

('HIM. 



123 



the way of extension of the voting franchise, supremacy in Congress. He was elected by an 

 pabllo education, and religious -tolerance. Save overwhelming majority, mid as President jn- 



11, tin --le in which the parties resorted 



arm-, tin- political development of Chili was 

 . from civil disturbances, and the ruling cla^s 

 s di-tingiii.-hed among the Spanish-American 

 nly l'.r wealth and education, but 

 talent for government and love of con- 

 ial liberty. Tin- republic was called 



the Ktigland of South America," and it was a ity in Congress. 

 minion boast that in Chili a pronunciamitnto or was 

 re\ulii;ion was impossible. The spirit of mod- 

 i Liberalism became more prevalent. The 

 nservative or Clerical party withdrew from 

 ral contests, although it still exercised a re- 

 straining influence in political life, being com- 

 d of the wealthiest families and the whole 

 y of the clergy. The Nationalists, as the 

 nttvaristas came to call themselves, counting 

 their ranks many distinguished lawyers, judges, 



joyed an unexampled degree- of popularity. For 

 two or three years the politicians who had been 

 his party associates worked in harmony with his 

 ideas. A thorough system of popular education, 

 the separation of church and state, and the de- 

 velopment of democratic government were the 

 aims hejollowed with the support of the major- 

 A system of normal schools 



established, and expensive school-houses 

 were built in all parts of the country. The cem- 

 eteries were secularized, a civil-marriage law was 

 passed, religious freedom was decreed, and sec- 

 tarian teaching was banished from the schools 

 and colleges. The Government carried out in- 

 ternal improvements on a grand scale, building 

 railroads, dredging harbors, making dry docks, 

 wharves, and piers, and the success of the admin- 

 istration was so striking, the progress and pros- 





irs, and diplomatists, lost ground, and the perity of the country so undeniable, that many 



of Balmaceda's former enemies came over to his 

 side. At the flood of the democratic tide he 

 was the most popular man in South America. 

 But when the old territorial families saw the 

 seats in Congress and the posts in the civil serv- 

 ice that had been their prerogative filled by 

 new men, and fortunes made by upstarts where 

 all chances had been at their disposal, then a re- 

 government of European states", and espe- action set in, corruption was scented, and Mod- 

 ly of England. Almost from the beginning erate Liberals, joining hands with the National- 

 ists and the reviving Conservative party, formed 

 an opposition of respectable strength. In the 

 earlier part of his administration Balmaceda 



vanced Liberals grew in influence and power. 

 As the Liberal party became all-powerful it 

 ^ilit into factions, divided by questions of prin- 

 ciple and by struggles for leadership and office. 

 Practice^ have sprung up in the system of gov- 

 ernment, founded rather on custom than on con- 

 stitutional law, by which it is assimilated in 

 me respects to the responsible or parliament- 



has been the custom of Presidents to choose as 

 nisters representatives of the dominant ele- 

 ments in Congress and to dismiss them after a 

 v< ite of censure. Congress can withhold supplies, 

 ami has another effective check over the Execu- 

 tive in the annual bill to fix the forces on land 

 and sea, which corresponds exactlv to the English 

 mutiny act. These safeguards have compelled 

 residents generally to act in harmony with the 

 g'ority in Congress. The patronage of the 

 ilian President is enormous, embracing not 

 y the general civil service, but local officials, 

 cept in the municipalities, and all appoint- 

 Biits in the army and navv and in the telegraph 

 d railroad services and tne giving out of con- 

 i s. The President has always oeen able to 

 ect his successor, and has exercised this power, 

 ally in harmony with the wishes of inftuen- 

 1 statesmen, sometimes calling a conference of 

 rty chiefs to decide on a candidate. 

 In the course of time the more advanced wing 

 the Liberals grew more numerous than the 

 oderates. The most radical section had its 

 icleus in a Reform Club in Santiago, composed 

 young university men, of whom Balmaceda 

 the finest orator. Entering Congress in 

 i, he took a leading part in debates. He was 

 one of the founders of the new Liberal party 

 that demanded large changes in the Constitution 

 and gained rapidly in strength, particularly when 

 the wave of national enthusiasm that followed 

 the victory over Peru swept over the country. 

 He added greatly to his reputation by his serv- 

 is minister to the Argentine Republic dur- 

 ing the Peruvian war, and when made Minister 

 of Foreign Affairs, by President Santa Maria, in 

 '885, he was the most popular man in the coun- 

 y ; 'out his claim to the presidential succession 

 a> contested i,y various other aspirants older 

 politicians and leaders of factions striving for 



part 



had the co-operation of the Nationalists, who 

 were represented in the Cabinet. In the last two 

 years of his term, when the time drew near for 

 selecting his successor, defection and revolt and 

 the rivalries of aspirants for the succession threw 

 the party into disorder and angered its hitherto 

 unquestioned leader. After the resignation of 

 the Cabinet in 1888 the Nationalists declined to 

 take part in the next one, and their secession 

 was followed by the breaking up of the admin- 

 istration party into warring factions. When 

 coolness arose between him and the leaders of 

 the party, he sought other advisers, and made 

 the broker Sanfuentes, who had been his busi- 

 ness agent, his chief confidant. President Bal- 

 maceda had appointed one ministry after an- 

 other, seeking to satisfy the different wings of 

 the Liberal party. The ministrv of October, 

 1889, of which Mariano Sanchez Fontecilla was 

 chief, with whom were associated Isidore Erra- 

 zuriz, Pedro. Montt. Juan Costellon, and oth- 

 ers chosen from various groups, was designed to 

 bring about harmony in the party, as it contained 

 the chiefs of five separate factions of the Lib- 

 eral party, and at first it had a majority in the 

 Chamber of Deputies of T3 to 64. The Hostility 

 that the President had aroused in society, to 

 which the press gave free expression, was very 

 hitter before the opposition in Congress grew 

 formidable, and he had obtained the power of the 

 Executive and given grounds for charges of arbi- 

 trary conduct that was contrary to precedents, if 

 not against the letter of the Constitution, in 

 carrying out the important innovations that Con- 

 gress had sanctioned in the face of obstacles 

 raised by powerful opponents. When the Con- 

 servatives and Monttvaristas united and were 



