Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Western civ Episode five hundred and fifteen,
Speaker 1: The Liberator. When we talk about independence in Central and
Speaker 1: South America, it's tempting to imagine a clean break, a
Speaker 1: triumph movement, when colonial rule collapsed and free nations rose
Speaker 1: in its place. And the changes that are going to
Speaker 1: grip Central and South America. Don't get me wrong, they're momentous,
Speaker 1: and the consequences for Spain in the long run are devastating.
Speaker 1: But the important thing to recognize is that between eighteen
Speaker 1: ten roughly and eighteen thirty independence was not a moment,
Speaker 1: and it was honestly a never ending, grinding, continent wide
Speaker 1: civil war followed by an uneasy piece that few truly
Speaker 1: understood how to keep. And no one's life captures that reality,
Speaker 1: of course, more than the man who is one hundred
Speaker 1: percent associated with these independence movements, the Liberator himself, Simon Bolivar.
Speaker 1: This is the story of how an empire fell, and
Speaker 1: honestly also how the men who tore it down struggled
Speaker 1: mightily to build something lasting from the ruins. Then we'll
Speaker 1: get to Bolivar and Moore in a second. Don't worry
Speaker 1: about that, but let's start to set the stage on
Speaker 1: the eve of the revolution. Spanish America was vast, it
Speaker 1: was wealthy, and it was profoundly unequal. I mean, if
Speaker 1: we're going to count Spanish territory, because we're pre Mexican independence,
Speaker 1: you're talking about a territory that stretches really from the
Speaker 1: northern boundaries of California, cutting down diagonally through today what
Speaker 1: is Utah, parts of Colorado, New Mexico, so on and
Speaker 1: so forth. We'll throw Texas in there for right now,
Speaker 1: for the sake of argument. Then cut down through Mexico,
Speaker 1: Central America, and then excluding Brazil, of course, which was
Speaker 1: under the purview of the Portuguese, you're talking about all
Speaker 1: of South America. So I'm absolutely huge swathen By the way,
Speaker 1: I'm not counting the islands in the Caribbean, or of
Speaker 1: course territories in the Asia Pacific, like the Philippines. I'm
Speaker 1: not counting those. But the Spanish crown governed all of
Speaker 1: this really with a smash and grab colonial extraction method.
Speaker 1: The idea was to govern through viceroys, audiencias and military
Speaker 1: governor and it was a mismatch of those different ruling
Speaker 1: styles to extract silver predominantly agricultural wealth kind of and
Speaker 1: customs revenue a lot less, while tightly controlling political power.
Speaker 1: Now at the top, as we discussed in our last
Speaker 1: episode of this social pyramid, you have in all of
Speaker 1: these territories Spaniards born in Europe. Those are the peninsularees.
Speaker 1: They monopolized basically all of the high offices beneath those
Speaker 1: with the creoles the American and I don't mean United States,
Speaker 1: I mean born in the Americas. American born Spaniards like Bolivar,
Speaker 1: wealthy and educated, but politically excluded because of their place
Speaker 1: of birth. And then, of course, below these two tip
Speaker 1: points on the pyramid, you have a massive population of
Speaker 1: indigenous peoples, free people of color, and enslaved Africans, more
Speaker 1: or less those depending upon where you are. Almost none
Speaker 1: in California, quite a few in South America. Now, the
Speaker 1: system depended on obedience and legitimacy, because this is a
Speaker 1: centrist rule system. It's all governed ultimately from Madrid, from
Speaker 1: the Spanish crown and the bureaucrats that surround that crown.
Speaker 1: But when Napoleon invades Spain in eighteen o eight and
Speaker 1: deposed King Ferdinand, the seventh, that legitimacy collapsed literally overnight.
