Florida State University Libraries
Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations
The Graduate School
2012
Redefining Civilization: Investigating
Argentina's Social and Cultural Dichotomy
Through Domingo F. Sarmiento's
Interpretation of Benjamin Franklin's
Principles
Andrea L. Arce-Trigatti
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THE FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND PUBLIC POLICY
REDEFINING CIVILIZATION:
INVESTIGATING ARGENTINA’S SOCIAL AND CULTURAL DICHOTOMY THROUGH
DOMINGO F. SARMIENTO’S INTERPRETATION OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN’S
PRINCIPLES
By
ANDREA L. ARCE-TRIGATTI
A Thesis submitted to the
Department of International Affairs
in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of
Master of Arts
Degree Awarded:
Spring Semester, 2012
Andrea L. Arce-Trigatti defended this thesis on January 20, 2012.
The members of the supervisory committee were:
Dr. Edward Gray
Professor Directing Thesis, History
Dr. Robinson Herrera
Committee Member, History
Dr. Juan Carlos Galeano
Committee Member, Modern Languages
The Graduate School has verified and approved the above-named committee members,
and certifies that the thesis has been approved in accordance with university
requirements.
ii
This thesis is dedicated with an enormous amount of love and gratitude to my family. In
particular, the inspiration and passion behind this thesis is dedicated to the memory of a dearly
respected and noble gaucho: my grandfather, Pedro I. Arce.
iii
“Los hermanos sean unidos,
Porque ésa es la ley primera;
Tengan unión verdadera
En cualquier tiempo que sea,
Porque si entre ellos pelean
Los devoran los de ajuera.”
-José Hernández
Consejos de Martín Fierro a sus hijos
Canto XXXII, Segunda parte
iv
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Coming from a family that represents both the gauchesco and European aspects of the
Argentine identity, I have forever been fascinated by the history of Argentina. As this thesis
gave me the opportunity to learn more about my family and the history of their native country, it
is a tremendously special project for me. Therefore, it is a difficult undertaking to put in so few
words the amount of gratitude and sincere appreciation I have for all of the individuals that have
guided and assisted me in the formation and completion of this project. Indeed, the educational
and professional growth that has resulted from the work put into this thesis is attributed to the
dedication, time, and effort put forth by these individuals on my behalf. For this I am forever
indebted. Thus, although I am limited with my expression in words, I trust that these individuals
already know the sincerity in my sentiments.
My thesis director, Dr. Edward Gray, is the first on this long list. This project
commenced with an idea in his Benjamin Franklin seminar and, with his encouragement and
motivation, was adopted as a thesis topic during my graduate studies. His extensive knowledge
in Early American history guided the research and exploration of this topic, allowing me to
investigate its relation to Argentine history and develop this connection into a thesis. Dr. Gray
has been an amazing mentor and advisor for this project and I am extremely grateful for his
guidance, advice, and dedication as my master’s thesis director.
In addition, the ideas formed from my interaction with Dr. Robinson Herrera and Dr.
Juan Carlos Galeano also form a significant part of this project. Dr. Herrera’s knowledge in
Latin American history and Dr. Galeano’s expertise in Latin American culture influenced the
exploration of the Argentine aspect of this thesis. I am sincerely thankful to both Dr. Herrera
and Dr. Galeano not only for the enthusiasm and interest they both demonstrated upon accepting
the position of committee member for this project, but also for the dedication, guidance, and
support they contributed to the writing of this thesis.
Also, for this project I was privileged with the chance to delve into the shelves and the
archives of the Archivos General de Entre Rios and do research concerning the history of El
Litoral. I have two individuals to thank for this opportunity: Professor Damian Capdevila,
director of the Archivos General de Entre Ríos, and Dr. Ana Maria Trigatti. Without their help,
support, and time, I would never have been able to partake in this experience.
v
Furthermore, a very early version of the topic of this thesis was presented at the
University of Miami’s 8th Annual South Florida Graduate Student Conference in Miami, Florida,
in April, 2010. I would like to thank Dr. Lee Metcalf for bringing to my attention this wonderful
opportunity.
In addition, I owe many thanks to several friends and colleagues that constituted the team
of people that supported and encouraged all of my efforts in completing this project. This list
commences with my committed and enthusiastic writing and study partners: Carlos R. Galindo,
Naida Saavedra, Daniela Galindo, and Caitlin Murphy. I thank you each for the multiple writing
and study sessions in which we each pushed and encouraged one another to complete our
respective tasks. I also thank my International Affairs colleagues, in particular L. Boyd, J. Cook,
A. Forbes, A. Johnson, S. Lacey, L. Pon, and D. Salazar, who always defended my decision to
go “the thesis route” to others. Go team! Also, I owe a special thanks to my dear friend, Kayla
Szumowki, for giving me the opportunity to visit Boston and take pictures of Sarmiento’s statue.
Finally, the journey and adventures attributed to the writing of this thesis have been made
evermore memorable due to the love, support, patience, and encouragement of my family. I am
eternally grateful to my parents, Pedro and Beatriz, my sister, Paula, and my grandmother, Julia,
for listening to all of my ideas, for their advice, and for always being there. In particular, I am
deeply grateful to the “outside” perspective provided by my mother who meticulously read my
rough drafts and provided feedback which helped to clarify several points in the work. Thank
you all for believing in me and for giving me the push needed to follow my dreams.
vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Figures .............................................................................................................................. viii
Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... ix
1.
CHAPTER ONE ......................................................................................................................1
2.
CHAPTER TWO ...................................................................................................................18
3.
CHAPTER THREE ...............................................................................................................32
4.
CHAPTER FOUR .................................................................................................................48
5.
CHAPTER FIVE ...................................................................................................................66
6.
CHAPTER SIX .....................................................................................................................85
Appendix A ....................................................................................................................................94
References ......................................................................................................................................96
Biographical Sketch .....................................................................................................................102
vii
LIST OF FIGURES
1.1 El Litoral .................................................................................................................................2
1.2 Domingo Faustino Sarmiento ..................................................................................................8
1.3 Biblioteca Franklin ..................................................................................................................9
2.1 Franklin, an engraving ...........................................................................................................30
3.1 Oliver Wendell Holmes .........................................................................................................42
3.2 Statue of Sarmiento ...............................................................................................................43
4.1 Indigenous Migration Map ....................................................................................................53
4.2 Nomadic Life of a Gaucho ....................................................................................................54
4.3 General Juan Manuel de Rosas..............................................................................................59
4.4 General Justo José de Urquiza ...............................................................................................60
4.5 Sarmiento in Battle ................................................................................................................64
5.1 Urban versus Provincial Attire ..............................................................................................71
5.2 Facundo: civilización y barbarie ..........................................................................................72
5.3 El Cacique .............................................................................................................................80
5.4 Juan Bautista Alberdi ............................................................................................................82
6.1 Martín Fierro .........................................................................................................................88
6.2 Parade of Countryside Pride in Entre Ríos, Argentina, 2010 ................................................89
6.3 Gaucho Moderno ...................................................................................................................90
viii
ABSTRACT
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento has forever held the revered position as the Father of
Civilization in Argentina’s history. Fascinated by Benjamin Franklin’s ideas that proclaimed
that civilization came from a society of “self-made men,” Sarmiento thought it possible to apply
such a concept in Argentina to make it the most civilized nation in Latin America. Thus,
throughout his presidency, Sarmiento aimed to foster this social change by implementing the
ideas of Benjamin Franklin into his nation’s young government. Although this explanation is
widely accepted in Argentine history, very little research has been done in understanding
Sarmiento’s methods in adopting and applying Franklin’s views to Argentine life. Such research
is important as a different implementation of Franklin’s ideas could explain Argentina’s current
societal structure and development, and why it varies from what Franklin had initially envisioned
for his own society. This study investigates this topic by analyzing Franklin’s contribution to
American liberalism, and consequently the formation of the concept of the “American spirit,”
and the influence that these ideas had on Sarmiento and his vision for Argentina. As part of this
investigation, the personal and private documents and publications of Sarmiento are explored to
understand what led him to become the “Benjamin Franklin of Latin America”. Once these
points are established, the presentation focuses on Sarmiento's modification and implementation
of Franklin’s ideas. Through this research, it becomes evident that Sarmiento manipulated
Franklin’s methods of civilizing society and applied these teachings only to the places and
people he deemed fit. This adulterated application of Franklin’s principles eventually influenced
the dichotomous nature of Argentina’s urban and rural lifestyles that continues to plague the
nation’s progress.
ix
CHAPTER ONE
“The Franklin of South America”:
Introducing Sarmiento, Argentina, and the Socio-Cultural Divide
When mentioned, the country of Argentina evokes strong images of its culture. Perhaps
the swift, steady beat of the Argentine tango begins to sound; or the sweet, ripened taste of one
of Argentina’s finest wines; or even the smells and accolades that surround the mention of an
expensive Argentine steakhouse. Regardless, when Argentine culture is evoked, very often it is
as the high culture associated with the capital of Buenos Aires. Being noted as the “Paris of
South America” by most visitors to the country, it is this pseudo-European capital and its culture
that has been exported throughout the world and that is inherently paired with the nation’s
identity.1 This association has earned Argentina praise for its “civilized” culture, its progressive
nature, and its air of high-class elitism.
Nevertheless, although this culture reflects part of Argentine society, it ignores the
diversity contained within the culture of the provinces, or the interior. Very rarely is Argentine
culture associated with the provincial lifestyle that is epitomized by the agricultural traditions of
the nation’s provincial inhabitants, the gauchos. To further this point, in a popular Spanish
language and culture site, out of the top ten places for visiting in Argentina only one is located
within El Litoral, the former capital of gaucho culture.2 Perhaps only as an afterthought, if at all,
is Argentina’s bucolic tradition, as embodied by this gauchesca culture and the gaucho leaders
that led Argentina to its independence and constitutional freedom, ever mentioned.
Thus, within Argentina there is a cultural dichotomy that represents the strong economic
and social divisions in the country. As a symbol of industry, trade, and commerce, the urban
culture of Argentina has flourished in cities like Buenos Aires, Mar del Plata, and Rosario in
which the music of the tango, the smog of industry, and the theaters of high culture are
omnipresent. Growing in parallel and with the same amount of influence in Argentina’s
1
William J. Duiker and Jackson J. Spielvogel, World History, Volume 2 (Stamford, CT: 2008), page 588.
“Ten Places to Visit in Argentina,” Blogging Spanish: Spanish Language and Culture Website, August
5, 2011, http://blog.donquijote.org.
2
1
Figure 1.1: El Litoral. This map indicates where El Litoral region is located in Argentina. Once
considered the “Mesopotamia of Argentina,” this region encompassed the provinces of Entre
Ríos, Santa Fé, Corrientes, Misiones, Formosa, and the Chaco. This photograph was taken by
the author. Credit is given to Carlos Diaz for the contribution of the map.
2
provincial regions, the gauchesca culture can be seen in the adoption of the native mate drink,
the folklore music festivals, and the ever present agricultural influence in Argentina’s provincial
population. Undoubtedly, both of these cultures represent the diversity that comprises
Argentina’s population. However, for the past two centuries, it has been the gauchesca culture
that has been under constant attack and scrutiny by the high culture that most of the world
associates with Argentine society.
Regardless of the fact that it was this countryside culture that freed Argentina from its
colonial bonds to Spain, created its first government, and restored the nation’s constitutional
freedom, Argentine leaders, desperately attempting to appease Western standards of civilization,
erased their ties to the rural identity and instead embraced the high culture of the cities. Thus,
deemed “backwards” and “barbarous” by a progressive movement in Argentina during the midnineteenth century, the gauchesca culture was rejected by Argentine leaders of Buenos Aires in a
sacrifice they felt was necessary for the progress of the nation. This shift from being a wellrespected and revered culture to one despised and ridiculed by the elite classes of Argentina was
promulgated by the man that first associated gauchesca culture with barbarism: Domingo
Faustino Sarmiento.
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento was arguably the most influential president in Argentine
history before Perón.3 In a country traditionally governed by cattlemen, Sarmiento became the
first famed writer and renowned philosopher to be President of Argentina (1868-1874),
promoting himself as a symbol of prosperity and the defender of the advancement of fine arts
and science for Argentines.4 Determined to change the course of his nation, Sarmiento enforced
a political ideology established on notions of self-improvement found in Benjamin Franklin’s
autobiography. A fanatical admirer of Franklin’s example and the American spirit it appeared to
represent, Sarmiento’s objective was to civilize a nation by facilitating the success of citizens
capable of adopting the elements of Franklin’s self-made model: self-improvement through
education and morality.
Sarmiento’s policies furthered his popularity as the “School Master
3
Juan Domingo Perón was the 29th President of Argentina serving from 1946-1955 as well as the 41st
President of Argentina serving from 1973 until his death in 1974. As president, he and his first wife, Eva
Duarte de Perón, promoted the political philosophy of Peronism or Justicialismo which fostered social
justice and working class principles that is still prominent in Argentina today. For more information on
Perón and Peronism, please refer to Perón’s works titled La hora de los pueblos, Doctrina peronista, La
fuerza es el derecho de las bestias, and Manual de conducción política.
4
Dorothy Penn, “Sarmiento- The ‘School-Master President’ of Argentina,” Hispania, Vol. 29, No. 3
(1976): 387, accessed October 14, 2008, www.jstor.org.
3
President” and the “Franklin of Latin America.”5 However, his policies, which favored the
urban minority, were not uniformly applied to Argentina. Excluded from the reforms that would
establish a Franklinesque model of civilization in Argentina, were the rural majority -the gauchos
and the indigenous inhabitants, as Sarmiento deemed them incompatible with his progressive
objectives.
Due to the biased political reforms implemented during the presidency of Sarmiento,
Argentina has been plagued by profound regional division. This division can be understood in
the following way: the urbanized, European metropolis of Buenos Aires versus the rural
farmlands of the interior. Justified only by its belief in the interior’s inferiority, Argentina’s elite
capital of Buenos Aires endlessly exploits the farmlands of the country both economically and
politically. In hopes of better understanding this dichotomy, scholars have focused on the
various intellectual influences that shaped Sarmiento’s presidency. According to Sarmiento
himself, none was more important than Benjamin Franklin. As Sarmiento stated in his
autobiography, Franklin “who examines his actions with a view to improving them…[should] be
considered greater than Saint Barbara…and called the People’s Saint.”6
The circumstances under which Sarmiento was born and raised help to explain the
affection he felt for Franklin and his model. In accordance, although Sarmiento was the
apotheosis for Buenos Aires’ cultural elite, he was in actuality born in the province of San Juan,
Argentina, on February 15, 1811, just one year after Argentina established an autonomous
government from Spain. His place of birth was rife with poverty, as San Juan was an
agricultural province, situated on the opposite side of the country from the relatively prosperous
industrial city of Buenos Aires.7 The only son of a militia captain and an embroiderer, he was
sent to work at a young age, helping his mother at the spinning wheel.8 Due to his financial
situation, his education was frequently interrupted, leading him to rely on his own wit and the
knowledge he gathered from books to create an educational foundation.9 It was thus at a young
5
Ibid.
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Elizabeth Garrels, and Asa Zatz, Recollections of a Provincial Past (New
York, NY: Library of Latin America, Oxford University Press, 2005), page 162.
7
Elda Clayton Patton, Sarmiento in the United States (Evansville, IN: University of Evansville Press,
1976), page 21.
8
Ibid., page 27.
9
Sarmiento, Recollections of a Provincial Past, page 147.
6
4
age that Sarmiento first read Benjamin Franklin’s autobiography, a book that he would later
describe as “the single most important model in [my] life.”10
Similar to Franklin, the young Sarmiento depended on his wit to prosper in a difficult
environment. At the age of eighteen, Sarmiento became politically radicalized and was forced
into Chilean exile because of his loyalty to the anti-government party, the Unitarians. For
twenty-two years he was exiled in Chile, returning to San Juan only once for treatment of a near
fatal case of typhoid fever.11 It was in Chile that Sarmiento was allowed the possibility to found
the first political newspaper (El Nacional, 1841) and daily newspaper (El Progreso, 1842) in
Santiago.12 Through his newspapers, Sarmiento began to utilize the works he had studied in
Argentina to formulate ideas which were to be published as articles in his newspapers,
pamphlets, and later books like Mi defensa (1843), Facundo: civilización y barbarie (1845), and
Recuerdos de mi vida provincial (1850).13 Over the course of time, these writings revealed an
increasing emphasis on the ideas presented by Franklin’s autobiography adapted to Sarmiento’s
life.
By applying the lessons of Franklin’s autobiography to his own life, Sarmiento utilized
the story of Franklin’s life as a template for perfection that he desired to emulate. In his own
autobiography, published in 1868, the year he was elected as Argentina’s president, Sarmiento
reflected on Franklin’s autobiography and stated:
“I felt myself Franklin. And why not? I was very poor like him, studious like him, and
by being shrewd and following his footsteps, I might one day come to be like him…I
might even receive an honorary doctorate like him and make a place for myself in South
American literature and politics.”14
In effect, Sarmiento was modeling his life after Franklin’s, comparing similarities of both their
lives to reflect the possibility of becoming someone as important as Franklin was to his nation.
The Argentine president was thus more than admiring Franklin. He was trying to be exactly like
10
Edmundo Correas, Sarmiento and the United States (Gainesville, Fl: University of Florida Press, Latin
American monographs, 1961), page 2; and Gordon Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin
(New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2004), page 14.
11
Sarmiento, Recollections of a Provincial Past, page 14.
12
Ibid., pages 20-21.
13
Ibid., page 14.
14
Marc Pachter and Frances Stevenson Wein, Abroad in America: Visitors to the New Nation, 1776-1914.
(Reading, Mass: Published in association with the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution by
Addison-Wesley Pub. Co, 1976), page 106.
5
Franklin by “following his footsteps” and copying the only model of self-made perfection that
seemed feasible to follow.15
Sarmiento’s lifetime accomplishments, which closely resemble those of Franklin, reveal
just how meticulously Sarmiento copied Franklin’s life to ensure social advancement and
success. Despite being from an impoverished family, Sarmiento, like Franklin, taught himself to
read and write in Spanish, English, and French.16 Sarmiento adopted Franklin’s trade and
became a publisher and writer, a profession he would continue until his death.17 In his native
province of San Juan, Sarmiento established the first successful newspaper (El Zonda, 1839), the
first philosophical and literature society (1838), the first library (1842), and the first school
(1839), all achievements accredited to Franklin in the state of Philadelphia.18 Sarmiento
accomplished all manner of feats that Benjamin Franklin himself wrote about, including being a
member of several prestigious societies of letters on his continent and in France, a Freemason,
the minister and ambassador of his country, and the recipient of an honorary degree from the
United States.19 Copying Franklin’s use of pseudonyms, Sarmiento also wrote prolifically under
various aliases.20 In addition, Sarmiento’s personal life also resembled Franklin’s as he
recognized an illegitimate child, lost a son in youth, and married a previously married woman,
all the while living abroad or away from his family due to ministerial or ambassadorial
responsibilities.21
15
Ibid.
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento and Jos Luis Lanuza. La vida de Dominguito. Buenos Aires, Argentina:
Ediciones Culturales Argentinas, Ministerio de Educación y Justicia, Dirección General de Cultura,
1963), page 236.
17
Sarmiento, Recollections of a Provincial Past, pages 20-21; and Wood, The Americanization of
Benjamin Franklin, pages 39-40.
18
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento and Jos P. Barreiro. ar as dis ursos ol i os i inerario de una
asi n re li a. Edición especial de obra de Domingo Faustino, v. 3. (Buenos Aires, Argentina:
Ediciones Culturales Argentinas, Ministerio de Educación y Justicia, Dirección General de Cultura,
1965), pages 4-5, 18; and Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin, pages 44-45.
19
Correas, Sarmiento and the United States, page 36; and Domingo Faustino Sarmiento and Michael
Aaron Rockland. Travels in the United States in 1847. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
1970.), page 65; and Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin, page 43.
20
William Marshall French and Watt Stewart, “The Influence of Horace Mann on the Educational Ideas
of Domingo Faustino Sarmiento,” The Hispanic American Historical Review, Vol. 20, No. , (Feb. 1940):
13, accessed October 15, 2008, www.jstor.org; and Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin,
page 12.
21
Sarmiento, Recollections of a Provincial Past, page 51; and Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin
Franklin, page 32.
16
6
Though it is striking how similar Sarmiento’s life was to Franklin’s, the importance lies
not in how he emulated Franklin’s model, but rather how Sarmiento adopted and envisioned
Franklin’s idea of the self-made man and how, through this adoption, he wanted to re-create the
“American spirit” in Argentina. To clarify, Sarmiento was engulfed in admiration for an idea of
the American people epitomized by what most political scholars consider a specific brand of
eighteenth century liberalism that allowed individuals to succeed in an otherwise rigid society.22
The effects of this form of liberalism were embodied by the spirit and character of individuals
like Franklin, who, despite his origin, managed to make a name for himself in American society.
This specific element of eighteenth century American society, henceforth labeled the “American
spirit”, is what was considered the force that drove America’s success.23 Influenced by this
notion of the “American spirit”, Sarmiento believed in the power of self-education, selfimprovement through knowledge, and the ever-present creed that was to serve humanity.24
These ideals are inherent in Franklin’s model: that the man who is self-taught, self-employed,
morally conscious, and willing to serve humanity is the man who will succeed.25 This
perspective of Franklin’s life is what Sarmiento was trying to imitate. It is this “self-made”
ideology and the ideas that influenced Franklin’s model and the consequential formation of this
liberal, American spirit that Sarmiento admired. Therefore, it is precisely these ideas that need to
be examined in conjunction with Sarmiento’s reforms as they are a continuous theme in
Sarmiento’s written works, and later in the political ideology that he developed as president of
Argentina. Thus, building on Sarmiento’s characterization of Franklin’s importance, this thesis
asks, how, if at all, did Sarmiento’s Franklinian ideal contribute to the rural/urban divide that has
plagued Argentine politics for nearly two centuries?
