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Carlos Pellegrini and the Politics of Early Argentine Industrialization, 1873–1906

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Donna J. Guy
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Extract

Until the 1870s, Argentina was principally a pastoral nation totally depenlent upon trade with more advanced nations to provide basic necessities. Yet, within a brief span of about thirty years, it became a major producer of livestock products, cereals and flour for export, and of a wide variety of foodstuffs and other consumer goods for internal consumption. Most of this had been achieved by the application of protective tariffs to nascent industrial activities, and by the importation and use of new machinery and technology to process available raw materials. Thus, unlike other Latin American nations which had not yet begun the arduous process of modernization, Argentina had already embarked on a program of import substitution and State-encouraged industrialization in the late nineteenth century.

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Articles
Information
Journal of Latin American Studies , Volume 11 , Issue 1 , May 1979 , pp. 123 - 144
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1979

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References

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3 Ibid.

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6 Cámara de Diputados, 14 Sept. 1875, p. 1124.

7 Ibid., p. 1125.

8 See, for example, Pellegrini's speech to sugar industrialists, 8 May 1897, ‘Industria azucarera de la Repúlica Argentina; Trabajo para un acuerdo entre los fabricantes’, Suplemento al N. 38 de la Revista Azucarera (Buenos Aires, 1897), p. 4 and Pellegrini's letter to Dr Angel Florio Costa, June 1902, in Pellegrini, , Obras, 3, 327, 336.Google Scholar

9 Cámara de Diputados, 18 Aug. 1876, pp. 5–9.

10 Ibid., p. 4–5.

11 Ibid., pp. 13–15.

12 Ibid., 23 Aug. 1876, p. 46.

13 Law No. 833, in Ibid., pp. 751–3.

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15 Guerrero, La industria argentina, pp. 89–110; Letter from UIA to Argentine industrialists requesting participation, La Prensa, 14 July 1899, p. 55.

16 As President Julio Roca noted in his Annual Message of 1884, ‘The Banco Nacional … is one of the most powerful influences in the surprising industrial and commercial growth in the interior. Perhaps in this Chamber there are vintners and sugar industrialists of Mendoza, Santiago, Sales and Tucumán, cattlemen of Córdoba, and farmers of Santa Fé and Entre Ríos, and they can testify whether this establishment … has responded to the ends envisioned by its founders.’ Roca, Museo, Publicaciones del Museo Roca: Documentos (7 vols., Buenos Aires, Ministerior de Educación y Justicia, 1966–1967), 11, 101.Google Scholar For the impact of the Banco Hipotecario Nacional on agro-industry, see Argentine Republic, Banco Hipotecario de la Nación, Memoria y Balance, 1887–1891 (Buenos Aires, 1888–1892), passim. The role of provincial banks has not yet been adequately assessed.

17 Guerrero, La industria argentina, pp. 65–6, 77–8.

18 Argentine Republic, Comisión Directiva del Censo, Segundo Censo de la República Argentina. [EI 10 de mayo de 1895] (3 vols., Buenos Aires, 1898), III, 271, 319, 322, 327, 336, 341, 353, 354. The value of distilleries in sugar factories was included in the sugar statistics.

19 Ibid., pp. 270–71.

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21 Cámara de Dipatados, 18 Dec. 1890, pp. 799–804.

22 Ibid.

23 Ibid., 2 Jan. 1891, pp. 813–15.

24 Law No. 2774, 26 Jan. 1891, in Ibid., pp. 1027–8. There were also monetary aspects to this law. Hodge, ‘Carlos Pellegrini …’, loc. cit., p. 509.

25 Williams, Argentine International Trade, p. 128; Hodge, ‘Carlos Pellegrini …’, loc. cit., p. 513.

26 See Table II. Adapted from Tornquist, Ernesto & Cía., Lta., El desarrollo cconómico de la República Argentina en los últimos cincuenta anos (Buenos Aires, 1920), pp. 288–90. Those items with asterisks indicate late payments for taxes of earlier years.Google Scholar

27 Cámara de Diputados, 15 June 1891, pp. 156–76; 3 July 1891, pp. 249–54; Law No. 2856, 17 Nov. 1891, pp. 671–2.

28 Ibid., 18 July 1892, p. 445.

29 Ibid., 30 Nov. 1892, p. 385.

30 Articles such as ‘Sugar and Wine producers; the question of duties’, and ‘From Tucumán. The Sugar Industry – Protectionists and Free Trade …’ were published first in La Nación, then reprinted in the Boletin de la Unión Industrial Argentina and in Revista Azucarera (Aug.–Sept. 1894), pp. 181–7, 220–4.