Speaker 1: Suddenly there was no unquestioned sovereign across the empire. Elites
Speaker 1: started to ask a dangerous question, if the king is gone, well,
Speaker 1: then why bother obeying anyone? Huntas quickly emerged across the
Speaker 1: America's initi claiming loyalty to Ferdinand. But their existence alone
Speaker 1: was revolutionary. Howard had very rapidly, almost overnight, shifted from
Speaker 1: obedience to Spain to local administration. So we went really
Speaker 1: from a centrist system to a federal system without anybody
Speaker 1: deciding that that's what we were going to do. And
Speaker 1: once power shifts locally, it just doesn't go back, at
Speaker 1: least not easily or quietly. And between the American Revolution
Speaker 1: and particularly this time period eighteen thirty and then we're
Speaker 1: going to get to some of the revolutions in Europe
Speaker 1: that failed ones. Of course, we're going to be talking
Speaker 1: about a period of time in which you really feel
Speaker 1: like the ideals that were planted in the American and
Speaker 1: French revolutions are driving the boat to a large extent,
Speaker 1: not for everyone, of course, no, because those indigenous peoples,
Speaker 1: those enslaved Africans, they're not going to get political power.
Speaker 1: But it's very similar to what we see in the
Speaker 1: United States, where it's not necessarily that we're going to
Speaker 1: get rid of slavery, but we want our elites to
Speaker 1: be in charge. And that's so much of what you
Speaker 1: have going on in South and Central America at the
Speaker 1: same time. So in a lot of ways, it really
Speaker 1: is the true ideals of the American Revolution, a transfer
Speaker 1: of sovereignty and power from the elites back in Spain,
Speaker 1: I'll just say Europe, so we can capture them all,
Speaker 1: and then the elites who are local. But let's talk
Speaker 1: about Simon Bolivar before we go any further, because he's
Speaker 1: the George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, He's all those
Speaker 1: people in Central and South America just kind of like
Speaker 1: wrapped into one. Although I think you could argue if
Speaker 1: you wanted to, that he was a significantly better general
Speaker 1: than George Washington. I'm not going to make that argument,
Speaker 1: but I've certainly seen it made. Now. Bolivar's early life
Speaker 1: mattered enormously. He was orphaned young like Alexander Hamilton, but
Speaker 1: fabulously wealthy like Alexander Hamilton, and educated by enlightened minded tutors.
Speaker 1: He had already by mid teens, traveled extensively in Europe.
Speaker 1: He had witnessed personally Napoleon's rise. He admired him, particularly
Speaker 1: his energy, but he didn't like his tyranny in Rome.
Speaker 1: According to later accounts, Bolivar swore an oath at the
Speaker 1: Vatican to liberate his homeland. Now what the Pope would
Speaker 1: have thought of that at the time is probably something
Speaker 1: we will never know, but my guess is they wouldn't
Speaker 1: have been particularly favorable. But Bolivar, of course, wasn't a
Speaker 1: pure democrat. He distrusted mass politics, he feared social upheaval,
Speaker 1: and he believed that strong leadership was essential, especially in
Speaker 1: a society emerging from colonial rule. I don't think he's
Speaker 1: necessarily wrong about that. By the way, if you're trying
Speaker 1: to transition out of a period of direct colonial rule
Speaker 1: into home rule, you really do need someone Anna Mtill
Speaker 1: who has that power, who has that authority, and who
Speaker 1: has that legitimacy, and I guess critically isn't afraid necessarily
Speaker 1: to use it. I mean, George Washington put down revolts
Speaker 1: in western Massachusetts quite successfully, and they needed his legitimacy
Speaker 1: in the United States. Of course, there's a huge difference
Speaker 1: in the economy and the society of the thirteen original
Speaker 1: colonies that become the Young Republic and what we're dealing
Speaker 1: with in Mexico and what's going to become Columbia, Bolivia
Speaker 1: and Venezuela, so on and so forth, And that's worth noting,
Speaker 1: and we can get into all of that, but the
Speaker 1: principle is the same, so that it's really, really, really
Speaker 1: hard to go from colonial rule directly to a democracy,
Speaker 1: particularly a peer one, and this tension between liberty and
Speaker 1: authority would come to define every single constitution that Bolivar
Speaker 1: later wrote. Now, Bolivar really gets into the game in
Speaker 1: the year eighteen ten, which is why we start this
Speaker 1: episode talking about eighteen ten, because that's when Caracas, which
Speaker 1: is one of the provincial capitals at the time of
Speaker 1: Venezuela today we all know because it's in the news
Speaker 1: a lot is the capital of Venezuela. When Caracas announces
Speaker 1: that it will form a junta, it's going to essentially
Speaker 1: separate at least its ruling elite from Spain Spanish domination.