In order to answer this question, this thesis analyzes the society and culture of Argentina
during the mid-nineteenth century with regard to Sarmiento’s primary political ideologies and
their foundations. As Sarmiento created his political ideology out of the Franklinesque notion of
22
John P. Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics: Virtue, Self-Interest, and the Foundations of
Liberalism. (New York, NY: Basic Books, 1984), page 7.
23
Alan Trachtenberg and Eric Foner, The Incorporation of America: Culture and Society in the Gilded
Age, (New York, NY: Hill and Wang, 1982), page 142.
24
Pachter, Abroad in America: Visitors to the New Nation, 1776-1914, page 110.
25
Benjamin Franklin and Kenneth Silverman. Autobiography and Other Writings. (New York, N.Y.:
Penguin Books, 1986), pages 105, 79.
7
Figure 1.2: Domingo Faustino Sarmiento. This photograph was taken in 1873, while Sarmiento
was President of Argentina. This image is under public domain. The original can be found in the
Archivo General de la Nación in Argentina.
8
Figure 1.3: Biblioteca Franklin. In honor of his mentor, Sarmiento established this library in his
native province of San Juan in 1866. This photograph is under public domain and the original
can be found in the archives of La Sociedad Franklin Biblioteca Popular. More information
about the still existing library can be found on the Sociedad Franklin Biblioteca Popular’s
website, http://www.bibliotecafranklin.org.ar.
9
the self-made man, the first step of this analysis is to examine the dynamics that created this
American spirit and the ideologies that were considered inherent to the American people. Only
after this evaluation can Sarmiento’s own beliefs with regards to politics, society, and culture be
understood. In addition, within this socio-cultural analysis, the ideologies that abounded during
Sarmiento’s era are also examined in order to put his reforms in context, both with regards to
Sarmiento’s Franklinesque principles and to the reality that was Argentina. In comparing the
perspectives and historical context of Franklin and Sarmiento, this thesis argues that a
manipulated version of Franklin’s ideas was applied to Argentina by Sarmiento during his
presidency. The overall investigation of the consequences of the implementation of these altered
ideas therefore contributes to the understanding of the socio-cultural analysis of the Argentine
Republic.
In order to detail the historical context that influenced both the creation of the Franklin
self-made model and the American spirit that embraced these principles, it is necessary to
consider the works of several renowned scholars in the area of early American history. Among
these include Durand Echeverria and his book Mirage in the West: A History of the French
Image of American Society to 1815, Claude-Anne Lopez’s My Life with Benjamin Franklin, Paul
W. Conner’s Poor Ri hard’s Poli i ks, and Nian-Sheng Huang’s Benjamin Franklin in American
Thought and Culture, 1790-1990. These books were critical in examining the creation of the late
eighteenth century liberalism that characterized the “American spirit” discussed in this thesis as
well as the principles that this spirit symbolized for the rest of the world: integrity, moral
consciousness, industry, and prosperity. In addition, the following books by J.A. Leo Lemay,
Reappraising Benjamin Franklin, The Oldest Revolutionary, and The Canon of Benjamin
Franklin, contributed to establishing the links between Franklin’s influence in the creation of this
American liberalism and how it is reflected in the self-made model that Sarmiento was
determined to emulate.
Moreover, several other well-known American history scholars’ works were integrated
into the analysis of the American ideologies that helped to re-shape and influence the
propagation of the American spirit throughout Sarmiento’s existence. For this purpose, it was
not only essential to make the connection between Sarmiento’s developing political ideology and
the social and cultural ideologies that abounded within the United States at the time, but also to
make evident the endurance of the American spirit and its influence throughout the world. The
10
following scholars and their works were elemental in achieving this feat: George Frederickson’s
The Inner Civil War: Northern Intellectuals and the Crisis of the Union, John Diggin’s The Lost
Soul of American Politics, Alan Trachtenberg’s The Incorporation of America: Culture and
Society in the Gilded Age, James Kloppenberg’s The Virtues of Liberalism, and Michael
Zuckerman’s Almost Chosen People. Through their research and historical works, the
information needed to construct the context of the mid-nineteenth century’s ideological
foundations and the influences of American liberalism on Sarmiento’s development would not
have been possible.
In addition to these works, as Franklin and Sarmiento were both prolific publishers and
writers throughout their life, the research for their respective ideologies is taken directly from
their own publications.26 This insures that the thoughts, ideas, and values representing each
scholar are genuinely their own. In accordance, to investigate and develop a portrait of Franklin’s
ideas, several of his works were referenced. These works include Franklin’s autobiography, his
political writings -his proposals relating to education, issues concerning the frontier, and race
relations-, his memoir, and his famous phrases collected in Poor Ri hard’s Almana k. These
original writings were complemented by two scholarly works that analyze the impact and
importance of Franklin’s influence within the American and global perspectives. These works
are Gordon Woods’ The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin and Walter Isaacson’s Benjamin
Franklin: An American Life.
For Sarmiento, the former Argentine president’s legacy of quotes, phrases, and personal
writings that impacted the literary world of South America during his time was sufficient for
conducting research with regards to his political development. Thus, this thesis utilizes the
abundance of Sarmiento’s literary pieces to capture the true essence of his thoughts on the
subjects under investigation. The works referenced include his autobiographies (Recollections
of a Provincial Past, La vida de Dominguito, Memorias), memoirs, documentation on his travels,
letters to his contemporaries, and publications that touch on such diverse topics as education,
manners, and race (e.g. Ambas Américas: revista de educación, bibliografía, i agricultura,
Conflicto y armonías de la razas en América, De la educación popular). To couple these
original ideas, scholarly essays and works, like William Katra’s Race, Identity, and National
26
Sarmiento, Recollections of a Provincial Past, page 42.
11
Destiny and Domingo F. Sarmiento, Public Writer: (Between 1839 and 1852) were utilized to
put Sarmiento’s ideas into historical context.
For the purpose of placing Argentina’s socio-cultural analysis in historical context and
making evident the nation’s cultural shift, the perspectives of his contemporaries had to be
captured. These individuals included General Justo José de Urquiza, Esteban Echeverría, and
Juan Bautista Alberdi, all intellectual colleagues of Sarmiento. As most of Sarmiento’s
contemporaries were also prolific writers, their opinions were omnipresent in their
correspondence with Sarmiento and essays concerning different aspects of Argentine life. Thus,
the opinions of Esteban Echevarria and General Urquiza were investigated in this manner. In
addition, the Archivo General de Entre Ríos, created by General Justo Jose de Urquiza in 1860,
was kind enough to lend their services, archives, and provincial library to assist in this research.27
Their collection provided direct access to photographs and documents of the people living under
General Urquiza as well as Juan Bautista Alberdi’s most prominent works -Bases y puntos de
par ida ara la or ani a i n oli i a de la Re u li a Ar en ina, Escritos póstumos: el crímen
de la guerra, La omnipotencia del estado es la negación de la libertad individual- which became
a central part of this analysis.
By utilizing these specific resources, which reflect on the connection between the United
State’s American liberalism with regard to Franklin and its influence on Argentina’s sociocultural shift, the originality and authenticity of this thesis topic is supported. This, however,
does not imply that the Argentine cultural divide has not been of topic of interest for scholars of
all academic varieties. In actuality, the Argentine dichotomy has been a topic of interest for
scholars throughout the history of the nation. Evidence of this interest can be illustrated by
various scholars’ investigations into topics of racism, politics, science, and literature to explain
how the element of civilization promised by Sarmiento could have gone so astray.
Julia Rodriguez, the author of Civilizing Argentina: Science, Medicine, and the Modern
State, is one such scholar. Interested in explaining Argentina’s rise and descent from stability,
she looks into the fractures within Argentina’s society. In her study, she argues that science and
medicine were leading factors in the formation of the Argentine state, which led to a division
“Historia”. Archivo General de Entre Ríos: Gobierno de Entre Ríos, July 14, 2009, accessed July
2010, http://www.entrerios.gov.ar/archivo/.
27
12
between those who lived off the land and those that were leading the state.28 Specifically, after
the civil wars of the mid-nineteenth century, Argentina, with the reforms of statesmen like
Sarmiento, commenced on a path to civilize the nation that was accomplished by combining
science and policy.29 Believing in the idea that certain races were superior to others, Argentine
statesmen in the late nineteenth century believed in the power of scientific-bureaucrats. To
clarify, these scientific-bureaucrats were educated men who would identify and purge Argentina
of its genetic deformities and replace it with superior strands of the human race.30 In
consequence, Rodriguez analyzes how these “social pathologists”, as she has named them,
attempted to genetically purify a nation through scientific methods that supported a eugenicist
view of humanity and thus “filtered” immigration to Argentina and “purified” the population that
was already inhabiting the nation. As a result, Rodriguez concludes that in trying to genetically
“purify” a nation through scientific reforms, Argentina was in actuality fostering a “new a more
comprehensive form of barbarism”.31
Another scholar whose study reveals more on the dichotomy of the Argentine state is
Ariel de la Fuente, author of Children of Facundo: Caudillo and Gaucho Insurgency during the
Argentine State-Formation Process (La Rioja, 1853-1870). Differing from other studies in
which Buenos Aires and the Pampas were the main focal point, de la Fuente looks at the results
of an everlasting social and cultural dichotomy within one of Argentina’s most impoverished
provinces, La Rioja.32 In his research, de la Fuente portrays the caudillo, the traditional leader of
the mid nineteenth century Argentine masses and assumed enemy of intellectuals like Sarmiento
during Argentina’s formative stage, as a political leader who politicized the marginal classes of
the provinces into a disciplined mass.33 The critical point in de la Fuente’s study lays in his
analysis of the development of the land within this province: the dichotomy was formed when
the self-proclaimed political parties of the mid nineteenth century Argentina – the Unitarians and
the Federalists- differed in how to administer the land. Specifically, de la Fuente argues that
after the dissolution of the Spanish empire, colonial grants, named merceds, were still in use
28
Julia Rodriguez, Civilizing Argentina: Science, Medicine, and the Modern State, (Chapel Hill, NC:
University of North Carolina Press, 2006), page 33.
29
Ibid., page 2.
30
Ibid., page 35.
31
Ibid., page 8.
32
Ariel de la Fuente, Children of Facundo: Caudillo and Gaucho Insurgency during the Argentine StateFormation Process (La Rioja, 1853-1870), (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2000) page 2.
33
Ibid., page 3.
13
allowing landless masses to commune and live off of this land without hindrance.34However,
with the formation of a democratic state and a proclamation to establish liberty, these land grants
were dissolved in the name of private property.35 In essence, for de la Fuente, the social
dichotomy of Argentina can therefore be summed up in the following: it was the ex-Federalist
and gauchos that represented the masses and the colonial, communal lifestyle, while it was exUnitarians and intellectuals like Sarmiento that forged a new, individualistic state supporting
private property.36
Other studies, like Joseph Criscenti‘s Sarmiento and his Argentina, make a direct link
between Sarmiento and the development of the social and cultural divide within Argentina. In
this book, Criscenti focuses on the established argument that Sarmiento’s pro-immigration
policies contributed to the Argentine social and cultural divide by attempting to replace and
extinguish the “inferior” rural, Argentine culture with “superior” European cultures. To
demonstrate this idea, Criscenti compiles two volumes of scholarly work that analyze the impact
and results of Sarmiento’s policy on immigration. The first of these works is Solomon Lipp’s
“Sarmiento Revisited: Contradictions and Curiosities” in which Lipp determines that Sarmiento
was not always logical or consistent in his ideas about the formation of Argentina’s society.37
Another is Georgette Magassy Dorn’s “Sarmiento, the United States, and Public Education”
where the influence of the United States, North American intellectuals like Horace Mann and his
wife, and the travels of then Senator Sarmiento to the United States are analyzed to demonstrate
the development and implementation of a copycat education system within Argentina.38 Also
included in Criscenti’s book are Kristin H. Ruggiero’s “The Legacy of Sarmiento’s Civilization
and Barbarism in Modern Argentina” which demonstrates the failure of Sarmiento’s immigration
policies to effectively integrate foreigners into Argentina’s national identity. Finally, Michael
Aaron Rockland’s “Sarmiento’s Views on the United States” which describes the influence of
the United States in San Juan, Sarmiento’s native province, through the settlement and
34
Ibid., page 67.
Ibid., page 65.
36
Ibid., page 68.
37
Solomon Lipp, “Sarmiento Revisited: Contradictions and Curiosities,” Sarmiento and his Argentina,
Joseph Crisenti, ed. (Boulder, CO: Lynn Rienner Publishers, Inc., 1993) page 9.
38
Georgette Magassy Dorn, “Sarmiento, the United States, and Public Education”, Sarmiento and his
Argentina, Joseph Crisenti, ed. (Boulder, CO: Lynn Rienner Publishers, Inc., 1993), page 77.
35
14
integration of North American settlers within the province, is also included.39 In presenting these
texts, Criscenti develops the theory that Sarmiento’s idea on immigration and progress were as
permutable as the political environment in which Sarmiento was writing. He was a visionary
who wanted to transform Argentine society, but that did not indicate that he always had the best,
or most logical, plan to implement and this is shown in the results of his policies.40
Diana Sorensen Goodrich’s Facundo and the Construction of Argentine Culture adds to
the research that connects Sarmiento to the existing social and cultural divide within Argentina.
In her research, Goodrich follows the impact of Sarmiento’s most accomplished work, Facundo:
civilización y barbarie, and its influence on Argentine society and culture. According to this
author, Sarmiento’s foremost impact was the establishment of a strictly civilized class and an
unforgivably barbaric class within Argentina.41 The establishment of two distinct cultures pitted
one against the other throughout Argentina’s shifting political tides: a populist government
would declare the intellectuals as a threat, while a modernist government would condemn rural
activists as a hindrance to progress. In accordance, she also makes the point that depending on
how you read Sarmiento, he can also be both vilified as the man who subdued populist and rural
representation within Argentine politics or deified as the man who brought progress to the
nation.42 Therefore, for Goodrich, the interpretation of Sarmiento’s work in such diverse ways is
what has led to the fractures that exist within Argentine society today.43
Finally, William Katra’s Domingo F. Sarmiento: Public Writer follows the great tradition
of historians like James R. Scobie, Raul Orgaz, Alejandro Korn, and Tulio Halperin Donghi in
placing Sarmiento’s works in their historical context for the purpose of comprehending their
socio-cultural influence.44 In order to explain the socio-cultural divide within Argentina, Katra
focuses on Sarmiento’s public works and their own transformation throughout his public career.
Kristin H. Ruggiero, “The Legacy of Sarmiento’s Civilization and Barbarism in Modern Argentina”,
Sarmiento and his Argentina. Joseph Crisenti, ed. (Boulder, CO: Lynn Rienner Publishers, Inc., 1993.)
page 184; and Michael Arron Rockland, “Sarmiento’s Views on the United States”. Sarmiento and his
Argentina, Joseph Crisenti, ed. (Boulder, CO: Lynn Rienner Publishers, Inc., 1993), page 46.
40
Joseph Criscenti, Sarmiento and his Argentina. (Boulder, CO: Lynn Rienner Publishers, Inc., 1993),
page 2.
41
Diana Sorensen Goodrich, Facundo and the Construction of Argentine Culture, (Austin, TX: The
University of Texas Press, 1996), pages xviii and 24.
42
Ibid., pages xviii and 3.
43
Ibid., page 26.
44
William H. Katra, Domingo F. Sarmiento, Public Writer: (between 1839 and 1852), (Tempe, AZ:
Center for Latin American Studies, Arizona State University, 1985), page xiii.
39
15
According to Katra, 1852, the year that marks the overthrow of General Rosas in Argentina, also
marks the year that Sarmiento changed from writer and theorist to political actor and
statesman.45As a result, his ideas regarding a utopian state to a dependent liberalism within
Argentina were blurred, as the philosophical and political movement to which he pertained was
comprised of inconsistencies and contradictions that did not allow for a united idea to prosper.46
Ultimately, Katra uses Sarmiento’s own works to defend his argument that Sarmiento’s works
developed and transformed to reflect the statesman’s permanent desire to see stability,
utopianism, and dependent liberalism to prosper within the ever changing socio-cultural
panorama of the Argentine Republic.
Ultimately, although these works have unlocked connections to the Argentine cultural
divide that have hitherto been explained, this thesis is unique in that it attempts to contribute to
the understanding of the socio-cultural division that has plagued Argentina since its formation by
linking the divide to Sarmiento’s understanding of American liberalism and his devotion to
Franklin. Albeit the reality that the Argentine cultural dichotomy has been analyzed in
economic, global, and ideological terms, literature on the origins and development of
Sarmiento’s idea regarding civilization versus barbarism is sparse. Thus, through the
investigation of the origins of Argentina’s socio-cultural division via the man that first labeled
the divide “civilization versus barbarism”, this thesis is an effort to bring another element to the
discussion, specifically through a historical lens. How did Sarmiento think to label the maladies
of Argentine unrest on a war of the civilized versus the barbarous? How did he determine who
was considered civilized and who was deemed barbarous? How did this war spread from a
literary work to political reforms? My argument is that the answer to most of these questions can
be linked to Sarmiento’s interpretation of Benjamin Franklin’s, his mentor’s, philosophy on selfimprovement and its connection with the American liberalism that abounded during the
nineteenth century.
In accordance, the critical argument made in this text has two main connections. The
first link consists of establishing a connection between Franklin’s self-made model and
American liberalism, as represented by the idea of the “American spirit”, to Sarmiento that led
him to adopt Franklin’s philosophy on self-improvement. The second key link focuses on
45
46
Ibid., page xi.
Ibid., page 12.
16
Sarmiento’s manipulation of Franklin’s philosophy and application of this altered idea to
Argentina, resulting in the social and cultural divide present today. In chapter two, the link
between Franklin’s self-made model and the formation of American liberalism and how it was
promulgated and perceived throughout the world is evaluated. Chapter three examines
Sarmiento’s values and beliefs and how they were influenced by the image of Franklin’s selfmade model and American liberalism, which had been transforming since the onset of the
nineteenth century. Chapter four provides a background of Argentina’s formation since its
independence from Spain, the development of the gauchesca culture, and the details of the
economic shift that divided Argentina ideologically in the nineteenth century. Focusing back on
Sarmiento, chapter five takes the information ascertained in chapter four and connects it to
Sarmiento’s rise to presidency, his political reforms, and how these reforms, focused on
Franklin’s self-made model, affected the gauchesca culture. Finally, the conclusion attempts to
connect all of these links and to analyze the impacts of the societal division within Argentina
today.
In essence, this thesis is written with the belief that in attempting to solve a problem, it
must first be understood. Thus, the issue surrounding Argentina’s economic, political, and
ideological controversy due to its severe social and cultural dichotomy, is taken back to where
the division was first introduced: to the man who first declared the existence of a war between
the civilized and the barbarous.
17
CHAPTER TWO
“The American Spirit”:
Connecting American Liberalism to Franklin’s Self-Made Model
In 1868, a few years after Sarmiento was welcomed back into his country from exile, he
was elected president in a political campaign which had turned Argentina’s attention to the
United States.47 As President, Sarmiento was convinced that Franklin’s self-made model was the
best one to administer in any nation. This realization came from his visits to the United States,
where his vision of a Franklinesque nation, based on individual aspirations made possible by
moral and intellectual progress, were ever-present. In a letter back to one of his gubernatorial
colleagues, Valentín Alsina, Sarmiento, as president-elect of Argentina, observed:
the only nation in the world where the population as a whole reads and writes, where
there are 2,000 newspapers that satisfy public curiosity, and where education and wellbeing are within reach of everybody, is the United States.48
Stating in his book, Travels in the United States, that the Americans were “the only really
cultured people that exist on this earth” and “the last word in modern civilization” because of
their ability to implement the elements of the self-made model, Sarmiento saw in the United
States what he desired for his own nation.49 From the United States example, Sarmiento
realized that the path to civilization lay in how successful a nation could implement the Franklin
model.
This admiration that Sarmiento held for the United States and its citizens was not unique
to the Argentine president, as the creation of the United States in the late eighteenth century had
left the world stunned and fascinated. For intellectuals, philosophers, scientists, and
revolutionaries, the American experiment became, as the famous philosopher Turgot would
proclaim, the “hope of the human race”, for it offered the “first practical trial construction of the
Heavenly City of the Philosophes”.50 The comments of Jean Charles Dominique de Lacretelle,
47
Correas, Sarmiento and the United States, page 12.
Ibid.
49
Sarmiento, Travels in he Uni ed S a es…, page151.
50
Ibid., page 3.
48
18
French historian and journalist, summarize the hope and sentiment the world felt with regard to
the creation of the United States:
The whole world watches you. In fifty years it will know, by your example, whether
modern peoples still can maintain republican constitutions, whether high moral principles
are compatible with the grand progress of civilization, and whether America is to make
better or worse the fate of humanity.51
Under this scrutiny, the founders and creators of the new American nation had the herculean task
to balance and combine the principles and theories of the Enlightenment era in such a way that
would create a nation that would uphold these very principles.
For those who had fought in the American Revolution, the protection of liberty -a
practical, natural right of man- embodied what was to become the American nation.52 It was
therefore not only the institutional experiment that seized the world’s focus, but also the spirit of
the people that had fought for their liberty under the belief that it was a natural right. By the
mid-1780s, less than a decade after the declaration of independence of these colonies, the word
“America” became synonymous with “liberty” in most of Europe.53 The Ephémérides of France
illustrated this proclivity for the American people by stating the following in an article: “the
inhabitants of the English colonies of North America, who form one great people, are both
physically and morally perhaps the healthiest of all the peoples in the worlds”.54 The idea and
concept of the American Republic was married to the formation of a society of free individuals: a
society that had yet to exist in the eighteenth century.55 The results of this experiment led to the
admiration of many and to the inspiration of other nations to seek the same liberties as the
American people.
