An act of courage and political intelligence that marked the beginning of the end of the centralist Rosas regime, and paved the way for the National Organization.
Wendel Gietz | Special for EL DIARIO
Every year since 1835, the same perverse political game was repeated, although the parties knew very well that it was a farce.
On the one hand, the all-powerful dictator of Buenos Aires, Juan Manuel de Rosas, religiously sent his little letter every September to the provincial legislatures in a contrite tone of false patriotism, announcing that he was inevitably resigning due to “poor health” the powers delegated to him by the provinces, especially the management of the foreign relations of the Argentine Confederation.
On the other side, the thirteen Argentine provinces of that time, subjugated and impoverished, submissively sent their response, begging the tyrant to continue, and in no way accepted his resignation: the hens begging the fox to stay in the henhouse. Literally.
A textbook psychopathic manipulation mechanism, when power is exercised by a sinister and narcissistic individual like Rosas, champion of cynicism, who loved to surround himself with buffoons and murderers.
Every year the sad spectacle of the Argentine provinces ceding their freedoms and possibilities of progress to a ruthless centralist regime was repeated. They humiliated themselves by being forced to reject the pharisaical resignation of the Restorer of Laws, while he indefinitely pushed forward the dream – and the obligation imposed by the Federal Pact of 1831 – of sanctioning a National Constitution that would organize the republic: “that little notebook”, when saying derogatory about Rosas himself.
Sitting on the large treasury of customs revenues from the port of Buenos Aires, the tyrant ruled in favor of the livestock and commercial elites of Buenos Aires. For the rest of the provinces: the stick and the carrot.
The situation in the interior was dire: the northern provinces, deprived of trade with Upper Peru, were exhausted after all their efforts in the wars of independence; those in the center survived as best they could; and the coastlines, with their sequestered rivers, unable to trade.
As the years went by, the Rosas dictatorship degenerated into a true satrapy. The Caligula del Plata – as Sarmiento called him – perfected the repressive apparatus of the regime with La Mazorca (the first expression of “state terrorism” in the country), and established the cult of his personality; His portrait hung on the altars of the churches and he walked in processions through the cities alongside the saints.
By 1850 this state of affairs was no longer enough. 40 years had passed since the May Revolution and everything was backwardness and inequality.
Someone had to do something, and that someone was clearly not going to come from Buenos Aires.
The figure with the courage and political intelligence to do so was called Justo José de Urquiza, governor of the influential province of Entre Ríos.
Let’s look at the facts. When the hypocritical letter from the despot of Buenos Aires arrived in September 1850 to the Chambers of Representatives of the provinces asking them to surrender their dignity, the expected responses followed, the tenor of which was more or less as follows: “the resignation of HE is strictly rejected. and the sum of faculties and rights that it retains is delivered so that General Juan Manuel de Rosas can make of this authorization the use that his high wisdom deems appropriate for the tranquility and general well-being.”
First was the legislature of Buenos Aires, of course, and then followed in single file: Córdoba, San Juan, and Salta in the same year, and between January and February 1851 those of Catamarca, San Luis, La Rioja, Santa Fe , Jujuy and Tucumán.
But there were two answers that were slow to arrive and the press addicted to the tyrant of Santo Lugares was beginning to get nervous. Something was brewing on the untamed coastline.
Scenarios
And Entre Ríos’ response finally came. On May 1, 1851, General Urquiza rose serenely at 4 in the morning in his camp in San José and marched to the Plaza de Concepción del Uruguay accompanied by the Estrella division escort and a large part of his General Staff. .
He had been meditating on this momentous decision for years and knew very well the effects of the political bomb that he was about to launch in the middle of the terrifying power apparatus of the Rosario dictatorship.
There and before a crowd that had gathered at the foot of the pyramid erected in the central square of Concepción del Uruguay in honor of another champion of federalism, General Francisco Ramírez, the young town crier Pascual Calvento read the historic Decree drafted by the very skillful secretary Juan Francisco Seguí (future Conventional Constituent), signed by the Entre Ríos Governor.
The irony-laden recitals of the decree written by Seguí, which hit the heart of Juan Manuel de Rosas’ enormous ego, are unmissable. In particular the 4th, which is the main foundation of the very important political act that it frames. “That it is to have a sad idea of the enlightened, heroic and famous Argentine Confederation to suppose it incapable, without General Rosas at its head, of sustaining its organic principles, creating and promoting tutelary institutions, improving its current state, and approaching the glorious future reserved.” as a reward for the well-proven virtues of their children.”
In the operative part and in a few words, the province of Entre Ríos, in an act of absolute legality, accepted Rosas’ resignation from the management of foreign relations, resumed its territorial sovereignty and was free to deal directly with the other governments of the world until the sister provinces meet in the National Assembly and organize the Republic.
The joy in all the cities and towns of Entre Ríos was widespread. The brave people of Corrientes immediately submitted to Urquiza’s Pronouncement, with their governor Virasoro at their head.
After 15 years of humiliation, violence, lies, backwardness, of seeing progress for Buenos Aires pass by, the province of Entre Ríos stood up and said enough.
What followed the historic Urquiza Pronouncement on May 1, 1851 is known history: meeting of the Large Army, victory of Caseros, flight of Rosas, meeting of the Constituent Congress and sanction of the National Constitution of the Argentine Republic in 1853.