Speaker 1: Bolivar announced that he would join the movement with enthusiasm,
Speaker 1: and it didn't take long for officials in Caracas to
Speaker 1: realize that you can't go halfway on this stuff, right
Speaker 1: if you're going to declare that you are ruling elite
Speaker 1: and that you're separating yourself from Spain, I mean, honestly,
Speaker 1: what is the difference between that and a declaration of independence?
Speaker 1: And recognizing that there really wasn't a difference in dependence
Speaker 1: in Venezuela was declared in eighteen eleven. But to be clear,
Speaker 1: the experiment, like it had been in the United States,
Speaker 1: like it had been in Mexico, was a bit fragile
Speaker 1: from the very beginning. The First Venezuelan Republic was destroyed
Speaker 1: not only by Spanish arms but by internal weakness. Federalism
Speaker 1: quickly fragmented authority the economy such that it was collapsed,
Speaker 1: and then there was an unfortunate circumstance. In eighteen twelve,
Speaker 1: a massive earthquake hit Caracas. It killed thousands of people
Speaker 1: and was widely interpreted by a population that was overwhelmingly
Speaker 1: Roman Catholic as divine punishment for the rebellion. Royalist forces
Speaker 1: surged throughout Venezuela, and Bolivar was forced to flee. An
Speaker 1: exile to a large extent radicalized him. Moving to Cartagena
Speaker 1: in modern day Columbia, he wrote with brutal clarity. He
Speaker 1: wrote that Venezuela had failed because it mistook theory for reality.
Speaker 1: Liberty without discipline, he argued, invited disaster. Yes, there needed
Speaker 1: to be some sort of representation in government, but the
Speaker 1: republic also needed above all, unity, authority, and force. Returning
Speaker 1: in eighteen thirteen, Bolivar launched the admirable campaign reclaiming western
Speaker 1: Venezuela and briefly restoring Republican rule. But this second Republic
Speaker 1: collapsed even more violently than the first. The royalist leader
Speaker 1: Jose Tomas Boyes mobilized the rural poor, especially Janeros and
Speaker 1: formally enslaved men, against creole elites and turned the war
Speaker 1: from something that was political and this thing that was social,
Speaker 1: and as a consequence, he turned it into a literal bloodbath.
Speaker 1: Independence itself now meant survival. By eighteen fifteen, Simon Bolivar
Speaker 1: was again in exile, this time in Jamaica. His famous
Speaker 1: letter from Kingston is one of the greatest documents of
Speaker 1: Atlantic revolutionary thought. He predicted that Spanish America would fragment,
Speaker 1: suffer civil wars, and struggle with Republican government, and he
Speaker 1: was right on basically every single count. Salvation came from
Speaker 1: an unlikely place. Haiti, the world's first black republic born
Speaker 1: of a successful slave revolution, offered Bolivar, arms, ships and sanctuary.
Speaker 1: President Alexandre Petien asked only one thing in return, the
Speaker 1: abolition of slavery. Bulivar was only too quick to agree,
Speaker 1: and this decision transformed the war for independence in Central
Speaker 1: and South America. Independence was no longer merely a creole
Speaker 1: political project. It was no longer just about switching who
Speaker 1: the political elites were going to be. This was now
Speaker 1: a social revolution, drawing thousands of enslaved and marginalized men
Speaker 1: into patriot armies. It also deepened elite fears of chaos,
Speaker 1: contradiction that Bolivar will never fully resolve. Between eighteen sixteen
Speaker 1: and eighteen twenty four, Bolivar didn't fight for a country.