Fifty years after Lacretelle published his comment regarding the importance of the
American experiment, the world was still watching with hope at the success of the American
people. With time the ideals and ideas linked to the notion of liberty had grown and morphed
with the growing nation. In accordance, albeit the world still connected America to the
convictions of liberty that had garnered its independence, this liberty was becoming ever more
51
Ibid., page 152.
George M. Fredrickson, The Inner Civil War; Northern Intellectuals and the Crisis of the Union, ( New
York, NY: Harper and Row, 1965), page 24.
53
Durand Echeverria, Mirage in the West, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1957), page 34.
54
Ibid., page 30.
55
Fredrickson, The Inner Civil War…, page 9
52
19
present in an economic sense. As an illustration of this phenomenon, Alexis de Toqueville’s
Democracy in America, published in 1838, declared that the American people “were a
conservative people in a liberal society of free political institutions inhabited by people who love
property and hate revolution.”56 Due to the combination of a fanaticism for competitive
capitalism with American liberalism, the same spirit that had rebelled against the British Empire
for liberal freedom was now inherent in the same people who adopted economic individualism as
a creed for the free nation.57 To be free and to live in a liberal democracy meant to have wealth
and materialistic possessions. Nevertheless, the American people still symbolized, as William
James would describe in the latter part of the nineteenth century, a society of “sobriety, industry,
intelligence, and goodness, orderliness and ideality, prosperity and cheerfulness”; a society that
remained the pillar of hope and admiration for the world.58
Thus, well into the nineteenth century, and therefore Sarmiento’s lifetime, the American
experiment continued to give the world what it had promised: a hope for the human race which
combined the greatest ideas of Enlightenment theories into a practical model for future
generations. What resulted from the revolutionary aims of the former British colonists was the
creation of the “American spirit” that individuals like Sarmiento devotedly admired.59 This
“American spirit” can be understood as the balance of enlightenment principles and theories that
the American forefathers aimed to instill in the American framework. To illustrate this point,
Thomas Jefferson wrote the following to future generations of the American people: “each
generation is sovereign and must therefore think for itself…[however] there are unalienable
principles and rights that no generation can efface.”60 It is precisely these principles and rights
that helped to create the great American experiment that has lasted to this day. Therefore, in
order to understand the American creed, the American spirit, and why intellectuals and
revolutionary leaders, like Sarmiento, wanted to emulate this model, the principles by which this
society was established must first be better deciphered.
When the founding fathers of the United States created the governmental system that
would preside over this new community of free people, they wanted an institution that would
56
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 4.
Ibid., page 5.
58
Trachtenberg, The Incorporation of America…, page 140.
59
Echeverria, Mirage in the West, page 116.
60
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 3.
57
20
protect the beliefs of its constituents. These beliefs included the concepts of liberty and equality,
the enlightenment and liberation of man’s mind, and the pursuit of material capital. In the purest
sense, both of these concepts assume that a government must uphold the natural rights and
freedom of the people: a government for and by the people.61 Resonating from the classical
models of the Greek and Roman republics, the American founders sought to integrate the sense
of liberty and natural rights from a republicanism that was central to the governance of society.
With classical republicanism, the objective was to create a system that encouraged its people to
strive on virtues that encompassed simplicity, frugality, self-control, duty to the polity, and
citizenship within their own society.62 Classical liberalism complemented this ideology with the
belief that an individual had the “natural right” to acquire, protect, and dispose of his or her
possessions as he or she wished.63 In fusing these two basic principles as the pillars of the
American nation, the founding fathers sought to create a recipe for the perfect enlightened
society that was promised to the philosophes at the onset of the American Revolution. This was
the birth of the American creed.
Nevertheless, the republican and liberal ideology that was adopted as part of the
American creed was never a singular, nor was it the classic, notion relating to both terms. In
actuality, the American experiment succeeded in creating a hybrid of these ideologies which
gave birth to new definitions to both ideas. For instance, American republicanism differed from
the traditional concept relating to the word in that for this new type of republicanism it was
essential that every individual not only have the virtues expressed in classical republicanism, but
that these virtues be both public and private. In effect, this public virtue was the willingness of
an individual to participate in civic affairs for the betterment of society, and the private virtue
reflected upon that individual’s propriety with regard to his or her personal life.64 In addition,
these virtues were coupled with the economic opportunity and individual freedom that the nation
provided to fulfill both these public and private duties. Therefore, as historian Nian-Sheng
Huang stated in his book, Benjamin Franklin in American Thought and Culture, 1790-1990,
“Only those who could embrace both sorts of virtue were true republicans. Only those few
61
James T. Kloppenberg, The Virtues of Liberalism, (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1998),
page 30.
62
Diggins, The Lost soul of American Politics…, page 19.
63
Ibid., page 5.
64
Nian-Sheng Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American Thought and Culture, 1790-1990, (Philadelphia,
PA: American Philosophical Society, 1994), page 37.
21
consummate individuals whose conduct embodied the highest morals could be regarded as
exemplary Americans.”65 As a result, American republicanism came to symbolize change,
progress, self-interest, natural rights, freedom from political authority, and commerce.66
In accordance, this new interpretation of republicanism came to influence America’s
understanding of classic liberalism. In the most contemporary terms, American liberalism can
hardly be considered one impermeable ideology. This is due to its multi-faceted origins and the
myriad of diverse ideals that were combined to create the tiered liberalism adopted by the
founding fathers. However, of these various interpretations, there were two main liberal theories
that echoed throughout the American creed. The first, supported by individuals like Thomas
Jefferson and Thomas Paine, was liberal individualism which aimed to reduce government and
extol the volition of the people. The other, liberal pluralism, garnished support from individuals
such as James Madison and favored a system of checks and balances to reduce oppression that
came from a social existence. Both forms, however, approbated an individual’s pursuit of
happiness through property and material pleasure.67
This new breed of liberalism elevated individual freedom, the production and
consumption of material goods, an individual’s private life, and the rights of its citizens over
classical constraints that forced individuals to subordinate their happiness to imposing
hierarchies and aristocratic elites.68 In essence, it offered the American people an escape from
the ascetic virtues of their previous superiors.69 In the above-mentioned book by historical
scholar Nian-Sheng Huang, reflected upon this point, commenting that,
This blend of moral sanction over economic success was an American invention.
Highlighting an individual’s obligation and ability to control his own destiny, such
sanction was phrased in a typical expression – ‘self-made man’.70
It was precisely this “self-made man” model, exemplified by Benjamin Franklin, which
Sarmiento adopted as his blueprint for life and for inspiration to his political reforms. However,
this self-made model was married to the ideas found in American liberalism, and in turn, to the
idea of the “American spirit” and must therefore be further evaluated.
65
Ibid.
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 19.
67
Ibid., page 5.
68
Kloppenberg, The Virtues of Liberalism, pages 5-6.
69
Ibid., page 29.
70
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in Ameri an…, page 42.
66
22
For many scholars, the uniqueness of the American creed can be directly attributed to the
nation’s initial foundations on virtue and the freedom that they were granted as colonists.
Therefore, unlike any other nation, the United States demanded virtue, character, and moral
goodness from their citizens as a part of their responsibility to the State.71 As the historical
scholar J.A. Leo Lemay states, the “utility of virtue was…a widespread doctrine.”72 Evidence of
this tradition can be seen in Benjamin Franklin’s Pennsylvania Gazette, when in 1738 he
published a popular saying from the Chinese philosopher Confucius, an advocate of virtue, on
the advantages of obtaining said quality: “whatever is honest and advantageous is amiable; and
we are obliged to love Virtue, because it includes both these Qualities.”73 Thus, prior to the
establishment of the American nation, virtue was ever present as a quality inherent to the
progress of the colonial lifestyle.
Moreover, having the ability to practice religious freedom, and therefore religious
tolerance within the same community, allowed the British colonists an opportunity to practice a
new governing system which optimized their ability to obtain and practice virtue. A recruiting
pamphlet that Benjamin Furly wrote for William Penn to recruit people to Pennsylvania
illustrates this very fact. This pamphlet promised “ingenious spirits of low estate” liberty,
representative government by secret ballot, taxation only by their own consent, the right to make
their own laws, and most importantly, religious freedom.74 An article published in Poor
Ri hard’s Almana in 1748 by Benjamin Franklin confirms the verity of William Penn’s
provincial objectives by declaring that “William Penn, the great founder of this Province; who
prudently and benevolently sought success to himself by no other means, than securing the
liberty, and endeavoring the happiness of his people.”75 Ultimately, though virtue was not a
concept confined to religious principles, the opportunity to create a virtuous nation by means of
religious tolerance did intertwine the two concepts within colonial life.
In accordance, in Pennsylvania, as in most of British America, Protestantism influenced
much of its citizens’ daily routines and helped to promote these characteristics of virtue. Under
71
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 7.
J. A. Leo Lemay, Reappraising Benjamin Franklin: a Bicentennial Perspective, (Newark: University of
Delaware Press, 1993), page 366.
73
Ibid., page 166.
74
Echeverria, Mirage in the West, page 15.
75
J. A. Leo Lemay, The Canon of Benjamin Franklin, 1722-1776: New Attributions and
Reconsiderations, (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1986), pages 71-72.
72
23
the predominant focus on the fear of God, character was based solely on virtue which could only
be found in such moral qualities like faith, charity, humility, obedience, peace, sincerity,
integrity, diligence, frugality, prudence, and industry.76 The last qualities relating to prudence
and industry were of supreme importance in Protestant ideology as believers placed a great
emphasis on skill, labor, and craft in their belief that everyone had a “calling”, which unfailingly
meant work. However, work was only considered a “calling” by the Protestant definition if it
produced benefit for the community.77 Thus, many leading Protestants in New England, like
Puritan preacher Cotton Mather, believed that each person’s behavior and “calling” was crucial
for the maintenance of their community.78 As a result, whether it was a direct result of Protestant
faith or the influence of the utility of virtue through enlightened ideals, a moral conscience was
ever present when the American forefathers were creating their new nation and the opportunity
for the formation of the self-made man model.79
Reflecting back on the idea of the American creed, it can be concluded that the American
interpretation of both republicanism and liberalism, which placed more emphasis on moral
content than any interpretation had done before, influenced its creation.80 This moral dimension
within American republicanism added a religious element that focused on the very character of
the American society.81 Furthermore, despite the influence of other doctrines that advocated
virtue as an inherent quality for the progress of society, by the end of the eighteenth century the
definition of republicanism within the American creed descended directly from the cardinal
values of Christianity; thus a person’s character was not only judged by their devotion to being a
staunch republican, but also to their character as a pious Christian.82 This same moral dimension
and Christian dynamic influenced the American interpretation of New World liberalism. All the
values that represented virtue within their society –change, progress, self-interest, civic dutyreflected the result of the liberal belief in the Puritan principle of “free labor”: every man had the
natural right and duty to work and thus better society.83 In effect, the American creed, and
therefore the “American spirit”, allowed for work to replace politics as the sole element that
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 16; and Zuckerman, Almost Chosen Peo le…, page 31.
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 11.
78
Ibid., page 7; and Zuckerman, Almost Chosen People…, page 34.
79
Zuckerman, Almost Chosen People…, page 32
80
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 7.
81
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 36.
82
Ibid.,and Lemay, Reappraising Benjamin Franklin…, page 367.
83
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 7.
76
77
24
would allow man to live an independent and productive life that was seen as virtuous for his
community.84
Benjamin Franklin agreed with this notion, stating that “only a virtuous people are
capable of freedom” and that God’s people best served him when they served his children.85
Thus, for a predominantly Christian community, in order to serve God’s children, God’s children
had to first be doing well for themselves. Hence, Americans began to look to economic
wellbeing, and the opportunity to better one’s lot in life, as a sign of an individual’s moral
integrity and the nation’s overall progress. Over fifty years after the founding of the United
States, the notion of a morally conscious and economically stable people resounded in Alexis de
Tocqueville’s comment:
American moralists do not pretend that one must sacrifice himself for his fellows because
it is a fine thing to do so. But they boldly assert that such sacrifice is as necessary for the
man who makes it as for the beneficiaries…They therefore do not raise objections to men
pursuing their interests, but they do all they can to prove that it is each man’s interest to
be good.86
The supreme epitome of these American ideals and the individual that made the world
believe the “American spirit” and the American creed to be truth, was none other than founding
father Benjamin Franklin. From his initial humble beginnings as a candle maker’s son to his rise
as a scientist, businessman, diplomat, philosopher, and philanthropist, Franklin’s example
reflected the Protestant ideals of virtue and labor that proved that in a free nation any man,
despite his origins, could achieve grand success.87 Jean Baptise Le Roy, Franklin’s close friend,
wrote in 1790:
M. Malesherbes made the excellent remark, when I introduced Franklin to him, that my
illustrious friend was the first scientist who had developed a marked talent for public
affairs. Now that was an advantage which Franklin derived from the government under
which he lived, which allowed his mind to direct itself towards those important objects
which affect the happiness and well-being of an entire people. In Paris, that great man,
under the ancien régime, would have remained in obscurity; for how could one have put
to use the son of a candlemaker?88
84
Ibid., page 14.
Kloppenberg, The Virtues of Liberalism, page 41.
86
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 41.
87
Ibid., page 48; and Claude Anne Lopez, My Life with Benjamin Franklin, (New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press, 2000), page 25.
88
Echeverria, Mirage in the West, page 160.
85
25
Thus, for many Americans Benjamin Franklin’s self-made model embodied the notion that one
could and should improve his or her social standing by focusing on the simple virtues that
governed that individual’s moral character.89 In accordance, this “self-made man” ethos allowed
Americans an optimistic belief in the New World, which embraced a staunch individualism that
accompanied their dream of success and attainment of a strong moral character.90
Albeit Franklin’s strong influence in the public sphere, the example that he left behind of
the American self-made man reverberated through the masses not through his association with
various scientific academies, his philanthropic efforts, and his diplomatic appointments, but
rather through the publication of his autobiography. Published first in French in 1791 and then
in English, Franklin’s autobiography became valid documentation for the effectiveness of the
“American spirit” and the possibility of the self-made model for the masses.91 However, when
Franklin began writing his autobiography, it was not with the purpose of setting an example for
future generations. On the contrary, the first half of the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin is a
letter dedicated to his son, William Franklin, with the sole purpose of passing on, as Franklin
states, “the Circumstances of my Life”.92 Nevertheless, it is the second part of the
autobiography, written after the American Revolution, in which the purpose of the book
changed.
Encouraged by his colleagues, Franklin finished his autobiography to give expression to
the elements which now form the basis of the self-made dream: intellectual esteem, moral
regeneration, material success, and social progress.93 Each of these ideals became incorporated
into the success of Benjamin Franklin and his achievements, forming the goals of others who
desired to follow his steps in the journey to becoming a self-made man. As evidence of this
shift, Franklin provides a letter in his autobiography from his friend, Benjamin Vaughn,
describing the function the autobiography would hold for society:
Your autobiography will not only teach self-education, but the education of a wise man;
and the wisest man will receive lights and improve his progress, by seeing detailed the
conduct of another wise man.94
89
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 42.
Ibid.
91
Echeverria, Mirage in the West, pages 124-125.
92
Franklin, Autobiography and Other Writings, page 3.
93
Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin, page 9.
94
Franklin, Autobiography and Other Writings, pages 80-81.
90
26
Thus, Franklin worked to finish his autobiography in order to provide the ultimate example of a
self-made man, proving the possibility of social mobility if one should only follow the
aforementioned elements needed for success.
Franklin’s self-made model, as outlined by his experiences and as documented by his
autobiography, boldly infused all of the convictions held present in the American interpretation
of republicanism and liberalism which promoted virtue and character within this new society.
This fusion is evident in Franklin’s adoption of the Protestant work ethic and the notions of
virtue that were profoundly advocated by enlightened ideals.95 Heavily influenced by New
England Protestantism, seen in both the Quakers in Pennsylvania and the Puritans in Boston, at a
young age Franklin determined to live his life as a “rational creature” and embody the
characteristics that accompanied industry, frugality, prudence, and economy.96 For Franklin,
there was no other evil than that of economic dependency which accompanied sloth, idleness,
and waste. Evidence of the Protestant work ethic in Franklin’s life is seen in a letter Franklin
wrote to Samuel Mather, the son of famous Puritan pastor Cotton Mather:
When I was a boy, I met with a book, entitled ‘Essays to do Good,’ which I think was
written by your father. It had been so little regarded by a former possessor that several
laves of it were torn out; but the remained gave me such a turn of thinking, as to have an
influence on my conduct through life; for I have always set a greater value on the
character of a doer of good, than on any other kind of reputation. 97
Nevertheless, this acknowledgment on the influence of Mather’s rhetoric did not imply
that Franklin himself was a devote Christian. In actuality, throughout his life Franklin’s
publications criticized some religious people on their hypocrisy, evidenced a pessimistic attitude
towards those who focused their actions based directly on notions of faith, and advocated the
utility of science and reason over blind devotion.98 Indeed, the opening of Franklin’s
Autobiography touches on the concept of vanity and the seven deadly sins and states, rather
iconoclastically, that “it would not be quite absurd if Man were to thank God for his Vanity
among the other Comforts of Life.”99 Although he did recognize the usefulness of religion in
aiding those who could not obtain virtue otherwise, Franklin insisted that virtue did not rely
95
Lemay, Reappraising Benjamin Franklin, page 367.
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 12.
97
Ibid., page 13.
98
Lemay, The Canon of Benjamin Franklin, page 73.
99
Lemay, Reappraising Benjamin Franklin, page 383.
96
27
solely on religious concepts, as it was his experience with virtue and not God’s direction to the
quality that confirmed his faith in the ideal.100
Therefore, Franklin’s self-made model suggested that one could, as he had done, separate
religion from its inherent values, defining one’s own objectives to reach and ensure his or her
own morality.101 This was illustrated in Franklin’s autobiography when he described his method
for achieving the “Art of Virtue”:
I made a little Book in which I allotted a Page for each of the Virtues. I rul’d each Page
with red ink, so as to have seven Columns, one for each Day of the Week, marking each
Column with a Letter for the Day. I cross’d these Columns with thirteen red Lines,
marking the Beginning of each Line with the first Letter of one of the Virtues, on which
Line and in its proper Column I might mark by a little black Spot every Fault I found
upon Examination to have been committed respecting that Virtue upon that Day.102
As a result, despite Franklin’s separation from a religious devotional ethic in an overwhelmingly
Christian community, he still achieved what all Americans thought to be the American creed: a
virtuous and moral character through self-endeavor.103
For Franklin, this self-made model meant that a path to virtue was completely plausible
and should be the only objective for a citizen embracing the American interpretation of
republican and liberal ideals.104 However, in Franklin’s version of the self-made model, material
well-being and happiness were two essential elements in following the path to self-improvement.
In accordance, Franklin, in part three of his Memoirs, stressed the utility of virtue by highlighting
one of various phrases that alluded to virtue in his publications of Poor Ri hard’s Almana :
with Proverbial Sentences, chiefly such as inculcated Industry and Frugality, as the
Means of procuring Wealth and thereby securing Virtue, it being more difficult for a Man
in Want to act always honestly, as it is hard for an empty Sack to stand upright. 105
Franklin’s self-made philosophy therefore came in direct contrast to the doctrines that had
inundated the centuries before him, which suggested that one’s own self-interest had to be put
aside for the interest of the community and of the state.106 To clarify, for Franklin, one’s selfinterest was in direct correlation with the community’s well-being, for without a standard of
100
Ibid., page 365.
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 17.
102
Ibid., page 10.
103
Lopez, My Life with Benjamin Franklin, page 30.
104
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 23.
105
Lemay, Reappraising Benjamin Franklin, page 367.
106
Ibid., page 342.
101
28
living that would allow an individual to, as suggested by his proverb, “stand upright”, there could
be no hope for that individual to obtain virtue and thus good moral ethics that would allow him
to serve his community.
Franklin’s emphasis on these ideals came to an apex with his publication of “The Way to
Wealth” which became more readily available by publication than his autobiography by the end
of the eighteenth century.107 For Franklin, to work meant to build character. In accordance, as
money fostered this labor, consumption, wealth, and work were all needed to create the character
which was essential in bringing progress to the nation.108 Thus, for Franklin, virtue and
commerce were married concepts. Luxury was essential for progress as the desire for selfbetterment resulted in a want for luxury which continued the cycle of consumption and
production that provided jobs and motivated people to be industrious, frugal, and prudent.109 A
virtuous individual and apostle of the self-made model would therefore be one that pursued
wealth as a self-reliant individual instead of subordinating their interest to that of the state.110
Only upon obtaining this success could an individual be successful in serving his community, as
Franklin had done by establishing a number of new institutions in Philadelphia which included
the Library Company, the American Philosophical Society, the Pennsylvania Hospital, and the
Philadelphia Academy which is now the University of Pennsylvania.111 Thus, although Franklin
exemplified the Protestant work ethic, he seldom referred to his work as a “calling”, preferring to
call it business instead and insisting that such business would bring virtue and happiness to
himself and the community.112
Ultimately, it was Franklin’s embodiment of the self-made man that resonated with the
American people and developed into the “American spirit”. Somehow Franklin resolved the
question of what would happen when public and private interests clashed by suggesting that
private interests would inherently foster public interest and add to the bettermentof society.
Thus, his model proved that the realization of self-interest was what was needed for
107
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 42.
Carla Mulford, The Cambridge Companion to Benjamin Franklin, (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2008), page 135.
109
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 21.
110
Ibid.
111
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 14.
112
Ibid., pages 18-19.
