Chapter 30 - Latin America: From Independence to the 1940s

I. Three National Histories

A. Argentina
1. From independence to WWII is in 3 general areas
a. Rebellion against Spain (1810-1850s)
b. Extraordinary economic expansion and immigration (1853-1916)
c. Argentines fail to establish a democratic state (1916-1943)
B. Buenos Aires versus the Provinces
1. 1810- junta in Buenos Aires overturns Spanish government
2. Porteños - people of Buenos Aires
3. Buenos Aires establishes primacy. Because of trade domination
4. 1821-1827- Bernardino Rivadavia worked to create liberal political state
a. He was not able to because of centrifugal regionalism
5. Commercial treaty- 1823
a. established GB as dominant trade partner
6. Rivadavia resigns in 1827
7. Juan Manuel de Rosas- strongmen of Buenos Aires
a. 1831- Pact of Littoral- Buenos Aires was in charge of trade
b. Mazorca assoc.- private police
C. Expansion and Growth of the Republic
1. 1852- Justo José de Urquiza overthrows Rosas
2. Argentine Republic captures Buenos Aires- 1859
3. Argentine economy was completely agricultural
a. Chief exports were animal products
i) 1876- first refrigerator ship “La Frigorique”
4. 1879- army of general Julio Roca carries out major campaign against natives- Conquest of the
Desert- in the Pampas
a. Pampas increased production of beef and wheat
i) Argentina was an agricultural rival of the U.S.
5. 1890- Radical Party, upper class people who ignored the lower classes
a. Hipólito Irigoyen was elected president in 1912- he was a Radical
i) Irigoyen made Spain remain neutral in WWI so Argentina could trade w. both sides
of the war
• Semana Tragica- labor quell w. army in January 1919
D. The Military in Ascendance
1. Late 1920’s- Radical Party was corrupt and directionless
a. 1930- military stages coup against Irigoyen
2. Right-wing nationalistic movement- nacionalismo
a. Resembled Fascism
b. Amperialism
c. Rejected liberalism
d. Against the Roman Catholic Church
e. Nacionalismo was backed by attitudes invoked by World War II
 3. 1943-1946, Juan Perón forged social discontent with authoritarian
political attitudes to create Perónism
a. authoritarian
b. militaristic
c. anti-Communist
d. Socially progressive
4. Perón knew that he could achieve political power through being well liked by the working
class
a. His power was rooted in antiliberal attitudes and aimlessness of Argentina during the
Depression
II. Mexico
A. Turmoil Follows Independence
1. Iturbide was unsuccessful in having Mexico become a monarchy
2. Mexico was governed by presidents
a. mostly caudillos from the army
3. Strongest figure- Antonio López de Santa Anna
a. opportunist willing to bend his ways to keep or get power
b. dictatorial
c. exiled in 1855
4. LA REFORMA- mid-century movement against Santa Anna
a. produced political stability, civilian rule, and an immigrant
attracting economy
5. La Reforma took church lands after Santa Anna was exiled
6. 1861- Benito Juárez emerges victorious from Mexican civil war (1857-1860)
7. Mexico was politically instable with a stagnant economy
a. the mines didn’t work and they didn’t have the resources to repair them
8. Inefficient Haciendas left farming in a retrograde state
9. Government tries to fix this with large foreign borrowings with interest payments
B. Foreign Intervention
1. 1823- Mexico allows Stephen F. Austin to begin colonizing Texas
2. 1835- rebellion in Texas against Santa Anna’s policies
a. Santa Anna is defeated at Battle of San Jacinto
b. Texas became an independent republic annexed by U.S. in 1845
3. Pres. James Polk launches war against Mexico in 1846
a. Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
i) U.S. gets New Mexico, Arizona, and California
4. Mexico invites Austrian Habsburg Archduke Maximilian to become Mexican emperor
a. Napoleon III provided support for the venture
C. Díaz and Dictatorship
1. liberal general Porfirio Díaz led revolt in 1876
2. Mexico grew rich under Díaz’s rule
3. Food production declines under Díaz and most Mexicans were
malnourished
4. Panic of 1907 in the United States disrupted Mexican economy
5. 1910- Pax Porfiriana was unraveling
D. Revolution
 1. Francisco Madero led an insurrection that drove Díaz in to European Exile in May 1911
a. Madero is elected president shortly after
2. Madero was distrusted by both conservatives, who wanted next to
nothing from him, and reformists, who wanted all from him
3. Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata were rising radical leaders
4. late 1911- Zapata proposes Plan of Ayala
a. large-scale peasant confiscation of land
5. 1913- Madero is overthrown by General Victoriano Huerta with the help of the U.S.
