirm the importance that recent authors have attached to
the relationship between the coastal elite and the landowners of the interior,
particularly those of the large Andean departments which were over-
representedin Congress. Ancash, Cajamarca,Cuzco, and Puno each supplied
more than ten members of the Chamber of Deputies, nominally I26-strong
in 19I5. However, although the importance of the links between the coastal
elite and the gamonales of the interior have been recognised, there has been
some disagreement over the extent of the latter's power. Cotler argues that
they were forced into respecting the system and gained local autonomy at the
expense of becoming 'clients of the executive which represented the
bourgeoisie'.98This analysis would suggest, however, that this ideal model
increasingly did not work out in practice, as the executive's patronage failed
to ensure a compliant Congress. Burga and Flores Galindo seem to argue
that, despite the heterogeneity and internal rivalry of the interior landowners,
Lima did not succeed in controlling them in this period.99Ernesto Yepes,
more recently, has drawn distinctions between landowners in the southern,
central and northern Andes, arguing that in much of the region their control
94 This analysis is based on I. R. Echegarray C., La Cdmara de Diputados y los
Constituyentes del Peru (Lima, I965); Legislatura Ordinaria de '915, Debates,
Senadores,passim; Paz Soldan, Diccionario biogrdfico;Parker,Peruviansof Today;
Benvenutto,Parlamentariosdel Peru.
95 Arenas, Algo de una vida, p. 2I; Basadre, La Vida y la Historia, pp. 124-5.
96 Of the remaining 23, 15 were born in Lima.
97 There is scope for a large-scalecomputer analysis of members of Congressin Peru.
Jorge Basadre appears to have been engaged in research along these lines at the
time of his death: Elecciones y centralismo, pp. 122-4, I28-32.
98 Cotler, Clases, estado, y nacion, pp. 125-6.
99 Burga and Flores Galindo, Apogeo y crisis,pp. 104-I2.
The CoastalElite and PeruvianPolitics II7
was not impaired and might even be increased by the extension of the state
apparatus in this period.100The new coastal elite and local power groups
were, in fact, interdependent at this time. The power of the local landowners
lay in Congress, and in their ability to use the executive's patronage for their
own ends. The coastal elite gradually lost whatever control they may have
possessed over Congress. Much of the explanation for this lies in the increas-
ing inability of the executive to control elections.
Jorge Basadre has outlined the major changes in electoral law.0'l Before
I896 a deputy needed the right connexions in Lima to be elected, for
Congress determined the outcome of disputed contests. The 1896 law, which
established direct voting in public, put control of the local elections into the
hands of provincial juntas chosen from amongst the highest taxpayers, all
being overseen by the Junta Electoral Nacional. Control of that body, there-
fore, became the key to Congress, the civilistas obtaining it fully in 1902.
However, since the nominations to the Junta Electoral Nacional were in the
hands of Congress, especially after I908 when the four representativesof the
judiciary were eliminated, a President who could not control Congress might
face difficulties in securing a compliant legislature, and this led to the
suppression of the Junta Electoral Nacional in 191 by Legufa. The remain-
ing elections of the Republica Aristocrdticawere again locally controlled by
Asambleas de Contribuyentes, using the military register as a basis after
I915, and disputes were resolved by the Supreme Court. Although abuses