108
29
Figure 2.1: Franklin, an Engraving. This is a picture of an engraving of Benjamin Franklin by
Augustin de Saint-Aubin, 1777. As an ambassador of the American Confederation to Europe, he
was received by French society as a symbol of liberal freedom. He adopted this folksy look to
represent the part. This photograph is under public domain and can be found in Gordon Wood’s
book, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin.
30
the continuous progress of the American society.113 Franklin’s self-made model became the
paragon of the complete and perfect philosophe: someone who had transformed theory into
practice by becoming for many the archetype for the free man.114 Nevertheless, it is not his
embodiment of the self-made model that is remarkable, but rather his overarching influence in
the formation of the American spirit. This is due to the plausibility of his model and the
attraction of this plausibility to his fellow countrymen, which voluntarily devoted themselves to
following in his footsteps.115
Due to this admiration and adoption by his followers, Franklin’s influence continued to
be felt well into the nineteenth century. In 1831, the city of Boston held a lecture series called
the Franklin lectures which educated men on the importance of self-endeavor.116 Upon
commenting on the success of powerful businessmen within the New England area, Carroll
Wright wrote that these “Captains of Industry” were more than mere producers as they were an
“instrument of God for the upholding of the race”.117 However, perhaps a New York Times
article published in 1856 captured more this Franklin fever when the author wrote that Franklin
was “the incarnation of the true American character.”118 It was precisely this image of Franklin
and the legacy of his self-made model that Sarmiento was absorbing as truths when he became
the leader of Argentina.
113
Ibid., page 41.
Echeverria, Mirage in the West, page 48.
115
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 31.
116
Ibid., page 46.
117
Trachtenberg, The Incorporation of America…, page 43.
118
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 31.
114
31
CHAPTER THREE
“An Aristocracy of Intellect”:
How the “American Spirit” and Franklin’s Model Influenced Sarmiento
As has been established, the formation and the success of the British colonies’
experiment in the late eighteenth century became the prototype of a free nation for the
enlightened world. All of Europe, all that followed enlightened ideals, believed that the
American Revolution was the realization of these ideals on earth.119 Thus, upon the declaration
of independence of the mainland North American British colonies in 1776, the subsequent
formation of the American nation symbolized the hope of all secular mystics that a “Heavenly
City of the Philosophes” could be created.120 Moreover, the American interpretation of
republicanism and liberalism, which expanded and protected individual rights from
governmental authority, gave the world hope that liberty could be redefined by the individuals
that succeeded in establishing their own nation.121
The verity in this belief was confirmed by evaluating the paradigm that was Benjamin
Franklin and his self-made model. No longer did the social and economic condition to which
one was born dictate the path of that individual’s life. The liberty promised by the American
nation gave people the opportunity to pursue happiness, personal interest, and material wealth
through the development of virtue, moral consciousness, and industry, as had done Franklin.122
By equipping a nation with the possibility of training its people to become virtuous, morally
conscious, and industrious, as well as instilling them with the principles of liberty,
republicanism, and civic duty, America laid out a model for the free world that no other nation
had previously sought to develop.
As a result, nations under the tyranny of monarchies, populations under the restraints of
colonialism, and intellectual aristocrats seeking to fulfill their own “Heaven of earthly
Philoso hes”, became inspired by the American experiment and attempted their own projects of
liberty. In 1789, the world witnessed the declaration of France’s own revolution against its
119
Echeverria, Mirage in the West, page 116.
Ibid.
121
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 4.
122
Huang, Benjamin Franklin in American…, page 41.
120
32
monarchical bonds.123 The occurrences in France quickly set the tone for the sequence of events
that followed in Latin America. As monarchical ties were being challenged due to consequences
of the French Revolution and France’s new emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte, the Latin American
colonies began their own campaigns and revolutions for independence in the early nineteenth
century.124 The first to start this process was Brazil, when in 1808 the royal court in Brazil
severed its ties to Portugal. Soon after, the Viceroyalty of New Spain sought independence with
the formation of revolutionary forces in 1810. In addition, South America, consisting of the
Viceroyalties of New Granada, Peru, and el Río de la Plata, commenced its long journey to
independence in the second decade of the nineteenth century under the leadership of Generals
José de San Martín and Simón Bolívar.125
Upon declaring independence, several of the leaders of these revolutions yearned to
follow in the footsteps of their beacon of hope, the American nation, in an attempt to create their
own projects of liberty.126 In consequence, the spirit of the American experiment was copied,
manipulated, and implemented as a component of several of these revolutions. Ultimately, all of
these attempts failed to establish the liberal state that Americans had succeeded in founding only
decades earlier. The outcome of these revolutions illustrates this point. The French Revolution
rapidly fell to corruption and violence as the Reign of Terror plagued French streets and ended
with the procurement of authoritarian power under the military forces of Napoleon Bonaparte. 127
Brazil’s independence was essentially a transfer of power from a monarchical state to another
monarchical state, while the Viceroyalty of New Spain’s independence concluded in the
formation of an Empire, not a republic.128 Finally, from the nations that were formed out of the
Viceroyalties of New Granada, Peru, and el Río de la Plata, civil conflict, social revolutions, and
racial differences thwarted the efforts of leaders to create republics out of the colonies. As a
result, dictatorships, empires, and regional conflicts marred the development of these nations,
among which included Sarmiento’s Argentina.129
123
Stephen M. Walt, Revolution and War, (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1996), page 46.
Thomas E. Skidmore and Peter H. Smith. Modern Latin America: Volume 6. (New York: Oxford
University Press, 2005), page 34.
125
Ibid., pages 32 and 25.
126
Walt, Revolution and War, page 46.
127
Ibid., pages 46 and 73.
128
Skidmore, Modern Latin America: Volume 6, pages 35-39.
129
Ibid., page 37.
124
33
As a consequence, the development and outcome of these events affected Sarmiento’s
views regarding the political stability and social development of a nation. Born approximately
three decades after the American Revolution, two decades after the French Revolution, and one
year after the start of the Argentine war of independence, by the time Sarmiento began to form
his political ideology, the knowledge of the success and failures of each of these nations’
attempts at freedom was readily known.130 Thus, in the 1830s, when Sarmiento began
publishing his writings in periodicals and articles throughout the Southern Cone, his thoughts
regarding these revolutions were already solidified.
From the lessons learned from history, Sarmiento was convinced that the American
Revolution was the epitome of the ideals that Argentina should have embraced upon its
independence from Spain.131 Sarmiento openly admitted his adoration for the model given by
the American people because for him it was one that did not veer away from the principles of
republicanism and liberalism that had established its creed. Moreover, the adherence to these
principles allowed the development of revolutionary individuals, like Franklin, which forged the
birth of the “American spirit” and propelled the nation to success.132 To further this point, in his
book, Libro de Lectura, Sarmiento makes the connection between Franklin, the self-made model,
and the “spirit” of the American nation:
Franklin is a testimonial against the classical concerns of Europe, which have produced, I
fear not in asserting this, the American spirit…With Franklin, good sense has been
elevated to the institutionalization and title of nobility in the United States, where the
self-made man prevails over the patented student.
Franklin es un desmentido a las preocupaciones clásicas de la europea, el cual ha
rodu ido, no emo ase urarlo, el es ri u anqui…El uen sen ido ha sido elevado on
Franklin a institución y título de nobleza en los Estados Unidos, donde impera el selfmade man, en lugar del patentado estudiante.133
In essence, Sarmiento elevated the people of the American nation as the world’s new nobility, as
they were able to rise above classic European ideas of nobility through individual efforts of selfimprovement. According to Sarmiento, every American citizen “desires to be Franklin, the self130
Patton, Sarmiento in the United States, page 21.
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Obras de D. F. Sarmiento, Volume 34: Cuestiones americanas, Luis
Montt and Augusto Belin Sarmiento, ed. (Buenos Aires, AR: Imprenta Mariano Moreno, 1900), pages 4849.
132
Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin, page 9.
133
Domingo F. Sarmiento, P inas de Sarmien o, (Buenos Aires, AR: Imprenta Mariano Moreno, 1900),
pages 85-86.
131
34
made man” even to the capacity that if they did become a distinguished individual, they would
pretend to have done so without the aid of the system of schools and colleges laid out by
Franklin himself.134
For Sarmiento, this “American spirit” was simply the product of the footprints left by
“their immortal man”, Franklin.135 Inasmuch as the immortal spirit of Franklin and the self-made
model were engrained in the American tradition, the American nation was able to continue the
path of progress laid out by Franklin’s model.136 As stated by Sarmiento, although Franklin was
the pioneer in establishing various service projects for the good of his community, the
community itself was instrumental in continuing this example.137 To further this point, upon
visiting the country of his idol, Sarmiento declared: “it is daily the almost millions of donations
that are done for the good of the community” [son diarios casi los dones por milliones que se
hacen a favor del pueblo].138 This alone defined how the self-made model had been embodied
by the American people: a people determined by the model of self-improvement to relentlessly
drive their own society to progress.
It was thus in the United States that Sarmiento found a national model that was founded
on the individual model he so cherished. For him, the American model was the model his
country needed to follow in order to be successful and enter into the civilized realm of
prosperous societies.139 Ultimately, the adoption of the Franklinesque model meant the rejection
of the European models various Latin American nations had adopted upon independence. In the
writings found in his work, Epistolario Intimo, Sarmiento explained his disapproval of European
models based on the events that took place in France:
It was precise of us to go in search of mentors and guides in the literature and history and
construction of other nations to dress ourselves in foreign attire, overlooking whether or
not such dress fit our habits and necessities. We were French with Rousseau, and with
the revolutionaries of 1789, until here, like in France, those trees gave us their bitter fruit,
the anarchy and horrible tyranny that came in the name of liberty and the people.
Era preciso ir en busca de mentores y guías a las literaturas e historia y construcciones
de otros pueblos para revestirnos de ajenos vestidos, cuadraran o no a nuestros hábitos y
134
Ibid., pages 87-88.
Ibid., page 87.
136
Katra, Domin o F. Sarmien o, Pu li Wri er…, page 162.
137
Sarmiento, P inas de Sarmien o, page 87.
138
Ibid., page 88.
139
Juan Mariel Erostarbe, El e is olario n imo de Sarmien o, (San Juan, Argentina: Editorial Fundación,
Universidad Nacional de San Juan, 199), page 164.
135
35
necesidades. Fuimos franceses con Rousseau, y los revolucionarios de 1789, hasta que
aquí como en Francia dieron aquellos arboles sus frutos amargos, la anarquía y las
tiranías horribles en nombre de la libertad y del pueblo.140
He goes on to say that the American nation, unlike Europe, was instilled with such principles of
dignity and respect that this model should have been the one that Latin America followed upon
proclaiming independence.141 Thus, inspired by the success of the American model, founded on
Franklinesque principles, the Argentine native sought to emulate this model within his own
nation.
Considering that after fifty years of independence, Argentina had yet to establish the
liberal republic that the United States had formed in the eighteenth century, Sarmiento had
motive to criticize his native land. Immediately after Argentina gained its independence from
Spain, the nation erupted in a civil war between the two predominant schools of thought
circulating among Argentine leaders: Federalism and Unitarianism. For the Federalists, the
future of Argentina depended on its organization into loose, autonomous states, governed by
those who knew the land and could develop the agricultural aspects of the economy.142
Traditionally, those who inhabited the Argentine land in the nineteenth century were gauchos,
escaped African slaves, and indigenous tribes. Thus, the Federalists, comprised of rural
businessmen, or caudillos, found their support in the recruitment of these groups of people.143
Their rivals, the Unitarians –supported by urban intellectuals like Sarmiento- favored a
centralized form of government in which a European/American model was to be followed.144
Believing that Argentina could progress through the whitening of the nation by the importation
of European and American ideals, traditions, and people, the Unitarians found their support in
the upper class urbanites that praised the lifestyle that Buenos Aires offered.145 Moreover, for
Sarmiento, the fact that post-independence Argentina resembled more the disasters of post-
Mariel Erostarbe, El e is olario n imo de Sarmiento, page 164.
Ibid.
142
Amy K. Kaminsky, Argentina: Stories for a Nation, (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota
Press, 2008), page 104.
143
John Lynch, Argentine Caudillo: Juan Manuel de Rosas, 1829-1852, (Lanham, MD: Scholarly
Resources, Inc. 2001), page 36.
144
Kaminsky, Argentina: Stories for a Nation, page 104.
145
Hendrik Kraay and Thomas Whigham, I Die with my Country: Perspectives on the Paraguayan War,
1864-1870, (Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska, 2004), page 140.
140
141
36
revolutionary France and not post-revolutionary North America, the more the superiority of the
North American race was reinforced.
This highlighted a critical point: perhaps the establishment of a well-functioning nation,
like the United States, depended on the composition of the people it governed. As a result of the
analysis of these events, the notion that only intelligent people could gain independence from
Europe and establish themselves as a true nation-state was reinforced by the ideas of social
discrimination that abounded during colonization.146 Upon the conquest of the Americas, the
Spanish Crown encountered a myriad of indigenous cultures that inhabited the American
territories. The sequential mixing of Spanish blood with indigenous, and then African, blood left
the Crown in the debate of who was a subject and who was a servant under their domain. In
consequence, a hierarchy was formally established, with the “pure-blooded” Spaniards offspring
of two Spanish subjects) at the very top and the indigenous “savages” offspring of two
indigenous individuals) at the very bottom.147 By the time of the Enlightenment, intellectuals
throughout the world were applying science to society in order to find a logical way to categorize
the races.148 In consequence, it was determined that certain races were biologically superior to
others, and that mixing with inferior races would degenerate the superior race.149
Although this notion of social and racial hierarchy was predominant within the Spanish
colonies at the time of their revolutions and development as independent nations, these concepts
were not limited to this era or to the Spanish. Even Sarmiento’s idol, Franklin, commented on
this notion of racial superiority when witnessing the establishment of German populations in
Pennsylvania during the mid-eighteenth century. With the proliferation of Germans into the
Pennsylvania colony, Franklin was prompted to thwart their multiplication and seed AngloSaxon values and virtues to distill the effects of these “Knaves and Rascals”.150 For Franklin, it
was not the Germans, but rather the English, Welsh, Scottish, and Protestant Irish communities
that needed to establish themselves within the colonies, as it was this “increase of mankind”
146
Sarmiento, Obras de D. F. Sarmiento, Volume 34, page 48.
David Weber, Barbaros: The Spaniards and their Savages in the Age of Enlightenment (New Haven,
CT: Yale University Press, 2005), page 13.
148
Ibid., pages 2-3.
149
Rodriguez, Civilizing Argentina: Science, Medicine…, pages 33-34.
150
Paul W. Conner, Poor Richard's Politicks; Benjamin Franklin and his New American Order. (New
York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1965), page 86.
147
37
through “the Right of Migration” that would bring civilization and virtue onto British land.151
This biological reasoning, which projected the superiority of the Anglo-Saxon race above all
other races, was further emphasized with the creation of the “land of liberty” established by
Anglo-Saxons.152 The success of the American Revolution and the institution of the United
States as a nation reflected the character of the Anglo-Saxon people and elevated their status
over other nations and races, like the French, which failed in their attempt to imitate the
American nation.
Nevertheless, the success of the American nation and the superiority of the Anglo-Saxon
race were not going to remain unchallenged. By the time Sarmiento became president of
Argentina in 1868, the American nation had suffered a bloody civil war driven by the issue of
racial slavery.153 However, the nation’s survival when confronted with this impediment further
aggrandized political leaders’ positive proclivity, like Sarmiento, to adopting the American
model for liberty. Thus, in order to understand the significance of America’s survival after the
civil war, the moral fissures and ideological development that led to the American Civil War
must be analyzed.
In accordance, several factors, including the nation’s rapid economical and geographical
expansion, which impacted the nation’s moral and social growth, led the American people to turn
to war.154 To clarify, in following the footsteps of Benjamin Franklin and attempting to raise
their social standing, the American people morphed its society into one that polarized the rich
and the poor, propelling the growth of a salaried middle class that was in constant pursuit of
elevating their social status.155 In turn, this growth gave rise to the deterioration of a virtuous
society into a culture of greed and corruption that justified its actions via an extreme
interpretation of American liberalism and republicanism.156 Indeed, the American society had
evolved drastically from what Franklin’s self-made model had encouraged. In fact, Franklin had
cautioned his nation of the negative consequences of misinterpreting the objectives of the selfmade model and believed that such outcomes could only be prevented by reinvesting one’s time
in serving the community. In particular, Franklin stated that, “Man can be rescued from his
151
Ibid., pages 86-87.
Ibid.
153
Fredrickson, The Inner Civil War…, page 32.
154
Trachtenberg, The Incorporation of America…, page 36.
155
Ibid., pages 140-141.
156
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 13.
152
38
egoistic nature to the extent that he partakes in public life and is thereby liberated from the prison
of the self.”157 Thus, before the outbreak of the American Civil War American leaders, in an
attempt to guide society back to the virtues of their forefathers, were advocating new ideological
reforms to steer America to the principles of its foundations and maintain the virtue that Franklin
had so fervently advocated to his people.
Of these reforms, perhaps the most influential was the transcendentalist movement that
encompassed individuals like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Walt Whitman, George Ripley, William
Henry Channing, and Theodore Parker. True to its name, transcendentalism was a theory that
believed that individuals were transcending fixtures in their own world. To clarify, in
transcendentalism, humans are merely transcending through this life to get to the next as they are
living two lives, one here and one once they pass away.158 As a result, two schools of thought
formed within the transcendentalist camp which focused on what individuals were meant to
accomplish during their time in this life.
This first school of thought had Ralph Waldo Emerson, “The American Scholar”, as its
principal advocate. Based on the convictions established by Franklin’s model of the pursuit of
material happiness, Emerson expanded this notion and went to the extreme by preaching of the
advantages of a society of “self-culture” that was founded on the idea of the “perfect man”.159
This “perfect man” was an individual who refused to contribute to the betterment of society and
instead focused on his own happiness, knowing that the society he could fix was one that he was
inhabiting ephemerally.160
To the other extreme, transcendentalist Walt Whitman invoked Franklin’s call to
community action and infused humanitarian ideals into transcendentalist thought. In
consequence, he believed that individuals had a purpose to fix the society in which they lived by
removing themselves from corruption and focusing on the values and virtues that would raise
society from its own ills.161 This type of transcendentalism, named reform transcendentalism,
157
Ibid., page 19.
Fredrickson, The Inner Civil War…, page 10.
159
Ibid., pages 10-11.
160
Ibid.
161
Ibid., page 21.
158
39
alluded to the American version of republicanism and Franklin’s hope for a society that required
people to participate in civic affairs and influence the public good.162
Soon after, reform transcendentalism was fused with the religious Unitarian movement
within the United States which was led by individuals like Mancure Conway, John Weiss, and
James Freeman Clark. This movement called upon American individuals to “free himself from
corrupt institutions and demonstrate ideal integrity” to secure the morality and virtue that had
fortified the American creed.163 This call for moral consciousness later influenced the ideologies
that led to the American Civil War, a war that examined the moral conscious of the American
people with respect to the issues of slavery, equality, and race.164
In contrast to the transcendentalist movement, which focused on the moral integrity of the
American people, institutionalism also abounded in the American nation. This ideology
supported the notion that it was the liberal and republican system that was created through the
American creed that needed to be revisited in order to secure America’s progress.165 Thus, if the
American people were succumbing to corruption and greed, then the solution lay in reverting
back to the institutions that were established to protect the principles of moral integrity and
virtue that were inherent in the formation of the nation. Francis Lieber, a German exile living
within the United States and author of On Civil Liberty and Self-Government, defended this
conviction by stating that the principles with which the United States’ government was founded
had hitherto not permitted popular rule within the nation.166 This proved that the power of such
“institutional liberty” was what had protected the American people from the fate of other newly
formed nations which had fallen to dictatorships, emperors, and civil strife. Ultimately, for
supporters of institutionalism, in order to foster lost American virtue, the American people did
not have to develop their own moral conscious, but rather they needed to review the American
principles ingrained within their institutions. Only this evaluation would lead them back to
virtue.
Finally, the growth of the Brahmin Intellectuals within the American nation during the
nation’s antebellum years also influenced the ideologies that shifted the direction of the United
162
Diggins, The Lost Soul of American Politics…, page 10.
Fredrickson, The Inner Civil War…, page 17.
164
Ibid., page 16.
165
Kloppenberg, The Virtues of Liberalism, page 29.
166
Fredrickson, The Inner Civil War…, page 24.
163
40
States. In essence, the Brahmin Intellectuals were an elitist doctrine that was formed by the
conservative secular class that was founded on a “learning culture”. Indeed, for Brahmin
Intellectuals, social leadership was married to intellectual achievement because the nation
depended on a leadership that would seize control of society and give it practical direction.167
These men stemmed from New England’s Federalist era when American society depended upon
the guidance of the intelligent and prosperous classes to mold its ideals. As American scholar,
George Frederickson, stated in his book, The Inner Civil War, these men “hoped that America
could yet learn to accept the leadership of a secular priesthood, composed of the well born and
highly educated”.168 To further illustrate this point, New England “chryso-aristocrats”, like
Oliver Wendell Homes and Charles Elliot Norton, advocated the necessity of high culture and
class in order to guide America out of its corruption and degeneration.169 Carroll Wright, an
American industrialist, summarized this idea when he declared that “the rich and powerful [were
instruments] of God for the upbuilding of the race”.170 By the 1860s, and the commencement of
the American Civil War, it was clear that America was searching for a way back to the path of
integrity and virtue that had first shaped the American creed.
Therefore, when Sarmiento was elected president of Argentina in 1868, the United States
had managed to survive a debilitating civil war, remain intact institutionally, grow economically,
and expand territorially. These facts, as well as the emergence of the social ideologies which
guided the nation, the allusions back to the age of Franklin, and the approbations of individuals
who continued to uphold the American creed through the model established by Benjamin
Franklin, all influenced Sarmiento as he was molding his political ideology. Furthermore,
Sarmiento was convinced that the endurance of the American creed during such trying times
further enforced the grandeur of the American people and their principles.