Speaker 1: He fought for a continant. His most audacious gamble came
Speaker 1: in eighteen nineteen, when he led an army across the
Speaker 1: flooded plains and frozen andes into New Grenada. Men died
Speaker 1: of cold disease and exhaustion. But as we have seen
Speaker 1: so many times throughout history, whether we're talking about Hannibal
Speaker 1: or where we're talking about Napoleon, the element of speed
Speaker 1: and surprise was decisive. Bolivar crossed into what is today
Speaker 1: Colombia and fought really the largest pitched battle of the
Speaker 1: entire war for independence at a place called Boyaca. Bolivar
Speaker 1: scored an enormous victory at Boyaca and marched triumphantly into
Speaker 1: the capital city of Bogota in a moment that shattered
Speaker 1: Spanish power in the northern part of Central and South America.
Speaker 1: By eighteen twenty one, after another battle, Venezuela was effectively
Speaker 1: independent and Bolivar found himself hailed as a liberator the liberator,
Speaker 1: but the war, of course, wasn't finished. While Bolivar pushed
Speaker 1: into Ecuador and Peru, one of his subordinates, Jose de
Speaker 1: San Martin Kin, liberated all of southern South America. They
Speaker 1: had a brief meeting in Guyaquiel in eighteen twenty two
Speaker 1: and then ended with Bolivar assuming overall command of the
Speaker 1: final phase of liberation, and the decisive blow finally came
Speaker 1: in eighteen twenty four when Patriot forces crushed Spanish armies
Speaker 1: at Juien and Ajuco. Three centuries of imperial rule ended,
Speaker 1: in this case, not with negotiation, but with pure annihilation.
Speaker 1: Now the reality is is that Spain and the Spanish
Speaker 1: Empire was coming to an end of its own accord.
Speaker 1: Spain had never really moved away from the model that
Speaker 1: it established after Columbus's expedition to the New World. That
Speaker 1: is sort of a wealth extrapolation model. Spain had never
Speaker 1: done an effective job of establishing an independent industry for
Speaker 1: all of its colonies. All of them were still run
Speaker 1: on essentially the old mercantile model, and that was a
Speaker 1: model that just didn't work anymore in the nineteenth century.
Speaker 1: As a consequence, and as a consequence of European affairs,
Speaker 1: Spain found itself weak, disorganized, and unable, frankly, to respond
Speaker 1: to these attacks. Now, Bolivar's victory did create nations, but
Speaker 1: it didn't create states. The Spanish Empire had centralized authority
Speaker 1: in Madrid. When it vanished, local institutions were weak, economies
Speaker 1: were shattered, and armies accustomed to power. Bolivar attempted to
Speaker 1: impose order through a new country that he called Grand
Speaker 1: Columbia a vast republic, stretching from Panama all the way
Speaker 1: to Ecuador, and it failed almost immediately. Regional elites resisted
Speaker 1: in central authority. Federalists clashed with centralists, elections bread factionalism.
Speaker 1: Bolivar increasingly relied on emergency powers, convinced that democracy without
Speaker 1: discipline would destroy independence itself. Elsewhere, the pattern found itself repeating.
Speaker 1: Central America fractured into rival states within a decade, Peru
Speaker 1: oscillated between military strongmen, and Argentina descended into Koidillo warfare. Chile,
Speaker 1: of course, achieved stability, but at the cost of restricted
Speaker 1: political participation. Yes, the war for independence had removed Spain,
Speaker 1: but it had not removed or resolved inequality, racial hierarchy,
Speaker 1: or economic dependency. Power flowed through armies and not through ballots.
