A magnificent demonstration was spontaneously accorded ex-President
General Mitre, by the citizens of this city, on the occasion of the
retirement from his high position; and it is at least suggestive of some
improvement, that after the expiration of his constitutional term of
office he handed over to his successor the government intact, the
treasury comparatively full, and, though engaged in a war, the people
enjoying a prosperity they never before realized; and to whatever
position General Mitre may be called, I feel confident our government
will always find in him a reliable friend. The question of the seat of
the national government is again exciting much interest. Before the last
session of the national congress adjourned they located it at Rosario,
but it did not
[Page 255]
receive the
sanction of President Mitre. In my judgment there is no reasonable
probability there will be any change for some years to come.
Address of the President.
Senators, Deputies, and Fellow-citizens:
After the solemn oath which I have just taken, it is needless for me
again to promise that I will fulfill the laws and the constitution,
by worthily exercising the authority conferred on me by my
fellow-citizens. This is my duty, my fixed resolve, my highest
aspiration. If rectitude of intention and a wish to do good are
claims upon the aid of Divine Providence, I dare to hope that the
blessings of Heaven will at last visit this part of the earth, so
long abandoned to the errors and misfortunes that retard the
progress of nations and their governments.
The attention of the country is at present naturally fixed, after so
long and bloody a war, on the exorbitant sacrifices imposed on each
and all of us for the common safety. I therefore hasten to assure
you that the guiding spirit of my administration, and especially in
the election of public employés, will be to insure, by every means,
economy and integrity in the disposal of the national moneys. I
shall also try to maintain our rising credit, the source of all
wealth, by religiously fulfilling our obligations, and thus
strengthening the confidence that the nation is acquiring both at
home and abroad.
The constitution makes the President sole head of the administration,
and I can therefore solemnly engage, since it depends on my own
acts, that the administrative morality will be complete during my
term of office.
I must also speak of the war wherein we are
engaged, and the alliance in connection with the same. Nations
have duties to perform in respect for their past history and
their future prospects. A war abandoned in disgust of weariness,
in 1827, did not give the much-desired
peace for six months; and after breaking the links of union,
there ensued a terrible tyranny and series of wars, that have
not yet ended with the fall of Humaitá. The present war seems
drawing to a close, but we must not be too sanguine, for all
judgment is at fault when events depend on the caprice and
unbridled passions of a semi-barbarous tyrant. We must never for
a moment lose confidence, but strenuously prosecute the war till
obtaining security for the future.
To offer peace to an enemy that does not sue for it after so many
disasters, would be to change our position from conqueror to
conquered. Such errors are always dearly expiated.
I trust that under my government the Argentine
Republic will show itself worthy of its glorious antecedents,
and maintain its high position among the nations of the world. I
think that the alliance with Brazil and Uruguay nowise
compromises the principles of our government, and I consider it
not only lawful and necessary but highly honorable. This
alliance will be maintained and faithfully observed while the
security and honor of the republic so require.
The social and political bonds that hold a nation together should
never be closer than when its honor and safety are threatened from
abroad; and you know well how far the republic has been from
offering such an example of duty, patriotism, and good sense, on the
part of its sons.
Whilst some were filled with love of country, participating in its
glory or disgrace, its greatness or humiliation, and rushed forward
to the frontier for its defense, there were others who availed
themselves of the occasion to take to the highways or join the
Indians, thus increasing the confusion of the time and calling off
the national forces, which should have been entirely occupied in the
noble and heroic enterprise of saving the honor of our flag.
I am still ignorant of the names of the leaders who appeared in this
obscure epoch, since they had attained no notoriety either in the
social or the political sphere; I am not, however, ignorant of the
duties of every government; and foremost is that of giving security
to life and property, keeping the high-roads clear, and encouraging
commerce and industry.
The constitution, in all free countries, admits not
of discussion by force of arms. To take up arms against the
Republic, no matter what the pretext, is an act of treason, and
our constitution, after the model of the United States, provides
the government with efficacious means to prevent such a calamity
as that the people should curse the day on which their
constitution was framed.
Meantime, I think I may promise you that the tranquility which has
been disturbed in some places will speedily be re-established, and
that the ill-advised persons who
[Page 256]
took up arms will quietly lay them aside,
confiding in the national justice for a remedy for their complaints
whenever such shall appear well-founded.
The evils that afflict the Argentine Republic are not of to-day’s
growth, neither are they peculiar to our country. The spectacle of
provinces convulsed by insurrection has been a constant repetition
for the last fifty years, with the same characteristics and
features, and differing only in names and pretexts. These social
phenomena are, moreover, reproduced throughout the rest of Spanish
America, with only slight variations incidental to climate and other
circumstances. Few states have become organized after sixty years of
strife and contention, or can quietly set themselves down to work
with security for the future.
Thus the evil is deeper than seems at first sight, and we see chronic
causes producing everywhere the same results. To study the fatal
causes of such prolonged inquietude would be the noblest task of our
thinking men, and to cure them in their origin should be the great
aim of our law-makers in Congress and the special study of
government.
The insurrectionary movements that call in question every moment the
solidity of our self-chosen institutions and impede our progress
have their focus in the barbarism of the country districts and the
ignorance and destitution of the poorer classes. The defense of the
frontier presents the same features. All the efforts of successive
governments, after half a century, have failed to protect the
settlers from the Indians; and more than once we have seen the
savage tribes invade our tribes as auxiliaries of this or that
faction.