Infused with his passion to emulate Franklin’s liberal society and the ideals of the
intellectual leaders of the contemporary American society in which he existed, Sarmiento
commenced to evaluate the “American spirit” in terms that would relate to the political reforms
167
Ibid., page 32.
Ibid., page 31.
169
Ibid., page 34; and Trachtenberg, The Incorporation of America…, page 142.
170
Trachtenberg, The Incorporation of America…, page 43.
168
41
Figure 3.1: Oliver Wendell Holmes. This photograph is of Oliver Wendell Holmes in the study
of his Boston home in 1891. As a famous Brahim Intellectual, Holmes dedicated himself to
improvement through education and advocated the rise of an elite, educated class to lead
America. This photograph is under public domain and can be found in Oliver Wendell Holmes’
book, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Lothrop Motley: Two Memoirs.
42
Figure 3.2: Statue of Sarmiento. These photographs are of a statue of Sarmiento in Boston,
Massachusetts, which was constructed in 1870. It was constructed to honor Sarmiento’s
dedication to education (top left) A far view of the statue. (top right) A close view of the statue.
(bottom) A re-commemoration plaque placed in Sarmiento’s honor in the 1970s. These
photographs were taken by the author.
43
he was creating for Argentina.171 According to Argentine historical scholar, Tulio Halperin
Donghi, “Sarmiento constructed his own project of a construction of a new Argentina…one of an
aristocracy of intellect.”172 In fact, Sarmiento’s repeated use of phrases like “democratic
nobility” and “aristocratic ideals” in his political commentary alludes to the influence of the
Brahimian intellectual strain of American liberal thought during the mid-nineteenth century.
This philosophy fervently supported an elite aristocracy that, according to Sarmiento, was
essential in the nation-building process of the young Argentine Republic.173 Indeed, akin to
these American intellectuals, Sarmiento seemed to desire a return to the republican and liberal
ideals of Franklin’s era by creating a society that mimicked the aristocratic and intellectual
standards of his mentor’s time.
Thus, influenced by the horrors of the French and Latin American revolutions and the
destruction of aristocratic ideals by the masses in these instances, Sarmiento believed that the
restoration of these same aristocratic ideals by certain groups of humans was the answer for any
societal revolution.174 Moreover, as the citizens of the newly established United States had
successfully completed a war of independence without a societal backlash, he believed in the
superiority of the American race and looked to them as the prototype for his own society.175
Evidence of this is found in the language Sarmiento uses to describe his second visit to the
United States:
Great revolutions have been underway since 1846 in which I visited the United States for
the first time. Since then, four or five million Europeans, of all races, have been mixed
into the population and changed the physiognomy of the yanqui pure blood, as fourteen
million Americans have European parents. Hitherto, the typical puritan and Quaker race
had been conserved.
Muy grandes revoluciones se han operado desde 1846 en que visite los Estados Unidos
por primera vez. Desde entonces acá, cuatro o cinco millones de europeos, de todas las
razas, se han mezclado a la población y cambiado de fisonomía del yanqui pur sang,
William Katra, “Race, Identity, and National Destiny,” Sarmiento, Gwen Kirkpatrick and Francine
Masiello, (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1994), page 82.
172
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Viajes en Europa, Africa i America, (Santiago: Imprenta de J. Belin y
compañía, 1849), page 785.
173
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Ambas Américas: revista de educación, bibliografía i agricultura, (New
York, NY: Imprenta de Hallet y Breen, 1867), page 28.
174
Ibid., page 39.
175
Sarmiento, La vida de Dominguito, page xvii.
171
44
pues catorce millones de americanos tienen padres europeos. Hasta entonces, se
conservaba típica la raza puritana y cuáquera.176
Simply by using words like “pure blood” and “puritan race” Sarmiento was adulterating the
social system in which the self-made model was born, by integrating racial barriers into the
equation. To clarify, Franklin’s self-made model aimed to erase the social notions that limited a
man to the social status to which he was born. Nevertheless, much like Franklin had suggested
with his discrimination of the German population in Philadelphia, the success of this self-made
model was dependent on the race of the person attempting to follow in his footsteps.
In several of his publications, Sarmiento furthered this point by explaining that the
survival of a liberal, constitutional democracy required the predominance of society’s cultured
elite – often European descendants- and the vigorous repression of the ideas and social
institutions associated with the popular masses –often of mixed race.177 Thus, for Sarmiento, a
new aristocracy, one that reflected the notions and ideals found in America, was needed to
improve his nation. Those that did not fit such a model were not to be extended the opportunities
afforded by a democratic society.178 Evidence of this philosophy is found in his negative
writings regarding the masses. For example, when Sarmiento witnessed carnival in Italy in what
was part of his European trip in the 1840s, he described the masses as the negative counterpart of
history and the arts.179 In addition, while as president, Sarmiento stated in his book, Ambas
Americas, that the common people were no more than “ignorant, mere lifeless masses, moved
and governed by an intelligent and cultured aristocracy” [ignorantes, meras masas inertes,
movidas i gobernadas por una intelijente i cultivada aristocracia].180
In addition to these claims, Sarmiento supported this theory by depicting the United
States as a nation that progressed because the nation consisted of only myrmidons of aristocratic
values. Raising the United States to perfection, Sarmiento specifically negated the existence of
lower societal classes within the United States, claiming that, “in the United States, not having
but one social class, which forms the man, there are not three or four classes of vagrants like in
Europe” [pues en los Estados Unidos, no habiendo sino una clase en la sociedad, la cual forma
Sarmiento, P inas de Sarmien o, pages 86-87.
Katra, Domingo F. Sarmiento, Public Writer…, page 7.
178
Mariel Erostarbe, El epis olario n imo de Sarmien o, pages 164-165.
179
Sarmiento, Viajes en Europa, Africa i America, page 785.
180
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Ambas Américas: revista de educación, (New York, NY: Imprenta de
Hallet y Breen, 1867), page 14.
176
177
45
al hombre, no hay tres i aun cuatro clases de vagones, como sucede en Europa].181 To make the
nation fit his image of perfection, Sarmiento overlooked the fact that the constituents of this
“sole class” nation of apotheosis citizens were, in actuality, the elite class that were descendants
of rich families or affluent businessmen. In addition, in his mystification of the United States,
Sarmiento deliberately ignored that within the reality of the situation of the United States there
existed poor agricultural workers in the newer states and widespread poverty in the cities which
was encumbering welfare organizations of the new nation.182 By elevating the United States to
include solely the elite class, he could justify limiting the opportunities that Franklin’s self- made
model awarded to the select few that he deemed fit, instead of helping to raise the masses to a
better standard of living by giving them the same opportunities afforded to his exclusive class of
citizens.183 Ultimately, where Franklin was attempting to break down societal barriers that
would block individuals like him from contributing to the society in which he functioned,
Sarmiento was placing new, racial barriers on certain groups of people to create a society that
mimicked that in which Franklin existed.
In effect, in an attempt to avoid the social maladies incurred by the United States in its
rise to greatness, Sarmiento believed that the only way Argentine society would reflect
Franklin’s civilized society was by elevating those he deemed fit into the elite classes and
suppressing the very masses that a model based on the American creed would have promised to
elevate.184 Sarmiento was thus not shy in his position regarding the inequality of races. For
Sarmiento, select races were more superior than others in several aspects concerning civility,
morality, and the ability to contribute to society. Within the Argentine society, Sarmiento
recognized that there existed a superior class of white, European descendants (criollos) and then
those that fell into the lower, social classes of black, indigenous, and mixed race.185 For
Sarmiento, because the gap between these two counterpoints in society was more aggrandized in
the United States than it was in Argentina, this was one reason why the United States was able to
progress as it had hitherto been able.186
181
Sarmiento, Viajes en Europa, Africa i America, page 302.
Ibid., page 879.
183
Katra, Domingo F. Sarmiento, Public Writer…, page 6.
184
Sarmiento, P inas de Sarmien o, page 68.
185
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Conflicto y armonías de la razas en América , S. Ostwalt, ed. (Buenos
Aires, AR: Imprenta de D. Tuñez, 1883), page 258.
186
Ibid., page 258.
182
46
Labeling these racial classes as the inferior or “savage” races, Sarmiento argued the
following in his book Conflicto y armonías de las razas en America:
The differences in volume of the brain that exist between individuals of a same race are
ever more evident as they reach higher levels of civilization. Under an intellectual point
of view, savages are more or less stupid, while those that are civilized are composed of
dull-witted individuals that resemble savages, people of a mediocre spirit, men of
intelligence and superior men. It is understood that the superior races are more
diversified than the inferior, assuming that the minimum is common in all races, and that
the maximum that is very weak for savages is, in contrast, very elevated for the civilized.
Las diferencias de volumen de cerebro que existen entre los individuos de una misma
raza son tanto más grande cuanto más elevadas están en la escala de la civilización.
Bajo el punto de vista intelectual, los salvajes son más o menos estúpidos, mientras que
los civilizados se componen de estólidos semejantes a los salvajes, de gente de espíritu
mediocre, de hombres inteligentes y de hombres superiores. Se comprende que las raza
superiores sean más diferenciadas que las inferiores, dando por sentado que el mínimum
es común en todas las razas, y que el máximum que es muy débil para los salvajes es, al
contrario, muy elevado para los civilizados.187
The critical point then was the following: education was needed to raise the intellectual and
moral ability of the Argentine populace in order to elevate society as a whole.188 However, as
some portions of this populace were physically unable to receive the elevating effects of such
education due to their inferiority, attempting to integrate these groups into a civilization scheme
was futile. In excluding certain people from his master plan, Sarmiento was in essence
redefining the world civilization to arrive at what he thought would be a model of the
quintessential race: Franklin’s virtuous America.189
187
Ibid., page 26.
Katra, “Race, Identity, and National Destiny,” Sarmiento, page 82.
189
Ibid.
188
47
CHAPTER FOUR
Provinciano or Porteño?
Understanding the Growth of Argentine Identity
Prior to examining the political reforms that Sarmiento proposed as a means to
Franklinize Argentina, it is important to evaluate the political and social background of the
nation throughout his political career. To this respect, the discussion must commence with a
brief history of Argentina’s formation.
The nation of Argentina began as a territory in the southern region of South America
which was barren and sparsely inhabited by indigenous populations. Upon the arrival of the
Spanish conquistadors in the sixteenth century, this territory became part of the Viceroyalty of
Peru under the Spanish Crown’s colonial conquests. However, it was not further developed until
the eighteenth century when the growth of Spanish settlements in the regions of Salta, Córdoba,
and Buenos Aires made it necessary for the region to form its own governmental region as the
Viceroyalty of el Río de la Plata in 1776.190 As a consequence of the fall of the Spanish
Crown’s monarchical family, the Bourbons, to France in the Napoleonic Wars that commenced
in 1805, the Spanish colonies began to seek independence. Already quite autonomous, the city of
Buenos Aires established its own government on May 25, 1810.191 In 1816, the region declared
its independence under the leadership of General José de San Martín and finally ended its battle
for independence in 1821.192
However, the glory of this independence was transient as the new nation erupted in a civil
war that would pit the provinces against the city of Buenos Aires. This war concluded with the
consolidation of a constitution that placed a pro-centralist intellectual, Bernardino Rivadavia, as
president in 1826. This attempt for democracy was proven futile when the provinces rejected
this pro-Buenos Aires constitution and put the governor of Buenos Aires, Juan Manuel de Rosas,
as leader of the Argentine Confederation.193 As a consequence of Rosas’ reign over the
190
Skidmore, Modern Latin America: Volume 6, page 32.
David Rock, Argentina, 1516-1987: from Spanish Colonization to Alfonsín, (Berkeley, CA: University
of California Press, 1987), page 27.
192
Ibid., page 27.
193
Ibid., pages 27-28.
191
48
Argentine provinces, any attempt to establish an Argentine democracy was hindered and the state
remained in perpetual battle between the pro-provincial leaders – the Federalists- and the battling
intellectuals – the Unitarians. Upon his refusal to enact a national constitution, Rosas’ rule,
which lasted from 1829 to 1852 with one brief interruption from 1832 to 1835, was ended by a
fellow Federalist, General Justo José de Urquiza of Entre Ríos. Through this restoration of
national sovereignty, Argentine leaders, both Federalist and Unitarian, wrote the 1852
constitution under which Sarmiento was elected as president in 1868.194
Indeed, Argentina’s turbulent political and social dynamics interfered with the creation of
a republic. These political and social maladies, which tormented the Argentine people after the
revolution of independence from Spain, can be explained as products of how the nation had been
developing economically due to the movement of the people within Argentina’s borders. To
commence, the movement of Argentine inhabitants throughout the Pampas and the provincial
sectors created a mosaic of cultures that were the result of the different lifestyles needed for these
regions. Under the Spanish Crown, merchants, traders, and Spanish officials dictated the
development of the region through an antiquated system linked to European regulations.
Emphasizing the importance of port cities, like Buenos Aires, which linked the Americas to
Europe, inhabitants of the Plata region were accustomed to a lifestyle that embodied European
traditions over pastoral customs.195 However, this linkage system quickly dissipated in the
aftermath of the revolution, leaving a vacuum of power in which intellectuals, like Sarmiento,
placed their political opinions and began a war between this established European lifestyle and
the formative country life.
Thus, before Sarmiento became president, there already existed a division within the
Argentine people that was based primarily on demographics. Prior to the revolutionary wars of
South America in the 1820s, the urban sector of what was then the Viceroyalty of el Río de la
Plata held more weight politically than did their rural counterpart due to the large concentration
of people in the former.196 To illustrate this point, between the concluding years of the
eighteenth century and the years that inaugurated the nineteenth century, the cities of Cordoba
and Buenos Aires sustained the majority of what was the viceroyalty’s population. In contrast,
194
Ibid., page 28.
Lynch, Argentine Caudillo: Juan Manuel de Rosas, page 35.
196
Ibid.
195
49
the entirety of El Litoral, which spanned six provinces and was the epicenter of the rural sector
of the viceroyalty, supported less than thirty-six percent of the population of the region.197
In addition, as the intricacies of the urban sectors of Argentina depended on the functions
and funding of the Crown, European influence and a connection to European markets were
ubiquitous only in these sectors. This allowed merchants and bureaucrats to benefit from these
links.198 For instance, for merchants and craftsmen employed in a trade, port cities, like Buenos
Aires, which offered the monopoly of the Crown and a direct connection to exterior markets,
were, for all practical purposes, more favorable to establish their business than countryside
communities.
By the inception of the eighteenth century, colonial Argentina was blossoming as a
region, attracting diverse cultures and peoples. As noted, commerce and trade established by the
Crown in the urban sectors drew thousands of Spanish peninsulares (subjects born in Spain),
American-born Spaniards (criollos), and European immigrants seeking to be part of this market,
to the cities. Albeit these groups constituted the majority of the population of the Argentine
region of the Spanish viceroyalty, alongside these groups of merchants and traders were minority
groups such as the African population which were coerced into the region as slaves and
servants.199 However, the countryside of the Argentine region of the Viceroyalty of el Río de la
Plata did not have the same high concentration of people of European origin living in the region.
In contrast to the urban sectors, migration towards these areas came from Northern indigenous
territories from what is now considered Chile, Bolivia, and Peru.200 In addition to this large,
indigenous population, criollos of low economic means and runaway African slaves, both of
which appeared first in the urban sectors of this region, migrated toward the countryside in
search of opportunity and freedom.201 As a result, the countryside became an amalgamation of
these three groups of people, with the criollo and indigenous groups producing the predominant
population in the region.202
197
Ibid.
Pacho O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas: el maldito de nuestra historia oficial, (New York, NY:
Bookette Software Company, 2003), page 23.
199
Eva Garcia Abos, "Composición social del ejército argentino durante la etapa de Rosas, 1829-1852."
ULÜA 7 (Enero-Junio 2006): 128, www.jstor.org.
200
Ibid., page 147.
201
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel…, page 25.
202
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 25.
198
50
It was not until the era after the revolutionary wars of South America that this distribution
of people within the Argentine region began to shift. After the revolutionary wars, the
movement of people continued at such a rate that by 1825 the population of both the urban and
rural sectors had significantly grown.203 This trend persisted until the rural sectors of Argentina
were at par with the local distribution of population in the urban regions. As a result, El Litoral
supported approximately fifty percent of the infant country’s population by the time Rosas came
to power.204
Although much of the displacement of urban dwellers to the countryside can be explained
by the turbulent nature of war, other reasons can be traced to the changes occurring within the
economic system of the cities that occurred after the war. In particular, these changes were a
result of the decline of commerce between the cities and the rural provinces, the competition
incurred by the British Industrial Revolution, the loss of the economic monopoly secured by the
Spanish Crown in the cities, and the destruction of the livestock industry in the rural provinces
due to the wartime barricades and battles.205 Due to these changes, by 1820 a large percent of
those that worked as merchants and traders in the city commenced to invest in land and livestock
in the rural provinces with the hopes of reinvigorating the market through these means.206 For a
nation built on the establishment of the urban sector, the continual investment in the rural sectors
of Argentina and the transformation of the demography of the countryside and cities definitively
affected the dynamics of the premature country.
As a consequence of these demographic shifts, the development of these dynamics into
two distinct socio-economic groups gave birth to two diverse cultures –one urban and one ruralwhich influenced the political and social ideas regarding the progress and growth of the nation.
Of these two cultures, the first, which related to the urban sectors of Argentina, was more wellknown globally as it was inspired by the social and intellectual European movements of the
eighteenth century. In consequence, this culture, which influenced individuals like Sarmiento,
came to resemble the intellectual elite of Europe and the new American nation.207 However, the
counterpart to this urban culture was less familiar to the eyes of the world. This rural lifestyle,
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel…, page 35.
Ibid.
205
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 23.
206
Ibid.
207
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento and Luis de Paola, Memorias, (Buenos Aires: Ediciones Culturales
Argentinas, Ministerio de Educación y Justicia, 1963), page 183.
203
204
51
known as the gauchesca culture, became the antithesis of Sarmiento’s intellectual revolution and
must therefore be further evaluated.
Coupled with the vision of the countryside was always that of the gaucho, his horse, and
his rural values. When the Viceroyalty of el Río de la Plata was formed in 1776, immigrants
from the western parts of the continents -what was once the Viceroyalty of Peru- inundated the
interior province of the region. Due to migration patterns, the majority of these immigrants were
of indigenous origin, and thus from their native languages the word “gaucho” appeared for the
first time in the vernacular and official paperwork of el Río de la Plata inhabitants.208 Derived
from the Quechua word guacho, a word meaning orphan, the significance of the application of
the word gaucho to the people of this region was evident in that it described a nomad, openly
adapting to the hardships of life in the pampas and the territory of the interior of the region,
without a government to officially claim them.209
Of mixed blood, usually of an indigenous mother and a European father, the gaucho was
the dominator of the purported savage territories of what is now Argentina. Traditional gaucho
culture emphasized certain aspects of their indigenous subculture which embraced the concepts
of stoicism, mysticism, and a pantheistic view concerning the natural world.210 As a
consequence of this worldview, an authentic gaucho was never bound to any hacienda or
government institution; the idea of private property, industry, and land tenure were ideas that
were as foreign to gaucho life as the absence of structure was to urbanites.211 Due to this
lifestyle, urbanites ofthe Argentine region reputed the gaucho as being as savage as the lands in
which he dwelled, often making the gaucho tradition comparable to only that of the indigenous
race of the region.212
Nevertheless, the life of the free gaucho changed with the shift of the economic interest
and the exodus of the urbanites to the countryside after the wars of revolution. When affluent
port merchants initiated their change of economic means to that of land owning, they began to
208
Rosalba Campra, "En busca del gaucho perdido." Revista de Crítica Literaria Latinoamericana, No.
60 (2004): 315. www.jstor.org.
209
Madaline W. Nichols, "The Gaucho," Pacific Historical Review, (Mar 1936): 65, www.jstor.org.
210
Will Rogers, The Papers of Will Rogers: Wild West and Vaudeville, April 1904-September 1908.
Arthur Frank Wertheim and Barbara Bair, ed. (Claremore, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2006),
page 309.
211
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel…, page 38.
212
Nichols,"The Gaucho," page 67.
52
Figure 4.1: Indigenous Migration Map. Indigenous migration patterns to the interior region of
present day Argentina. The arrow indicates the movement of indigenous people from the
Viceroyalty of Peru to El Litoral. This photograph was taken and made by the author.
53
Figure 4.2: The Nomadic Life of a Gaucho. In this picture two gauchos are portrayed drinking
mate, an herbal drink of Argentina. This image is under public domain and can be found in the
Museo Histórico Nacional in Argentina.
54
claim territories which pertained to no one on official records yet were nonetheless inhabited by
the indigenous and gaucho populations. As a result, these rural populations found themselves
confronting a system of laws and a governmental institution that the elites of the city knew how
to maneuver, yet where incomprehensible to a population accustomed to autarchy.213 Almost
instantaneously, the rural provinces of the interior districts which had hitherto been abrogated by
city officials as falling outside of gubernatorial jurisdictions became new political and legislative
colonies of these urbanites. In consequence, new land patrons decided to personally administer
their newly arrogated lands instead of controlling these territories from the city through
delegations.214 Through this structure of ad hoc administration, the urbanites were successful in
creating a society of economic class and racial division in the rural provinces that had
antecedently not existed for the gaucho population of the countryside. However, without a
settled middle class, as was consistent of urban societies, the societal divisions in the countryside
favored those who brought in wealth through land, thus leaving those without official land titleslike the gaucho- as the constituents of the lower class.215
Versed in the dynamics of industry, these new rural patrons knew they needed a large
amount of cheap labor in order to earn a sufficient amount of money in the pampas that would
replace the business they had lost to the economic changes of the nation.216 The solution to this
dilemma was found in the gauchos who knew the territory and how to work it well. In order to
coerce this semi-anarchical population into a structured lifestyle with laws and regulations, rural
patrons implemented a system of laws that made inherent activities of the gaucho lifestyle illegal
in the region. For instance, all persons living in the rural provinces of Argentina had to carry
identification that permitted them to enter and leave certain territories, no one could hunt wild
animals or livestock on these territories, and all individuals had to be registered in the official,
rural army of the province in order to fight against the indigenous populations of the frontier.217
In essence, through these reforms, the elites were systematically eliminating the culture and
tradition of the free roaming gauchos, hoping to drive this population of mozos vagos y mal
213
José Hernández, Frank Gaetano Carrino, and Alberto J. Carlos. The Gaucho, Martín Fierro.(New
York, NY: State University of New York Press, 1974), page 102.