Speaker 1: By the late eighteen twenties, Simon Bolivar was exhausted and
Speaker 1: he was ill. Grand Columbia had long ago disintegrated. Former
Speaker 1: allies now denounced him as a dictator. Assassination attempts stalked him,
Speaker 1: and in despair, he resigned power and prepared for an
Speaker 1: exile that he ever made it to. And eighteen thirty
Speaker 1: Bolivar died poor, bitter, and convinced that his life work
Speaker 1: had failed America. He wrote, is ungovernable, and yet without
Speaker 1: him there would have been no independence. Between eighteen ten
Speaker 1: and eighteen thirty, Central and South America achieved political freedom,
Speaker 1: but they inherited instability. Their revolutions destroyed empire, but they
Speaker 1: couldn't instantly create citizenship. Bolivar understood this better than anyone,
Speaker 1: and it haunted him until the end of his life.
Speaker 1: And honestly, his life reminds us that independence and this
Speaker 1: is key, is not an ending. It's a beginning and
Speaker 1: is often violent, uncertain, and unfinished. When Simon Bolivar died
Speaker 1: in December eighteen thirty, he did not leave behind a
Speaker 1: continent at peace. He left behind a power vacuum. Bolivar
Speaker 1: had dreamed of unity, a single strong republic stretching from
Speaker 1: the Caribbean to the Andes, looking a lot like the
Speaker 1: United States, capable of resisting European imperialism and internal decay.
Speaker 1: But by the time that his body was carried from
Speaker 1: Santa Marta, his dream was already in ruins. The great
Speaker 1: experiment of Grand Colombia had collapsed, and South America entered
Speaker 1: a turbulent decade defined not my liberation but my fragmentation.
Speaker 1: The continent was newly freed, but deeply divided and struggled
Speaker 1: to govern itself. Between eighteen thirty and eighteen forty, the
Speaker 1: Grand Colombia, comprising modern day Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador, had
Speaker 1: been Bolivar's greatest political project, but it collapsed under the
Speaker 1: weight of regional rivalries, weak institutions, and bitter disputes over
Speaker 1: federalism versus central authority. By eighteen thirty, Venezuela had seceded
Speaker 1: under Jose Antonio Paez, E declared independence under Juan Jose Flores,
Speaker 1: and Bolivar had resigned, exiled from the political system that
Speaker 1: he had created. He wrote, those who served the revolution
Speaker 1: plow the sea, and his death marked not an ending,
Speaker 1: but a beginning, a new era dominated by strongmen who
Speaker 1: ruled through political loyalty called cadillos. They ruled through military
Speaker 1: power and fear. The rump state of Colombia, oftentimes called
Speaker 1: New Granada, struggled to define itself after Bolivar. The eighteen
Speaker 1: thirties were consumed by constitutional experiments and civil unrests. Liberals
Speaker 1: and Conservatives in Colombia fought over the power of the
Speaker 1: Catholic Church, federalism versus central authority, and the role of
Speaker 1: military and politics. Presidents often came and went ruling weekly
Speaker 1: from Bogata, while regional elites governed their own territories as
Speaker 1: they saw fit. Elections existed, but violence was never far behind.
Speaker 1: The state survived, but barely. Now Colombia did not collapse
Speaker 1: like Grand Colombia had, but it entered a long pattern
Speaker 1: that would define much of South American politics. Formal republicanism
Speaker 1: layered over informal oligarchy. In Venezuela, independence brought not unity
Speaker 1: but exhaustion. Years of brutal warfare had devastated the countryside.
Speaker 1: Slavery remained in place, the economy had been shattered. Juan
Speaker 1: Antonio Paiez ruled as a president and strong man, representing
Speaker 1: only the interest of landowners and cattle elites. Venezuela became
Speaker 1: nominally constitutional, but in practice power flowed through personal patron
Speaker 1: client networks, and military loyalty. The irony, of course, was bitter.
Speaker 1: Venezuela had been liberated predominantly by mass mobilization of enslaved
Speaker 1: people and rural fighters, yet the republic that emerge entrenched
Speaker 1: inequality rather than dismantling it. Ecuador entered the eighteen thirties
Speaker 1: as a state with little national cohesion. The coastal elites
Speaker 1: of Guadalakielle and the highland elites of Quito mistrusted each
Speaker 1: other completely. President Juan Jose Flores governed through force patronage.