6. Venustiano Carranza, wealthy pro-Villa landowner
a. head of a large Constitutionalist army representing opposition of
Huerta)
7. Huerta collapses on August 15, 1914 when Constitutionalists take
Mexico City
8. Woodrow Wilson sent U.S. Marines to Veracruz in April 1914 to help
Carranza
9. Carranza denounces Wilson, thus casting himself in the role of patriot and
nationalist
10. 1916- Carranza confronts U.S. military intervention along border until U.S.
becomes involved in World War I
11. 10.Constitution of 1917 set forth political reform
12. Most famous provisions: articles 27 and 123
a. 27- gave the government the rights to all of the water. Mineral, and
other subsoil properties
b. 123- rights for the organization of labor
13. Carranza and his chief supporters admired California’s economic
developments
14. 1919- Zapata is lured into an ambush and killed
15. Carranza was assassinated in 1920
16. 1923- Villa is assassinated
17. 1929- Plutarco Elías Calles organizes the PRI
a. Institutional Revolutionary Party. Was and is the most important
political force in Mexico
18. 1934- Lázaro Cárdenas was elected president
19. he turned tens of millions of acres of land over to peasant villages
20. PeMex- Mexican oil company
21. Cárdenas was a bureaucrat and an administrative
III.Brazil
A. The Slavery Issue
1. Pedro I- first emperor of Brazil
a. regent for his father the king of Portugal
2. Sugar was the economies mainstay until mid-19th century
3. Most sugar plantations were coastal North-East
4. 1850-Coffee begins to take over the economy and trade
5. Coffee people were more progressive and emancipative
6. Brazil did not honor slave provisions that had been settled in slavery
suppression with GB
 7. Paraguayan War- (1865-1870)
a. Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay vs. Paraguay
b. because of Paraguayan access to the lower Plate River-
Montevideo
8. Dictator of Paraguay- Francisco Solano López
a. he mobilized the entire country in the war!
b. he dies in 1870-ending the war
9. ½ the adult population of Paraguay died in the war
10. Brazil, Puerto Rico, and cube were now the only slave-holding
countries in the hemisphere
11. 1871- the crown’s slaves were freed and decreeing freedom for their
children as well
12. 1888- Pedro II’s daughter, as temporary regent, signs abolition law that ends slavery in Brazil
B. A Republic Replaces Monarchy
1. 1889- Pedro II is sent into exile to France by the army
2. The President was chosen alternately by the states of São Paulo and Minas Gerais
3. Literacy replaced property as the requirement for voting
4. 1900- Brazil is producing ¾+ of the worlds coffee
5. the government made high prices for coffee so that it would not be
overproduced
C. Economic Problems and Military Coups
1. WWI causes major economic disruption in Brazil
a. Urban labor discontent
i) Strike in São Paolo in 1917- military action against strikers
b. Attempted military coups in 1922 and 1924
2. 1929- record low coffee prices
3. October 1930- Successful military coup by Getulio Vargas
a. he remained in power till 1945
i) Middle-class reformists sided with Vargas
4. Vargas attempted to allow emerging economic powers to have a role in society but nothing that
was particularly influential
5. Vargas wanted to lessen Brazil’s dependence on coffee
a. he attempted to create internal suppliers to the economy so that
it would be self-sustaining
6. New right-wing movement called integralism
7. 1937- Vargas becomes a dictator- he is now repressive
a. He established the Estado Novo- new state
8. Brazil sides with the Allies in WWII
a. Through massive foodstuffs, brazil manages to accumulate money from allies
b. Participation in WWII led Brazil to begin to think counter-dictatorially
c. 1945- Military coup takes Vargas out temporarily
9. 1950- Vargas was elected president!
a. 1953- Vargas establishes Petrobas (oil company)
b. Vargas commits suicide in 1954
10. 1957- construction of new capital- Brasília
11. Widespread poverty was a consequence of very fast economic growth
12. 1960- João Goulert becomes president
a. 1964- land reform
b. Peasants began to fight the rich for land
13. 1964- Military reclaims Brazil to “evade communism.” Thus ending its
democracy.