214
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 22.
215
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel…, page 37.
216
Marcelo Germán Posada, "La conformación del perfil del empresariado pecuario. El caso del Partido
de Mercedes (Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1850-1890)," Revista de Historia de América, no. 112 (Jul. - Dec.
1991.): 162, www.jstor.org.
217
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel…, page 43.
55
entretenidos into a working class that would benefit their business.218 Thus, in a turn of
misfortune, the once free and independent gaucho became an impoverished, unemployed vagrant
of the lands now ruled by the elites.219
As a result of these reforms, the elite class began losing gaucho populations to even more
virgin territory in the south. In order to reverse this trend, the elites’ spearheaded a campaign to
gain the respect and support of this new “lower class”. In an 1829 interview with Argentine
newspaper agent Santiago Vazquez, the future dictator of Argentina, Juan Manual de Rosas, shed
light over this very point:
I know and respect many of the talents of several of the men that have governed this
nation, especially the talents of men like Rivadavia, Agüero, and others of their era,
however in my belief all of these men have committed a grave error: they worked well
with the enlightened [societal] classes, yet they despised the man of the lower classes,
those of the countryside, the ones who are people of action.
conozco y respeto mucho los talentos de muchos de los señores que han gobernado el
país, y especialmente de los señores Rivadavia, Agüero y otros de su tiempo, pero a mi
parecer todos cometían un error grande: se conducían muy bien con la clase ilustrada,
pero despreciaban al hombre de las clases bajas, los de la campaña, que son la gente de
acción.220
Although Rosas proposed gaining the trust and support of the lower classes as the key to reigning
the countryside of the nation, acquisitioning the support of this ‘class of action’ was not a
feasible task. As part of the values of the gaucho lifestyle, this population submitted to no one
who was not on an equal level to them with regard to their land skills and their cultural values.
Such an individual had to display courage, loyalty, strength, and labor -characteristics that not all
individuals of the enlightened class possessed- on a level that gauchos could respect and
follow.221
In attempting to achieve this feat, men of the elite class of the cities, like Juan Manuel de
Rosas, began to adopt the ways of the gaucho in order to attain the loyalty of this rural class. In
the same aforementioned interview, Rosas commented upon this transformation process:
I thought it, then, very important to achieve a great influence over these people [the
gauchos] in order to contain them, or to guide them, and I proposed to myself to acquire
The translation of mozos vagos y mal entretenidos is “lazy servants and badly entertained”
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel …, page 43.
220
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 23; and Garcia Abos, " om osi i n so ial del ejér i o …”,
page 60.
221
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel …, page 43.
218
219
56
this influence by whatever means necessary; for this [purpose], I went precisely to work
with much persistency, with many sacrifices, to become a gaucho like them, to talk like
them, and to do whatever they did, to protect them, and make me their leader.
Me pareció, pues, muy importante, conseguir una influencia grande sobre esa gente para
contenerla, o para dirigirla, y me propuse adquirir esa influencia a toda costa; para esto
me fue preciso trabajar con mucha constancia, con muchos sacrificios hacerme gaucho
como ellos, hablar como ellos y hacer cuanto ellos hacían, protegerlos, hacerme su
apoderado.222
Through these means, the urban elite now ruling over the rural provinces were able to attain the
loyalty, support, and thus the cheap labor and vote of the gaucho class.223 In essence, in
exchange for the promise of a lifestyle relatively free from the regulations and restrictions of the
urban societies, and the protection of their patron through loyalty and hard work, the once free
gaucho became the subordinated working class of the rural provinces of Argentina.224
In acquiring the respect and support of the gaucho class, these urban leaders of the rural
poor, named caudillos in the provinces, extended their influence in the provinces by becoming
known as the “fathers” of all the poor, through the generosity of their protection and support.225
As mentioned, this support was not only beneficial for the urban patrons for the use of labor, but
it also augmented the number of votes these individuals accumulated for elections to political
positions in the rural provinces. To illustrate this point, during the years 1835 and 1852, almost
sixty percent of the governmental delegates of the nation were provincial land owners and
patrons that commanded their territories as caudillos. By 1869, during Sarmiento’s presidency,
the influence of the inhabitants of the countryside was triple than that of the urbanites solely due
to the amount of people living in the countryside at the time.226 In addition, the focus of the
economy on cattle, wool, and agriculture made the provinces the center of Argentina’s growth
and progress.227
Thus, in the midst of the formation of the once European centered nation, Argentina was
leaving behind its trajectory of an industrial nation for that of a more agricultural centered
Garcia Abos, " om osi i n so ial del ejér i o …”, page 160.
Carlos Horacio Luparia, El gaucho: de hombre libre a peón del campo, (Indianapolis, IN: Indiana
University and Ciudad Argentina, 2003), page 61.
224
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 23.
225
Garcia Abos, " om osi i n so ial del ejér i o …”, page 128.
226
Lynch, Ar en ine audillo: Juan Manuel…, page 36.
227
Rock, Argentina, 1516-1987…, page 126.
222
223
57
economy due to the efforts of the urban elite in the countryside. With regard to this shift in the
political situation, Sarmiento commented the following in a memoir: “Cattle direct the politics of
Argentina. Who are Rosas, Quiroga, and Urquiza? They are grazers of cattle, nothingelse”
(‘Las va as diri en la ol i a Ar en ina. ¿Qué son Rosas, Quiro a Urqui a? Apacentadores
de va as, nada m s’).228 This “cattle politics” prospered under Rosas’ rule providing provincial
leaders the political and economic power of the region through tariff and trade exclusions which
let their lands prosper.229 Nevertheless, Rosas’ rule did not satisfy Argentine intellectuals’ desire
for a constitutional government, and thus after two decades of rule, the control that cattle politics
had on Argentine land began to falter.
Argentina’s chance at becoming a constitutional republic came in the mid-nineteenth
century, well over four decades after the nation formed its first government in 1810. The words
of a prominent Argentine intellectual, Esteban Echeverria, during the decade that culminated in
Rosas’ overthrow, illustrate this shift. According to Echeverria, the unification of Argentina was
the link to its success as a democracy. In accordance, Echeverria suggested that future leaders of
the Argentine Republic should not penalize those that supported Rosas and other forms of
tyranny in the past, but rather allow them the opportunity to be part of the democratic fabric of
the new constitution so that tyranny would not exist.230 He further clarified his position with
regard to Argentina’s future by stating the following in a letter written to General Justo Jos de
Urquiza in 1846:
We are not Unitarians or Federalists, because we believe that both have misunderstood
the ideology of May or have forgotten it…We want, then, in the national organization,
the sovereignty and independence of each Province in everything that relates to its
internal regimen and the erection of a central government to administer the interests and
direct the general business of the Confederation. We want, then, social guarantees,
fraternity between all, liberty for all, and the equality of the rights and privileges for each
and every one of the members of the great Argentine family.
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 41.
Ibid., page 25.
230
Ibid., page 35.
228
229
58
Figure 4.3: General Juan Manuel de Rosas. This sketch is a portrait of General Juan Manuel de
Rosas, c 1832. This image is under public domain. The original work can be found in the
Archivo General de la Nación in Argentina.
59
Figure 4.4: General Justo José de Urquiza. This is a daguerreotype of General Justo José de
Urquiza, Governor of Entre Ríos. c. 1852. This image is under public domain. The original can
be found in the Museo Histórico Nacional (Argentina).
60
Nosotros no somos unitarios ni federales, porque creemos que unos y otros han
om rendido mal el ensamien o de Ma o o lo han e hado en olvido…Queremos, ues,
en la organización nacional, la soberanía e independencia de cada Provincia en todo lo
relativo a su régimen interno y a la erección de un Gobierno central para la gestión de
los interés y la dirección de los negocio generales de la Confederación. Queremos, pues,
garantías sociales, la fraternidad entre todos, la libertad para todos, y la igualdad de
derechos y deberes en todos y cada uno de los miembros de la gran familia argentina.231
In effect, Echevarria explained in this passage that the only way to progress was to deride all of
the ideologies that had divided the nation in the past and kept haunting the leaders of their
generation. Argentina did not consist of Unitarians and Federalists, but rather of Argentines, all
united and willing to construct a stronger nation than what had resulted from the conclusion of
the wars of independence from Spain.232
Thus, impassioned by the desire to unify the country under one constitution and weary of
the frivolous policies and reforms that Rosas began to implement in the late 1840s to protect his
monopoly of meat and hide exports in Buenos Aires, the people of the provinces supported the
1851 attack against Rosas’ by fellow caudillo General Justo José de Urquiza of Entre Ríos. Just
one year later, in 1852, General Urquiza was successful in usurping power from Rosas in what
became known as the “conquest of Federalism”.233 In this campaign, Urquiza united rival
Federalists and Unitarians in a cause that would aim to unify the country. Upon the re-conquest
of Argentina from Rosas, Urquiza wrote the following in a letter in which he professed his hope
for the future of his nation:
The glory of constructing the Republic [of Argentina] should be by everyone and for
everyone. It has always been to my favor having been able to thoroughly comprehend
the thoughts of my countrymen and contribute to their realization.
La Gloria de constituir la República debe de ser de todos y para todos. Yo tendré
siempre en mucho la de haber comprendido bien el pensamiento de mis conciudadanos y
contribuido a su realización.234
231
Celso Ramón Lorenzo, Manual de historia constitucional Argentina 2. (Rosario, AR: Editorial Juris,
1997), page 172.
232
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 32.
233
Rock, Argentina, 1516-1987:…, page 120.
234
Juan Bautista Alberdi, Bases un os de ar ida ara la or ani a i n oli i a de la Re u li a
Argentina. (Buenos Aires, Argentina: Academia Nacional de Derecho y Ciencias Sociales, 1852),
retreived from: http://www.hacer.org/pdf/Bases.pdf, page 3.
61
With the hope of constructing of nation for all of his countrymen, which encompassed the needs
of both gauchos and intellectuals, Urquiza led the conversation that created the Agreement of
San Nicolás in 1852. This agreement laid the groundwork for the first Argentine constitution
that addressed both the gauchos’ needs by eradicating internal tariffs and the intellectuals’ needs
by strengthening central government.235
Unfortunately, the pith of the debates that permitted Argentina’s leaders to write a
constitution left leaders of the provinces and of Buenos Aires deaf to the pleas for unification. In
turn these became the very rift that ignited yet another civil war among the nation’s leaders.
Displeased with the economic concessions given to the cattle herders of the provinces in the
constitution of 1852, an elite group of liberal intellectuals from Buenos Aires, called the
setembristas for their formation in September of 1852, refuted the constitution and began an
urban revolt that same year.236 By early 1853, the setembristas officially rejected the Agreement
of San Nicolas and withdrew from a constitutional convention led by General Urquiza.
Moreover, this liberal movement declared that until the Argentine constitution granted Buenos
Aires complete economic and political primacy, allowing the city to utilize and exploit the
provinces as markets for their success, the representatives of Buenos Aires would not approve
any future constitution.237 In response to this urban attack on the provinces, Urquiza began his
new campaign in defense of the provinces that would result in the separation of Buenos Aires
from the provinces.
Unable to reach an accord with Buenos Aires, the provinces of El Litoral formed the
Argentine Confederation in 1853 which offered the provinces a constitution that favored their
economic interests. In 1854, General Urquiza was elected the Argentine Confederation’s first
president and he moved the capital to his native town of Concepción del Uruguay in Entre
Ríos.238 In this same year, Britain commenced a strong wool trade with the Argentine provinces
and awarded the Argentine Confederation diplomatic recognition which opened up commerce
that was previously closed by Rosas’ Buenos Aires reforms within El Litoral.239 Distraught at
the idea of having such intense economic competition from the Argentine Confederation, Buenos
235
Rock, Argentina, 1516-1987…, pages 120-121.
Ibid.
237
Ibid.
238
Ibid.
239
Ibid., page 120.
236
62
Aires leader, Bartolomé Mitre, began to exploit local grievances within the provinces to disarm
the confederation’s power. As a result, President Urquiza invaded Buenos Aires in 1859 which
sparked mitrista revolts within the city.240 This quasi civil war ended in the Battle of Pavón in
September of 1861, where General Urquiza, tired of the disunity that marred the nation,
withdrew from Buenos Aires on the condition that the 1852 constitution would be ratified. In
that same year, all provinces, including Buenos Aires, ratified the 1852 constitution and elected
Bartolomé Mitre as the first president of Argentina.241
From the re-conquest of Argentina by Urquiza to the election of Bartolomé Mitre as
president, Sarmiento was rapidly building his political career and intellectual repertoire amongst
leading Argentines. Upon the commencement of the campaign to usurp General Rosas from
power, Sarmiento saw his opportunity to rejoin his countrymen in the land that had exiled him
for over three decades and returned to Gualeguaychú to join the troops of General Urquiza. As
lieutenant colonel under the orders of Urquiza, Sarmiento fought with Urquiza until the battle of
Caseros where Rosas fell from power in 1852. Despite the fact that most intellectuals and
Unitarian party members, like Juan Bautistia Alberdi, had become pro-Urquiza, Sarmiento was
unable to reconcile the differences that he had with Urquiza’s policies and once again fled to
Chile under self-exile in the same year.242
Ultimately, this self-exile stemmed from Sarmiento identifying himself with the culture
and intellectuals of Buenos Aires instead of the provincianos of the Argentine Confederation.
As a result, from 1852 to 1855, Sarmiento rejected several political posts under the leadership of
General Urquiza as a representative of the Argentine Confederation, including delegate for San
Juan, delegate for Tucuman, and delegate to the Legislature of the State of Buenos Aires.243
Distraught at being a “provinciano en Buenos Aires, porteño en las provincias”, Sarmiento
sought to reconcile the elite culture of Buenos Aires with the provinces in order to unify the
nation.244
240
Ibid., page 123.
Ibid., page 125.
242
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Andr s Iduarte, and James F. Shearer, Sarmien o: a ravés de sus
mejores
inas (New York, NY: Dryden Press, 1949), page xviii.
243
Ibid., page xix.
244
Ibid.; translation: “a provincial person in Buenos Aires, and a Buenos Aires person in the provinces”.
241
63
Figure 4.5: Sarmiento in Battle. This is a daguerreotype of Domingo Faustino Sarmiento in
1852. The photo was taken after the Battle of Caseros, in which Sarmiento fought under the
orders of General Urquiza. This image is under public domain. The original can be found in the
Museo Histórico Sarmiento in Argentina.
64
Only when the state of Buenos Aires offered him a post as editor of El Nacional in 1855
did Sarmiento return to Argentina. Having rejected any posts under the Confederation of
Argentina and returning only to represent Buenos Aires, which remained independent from the
Argentine Confederation, Sarmiento was confirming his identity with Buenos Aires. The next
year, Sarmiento was elected Councilman of Buenos Aires and fulfilled several of the land,
colonization, railroad, and education projects in Buenos Aires that leaders with the Argentine
Confederation had previously offered him the possibility to accomplish in the provinces.245
Throughout the 1850s, Sarmiento’s political rise in Buenos Aires would continue, as he was
named Chief of the Department of Schools in Buenos Aires, delegate for Buenos Aires in the
Assembly to amend the 1852 constitution, and the Minister of War for Buenos Aires.246
When the Governor of Sarmiento’s native province of San Juan, Antonino Aberastain,
was assassinated in 1861, Bartolomé Mitre, as leader of Buenos Aires, sent Sarmiento to San
Juan with a military expedition from Buenos Aires with the purpose of establishing order. Upon
the resolution of the battle of Pavón -which dissolved the Argentine Confederation, the
unification of Argentina, and the election of Mitre as President of the reconciled nation,
Sarmiento accepted the elected post of Governor of San Juan in 1862. His reign as governor was
short lived, however, as he left the post two years later to accept the position offered to him in
Buenos Aires as Minister to the United States in 1864. This was the position he kept until 1868
when he was elected president of the Argentine Republic.247 It was in these four years that he
spent as Minister to the United States, that Sarmiento’s infatuation with the American people, the
“American spirit”, and the possibility of emulating its national model by implementing
Franklinesque reforms in Argentina were reaffirmed.248
Ibid.; and Juan Bautista Alberdi, Bases un os de ar ida ara la or ani a i n politica de la
Republica Argentina (Buenos Aires: Academia Nacional de Derecho y Ciencias Sociales, 1852), retreived
from: http://www.hacer.org/pdf/Bases.pdf, page 51.
246
Sarmiento, Sarmien o: a ravés de sus mejores
inas, page xx; and Sarmiento, Memorias, pages
183-185.
247
Sarmiento, Sarmien o: a ravés de sus mejores
inas, page xxi.
248
Sarmiento, Memorias, page 185.
245
65
CHAPTER FIVE
Redefining Civilization:
Gauchos, Caudillos, and the Consequences of the Self-Made Model
Upon Sarmiento’s return to Argentina, his actions revealed that his allegiance was to
Buenos Aires and the elite cultural ideals that the urban center embodied. Despite having been
born in the province of San Juan and considered a provinciano by Buenos Aires intellectuals,
Sarmiento worked hard to dismantle his connection to provincial culture. As a result, his actions
allowed him to become associated with a provincial identity only in Buenos Aires and with
Buenos Aires elitism in the provinces.249
His initial dissociation from the provinces began with his self exile to Chile upon his
rejection of the 1852 constitution because it did not give Buenos Aires sole control of the
nation’s economic and political institutions.250 By refusing to accept any posts or political
positions that would have him representing the provinces for the Argentine Confederation he
continued to tie his identity to Buenos Aires. To further solidify his identity with Buenos Aires,
only as an ambassador of Buenos Aires did he return to his native province of San Juan.
Moreover, his homecoming to his province was short lived as he relinquished his Governor’s
post before completing his term in order to represent Buenos Aires in the United States.251 Thus,
through his political actions, Sarmiento was making it clear that the interests and the culture of
the provinces were not a priority to him or his plans for the future of the country.
Ultimately, as Sarmiento’s rejection of provincial interests and association with Buenos
Aires grew, he was pushed to believe ever more fervently that the American model was the only
one for his nation. Sarmiento’s travels as Minister to the United States further reinforced the
idea that among a civilized people, there was no place for the gaucho and constituents of the
inferior races. In particular, angered because he believed that the gaucho had the potential to be
civilized but chose not to, Sarmiento argued that the gaucho’s rustic culture, which reflected the
Sarmiento, Memorias, page xix; translation: “a provincial person in Buenos Aires, and a porteño in the
provinces”. People from Buenos Aires were called porteño because of their proximity to and dependence
on the ports of Buenos Aires.
250
Ibid., page xxi.
251
Ibid.
249
66
opposite of the urbanized, Northeastern United States, was a detriment to the Argentine nation.252
Traveling all over New England, it became more apparent to Sarmiento that in order to achieve
the success of the United States, policy would have to be rewritten to shift the focus of his
government from the interior to the cities and from the gauchos to the educated.253 Sarmiento
justified the focus of gubernatorial policies to favor the cities, by proclaiming the benefits of
urbanized centers versus the interior. In the same letter to his gubernatorial colleague, Sarmiento
stated: “cities are the small oases of civilization…the only means of developing the capacity of
man, while plains prepare the way for despotism.”254 In essence, through his presidential
policies Sarmiento aimed to shift from a predominantly gaucho, rural culture, to an AngloEuropean, urban culture, in order to implement the elements of the Franklin self-made model.
Incited by his image of America, Sarmiento was determined to implement specific
political and social reforms in Argentina in order to create the equivalent of the “American
spirit” within his own nation. This national model, based on the ideas of virtue and moral
consciousness that were basic to Franklin’s self-made model, meant a redefinition of civilization
in terms that related to the elements of the Franklin model. Thus, throughout his publications
Sarmiento preached that intellectual advancement, moral regeneration, material success, and
social progress were the basis of a civilized world. In his acclaimed books, Facundo:
civilización y barbarie (1848) and Of Popular Education (1849), Sarmiento spoke of the general
law of human evolution as a reason to adopt Franklin’s model nationally. To elucidate this point,
Sarmiento outlined how evolution depended on the “education of the people so that rational
faculties could realize the truths of universal nature and moral reason” and thus man could be
“empowered to make his own life” and reach a civilized state.255 For all intents and purposes,
this meant that men should be educated, morally conscious, and industrious: all characteristics
highlighted by Franklin’s autobiography. This, proclaimed Sarmiento, was the message of “the
civilizer to the barbarous native.”256 Sarmiento was therefore attributing all characteristics of the
252
Sarmiento, Conflicto y armonías de la razas en América, page 215.
Correas, Sarmiento and the United States, page 6.
254
Sarmiento, Travels in the United States in 1847, page 11.
255
Allison W. Bunkley, “Sarmiento and Urquiza,” The Hispanic American Historical Review, Vol. 30,
No. 2 (May 1960): Duke University Press, www.jstor.org, page 177.
256
French, “The Influence of Horace Mann…,” page 18.
