Aniceto Arce
President of Bolivia
1824 CE to 1906 CE
Aniceto Arce Ruiz de Mendoza (April 15, 1824, Tarija – August 14, 1906) is President of Bolivia from 1888 until 1892.
The Aniceto Arce Province is named after him.
Arce is a native of Tarija but is educated as a lawyer and resides most of his life in Sucre, where he becomes one of the country's foremost silver-mining tycoons.
A supporter of Linares and Constitutionalist government, he later serves in Congress during the 1870s until the time of the Daza dictatorship.
Unlike other capable leaders of his day, Arce oes not enlist to serve when the War of the Pacific develops in 1879
Indeed, his becomes one of the most accommodationist voices in the political spectrum, perhaps as a result of his extensive business connections to Chile, where he sells much of his silver, invests his profits, and seeks financing for his projects.
His position is that the Litoral is, for various lamentable reasons, largely indefensible.
Thus, the country should cut its losses and seek an alliance with Chile rather than with Peru.
Despite this minority position, what rings more clearly in the ears of most Bolivians is Arce's steadfast call for the establishment of a conservative democratic order, with the primacy of law, regular elections, and rule by enlightened pro-business elites such as himself.
To this end, he founds the Conservative Party, participates as one of the principals in the 1880 Congress that topples Hilarión Daza, and has a role in the drafting of the country's new Constitution.
Moreover, he agrees to become Narciso Campero's vice-president for the crucial, nation-building 1880-84 period.
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Bolivian president Aniceto Arce Ruiz (1888-92), although elected legally, is an autocrat who manages to stay in power only through repression.
His main economic accomplishment is to extend the Antofagasta-Calama Railroad to Oruro.
The extension of the railroad drastically reduces the cost of transporting minerals to the Pacific Coast.
Economic growth is skewed, however, as railroads that are built to export minerals started to bring imported wheat from Chile; in 1890 Chilean wheat had been cheaper in La Paz than wheat from Cochabamba.
The open economy also hurts local industry.
The expansion of the haciendas at the expense of the free indigenous communities had resulted in numerous uprisings and forced many indigenous people to work for their landlords or to migrate to the cities.
As a result of this migration, the census of 1900 will note an increase of the mestizo population, but Bolivia remains a predominantly indigenous and rural nation, in which the Spanish-speaking minority continues to exclude the majority.
Bolivia's Liberal Party overthrows the Conservatives in the "Federal Revolution" of 1899.
Although the Liberals resent the long rule of the Conservatives, the main reasons for the revolt are regionalism and federalism.
The Liberal Party draws most of its support from the tin-mining entrepreneurs in and around La Paz, whereas Conservative governments have ruled with an eye on the interests of the silver mine owners and great landowners in Potosi and Sucre.
The immediate cause of the conflict is the Liberal demand to move the capital from Sucre to the more developed La Paz.
Bolivia's Federal Revolution differs from previous revolts in that indigenous peasants actively participate in the fighting.
Native discontent had increased because of the massive assault on their communal landholdings.
The campesinos support the Liberal leader, Jose Manuel Pando, when he promises to improve their situation.
President Pando, however, reneges on his promises and allows the assault on land held by Bolivia's indigenous people to continue.
The government suppresses a series of campesino uprisings and executes the leaders
One of these revolts, led by Pablo Zarate Willka, is one of the largest rebellions of indigenous people in the history of the republic.
It frightens whites and mestizos, who once again successfully isolate the indigenous people from national life.