Background
Francisco Bilbao Barquín was born on 9 January 1823 in Santiago.
Francisco Bilbao Barquín was born on 9 January 1823 in Santiago.
He studied at the Instituto Nacional de Chile.
When only 21 years of age, he published Sociabilidad Chilena, which advocated wide democratic reforms and was particularly critical of the church. He was tried and convicted of blasphemy and given a 1200 pesos fine. Bilbao then moved to Valparaiso, where for a short while he edited the newspaper La Gaceta del Comercio.
In 1845 Bilbao went to Europe, where he had personal contact with Utopian Socialists and advanced democrats of various kinds. Upon return home, he advocated establishment of a working-class party and organized the Sociedad de la Igualdad to carry on education and propaganda among the workers. He was severely persecuted, and an attempt was made on his life, supposedly with police instigation. The society was suppressed after an unsuccessful military coup against President Manuel Bulnes Prieto, and Bilbao fled into exile in April 1851.
Bilbao spent the rest of his life in Peru, Europe, and finally Argentina. He maintained contacts with supporters in Chile. Some were among the founders of the Radical Party, and his idea of a working-class party was finally achieved in 1887, with the founding of the Democratic Party.