253
67
self-made model to civilization, which meant that those elements must be achieved in order for
civilization to exist.257
Sarmiento’s passion for creating a utopian, Franklinesque civilization, led the newly
elected President of the Argentine nation to declare a war against any encumbrances that
hindered progress towards this goal. From the lessons learned from the French Revolution, the
civil wars that plagued Argentina, and the American Civil War, Sarmiento created his political
theory which declared that in any given nation there existed a battle between civilization and
barbarism that determined the future of that nation. Thus, in order to protect the growth of a
Franklinesque nation, this barbarism must be eradicated.258 In the case of Argentina, the
educated, culturally elite urbanites were the emissaries of civilization and the gauchos and their
caudillo leaders were the bearers of barbarism.259
This was truth for Sarmiento as he believed that the gauchos, a mix of indigenous and
white races, were the direct adversaries of civilization, because they chose to live a life of
barbarism due to their indigenous half instead of embracing their superior, white half.260
Furthermore, according to Sarmiento the maladies that plagued Argentina were due to the
rampant allowance of this barbarism to control the growth and prosperity of the nation. Based
on his political ideology, Sarmiento was determined not to compromise with “barbarians” or
“barbarianism” lest the path of civilization be deterred.261 The details of this Argentine battle
became evident in Sarmiento’s book Facundo: civilización y barbarie, published first in Spanish
in 1845 and translated to English in 1866, just two years before Sarmiento was elected
president.262
The foundations of this book were based on the tempestuous years after Argentina’s
independence, when Sarmiento witnessed his nation under the rule of a gaucho majority and
their charismatic, farmland leaders, the caudillos. At the time Sarmiento was forced to flee to
Chile in self exile, the caudillo Juan Manual de Rosas was in power in Buenos Aires and his ally,
Bunkley, “Sarmiento and Urquiza,” page 177.
Sarmiento, Domingo F. 1998. Facundo: civilización y barbarie, vida de Juan Facundo Quiroga. D.F.,
Mexico: Editorial Porrúa. Page 16.
259
Ibid., page 17.
260
Ibid., page 16.
261
Bunkley, “Sarmiento and Urquiza,” page 177.
262
Sarmiento, Travels in the United States in 1847, page 11.
257
258
68
the caudillo Facundo Quiroga, controlled Sarmiento’s native province of San Juan.263 These
events led Sarmiento to view the gauchesca culture of Argentina as a detriment to society and
the one encumbrance that was to impede the civility of the nation.264 In his perspective, because
the gaucho culture did not embody elements of the Franklin model, they were thus inferior
culturally, intellectually, and morally. As evidence of this belief, Sarmiento published in one of
his political works that: “an educated people would never have voted for a caudillo.”265
Moreover, he believed that a society based solely on agriculture, like that of the gauchos, would
impede the progress of a culture toward civilization.266
Throughout his first months in office, Sarmiento continually referred to the assault of
barbarism on civilization and alluded to his famous literary work, Facundo: civilización y
barbarie, in order to explain his policies. His view of Argentina’s struggle was summarized in
the following statement from this book:
Argentina is a site of an age-old struggle between civilization and barbarism; that
civilization is represented by rationalism and intellectualism, by a settled life, and by
cities, while barbarism [is] represented by the willfulness and personalism of the gauchos,
by the nomadic life, and by the plains.267
Relating the battle between the civilized and the barbarous to the Franklinesque model,
Sarmiento argued that the countryside, where the gauchos resided, did not help to elevate the
characteristics necessary to cultivate the self-made model. To him, the countryside “justified
natural laziness” and encouraged a destruction of moral standings that were essential in fostering
the spirit of progress.268 He thus encouraged the establishment of cities throughout Argentina in
order to bring light and civilization to the Argentine nation. For him, “The city is the center of
Argentine-Spanish, European civilization” […La ciudad es el centro de la civilización
argentina-española, europea].269 Without the construction of these “oasis of civilization”
Sarmiento, Domingo Faustino, and Alberto Palcos. 1962. Facundo: Pr lo o no as del Al er o
Palcos. Buenos Aires: Ediciones Culturales Argentinas. Page 10.
264
Sarmiento, Domingo Faustino and Carlos Alberto Erro. 1963. P inas es o idas. [Buenos Aires]:
Ediciones Culturales Argentinas. Page 52.
265
Sarmiento, Travels in the United States in 1847, page 8.
266
Benjamin Franklin, On the Need for an Academy, (Yale University Institute: The Franklin Papers.
www.franklinpapers.org, August 24, 1749), accessed October 15, 2008; and Sarmiento, P inas
escogidas, page 53.
267
Sarmiento, Travels in the United States in 1847, page 11.
268
Sarmiento, Facundo: civilización y barbarie, page 17.
269
Ibid., page 16.
263
69
throughout the nation, the Republic would not be able to escape the darkness of the barbarism
brought on by the gauchos and their inferiority.
Sarmiento made evident his adulation for the city dwellers and their proclivity to
civilization over the gauchos in a specific passage of Facundo: civilización y barbarie in which
he compares the dress and physiognomy of a city dweller to that of a gaucho. For Sarmiento, the
man residing in a city:
dresses in European dress, lives a civilized life…where there are laws, ideas of progress,
mediums of instructions, some type of organized municipality, a regular government, etc.
El hom re de la iudad vis e el raje euro eo, vive de la vida ivili ada…all es n las
leyes, las ideas de progreso, los medios de instrucción, alguna organización municipal,
el gobierno regular, etc.270
In contrast, the gauchesca mode of dressing did not typify civilization, but rather went directly
against civilized dress. For Sarmiento, the man of the countryside:
far from aspiring to be like [the man] from the city, rejected with disdain the [city
dweller’s] look and manners of courtesy; and the city dweller’s dress, the tailcoat, the
cape, the chair, no European symbol can present itself with impunity in the countryside.
lejos de aspirar a semejarse al de la ciudad, rechaza con desdén su lujo y sus modales de
corteses; y el vestido del ciudadano, el frac, la capa, la silla, ningún signo europeo puede
presentarse impunemente en la campaña.271
For Sarmiento, these superficial differences between the civilized people of Buenos Aires and
the gauchos of El Litoral were evidence of deeper divisions within the people of his nation.
In addition to highlighting these apparent differences in culture, within Facundo:
civilización y barbarie Sarmiento makes his argument for the gauchos’ inherent incompatibility
with Franklin’s self-made model. Throughout his work, Sarmiento identified the gauchesca
culture as lacking the two basic elements of Franklin’s model necessary for civility: the desire
for intellectual capacity and moral integrity. In a section dedicated to the descriptionand analysis
of the gaucho and his lifestyle, Sarmiento states: “Country life, then, has developed the gaucho’s
physical faculties, but none of his intelligence…his moral character is thus affected…he does not
work.”272 Sarmiento is clear to show how the gaucho goes against
270
Ibid.
Ibid.
272
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento and Kathleen Ross, Facundo- Civilization and Barbarism : The First
Complete English Translation, (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, . 2003), page 58.
271
70
Figure 5.1: Urban versus Provincial Attire. (Right) A photograph of a Buenos Aires socialite
from the mid-nineteenth century. (Left) A photograph of a gaucho in traditional attire, taken c.
1868. Both photographs are under public domain. The originals can be found (left) in the
Archivo General de la Nación in Argentina and (right) the Library of Congress.
71
Figure 5.2: Facundo: civilización y barbarie. The published version of Facundo: civilización y
barbarie (1845). This image is under public domain. However, a version of the image can be
found in "Grandes protagonistas de la historia argentina: Domingo F. Sarmiento" by Félix
Luna.
72
the main characteristics of Franklin’s self-made model: the gaucho has afflicted morality, low
predilection for intelligence elevation, and no industry. For these reasons, he indicates that the
gaucho does not comply with his definition of civilization. To illustrate this point, Sarmiento
wrote, “this dissolution of society deeply implants barbarism because of the impossibility and
uselessness of moral and intellectual education”.273 Thus, because the gauchos did not follow a
lifestyle that embraced facets of Franklin’s self-made model, Sarmiento categorized gauchos as a
representation of all that was the worst, the most savage, of the Argentine character. Due to this
conclusion, for Sarmiento the gauchos could never become civilized.274
Distraught at having “two different societies on the same soil: one still
nascent…repeating the popular work of the Middle Ages…another the [result] of European
civilization” Sarmiento yearned to see the former destroyed in order to ensure the latter’s
survival.275 Through his writings Sarmiento attempted to undermine the gauchesca culture in
order to clear the path for a Franklinesque revolution. In his work, The schools: Basis of the
Prosperity of the United States, in which Sarmiento was writing to the Argentine government,
then inundated with gaucho statesmen, he belittles his countrymen’s culture by saying: “To write
for people who cannot read is like being a genealogist among peasants…Lord have pity on
me!”276 Further challenging the ways of the gaucho, Sarmiento wrote in a letter to his dear
friend, Mrs. Mann, that because of Argentina’s backwardness, “…the negro race of the United
States is more advanced in fifteen years of emancipation than our people in four centuries of
existence.”277 Sarmiento’s negative view of the gauchesca culture for its incompatibility with
Franklin’s version of a successful, self-made model therefore influenced his political ideology,
which he enforced throughout his presidency through pro-American, anti-gaucho reforms.
However, for his reforms to be successful, Sarmiento needed to efface the image of the
gaucho as part of the Argentine identity. As the gauchos were the majority in Argentina, the
city-dwellers often respected the mystic nature of their countrymen, either out of fear or out of
respect.278 Thus, Sarmiento needed to destroy this mystical image of the gaucho in order to place
273
Ibid.
Patton, Sarmiento in the United States, page 7.
275
Sarmiento, P inas es o idas, page 53.
276
Correas, Sarmiento and the United States, page 31.
277
French, The Influen e of Hora e Mann…, page 29.
278
Patton, Sarmiento in the United States, page 12.
274
73
a new image -that of the educated, self-made man - upon “the altars of mankind.”279 Therefore,
Sarmiento made a point of belittling and humiliating the gaucho culture in his presidency to
dismantle their hold on the pampas and on the imagination of the Argentine people. Referring to
the gaucho community as “backwards”, “uncivilized”, “unashamed of their ignorance”, and
“miserable” Sarmiento inspired an anti-gaucho sentiment in order to assist the process of shifting
Argentina to a more progressive nation.280 In doing this, Sarmiento was creating an image of the
gaucho as anti-republican and anti-democratic, when, in actuality, it was a gaucho who had
fought for the nation’s constitutionality and democracy.
As Sarmiento’s presidential polices required the exclusion of the “barbarous” gaucho
population from societal reform, only upon adulterating the image of the gaucho in Argentina’s
cultural identity could Sarmiento achieve his Franklinesque version of civilization. This was a
component of what Sarmiento considered his plan for “perfect liberty.”281 Perfect liberty, was an
ideology founded on Sarmiento’s belief that Argentina should be a nation serving those who
were already educated or had the propensity for intellectual advancement, those who lived in
urbanized cities, and those who had, or could achieve, a lifestyle of self-improvement. In
consequence, Sarmiento believed that by elevating only exclusive sections of Argentina’s
population, society as a whole would be improved.282 In his first address as president to the
Senators and Provincial Representatives of the Argentine government, Sarmiento expressed
these sentiments by declaring:
A majority doted with the liberty of being ignorant and miserable, does not constitute a
jealous privilege for the educated minority of a nation that is proud to call itself
republican and democratic.283
In essence, Sarmiento was implying that the educated minority was going to re-capture
Argentina from its backward predecessors. As president of the Argentine Republic, Sarmiento
was not willing to compromise with the gauchos for fear of jeopardizing the civility of a nation.
279
Sarmiento, Recollections of a Provincial Past, page 162.
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Obras de D. F. Sarmiento, Volume 12, Luis Montt and Augusto Belin
Sarmiento, ed. (Buenos Aires, AR: Imprenta Mariano Moreno, 1896), page 195.
281
Jeremy Adleman, Between Order and Liberty: Juan Bautista Alberdi and the Intellectual Origins of
Argentine Constitutionalism, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006), Project Muse: Scholarly
journals online, page 106.
282
Sarmiento, ar as dis ursos ol i os…, page 175.
283
Ibid., page 176.
280
74
He instead determined to bring the educated minority into power, hoping that his policies would
create a more educated population that would eventually overrule the barbarians of his land.
Albeit the marginal support of the provincial population, as a result of following the
theories that embodied the idea of “perfect liberty”, Sarmiento implemented three Franklinesque
policies in an attempt to shape Argentina into a replica of the United States. Through these
policies, Sarmiento believed that the Franklin self-made model would be accessible to a selective
mass that would be equipped, intellectually and morally, to improve themselves and therefore
their community.284 Only then would Argentina be successful in creating a civilized culture.
Thus, in the hopes of “changing the physiognomy of a country,” as Sarmiento declared in a letter
to his friend Mrs. Mann, Sarmiento’s policies were aimed at eradicating the gauchesca culture of
the countryside that dominated the preceding eras.285
The first and foremost of these platform issues was education. As Franklin had once
promoted in Pennsylvania, Sarmiento believed that universal education was necessary to elevate
the moral consciousness and integrity of the people.286 In attempting to Franklinize Argentina,
Sarmiento passed laws under his presidency which would create a universal common education
system that echoed the system already in use in the United States.287 Education, for Sarmiento,
was the requisite for human happiness, as he claimed that “…the dignity and capacity of
individuals, the greatness of nations…have no other lasting basis”.288 This was the tool
Sarmiento prized in combating barbarism, as he believed that an educated mass would lead the
nation away from despotism.289 In a conversation with his grandson, Augusto Belin, Sarmiento
commented the following:
We will improve the social conditions of the great majority and enter into the Republic’s
reality by way of education and well-being, so that those left unprotected by inheritance
may come to see the government and fatherland as their own.290
Furthermore, Sarmiento argued that such a system, as was established in the United States,
would work to improve a nation’s industry by making each urbanized man “…a focus of
284
Sarmiento, Travels in the United States in 1847, page 8.
French, The Influen e of Hora e Mann …, page 25.
286
Lemay, Rea raisin Benjamin Franklin…, page 367.
287
French, The Influen e of Hora e Mann …, page 21.
288
Penn, “Sarmiento- The ‘School-Master President’ of Argentina,” page 388.
289
Ibid., page 387.
290
Barrenchea, “The Buenos Aires/Córdoba Duality,” page 63.
285
75
production…a workshop for elaborating the means of prosperity.”291 His universal common
educational system would thus lead to a learned people and an improved industry, achieving two
essential elements of the Franklin model. To reach this goal, the government spent a large
majority of its budget on schools, universities, and public libraries during the six years of his
presidency.292
Moreover, Sarmiento equated the founding of a system, which provided universal
education to its citizens, to the rise of an elite class of citizens that was mythically found only in
the United States.293 For proof of this objective, Sarmiento wrote of his envy of the United
States because of the level of sophistication and intelligence of the North American people,
which was undoubtedly the result of the system of education modeled after Franklin’s
Pennsylvania. In one of his trips to Boston, Sarmiento commented that the United States could
count on “1000 or 2000 women and men that know much more than all of [Argentina’s] own
intellectuals” to guide them.294 Ultimately, in trying to equalize his nation’s population through
educational methods, Sarmiento was hoping to reach the level of mental superiority that the
United States was able to establish in just a few years. As evidence of this opinion, Sarmiento
published the following statement in an Argentine magazine:
The fundamental doctrine of a true democracy should be that superior education be a
right and privilege for all. Only coming from this principle is it possible to establish a
true Republic.
La doctrina fundamental de una verdadera democracia debiera ser que la educación
superior fuera el derecho i privilejios de todos. Solamente partiendo de este principio es
posible establecer una verdadera República.295
Thus, in following the doctrines of Benjamin Franklin and the system of public education that
the Philadelphian philosopher established in Pennsylvania, Sarmiento believed that universal
education was the only way that Argentina could become the elite class of citizens that could
embrace the equivalent of the “American spirit” in Argentina.
Nevertheless, Sarmiento acknowledged that Argentina, with its varying social and
economic classes, was nowhere near where he thought the United States was in terms of
French, The Influen e of Hora e Mann …, page 25.
Penn, “Sarmiento- The ‘School-Master President’ of Argentina,” page 388.
293
Please refer to chapter 3for more information.
294
Sarmiento, Memorias, page 222.
295
Sarmiento, Ambas Américas: revista de educación…, page 29.
291
292
76
progress. Therefore, within his political speeches and campaigns, he fervently expressed the
need to elevate all classes of his select urban society, especially woman and the impoverished, in
order to solve the maladies of the state.296 In the same Argentine magazine, Sarmiento clarified
that in order for the constituents of the Argentine Republic to follow the example of the United
States, schools had to be established for orphans, children, adults, women, and the
impoverished.297 For the poor cities of the provinces, Sarmiento maintained that education, even
if it was only seasonal primary education, was necessary in order to eradicate the ignorance of
the provinces.298 To further this point, and in keeping true to Franklin’s self-made model, he
noted in another one of his texts: “Educating the impoverished, is thus augmenting the number
[of people] that could be rich, that is, to add capital to the total capital of the State” [Educar
pobres, es pues aumentar el numero de que pueden ser ricos, es decir, a crecer riqueza al total
de la riqueza del Estado].299 With regards to women, Sarmiento continuously proclaimed their
ability to contribute to society and their eagerness within the classroom. Specifically, Sarmiento
wrote, ‘The level of civilization of a town can be judged by the social position of its women”
[Puede juzgarse el grado de civilización de un pueblo por la posición social de las mujeres].300
In essence, just as education had been a vehicle for Franklin to rise up from his impoverished
state, Sarmiento believed that this privilege was necessary for all of the citizens of his exclusive
class in order to foster the same spirit of progress as had Franklin’s America.
To continue fostering this spirit, Sarmiento’s second platform issue concerned the
Argentine Republic’s economy. Within his economic reforms, Sarmiento alluded to Franklin’s
staunch support for developing an industrious people. To elucidate this point, with regard to
industry, Franklin emphasized the relationship between work and character by preaching that
money, consumption, wealth, and work were all needed to create this character and bring about
the progress of the nation.301 Thus, influenced by Franklin’s model, with his economic platform
Sarmiento was determined to shift the focus of the nation’s economy from the countryside back
to the cities in an attempt to centralize the economy in Buenos Aires. The basis of this change
296
Sarmiento, Obras de D. F. Sarmiento, Volume 12, page 195.
Sarmiento, Ambas Américas: revista de educación…, page 61.
298
Domingo F Sarmiento, De la educación popular, (Santiago: Imprenta de Julio Belin y Compañía,
1849), page 536.
299
Sarmiento, Obras de D. F. Sarmiento, Volume 12, page 109.
300
Sarmiento, De la educación popular, page 143.
301
Mulford, The Cambridge Companion to Benjamin Franklin, page 135.
297
77
from an agricultural economy to one of the industrialized cities was based on the ideas of
progress established on the urbanized people’s superior sense of industry. Sarmiento argued:
In vain I have asked the provinces to let pass a bit of civilization, of industry, and of
European population; a stupid and colonial politic that became deaf to this
reasoning…the progress of civilization thus accumulates in Buenos Aires only, as la
pampa is a horrible conductor to take and distribute [civilization].302
Through these policies Sarmiento wanted to ensure that the government would attempt to
improve the economic health of the country. This in turn would raise the standard of living so
that material deficiency might not deter the process of their path to civilization.303
In supporting an economic model that promised an increase in material capital and wealth
accumulation, Sarmiento was ascribing to a specific component of the Franklin self-made model.
In particular, Franklin professed that material success was an important component in displaying
an individual’s social progress.304 In supporting this specific component of his economic
platform, Sarmiento was again going against the culture of El Litoral. To clarify, the people of
the pampas, who were not known to appreciate material possessions, were again symbols of
incivility and failed conductors of the self-made model for Sarmiento.305 Juan Bautista Alberdi,
Sarmiento’s intellectual colleague who had parted ways with Sarmiento upon becoming proUrquiza in 1852, critiqued Sarmiento’s policies and derided his anti-gaucho policies. One of his
more famous critiques succinctly summarizes what Sarmiento was aiming to do: ask the
economy “civilized in name but rustic in reality…to give us liberty, morality, and an intelligent
culture” by divorcing itself from the plains and the gauchos.306
The third and final platform in Sarmiento’s path to “perfect liberty” was immigration
reform. Although the Franklin self-made model did not allude to immigration as a factor for
success, Sarmiento aimed to use the immigration of paradigms of the “American spirit” in order
to plant seeds for this spirit to grow within Argentina.307 Thus, when he passed the law that
would allow the second largest immigration of European and North American people into
Argentina’s urban centers, he was attempting to over-power the countryside majority with people
Sarmiento, P inas es o idas, page 49.
Bunkley, “Sarmiento and Urquiza,” page 177.
304
Wood, The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin, page 49.
305
Sarmiento, P inas es o idas, page 51.
306
Adleman, Between Order and Liberty…, pages 107-108.
307
Bunkley, “Sarmiento and Urquiza,” page 178.
302
303
78
he deemed had the potential of achieving self-improvement.308 Once more, this idea can be
better understood in the words of Sarmiento’s chief critic, Juan Bautista Alberdi. In a letter to
Sarmiento regarding his immigration reform policy, Alberdi states:
This principle means going to the logical conclusion that we would have to suppress the
entire Argentine Hispanic colonial nation, incapable of becoming a republic, to be
supplanted in one sweep by an Anglo-European republican Argentine nation, the only
one that could be exempt of caudillismos.309
In essence, Sarmiento was attempting to remove the gaucho culture by inundating the country
with foreigners of a higher intellectual and moral disposition.310 This inundation of foreigners,
he hoped, would displace if not overpower the present barbarism in Argentina with what
Sarmiento considered to be civility.
