The Liberal Party (Spanish: Partido Liberal; PL) was a liberal political party in Bolivia active between 1883 and 1979. It was one of two major parties, alongside the Conservative Party, that dominated the politics of Bolivia from 1884 to 1920. The Liberals constituted the primary opposition to the Conservatives from 1884 to 1899 and ruled continuously from 1899 to 1920 after taking power in the Federal War. Liberal rule ended in 1920 when the party was ousted in a coup d'état. The Liberals remained intermittently influential and electorally competitive until the Bolivian National Revolution of 1952, and it finally lost its legal party status in 1979, during the democratic transition.

History The Liberal Party was formally founded in 1883 by Eliodoro Camacho. The party espoused freedom of religion, a strict separation between church and state, legal acceptance of civil marriages and divorce, and strict adherence to democratic procedures. When the party took power in 1899, it moved the base of the presidency and the Congress to La Paz, which became the de facto capital city. The Supreme Court remained in Sucre. To this day, Sucre is the de jure capital of Bolivia while La Paz acts as the de facto seat of government.

Between 1899 and 1920, all of the presidents of Bolivia were members of the Liberal Party, supported by the tin-mining oligarchy until the Republican Party took power in a coup in 1920.

The last Liberal president was José Luis Tejada Sorzano, who served between 1934 and 1936.

By 1940, however, the party had formed a Concordance with their erstwhile Republican opponents to counter the rising tide of radical or revolutionary parties. The Concordance supported the candidate Enrique Peñaranda.Bustillos Vera, Jonny and Peñaranda Barrios, Carlos. Hechos y registros de la Revolución Nacional (1939-1946). La Paz, Bolivia: La Palabra, 1996. Pp.54-55.

In 1947, the Liberal Party's Luis Fernando Guachalla narrowly lost to Enrique Hertzog of the Republican Socialist Unity Party (PURS).

In the 1951 elections, Tomás Manuel Elío ran for the Liberal Party but received far fewer votes than the winner..

For the 1966 elections, the Liberal Party was a component of the Democratic Institutionalist Alliance, with the PURS's Enrique Hertzog as the coalition's presidential candidate and the PL's leader, Eduardo Montes, as his running mate. They polled 11,400 votes (01.13%) and came sixth.Elections in the Americas : a data handbook / ed. by Dieter Nohlen, Vol. 2. [Oxford] [u.a.]: Oxford Univ. Press, 2005. P.150.

For the 1978 election, the PL fostered relations with the Nationalist Union of the People (UNP) and its candidate, Juan Pereda. The party put forward Montes as Pereda's running mate but was passed over in favor of Alfredo Franco. As a result, the PL scrambled to form its own ticket, nominating Montes for president, accompanied by Raúl Monje for vice president. The party failed to meet the filing deadline for ballot access and was consequently barred from competing by the Electoral Court. It ultimately resigned to endorsing Pereda's candidacy.

When elections were rerun in 1979, the PL was among several minor fronts not granted legal party status by electoral authorities. On 29 April 1979, the Electoral Court announced that the PL and sixteen other parties had not met the necessary prerequisites to be allowed ballot access, rendering them effectively defunct.

Electoral history

+ Year Presidential nominee Votes Result . Total % . 1884 Eliodoro Camacho 8,202 27.14% 3rd 1888 Eliodoro Camacho 7,183 20.86% 2nd 1892 Eliodoro Camacho 10,607 2nd 1896 José Manuel Pando 16,709 45.60% 2nd 1904 Ismael Montes 32,884 76.45% 1st 1908 Fernando Eloy G. 24,017 1st 1909 Eliodoro Villazón 32,543 93.50% 1st 1913 Ismael Montes 77,731 98.86% 1st 1917 José Gutiérrez G. 73,705 88.09% 1st 1925 Daniel Salamanca colspan=2 2nd 1931 Daniel Salamanca 38,282 78.76% 1st 1934 Juan María Zalles 6,642 40.78% 2nd 1940 Enrique Peñaranda 58,060 85.99% 1st 1947 Luis F. Guachalla 43,634 46.74% 2nd 1951 Tomás M. Elío 6,530 5.18% 5th 1966 Enrique Hertzog 11,330 1.13% 6th 1978 Eduardo Montes colspan=3 Source:

See also History of Bolivia (1809–1920)

References

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