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Pedro Aguirre Cerda | |
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| 22ndPresident of Chile | |
| In office December 25, 1938 – November 25, 1941 | |
| Preceded by | Arturo Alessandri |
| Succeeded by | Jerónimo Méndez |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1879-02-06)February 6, 1879 Pocuro, Chile |
| Died | November 25, 1941(1941-11-25) (aged 62) Santiago, Chile |
| Resting place | Cementerio General de Santiago |
| Political party | Radical |
| Spouse | |
| Education | |
| Occupation |
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| Signature |  |
Pedro Abelino Aguirre Cerda (Latin American Spanish:[ˈpeðɾoaˈɣireˈseɾða]; February 6, 1879 – November 25, 1941) was a Chileanpolitical figure, educator, and lawyer who served as the 22ndpresident of Chile from 1938 until his death in 1941. He was amoderate.[1]
A member of theRadical Party since 1906, he was chosen by the left-wingPopular Front coalition as its candidate for the1938 presidential election and won.[2] He had previously served asdeputy for San Felipe, Putaendo and Los Andes from 1915 to 1918,Minister of the Interior from January to September 1918 under presidentJuan Luis Sanfuentes, deputy for Santiago from 1918 to 1921,Minister of Justice and Public Instruction from 1920 to 1921 under presidentArturo Alessandri, andsenator forConcepción from 1921 to 1927.
He died two years and eleven months into his presidency on November 25, 1941, at the age of 62, fromtuberculosis.
Pedro Aguirre Cerda was born on February 6, 1879, inPocuro, a small village near the city ofLos Andes, Chile. He was the seventh of eleven children born to parents Juan Bautista Aguirre Campos and Clarisa Cerda Escudero. His father, a farmer, died in 1887 when he was eight years old, leaving his widowed mother to run the farm and raise the eleven children on her own. His family was of Basque descent.[3]
He completed his initial tertiary studies at thePedagogical Institute of the University of Chile in Santiago, becoming a Spanish teacher. He continued his studies at the university's faculty of law, becoming a lawyer in 1904. In 1910, he received a government grant to study administrative and financial law at theSorbonne inParis and political economy and social legislation at theCollège de France. He returned to Chile in 1914 and took a position as a teacher at theInstituto Nacional and was elected as president of the National Society of Teachers. In 1916, he married his first cousinJuana Rosa Aguirre Luco, with whom he had no children.
He was a very distinguished teacher, attorney, deputy and senator. He was also the first dean of the new school of economy of the University of Chile. As a member of theRadical Party, he was minister of Public Instruction and of the Interior during the administrations ofJuan Luis Sanfuentes andArturo Alessandri. During the period of military domination, he was persecuted and became an active opposition leader to the government ofGeneralCarlos Ibáñez del Campo.
He was chosen by the Popular Front coalition of left-wing parties and trade unions as its candidate in the 1938 Chilean presidential election, where he narrowly defeated right-wing candidateGustavo Ross [es] of the Liberal-Conservative coalition by 4,111 votes.
Aguirre Cerda assumed his duties as president on December 25, 1938, under the slogan "Gobernar es educar" (to govern is to educate). As a teacher, his priority in government was education. As such, he promoted the development of the technical-industrial schools as a means to promote the formation of technicians for the nascent industrialization of the country. He also created thousands of new regular schools and encouraged the growth of the university system to cover the whole of the country. Aguirre's government also redistributed some land, encouraged the formation of agricultural settlements, built low-cost housing and schools, and integrated the Marxist parties into the political system.[4]
During his first year he had to face military opposition to his plans, which boiled over with the so-calledAriostazo. He also promoted and campaigned for aNobel Prize forGabriela Mistral, which only came to fruition under his successor,Juan Antonio Ríos.
On the economic side, and prompted in part by the devastatingearthquake of 1939, he created the Production Development Corporation (Corporación de Fomento de la Producción -CORFO) to encourage with subsidies and direct investments an ambitious program ofimport substitution industrialization. This was the basis for the industrialization of Chile. From there sprung the steel, manufacturing and sugar industries.
In 1941, due to his rapidly escalating illness, he appointed his Minister of the InteriorJerónimo Méndez as vice-president to succeed him. He died soon after on November 25, 1941, inSantiago, Chile, from tuberculosis. Méndez served as acting president untilJuan Antonio Rios, elected on February 1, 1942, took office on April 2.
In the Chilean Antarctic Expedition in 1950–51, the explorers named theAguirre Passage betweenLemaire Island andDanco Coast after Don Pedro Aguirre Cerda.[5]
Salvador Allende, one of Aguirre Cerda's close associates andMinister of Health under his presidency, would become president in 1970.
On July 3, 2018, another statue of him was inaugurated in the center of Santiago, this time in the Plaza de la Constitución, on the corner of Moneda and Teatinos streets.[1]
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This article incorporatespublic domain material from"Aguirre Passage".Geographic Names Information System.United States Geological Survey.| Political offices | ||
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| Preceded by | Minister of the Interior 1920-1921 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister of the Interior 1924 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister of the Interior 1924 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | President of Chile 1938-1941 | Succeeded by |
