The Oligarchy, 1880-1916
The federalization of the city of Buenos Aires promoted a certain degree of stability but failed to solve other historical Argentine problems. Provincial unrest was commonly met by armed federal interventions, and until 1912 the political life of the country remained controlled by an oligarchy. The men of the generation of 1880, the republican liberals who had helped shape the national consolidation, adopted a Conservative position to withstand the political pressures that resulted from the economic and social changes occurring in turn-of-thecentury Argentina. The Conservative republican elite did not, however, betray its liberal ideals of economic and administrative progress.
Members of the oligarchy, composed of the leading families in Argentina, shared social and economic interests that were voiced by the Argentine Rural Society and perceived the future of the nation as a personal project. They controlled the electoral process through the use of all sorts of gimmicks — including fraud. Provincial governors appointed their successors, the presidential candidates, and the candidates for both provincial and national legislatures. Constitutional presidential prerogatives included federal intervention in provincial affairs, which created another powerful mechanism for the manipulation of the political life of the country.
After 1880 the oligarchy became conscious of its political strength and adopted an aristocratic outlook characterized by ostentation and a fever for luxury. The absence of strongly organized political parties was related both to the inexperience of the Argentine masses in self-government and to the unwillingness of the oligarchy to allow popular participation in the political process.
Class interests thus became the stumbling block of liberalism, which developed into a system of one-party rule, known locally as the unicato, which was defended by presidents Roca (1880-86) and Miguel Juarez Celman (1886-90). Later presidents, Carlos Pellegrini (1890-92), Manuel Quintana (1904- 06), and José Figueroa Alcorta (1906-10), followed these same policies to a lesser degree.
The unicato provided an absolutist concept of the presidency in response to the country's political instability and the oligarchy's desire for centralization. There were no political groups capable of launching an effective opposition to the oligarchy, which held the land and promoted agricultural exploitation for its own profit. Immigration was encouraged to increase land productivity, and public works projects were undertaken to increase profits for the landed elite.
Because most immigrants remained in the coastal area, those provinces reaped most of the profits. The elite favored foreign enterprises to carry out the improvements and, although loans became a drain on the national economy, the oligarchy kept protecting foreign investment and speculation, even on the eve of financial disaster. After the balance of payments crisis of 1889, however, the country's oligarchy adopted more prudent economic policies.
The reform and reorganization of the legal code was one of the most liberal tenets of the unicato. In 1884 the Law of Civil Registration and the Law of Public Education were approved, though they divided Catholics and liberals and caused a rupture of relations with the Vatican between 1884 and 1890. Conflicts developed over the ideas of freedom of conscience, civil marriage, divorce, public education, and the appointment of church officials.
In 1890 serious disturbances occurred in response to the oligarchy's determination to impose modern legislation upon Argentina. The power brokers of this period failed to realize the need for renovation of their cadres, and by alienating its political leadership from both the old clans and the leaders of the new families of money and education, the oligarchy damaged its own future position in society. The new wealth was being bred in the coastal provinces, from which sprang an opposition group of young intellectuals who were to become the new contenders for political power.
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