continued to occur, the Supreme Court's record of annulments in these years,
coupled with the election of members like Abelardo Gamarra and Julio
Tello, would suggest a greater degree of independence.102
At the local level the whole process was marked by violence, especially
before I896 and after I913, and fraud. In areas like Cajamarca private
armies existed throughout the period, and elections were the arena for
confrontation between the locally powerful families.103In Chota and Cutervo
the situation was particularlybad. One deputy reported, besides the murder
of an alcalde and a gobernador, the killing of 27 peones in one month.
Io gendarmes, he commented, could scarcely control the prison population
100
Yepes, 'Burguesia y gamonalismo', pp. 56-6i.
101 Jorge Basadre, 'Leyes electorales peruanas, I890-19I7: teoria y realidad', Historica,
Vol. I, No. I (1977), pp. I-36. Similar material is to be found in Elecciones y
centralismo, passim.
102 This
paragraph is based both on Basadre, 'Leyes electorales peruanas', and Villaran,
Pdginas escogidas, pp. 197-205. See also Basadre, Elecciones y centralismo,
pp. 76-83, IoI, o06.
103
Burga and Flores Galindo, Apogeo y crisis, pp. IO9-IO and I40-I; Michael J.
Gonzalez, 'Capitalist agriculture and labour contracting in northern Peru, I880-
1905', JLAS, Vol. 12, (I980), p. 302.
i 8 Rory Miller
of 60. The I9 7 election caused at least three dead in Bambamarca,includ-
ing the local president of the Partido Civil.04 Local landowners fought to
control the subprefects.l05Just as the presidentsfrequently lost their supposed
control over Congress, landowners lost that of the subprefect to their rivals.
The situation was equally difficult in the south. From 1895 Cuzco was
considered a political centre that the national government found it impossible
to manage.106Few hacendados in the altiplano called themselves civilistas.07
Despite reforms, fraud and violence were commonplace. In 19I7, 139 votes
were recorded for Tiquillaca which had 36 registered voters, Io6 for
Capachica with 29 electors.108In the south, particularly, the practice of
allotting seats according to population, but allowing only literates to vote, led
to very small electorates. One provincia, Sandia, had only 193 electors.l09
The odd candidate coming from Lima needed to pay attention to local
concerns to gain support. Arenas attributed his election in 1905 to the
donation he gave to repair the local church. In 1911, in an unsuccessful
attempt to gain re-election, Arenas spent S/.7000, including a loan to the
one recalcitrantmember of the local junta de registro."0 Two deputies were
shot in Andahuaylas, one in 1915 and one in 1917. The 1917 election in all
took a toll of three candidates in the sierra.111The decentralisation of the
electoral system in 913 does seem to have made elections more violent and
difficult to manage.
Even the control of elections would not ensure a submissive Congress.
Deputies and senators were elected for six years, which gave the legislature
considerable continuity. It also meant that many would be dependent for
re-election not on the actual president but on his successor. This problem
was exacerbatedby the fact that, after 1903, presidential and Congressional
elections went out of phase because of the need to elect a new president after
Candamo's death in 1904. Constitutional reformers clearly recognised that
strengthening of the executive and the state could be obtained only by electing
simultaneously both the president and the Congress for five-year terms. Even
under this system, after the promulgation of the 1920 constitution, it took
104 Ia Legislatura Extraordinaria de 1917, Debates, Diputados, pp. 297-8, 460-I.