Public patience can no longer tolerate such evils, and the time has
now arrived to see if our government is really what it ought to be
under our republican institutions, namely, the means of distributing
the greatest possible amount of felicity to the greatest possible
number of individuals. A nation loves not its institutions unless
when these conditions are fulfilled.
The work before us is even of a more pressing nature. We have
inherited ignorant and destitute popular masses, and the uniformity
and cohesion which are the essential conditions of all societies
have been violated. The public powers are, nevertheless, called upon
to foster liberal institutions on a soil thus badly prepared, and to
combat the difficulties that obstruct the way.
Our situation is, however, neither desperate nor irremediable. If
population is wanting to fill our extensive territory, other nations
only ask from us security and protective laws, and will give us
millions of men who constitute their superabundant population. If
distances are enormous, steam shortens them. But, all these
resources must be distributed and utilized by wise and even-handed
laws, avoiding that, whilst the elements of civilization accumulate
on the coast, the remainder of the country shall not be abandoned to
barbarism, and that an apparent benefit shall not give rise to
further calamities and disorders.
The public lands, under an equitable system of distribution, will fix
the population that is to-day houseless, give a home to the
thousands of emigrants that come in search of it, and put a stop to
the depredations of the hordes of the desert, by effacing that very
desert which is their theater and their element. Some organic laws
on education will suffice to render the prosperity which we are
bound to secure for future generations a reality. Nations, like
individuals, have almost always to blame the recklessness of their
fathers for the evils that afflict them.
To spread civilization over that part of the republic that is as yet
deprived of its benefits, to provide efficiently for the defense of
the frontier, to give security to property and life, are conditions
as essential as the very compliance with constitutional precepts,
because they all tend to the same end. A majority enjoying the
liberty of being ignorant and poor does not constitute an enviable
privilege for the educated minority of a nation which is proud of
calling itself republican and democratic.
I repeat it again: the time has come to ponder seriously upon these
grave social questions, since, fortunately, political ones are in a
great measure settled.
The national sentiment that leads us, without any local preference,
to interest ourselves in all that affects our common mother country,
has assumed in these later years a deeper intensity. The nation
acquires every day more consistence; and, thanks to the progressive
development of that noble feeling that makes of an assemblage of
individuals a social being animated by the generous passions of
heroism and justice, we may soon hope that the name of Argentine
will be associated in men’s minds with those moral, intellectual,
and progressive qualities that characterize a free and enlightened
people.
The general progress of mankind comes also to our
help. Men’s blood is not spilt in vain for the supremacy of a
principle; and its triumph, once obtained, does not become the
exclusive patrimony of the nation that has been its redeemer.
The abolition of torture, the disappearance of slavery, the
liberty of conscience, the declaration of rights which we have
inscribed in our constitution, are no conquest of ours, but a
legacy which, we are bound to preserve intact. In this category
we can add to-day “The indissolubility of federal nations.” A
million of men, whose corpses have strewn the battle-fields,
have put the seal for us and for all federal republics
[Page 257]
on this mighty principle. Henceforward there can
be neither nullifiers nor separatists, but only traitors and
criminals.
Thus far we may at any rate rest tranquil. Our political agitations
will ever he preserved within the limits of the nationality which
has cost our forefathers so much blood, and of the constitution
which we ourselves have cemented by so many sacrifices.
I have thus sketched the policy of my government. I am not cowed by
the difficulty of the undertaking, although I am not ignorant how
much those who are called upon to assume the arduous task of
governing are destined to suffer for their reputation and repose. I
am bound to submit to this doom, since our mother country is not yet
sufficiently well organized to afford enjoyment to those who are
fortune’s favorites. But I am overwhelmed by the confidence and the
hopes reposed in me. Our history reveals to us that we possess the
conscience of good much more than the patience and capacity to
attain it. Many of those who tried it died in the attempt or in
exile. It is only future generations that can revindicate the memory
of those faithful servants who failed to be popular because they
preferred being deemed worthy of esteem.
A majority has raised me to power without my having sought it; and I
have, therefore, the right, on taking possession of the hard seat to
which I am called, to ask that that majority may continue united,
and not throw upon me alone the responsibility of its own
government. I am bound, likewise, to ask that it may attract to its
ranks all those who deserve to figure therein for their patriotic
aims and their liberal ideas.
With regard to those who have opposed my election,
I can only say to them, in the words that Jefferson addressed to
his opponents, “That they have their own rights and position as
citizens of this country, and that I have not received from the
constitution any power to change them;” and will conclude by
reminding them, with Lincoln, “That the electoral urn is the
legitimate successor of bullets, and when the suffrage has
declared itself, freely and constitutionally, the only appeal
from its verdict is by consulting again the polling-booths of a
subsequent election.”
Protected by Providence, in whose help I confide, aided by the active
co-operation of my fellow-citizens, guided by your prudent laws,
honorable senators and deputies, enlightened by the wisdom of my
councillors, looking to the constitution as a guide and to the force
it places in my hands as an auxiliary, I shall attain the
realization of some of the hopes that I have sketched, and shall
deliver up to my successor the republic undivided, the revenue
prosperous, a greater number of happy and educated men, the laws
respected, and, perchance, although I scarcely hope it, the
government the object of everybody’s blessing.
