Background
Francisco José de Paula Santander was born on 2 April1792 into a prominent provincial landowning family in Cucutá.
Francisco José de Paula Santander was born on 2 April1792 into a prominent provincial landowning family in Cucutá.
While still in his teens he was sent to study law at the College of San Bartolomé in Bogotá, where he was when the independence struggle broke out in 1810.
Santander abandoned his studies to join the patriot cause and fought both in the internal civil conflicts in New Granada and against the Spanish.
When the fortunes of war turned against the patriots, Santander retreated northeastward with the French General Manuel Serviez, who had joined the colonials’ cause. In the llanos, or plains, they joined forces with José Antonio Páez, later chief executive of Venezuela. From Páez, Santander learned bold cavalry and guerrilla tactics.
In 1819, after several years of harassing Spanish columns and garrisons, Simón Bolívar promoted Santander to brigadier general and made him a top field commander.
With Bolivar absent on campaigns in southern Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru, Santander set about organizing a government. He viewed his task as one of reconciling conflicting regional and institutional interests, and of reconstruction without further upsetting the fragile social order. Much of his attention was given to countering separatist tendencies in Venezuela and Ecuador, which together with Colombia, comprised Gran Colombia.
He was elected vice president of Gran Colombia in 1821 (with Bolivar as titular president).
Opposition of the church, of conservatives, and, finally, of Bolivar himself led to Santander’s ouster in 1827. Upon his return from Peru, Bolivar sought to impose his vision of a grand confederation of Andean states reaching from Bolivia to Venezuela, ruled by a president-for-life but with a republican constitution. When he could not convince the Colombians to pass the necessary constitutional reforms, he established a military dictatorship. After an attempt on the Liberator’s life in Bogotá in 1828, Bolivar suspended many of the liberal reforms of the Santander administration, epecially in the religious and financial areas, and exiled Santander.
After the dissolution of Gran Colombia and the death of Bolivar, Santander was elected the first president of the Republic of New Granada in 1832. As a legacy of the turbulent final years of Bolivar’s dictatorship, he encountered resistance, especially among disgruntled elements in the army, which had been reduced in size and which Santander was attempting to limit in influence. When a major conspiracy against the regime was discovered, Santander had a number of the plotters executed. He showed little inclination to bring about reconciliation with the former supporters of Bolivar.
When a political foe of Santander, José Ignacio de Marquez, was elected president in 1836, the “Man of Laws’’ peacefully turned over the presidency. After a short retirement, he was elected to the Chamber of Representatives, where he led the opposition to the Marquez administration. Santander died while serving in Congress.
Santander’s government promoted secular, public education; education had been dominated by the Catholic Church and limited to members of the upper class. As government educational institutions grew and expanded, the opposition of the church increased, and Santander moved to restrict clerical influence. In the economic area, Santander retained protectionist policies of the past, but the influence of liberal, individualist ideas about private property began to prevail.
Santander did not succeed in liquidating the national debt of the former Gran Colombian countries or in reaching agreement with Venezuela over boundaries. He was more successful in fostering education, however. By the time Santander left office, over 17,000 students were reported to be in primary schools throughout the country, and there were thriving colleges and universities in major cities.
In the ensuing struggle, Santander displayed remarkable talents for organization and intrepid action. Bolivar named the 27-year old general administrator of the liberated territories.
One of Santander’s principal concerns was to develop a constitutional framework based upon a sound legal structure. These efforts earned him the informal title of “Man of Laws.”