31 On the basis of this trip, Terry wrote a report recommending no tariff increase for sugar. Terry, José A., Memoria presentada al Sr. Presidente de la República: Tucumán, Salta, Jujuy y Santiago (Buenos Aires, 1894).Google ScholarRevista Azucarera, 4 May 1894, p. 5, outlines the sugar lobby's tactics for dealing with the Tariff Review Commission. These plans are further elaborated in subsequent issues. See Tarifas de Aduana; Estudios y antecedentes para su discusión legislativa por la comisión revisora nombrada por el poder ejecutivo (Buenos Aires, 1894) for testimony of sugar and other industrial lobbyists, and for composition of the Tariff Review Commission.

32 Dorfman, Historia de la industria argentina, p. 179.

33 See Argentine Republic, Poder Ejecutivo de la Nación, Ministerio de Hacienda, Memorias (1892–1900) (Buenos Aires, 1893–1901), 1899 II: 161; 1900, p. 33.

34 El Orden (Tucumán), 27 Apr. 1895, p. 1.

35 In Rivero Astengo's collected works of Pellegrini, he comments that Emilio Pellet supplied Pellegrini with most of the information for his article. Pellegrini, Obras, III, 196.

36 Pellegrini, ‘El estanco de alcohol ’ La Biblioteca (julio–septiembre 1897), pp. 5–43.

37 For an emotional response to the alcohol controversy, see Fermín Rodríguez, ‘Alcoholismo y suicidio en Buenos Aires ’ in Ibid., pp. 443–66. Laura Randall argues that social aspects of alcohol motivated Pellegrini in most of his alcohol legislation. Randall, Laura, A Comparative Economic History of Latin America 1500–1914, Volume Argentina (Ann Arbor, University Microfilms International), p. 632.Google Scholar

38 Cámara de Diputados, 1 July 1898, p. 297.

39 Reported in El Orden, 10 Sept. 1898, p. 1.

40 Presidential message, Cámara de Diputados, 9 Nov. 1898, p. 168–71.

41 Ibid., 2 Dec. 1898, pp. 357–8.

42 La Prensa, 23 Nov. 1898, p. 3; El Orden, 14 Nov. 1898, p. 1.

43 Cámara de Diputados, 13 Dec. 1898, pp. 383–4 and Ministerio de Hacienda, Memoria, 1899, I, 123.

44 The Economist, Apr. 1899, p. 311. See also reports on loan negotiations in Ibid., 19 Apr. 1899, p. 723; and South American Journal, 7, No. is (16 Sept. 1899), p. 317.

45 Annual Message, May 1899, Museo Roca, Documentos, III, 13.

46 As late as 31 Mar. 1900, The South American Journal reported that the Argentine Government was still trying to procure the loan from a British syndicate. South American Journal, 48, No. 11 (31 Mar. 1900), p. 340. For later plans made by grain distillers, see El Orden, 24 Aug. 1900, p. 1; Impuestos Internos, 5, 164 (1 Sept. 1900), pp. 571–572.

47 La Prensa, 1 May 1899, p. 4.

48 For details of the 1901 rift, see Pellegrini, Carlos, Escritos y Discursos [selección y estudio preliminar de José María Bustillo] (Buenos Aires, 1959), pp. cxxxvi–cxxxix.Google Scholar

49 See Table II.

50 Martínez, Albert B. and Lewandowski, Maurice, The Argentine in the Twentieth Century (3rd ed., Boston, n.d.), pp. 306–7.Google Scholar

51 After that date, Congress no longer automatically reconsidered tariff and impuesto interno legislation on an annual basis.

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54 ‘Industria azucarera de la República Argentina; Trabajo para un acuerdo entre los fabricantes’, loc. cit., p. 5.

55 Revista Azucarera, May 1899, pp. 681–3; Labougle, Alfredo, Carlos Pellegrini: un gran estadista. Sus ideas y su obra (Buenos Aires, Academia de Ciencias Económicas, Ediciones especiales, No. 14, 1957), p. 84.Google Scholar

56 This is a summary of the original petition. Dorfman, Historia de la industria argentina, p. 390. For the complete set of resolutions which was submitted to the Chamber of Deputies by the Unión Industrial, see Guerrero, La industria argentina, pp. 99–502.

57 Guerrero, La industria argentina, p. 112; Revista Azucarera, 1 June 1900, pp. 545–2.

58 Cámara de Diputados, 28 Aug. 1905, pp. 620–43, especially the speeches of Seguf, Francisco and Palacios, Alfredo. Walter, Richard J., The Socialist Party of Argentina, 1890–1930 (Austin, Institute of Latin American Studies, 1977), p. 86.Google Scholar

59 Law No. 4933, Cámara de Diputados, 11 Dec. 1905, pp. 960–72.

60 Solberg, Carl, ‘Tariff and Politics in Argentina 1906–1930’, Hispanic American Historical Review, 53, No. 2 (May 1973), pp. 260–84;CrossRefGoogle ScholarSmith, Peter H., Argentina and the Failure of Democracy (Madison, University of Wisconsin Press, 1974), passim.Google Scholar