Legislatura Ordinaria de I9I7, Debates, Diputados, pp. 370-I.
105
106
Jose Tamayo Herrera, Historia social del Cuzco republicano (Lima, 1978), p. 93.
107 Nils Jacobsen, 'Desarrollo economico
y relaciones de clase en el sur andino, I780-
I920: una replica a Karen Spalding', Analisis 5 (May-August I978), pp. 69-70.
108 Dan C. Hazen, 'The Awakening of Puno: government policy and the Indian
problem in southern Peru, I900-I955' (Ph.D. thesis, Yale University, I974), p. 5.
109 Villaran, Paginas escogidas, pp. 241-2.
10 Arenas, Algo de una vida, pp. 20-8 and 70-5.
111 Basadre, Historia, pp.
3806-I7.
The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics I19
Leguia some years to establish his complete domination over Congress.112

The executive's control of Congress was actually deteriorating towards the
end of the civilista era. The Deputies in 1917 affirmed their right in extra-
ordinary sessions to debate matters other than those for which they had been
convoked.1l3 Pardo, the last civilista president, complained of the large
number of occasions on which Congress had imposed on the executive
measures vastly different from the ones which had been submitted to it, even
in matters of great gravity.1l
This research on Peruvian politics during the Republica Aristocrdtica
arose from earlier work on the relationship between British firms and the
Peruvian government, in which it was found that despite the supposed
control of Peruvian politics by an oligarchy closely linked to British capital
disputes between the two could be lengthy and difficult to resolve, particu-
larly given the power of Congress to delay matters.11l A more extensive
reading of the primary sources on the period confirms the intensity of political
conflict within the ruling group between 1895 and 1919, and the limits to
the omnipotence of the coastal elite. In part, dissatisfaction arises from the
fact that this period has often been treated in a rather static manner, overlook-
ing the fluidity of membership within the elite during this period, and the
changes in the economy which were destroying or creating different interest
groups within the elite. Throughout the period the oligarchy was divided by
personal rivalries, which might be linked to local economic conflicts and the
struggle to control local officials, as well as by the growth of different
economic interests. Neither parties nor interest groups could mediate these
conflicts, which might involve matters of serious import to the functioning
of the export economy - the gold standard, banking and monetary laws,
export duties, and the concessionsgiven to foreign firms.
Central to the elite's failure to secure its control over the country was its
failure to control Congress, either by infiltrating it with a large number of
members from the oligarchy or by reducing its power. The relationship
between the president and Congress was a complex one, requiring careful
management on the part of the president and the skilful use of his powers of
patronage. Although these were extensive, they could not ensure Congres-
112 Carl Herbold,'Developmentsin the Peruvianadministrative
system, I919-39:
modern and traditionalqualitiesof governmentunder authoritarianregimes'
(Ph.D. thesis, Yale University, I973), p. I I.
113
Basadre, Historia, pp. 3836-7.
114 Pardo, Cuatro anos, p.
72.
115 Miller, 'British firms and the Peruvian government I885-I930', in D. C. M.
Rory
Platt (ed.), BusinessImperialism,I840-i930: an inquiry basedon British experience
in Latin America (Oxford, I977), pp. 37I-94.
I20 Rory Miller
sional subservience. The power of Congress was largely negative, being that
of delaying or amending executive projects, but the failure to control it could
embarrassor weaken the executive. As congressional sessions became longer
its independence grew. During the debates on the sugar duties, Antero
Aspillaga expressed the frustration of many members of the elite when he
wrote: 'From how many barbaritieswill we have escaped or been delivered
once Congress is closed? If only they would return to their provinces and
leave us in peace.'l16Central to the conflict of the executive and legislature
was the power to determine electoral results. Once Legufa, in 91 I, abolished
the role of the Junta Electoral Nacional, the civilistas lost the control of the
electoral machinery which was vital to any hope of dominating the govern-
ment. Although elections became fairer in the sense that fewer candidates
were imposed from Lima and more represented local interests, the violence
latent in Peruvian politics re-emerged. The Liberals, whom Basadre sees as
epitomising the power of local interests in politics, increased their number
and became alienated from the Pardo government in I9I9 through its
inability to control the electoral violence which had culminated in the death
of Rafael Grau in I917 and an assassination attempt on Augusto Durand
in I9I9.117 Ironically, the stagnation that resulted from the negative power
of Congress probably aided the coastal elite in the short run, for it hindered
strong government. As Jose Matfas Manzanilla commented: 'The best
government is that which governs least, and the best Congress that which
does not legislate.'l18In the long run, however, all became affected by a crisis
of morale. Planters like the Aspillagas resented the politicians and bureau-
crats, while the younger members of the political elite lacked confidence in
the entire system. For some of them, Legufa in I919 represented the oppor-
tunity for change, but his coup also signified the failure of the coastal elite,
despite the wealth obtained from wartime conditions, to develop a political
system which would allow them to overcome the conflicts and jealousies
within their own ranks.
11 Antero Aspillaga to Ram6n and BaldomeroAspillaga, 25 January 1915, Vol. 217,
Cayaltiarchive.
117
Basadre,Eleccionesy centralismo,p. io6; Basadre,Historia, pp. 3843-I7 and 3835.
118 Jose Matias Manzanilla, 'El
poder legislativo en el Peru', Anales de la Universidad
Mayorde San Marcosde Lima, Vol. 31 (I904), p. 9.

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The Coastal Elite and Peruvian Politics, 1895-1919

Author(s): Rory Miller

The Coastal Elite and Peruvian

For the foreign scholar, especially, an understanding of Peruvian politics

I. The Age of a Civilista Oligarchy?

19 Cotler, Clases, estado, y nacion, p. I30.

the San Nicolas plantation, always depended on control of El Comercio.23

23 On Payan, see Carlos Camprubi Alcaizar, Jose Payan y de Reyna (i844-I919): su

I914 by a military coup supported by representatives of all four major

2. The homogeneity of the coastal elite

Such observations raise questions about the cohesion of the so-called

46 El Financista,9 / 6 November 19I5.

agricultural interests, clearly seen in Congress, which could not be more

overall impression of the export agricultural interests, especially when they

3. Congress, the coastal elite, and Peruvian politics

permitted private profit, whether for the congressman, members of his

104 Ia Legislatura Extraordinaria de 1917, Debates, Diputados, pp. 297-8, 460-I.

Leguia some years to establish his complete domination over Congress.112

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