Sarmiento took this argument one step further when he promoted the idea of the complete
eradication of these races and cultures from the country as the only solution in saving the
nation’s future. The purpose of encouraging immigration from Europe was not for these
“superior” races to inundate the country to mix with the already inferior classes, as that would
only propagate barbarism and obstruct the dissipation of civilization throughout the nation.311 In
an attempt to avoid this possible outcome, Sarmiento used civilization as his justification to wage
a war against the “inferior and mixed races of barbarians” within Argentina, encouraging all the
nation’s intellectuals to follow him in this cause. In accordance, Sarmiento gave evidence to this
sentiment in various texts, including an article that he published in the newspaper El Progreso in
which he stated the following:
For the savages of America, I feel an invincible repugnance that I cannot remedy. That
rabble is no more than disgusting Indians that I would send to have hung at this
moment…Incapable of progress…they should be exterminated without even forgiving
the youngest who already carries the instinctive hatred of the civilized man.
Por los salvajes de América siento una invencible repugnancia sin poderlo remediar.
Esa canalla no son más que unos indios asquerosos a quién mandaría a colgar ahora
mismo…In a a es de ro reso… Se les de e ex erminar sin ni siquiera erdonar al
pequeño, que tiene ya el odio instintivo al hombre civilizado.312
308
Ibid.
Adleman, Be ween Order and Li er …, page 105.
310
Sarmiento, P inas es o idas, page 51.
311
Domingo F. Sarmiento, Educación común: memoria presentada al consejo universitario de Chile.
(Santiago: Imprenta del Nacional, 1855), page 14.
312
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas: …, page 67.
309
79
Figure 5.3: El Cacique. This is a daguerreotype of an indigenous, Argentine man, c. 1848. This
image is under public domain.
80
As these inferior social and racial classes were not considered to be superior conductors for the
American spirit of progress, Sarmiento did not want their presence to dilute the immigration of
this spirit through the American and Northern European immigrants that were to complete his
third reform.
According to Sarmiento’s policies, the gauchos did not have a better outcome. In a letter
written to then President Mitre in 1862, Sarmiento wrote the following regarding the fate of the
Argentine gaucho: “Do not spare gaucho blood – it is the only human trait they have; it will
serve as a fertilizer to enrich the land and make it useful”.313 In consequence, President Mitre,
actively supported by Sarmiento, commenced a war to exterminate the gauchos from Argentine
territory in order to allow civilization to take root in the nation.314 Sarmiento continued this
campaign in his presidency, justifying the fact that by not being worthy enough to be included in
any progressive reforms, why should they be worthy enough to exist?315
Nevertheless, the reality that pro-Urquiza intellectuals were against these reforms further
illustrates the creation of the cultural rift within Argentina. Once again, the words of
Sarmiento’s most acrimonious critic, Juan Bautista Alberdi, better explains the commencement
of this divisiveness within Argentina’s intellectuals. A contemporary of Sarmiento’s and a
leading Argentine intellectual, Alberdi also had plans that concerned the progress and future of
the nation. However, unlike Sarmiento, Alberdi’s ideas for the future of Argentina included the
unification of the Argentine Republic without the exclusion of any race or culture.
To illustrate this point, Alberdi commenced his campaign against Sarmiento’s ideology in
1852 when he defended General Urquiza against Sarmiento’s criticism. To explicate this point,
Alberdi argued that perhaps Sarmiento’s ideas, although praised in earlier years, were not
relevant to the new ideas and the interests of the Argentine people after Rosas.316 In another
episode in which Sarmiento provoked Alberdi’s criticism, Alberdi answered his contemporary by
correcting Sarmiento’s image of Rosas as a tyrannical leader. In a letter to presidential candidate
Ernesto Rivadavia, Alberdi wrote that, unlike what Sarmiento had published, Rosas was not a
313
Ibid., page 66.
Halperín Donghi, Tulio. 1972. Argentina : la democracia de masas. Buenos Aires, AR: Editorial
Paidós. page 289.
315
Sarmiento, Educación comun, page 14.
316
Katra, Domin o F. Sarmien o, Pu li Wri er…, page 66.
314
81
Figure 5.4: Juan Bautista Alberdi. This is a daguerreotype of Juan Bautista Alberdi, taken in
Valparaiso, Chile, c. 1850. This image is under public domain. The original can be found in the
Museo Histórico Nacional of Argentina.
82
despot. Alberdi then explained his statement by stating that albeit Rosas’ reign was not a
democratic one, the leader was in actuality providing an example to all Argentine leaders by
listening to the voices of the majority, of the plebian class, instead of excluding them as most
elites, including Sarmiento, would have done.317
In addition, with regard to Sarmiento’s declaration of war against those that he deemed
“barbarous”, Alberdi proclaimed the following:
No, the one that is more capable of destruction is not the more civilized; civilization is
not a science of devastation, the art of destroying and of burning monuments of the
brilliance and the civilization of man…A people stronger in the art of destruction is not
more civilized, rather [it is the people] more capable in the art of producing what is
useful, good, beautiful, healthy for the human race.
No, no es más civilizado el que es más capaz de destrucción; la civilización no es la
ciencia de la devastación, el arte de arruinar y de quemar los monumentos del genio y de
la ivili a i n del hom re…No es m s ivili ado el ue lo m s fuer e en el ar e de
destruir, sino el más capaz en el arte de producir lo que es útil, bueno, bello, saludable
para el género humano.318
In effect, Alberdi was deconstructing Sarmiento’s argument of the battle of the civil versus the
barbarous in Argentina by proclaiming that civilized people did not engage in destruction. By
eliminating the “inferior” races through war, Sarmiento was, in essence, becoming part of the
“inferiority”. Alberdi concluded this episode of criticism by declaring that such a false idea of
civility would hold no promise to actually civilize the nation.319
Moreover, Alberdi believed that there was a more civilized way of bringing about
progress to Argentina. Under the banner “to govern is to populate”, Alberdi believed that
populating the country, specifically through a mass immigration policy from Europe, was the key
to Argentine progress.320 However, unlike Sarmiento, who believed that mixing with “inferior”
races would detour progress, Alberdi believed that the population as a whole would be improved.
Immediately after the liberation of Argentina by General Urquiza, Alberdi published these
thoughts in the book Bases y puntos de partida para la organización política de la República
O'Donnell, Juan Manuel de Rosas…, page 32.
Juan Bautista Alberdi, Escritos póstumos: el crímen de la guerra, (Buenos Aires, AR: Imprenta
europea, Moreno y Defensa, 1895), pages 156-157.
319
Ibid.
320
Juan Bautista Alberdi, La omnipotencia del estado es la negación de la libertad individual, (Buenos
Aires, AR: la Universidad de Buenos Aires, 1880), page 346.
317
318
83
Argentina. In this book, which influenced the ideas set in the Argentine constitution of 1852,
Alberdi proclaimed the following:
The argument can be made: educating our masses, we will have order; having order,
people from the exterior will come.
Se hace este argumento: educando nuestras masas, tendremos orden, teniendo orden
vendrá la población de fuera.321
Thus, in Alberdi’s political ideology, the only way to spur progress from within Argentina was to
incorporate and educate the very masses that Sarmiento wanted to eradicate.
In essence, all who were inhabitants within the border of the Argentine Republic, those
that contributed to the independence of the nation, those who proclaimed themselves Argentine,
whether they were from the countryside or from the city, were, for Alberdi, the future of the
nation. To this regard, Alberdi published the following in the hopes of deterring Sarmiento’s
policies: “only the unity of the Argentine nation and her government will return to those of
Buenos Aires and to all Argentines their liberty and their spoils” [solo la unidad del país
argentino y de su gobierno, ha de devolver a los porteños y a los argentinos su libertad y su
riqueza].
321
Alberdi, Bases
un os…, page 51.
84
CHAPTER SIX
Closing the Connections:
Conclusions and Reflections over Sarmiento’s Franklinesque Argentina
Ultimately, Argentina’s progress has forever been affected by its turbulent past. Social,
cultural, and economic divisions by conflicting beliefs that support one way of life over another
have shaped the unity and identity of the nation.322 Thus, in an attempt to correct its misguided
path from further economic instability, political unrest, and social disunity, scholars have looked
for explanations. Several academic subjects, including science, literature, and economics, have
come under scrutiny in an effort find an explanation for Argentina’s socio-economic divisions.
However, few have analyzed the subject from the point of view of the individual that first gave
name to the divide: Domingo Faustino Sarmiento.323 For Sarmiento, since the formation of its
first government in 1810, Argentina had been facing a struggle between civilization and
barbarism that it had lost to barbarism upon the rise of the gauchos in 1832.324 By disseminating
this philosophy throughout Argentina and by acting to correct this struggle, it was this statesman
who permanently divided the nation culturally and socially.
As this thesis illustrates, Sarmiento’s approach to this problem was shaped by his
interpretation of the life and thought of the American revolutionary, Benjamin Franklin.
Although Sarmiento did not live during the same historical period as Franklin, at an early age he
adopted Franklin as a mentor and adapted his life to follow that of Franklin’s self-made model.325
Born into an impoverished family, as Franklin was, Sarmiento saw in Franklin’s life a path out of
his own humble roots. However, as mentioned earlier, the importance of Franklin’s influence on
Sarmiento did not lie in how Sarmiento emulated his life, but rather on how Sarmiento adapted
the principles behind Franklin’s self-made model.
Moreover, upon becoming president of Argentina, Sarmiento wanted to emulate the
American model in his country by passing social reforms that would ingrain Franklin’s
principles and foster a similar “American spirit” in Argentine culture. However, one aspect of
322
Goodrich, Facundo and the Construction of Argentine Culture, page 6.
Katra, Domingo F. Sarmiento, Public Writer…, page xv.
324
Skidmore, Modern Latin America: Volume 6, page 24.
325
Correas, Sarmiento and the United States, page 2.
323
85
Argentine culture -the gauchos and their rural lifestyle- did not fit into Sarmiento’s image of a
civilized Argentina. The gaucho culture, described by famed English traveler, Francis Bond
Head, as “little better than a species of carnivorous baboon”, presumably did not appreciate the
utility of intellect and moral discipline that was necessary to achieve the Franklin self-made
model.326 In consequence, as president, Sarmiento determined those of the farmlands barbarians
that were incapable of a civilized lifestyle and therefore aimed to exclude them from the
Argentina that was to be created under the solitary guidance of Buenos Aires.
By implementing policies that included the education of the urbanized minority, an
economic shift from agriculture to industry, and massive immigration efforts, Sarmiento
attempted to accomplish the objective he set years before he became president: in reclaiming “for
civilization the land which we keep deserted to its backwardness.”327 Thus, instead of
compromising with the interior and the gauchos, Sarmiento attempted to erase their existence
from Argentine history and begin anew with a population and a culture that had the potential to
emulate the self-made model created by Franklin and embodied by citizens of the United
States.328 As a result, Sarmiento’s presidential term divided the nation culturally, socially, and
economically under supposed civilized and barbaric ideals, which developed from Sarmiento’s
understanding of Benjamin Franklin’s self-made model.329
Thus, for a nation in the midst of establishing itself as a major power in the southern
region of South America, Sarmiento’s derisive reforms had everlasting effects on the
development of the region. The conditions placed on gaucho culture under the political banner
of the “Politics of Progress” were effective in severely decreasing their ability to maintain their
lifestyle. No longer were they able to flourish as they once had as the frontiersmen of the
Argentine plains.330 As a result, over a century after Sarmiento led the nation as President, the
culture, lifestyle, and spirit of the gaucho was almost obsolete. Twenty years after Sarmiento
introduced his anti-gaucho and pro-civilization reforms in Argentina, he published a text on
immigration and colonization. In one of his publications, Sarmiento observed the following of
his nation:
326
David T. Haberly, Francis Bond Head and Domingo Sarmiento: A Note on the Sources of Facundo,
(Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 2005), Project Muse, page 288.
327
Ibid., page110.
328
Bunkley, “Sarmiento and Urquiza,” page 177.
329
Adleman, Between Order and Liberty…, page 109.
330
Hernández, The Gaucho, Martín Fierro, page 3.
86
In twenty years the physical and moral physiognomy of the nation has changed, leaving
rooted the foundations of a future of civilization, morality, and riches.
En veinte años la fisonomía física y moral del país ha cambiado, quedando echadas las
bases de un porvenir de civilización, moralidad, y riqueza.331
These amendments to the physiognomy of the country and the foundations for the nation’s future
were constructed over the destruction of the gauchesca culture, in what Sarmiento deemed the
barbarous enemy to his plans.
In response to the decline of the gauchesca culture due to the discrimination placed upon
them by Sarmiento’s campaign against barbarism, Jos Hernández, contemporary literary foe to
Sarmiento, published the poem Martín Fierro in 1872 during Sarmiento’s presidency.332 By
publishing this poem, Hernández was attempting to highlight the cultural contributions of the
gauchesca culture and denounce Sarmiento’s theory of a battle between civilization and
barbarism.333 Since its publication, Martín Fierro became a symbol of nationalism and romantic
folklore that established the gaucho as part of the Argentine identity via their participation in the
revolutionary battles that freed the nation from Spanish dominion, their musical and poetic
contributions to society, and their values with regard to nature.334
Ultimately, Hernández’s campaign to promote and protect gauchesca culture brought a
different dimension to the theory that promulgated the battle between civilization and barbarism.
Through the efforts of artists like Hernández, cultural ministries, and the continuance of gaucho
traditions and lifestyle throughout the Argentine Litoral and the interior, the gauchesca culture
has slowly been recuperating its place in the Argentine identity. As a result, although gauchesca
culture never recovered from the campaign against barbarism that aimed to eradicate this form of
life, its presence in Argentina was never fully decimated.
In consequence, due to this extreme adaptation of Franklin’s self-made model, Sarmiento
created the most prominent divide in Argentine culture: a divide which favored the urbanized
capital of Buenos Aires, exploited and ridiculed the farmlands of the interior, and plagued
331
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, Obras de D. F. Sarmiento, Volumen 23: inmigración y colonización,
Luis Montt and Augusto Belin Sarmiento, ed. (Buenos Aires, AR: Imprenta Mariano Moreno, 1899),
page 260.
332
History of Humanity: Volume 6, The Nineteenth Century, P. Mathias and N. Todorov, ed.,(Paris, FR:
UNESCO, . 2005), page 224.
333
Ibid.
334
Ibid.
87
Figure 6.1: Martín Fierro. (left) José Hernández’s 1872 publication of Martín Fierro. (right) A
daguerreotype of a gaucho and his horse during the time Martín Fierro was published. Both
images are under public domain.
88
Figure 6.2: Parade of Countryside Pride in Entre Ríos, Argentina, 2010. (top left) Gauchos from
Ramírez, Entre Ríos, display their horsemanship in a town parade. (top right) A young gaucho
rides atop his horse. bottom) A “chinita” or female gaucha displays her horsemanship in the
same town parade as the above featured gauchos. All pictures were taken by the author.
89
Figure 6.3: Gaucho Moderno. This is a picture of a modern day gaucho in Entre Ríos,
Argentina, overseeing his land. This image is the property of the author.
90
Argentina’s ability to unite under one flag. Therefore, justified only by its belief in the interior’s
inferiority, Argentina’s elite capital of Buenos Aires continues to exploit the farmlands of the
country both economically and politically. The recurrent farmworker strikes of 2008 against the
government’s unfair tax and reform policies serve as evidence of this exploitation.
Tired of high taxes on farm products, including the government’s most recent tariff which
places a 44 percent tax on all exported farm products, Argentina’s four major farming groups
united in the longest farmer strike in the history of Argentina on March 6, 2008.335 The strike
produced food shortages and food spikes causing the government to declare a national crisis. 336
Strike leaders warned of worse to come if the government did not incorporate people that
“understood the farm lands” into the bicameral legislature.337 In direct opposition to the
President’s anti-farmland policies, over 300,000 farm workers united to celebrate Argentina’s
national holiday, May 25, 2008, in Rosario, Santa Fe, instead of the traditional location in
Buenos Aires, demonstrating the strength and unity of rural Argentina.338 This division between
the modern gaucho culture of the interior versus the urbanized elite of Buenos Aires
demonstrates the ever-present ideology of urban “civilization” against rural “barbarism” that
hinders the unity of Argentina.
In actuality, Sarmiento never intended to divide a nation, as he had hoped that through
Franklin’s principles, Argentina would be a unified under the banner of progress and civilization.
Moreover, his legacy remains not in his actions toward the gauchos, but as the “School Master
President” and as the first intellectual leader of Argentina to place education as a priority in
politics. This is illustrated in the nation’s celebration of his educational contributions to
Argentina on the federally issued “School Teacher Holiday”, marked on the eleventh of
September, the day of Sarmiento’s death.339 Although credit must be given to Sarmiento’s
arduous efforts in promoting educational campaigns within Argentina, Sarmiento’s legacy
“Argentina Farmers Back on Strike after Talks Break Down,”Agence France Presse-English, (May 7,
2008, 3 pages, Newswire: Buenos Aires),www.lexisnexis.com, accessed October 28, 2008, page 1.
336
Ramy Wurgaft, “Mitines multitudinarios paralelos de Kirchner y airados agricultores; Partidarios de la
presidenta argentina tildan de golpistas a sus oponentes,” El Mundo, (May 26, 2008. Col. 3; 4 pages.
Unidad Editoral: Buenos Aires),www.lexisnexis.com, accessed October 27, 2008, page 27.
337
“Argentine Farmers Plan to Lift Strike but Continue to Protest,” Agence France Presse-English, (June
7, 2008, 2 pages, Newswire: Buenos Aires),www.lexisnexis.com, accessed October 28, 2008, page 2.
338
Wurgaft, “Mitines multitudinarios paralelos de Kirchner...”, page 27.
339
“Domingo Faustino Sarmiento: El día del maestro”, Mundo Docente, 2002,
http://www.docente.mendoza.edu.ar/actos/setiembre/11desetiembre/index.htm, accessed April 22, 2011.
335
91
overlooks his political actions that contributed to the repression of the gauchesca culture. In
being remembered as a leader of the elites, promoter of education, and defender of civilization,
Sarmiento’s memory continues to perpetuate the idea of civilization within Argentina in the hope
that all provincianos would become “porteño en las rovin ias”. This in turn has blurred and
perpetuated the historical links that this individual had in creating the cultural and social divide
within Argentina.
Although this thesis did not propose to cure the divide that mars Argentina’s progress, it
has attempted to add another angle to the ever unfolding understanding of Argentina’s social and
cultural dichotomy by studying the origins from which it was formed. Though unclear with
regards to its origins, the effects of the Argentine dichotomy have forever been a topic of interest
for Argentine scholars. However, the truth regarding Argentina’s socio-cultural divide has
remained stowed away in the details of Argentina’s history. As a result, several pieces of the
puzzle have been overlooked, leaving gaps in the story of Argentina’s identity which have
transformed into prejudices and hindrances to the nation’s societal progress. One of these gaps
became the focus of this thesis’ research: the origin of the gauchesca downfall, as a culture and
as a lifestyle. In accordance, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento became essential in this analysis of
the Argentine dichotomy, as he was the first Argentine to publish the existence of a struggle
between the civilized and barbarous, which placed the gauchesca culture in the barbarous camp.
As was illustrated by this research, it was Sarmiento’s reasons for declaring this battle and his
advocacy for the civilized that have remained embedded in the feud that continues between the
culture of Buenos Aires and that of the rural provinces today.
However, this thesis has only touched the surface of the details that surround this story
and contribute to the understanding of Argentine identity. For a nation that was destined for
success due to its economic privileges and found wanting of all its forefather’s promises due to
its leaders’ decisions, understanding its history is essential to improving its future. Despite
having a constitution that was written by the nation’s intellectuals in 1852 with the intention of
serving all Argentines equally, this same constitution continues to rip the nation apart with
unequal protection for the provinces that stems from unwarranted prejudices for their lifestyle
and culture. Thus, even after a century and a half, the farmworker riots in the provinces, the
proclivity of politicians to favor the capital of Buenos Aires, and the unstable economic and
92
political tendencies of the nation demonstrate that General Urquiza’s to see his nation united and
satisfying the needs of all Argentines is yet to be fulfilled.
Had the nation been given to leaders who understood the importance of equal
representation between the rural culture of the provinces and the elite culture of Buenos Aires,
could Argentina have hoped to establish itself as a unified nation. However, because the rift
between provinciano and porteño was forever promulgated by mid-eighteenth century leaders
like Sarmiento, Argentina has progressed, not as a “civilized culture” as Sarmiento would have
hoped, but rather as a nation divided economically, politically, and culturally. In actuality, his
manipulation of Franklin’s ideas and the effects of his declaration of war against the barbarism
of Argentina are still being felt over a century and a half after his first publication containing the
phrase “civilization versus barbarism.” As a result, struggling to develop a national identity that
would incorporate both the traditions of the gauchos and the modernization embodied by Buenos
Aires, Argentina has yet to find unity or peace. Thus, until this division is understood and
rectified in the context of national unity, the Argentine identity, and Urquiza’s wish of unity, will
forever remain fragmented.
93
APPENDIX A
“University of Miami and Florida International University -Eighth Annual Latin American and
Caribbean Studies Graduate Student Conference program”
94
95
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH
The author, Andrea L. Arce-Trigatti, is a first-generation American descended from an
Argentine heritage. After graduating Summa Cum Laude from Florida State University with a
dual Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Latin American and Caribbean Studies and a
Bachelor of Science degree in International Affairs, she was awarded the prestigious
Gubernatorial Fellowship from the State of Florida. Through the Gubernatorial Fellowship
program, she was presented with the opportunity to serve her community while continuing her
education at Florida State University with a Master of Arts degree in International Affairs. Upon
defending her thesis and graduating from Florida State University in Spring 2012, she plans to
continue her graduate education pursuing a doctoral degree in Multicultural Education.
102