Enrique Hertzog Explained

Enrique Hertzog
Order:42nd
Office:President of Bolivia
Term Start:10 March 1947
Term End:22 October 1949
Vicepresident:Mamerto Urriolagoitía
Successor:Mamerto Urriolagoitía
Office2:Minister of Work, Health, and Social Security
President2:Enrique Peñaranda
Term Start2:16 September 1943
Term End2:20 December 1943
Predecessor2:Juan Manuel Balcázar
Successor2:Víctor Andrade Uzquiano
Office3:Minister of War and Colonization
President3:Daniel Salamanca
Term Start3:15 December 1932
Term End3:30 November 1933
Predecessor3:Joaquín Espada
Successor3:José Antonio Quiroga H.
Office4:Minister of Development and Communications
President4:Daniel Salamanca
Term Start4:25 October 1932
Term End4:9 January 1933
Predecessor4:Agustín Villegas
Successor4:José G. Almaraz
Office5:Minister of Government and Justice
President5:Daniel Salamanca
Term Start5:9 March 1932
Term End5:25 October 1932
Predecessor5:Luis Calvo
Successor5:Demetrio Canelas
Birth Name:Enrique Hertzog Garaizabal
Birth Date:10 November 1897
Birth Place:La Paz, Bolivia
Death Place:Buenos Aires, Argentina
Spouse:Edna Sánchez
Parents:Enrique Hertzog
Eduviges Garaizábal
Awards:Order of Charles III
Education:Higher University of San Andrés
Signature:Signature of Enrique Hertzog (1897-1981).svg

José Enrique Hertzog Garaizábal (pronounced as /es/; 10 November 1897 – 31 July 1981) was a Bolivian politician who served as the 42nd president of Bolivia from 1947 to 1949. He resigned in 1949, and died in exile in Argentina.

Biography

A medical doctor by trade, Hertzog joined the Genuine Republican Party of Daniel Salamanca in the 1920s, and rose to become Minister of Public Information and Communications as well as Minister of War during the 1932 - 35 Chaco war against Paraguay, which Bolivia lost.

President of Bolivia

In 1947 elections he ran for president on a ticket of united Republican Party (Bolivia) factions (former Saavedrists, Genuines, etc.) calling themselves Republican Socialist Unity Party (Partido de la Unión Republicana Socialista [PURS]). He won against the Liberal leader Fernando Guachalla and the reformist candidate Víctor Paz Estenssoro, who led the Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario (Nationalist Revolutionary Movement).

Hertzog faced innumerable obstacles during his term, mostly in the form of constant rebellion from the lower sectors of society, as represented by striking miners and union workers. He was also saddled with the implacable opposition of Paz's MNR party and its allies, in addition to a declining economy. In essence, the attempt of the privileged sectors (led by Hertzog himself) to "turn back the clock" to the oligarchic pre-Chaco War status quo did not work. Rising expectations and demands from an increasingly activist and indeed, violent, popular class, combined with the unwillingness or inability of the governing elites to give concession that would undermine their power, led the country to the very brink of civil war. On 18 September 1947 he declared the state of siege.

Escalating repressive measures, such as arrest and deportation of many MNR leaders, only bred further discontent. When the legislative elections of 1949 confirmed the dramatic ascendancy of the parties of the Left, the PURS leadership lost trust in the relatively more conciliatory Hertzog's ability to control the situation. They forced his resignation for "reasons of (non-existing) illness" in favor of his far more combative vice-president, Mamerto Urriolagoitía.

Later life

A few months later Hertzog was named Bolivia's Ambassador to Spain. Following the 1952 Bolivian National Revolution that brought Paz Estenssoro's MNR party to power, the ex-President remained exiled in the Spanish capital, later moving to Buenos Aires, where he died.

Hertzog again ran for President of Bolivia in 1966 on behalf of remnants of the pre-Revolution parties which had formed Democratic Institutionalist Alliance against René Barrientos, but only got a small share of the vote.

See also

Bibliography