Speaker 1: Indigenous populations, who formed the majority, remained excluded from citizenship
Speaker 1: in any meaningful sense. Ecuador survived the decade, but as
Speaker 1: a fragile creation, held together less by institutions than by
Speaker 1: exhaustion and fear of chaos. And further south, the world
Speaker 1: of the Andes descended into rivalry. In Peru, the military
Speaker 1: totally dominated politics. Governments came and went through coups rather
Speaker 1: than elections. Economic instability and debt haunted the republic. In Bolivia,
Speaker 1: named after all, after Bolivar himself, the instability was even worse.
Speaker 1: Bolivia went through multiple presidents in rapid succession, many of
Speaker 1: the military generals. In eighteen thirty six, the two countries
Speaker 1: were actually briefly united in the Peru Bolivian Confederation, an
Speaker 1: ambitious attempt to restore power throughout the Andes, but the
Speaker 1: experiment alarmed neighboring Chile, which feared regional domination, and so
Speaker 1: Chile invaded, and by eighteen thirty nine Chilean armies had
Speaker 1: destroyed the confederation. The message was now clear. Unity in
Speaker 1: South America would be punished, not rewarded. And nowhere in
Speaker 1: post Believiar politics take a darker turn than in Argentina.
Speaker 1: The country was torn between unitarians who wanted centralized authority
Speaker 1: in Buenos Aires and federalists who defended provincial autonomy. And
Speaker 1: out of this chaos rose Juan Manuel. They were by
Speaker 1: the late eighteen thirties. The euros us ruled Buenos Aires
Speaker 1: and effectively the country through censorship, secret police, and political violence.
Speaker 1: His regime enforced loyalty through fear, while claiming to defend tradition,
Speaker 1: order and national sovereignty. Argentina did not stabilize. Instead, it
Speaker 1: hardened amid the chaos of Spanish America. Brazil followed a
Speaker 1: strikingly different course. Brazil had achieved its independence in eighteen
Speaker 1: twenty two, but actually, interestingly enough, remained a monarchy. When
Speaker 1: Emperor Pedro the First abdicated in eighteen thirty one, Brazil
Speaker 1: entered a regency period marked by revolts, but the imperial
Speaker 1: framework endured. Brazil's actually the only South American country to
Speaker 1: continue to try to work on monarchy after independence. Brazil's
Speaker 1: monarchy paradoxically provided, interestingly enough, more continuity than republicanism did.
Speaker 1: Throughout the rest of South and Central America. Slavery continued
Speaker 1: in Brazil. Elites remained powerful, but there was no fragmentation
Speaker 1: in the Brazilian state. It was a reminder, though, that
Speaker 1: independence didn't dictate political reform at all. Change had to
Speaker 1: come from within, and normally it had to come from
Speaker 1: the bottom. The elites were only interested in securing their
Speaker 1: own power, and so by eighteen forty, which is where
Speaker 1: we're going to leave South America for now, the continent
Speaker 1: was free from Spanish domination, but it was really unsettled.
Speaker 1: Bolivar's dream of unity lay shattered, and in its place
Speaker 1: were weak republics with strong men, constitutions overshadowed by the
Speaker 1: power of bayonets and social hierarchies inherited from empire and
Speaker 1: never erased by revolution. Independence had ended colonial rule, but
Speaker 1: it had never those deeper questions who should rule, who
Speaker 1: counted as a citizen, and how could power be restrained
Speaker 1: once gained by force? Those questions would haunt South America
Speaker 1: for the rest of the nineteenth century and beyond. And
Speaker 1: in that sense, Bolivar's death didn't close a chapter, it
Speaker 1: opened a long and uncertain aftermath. Now that's a lot,
Speaker 1: but it sets the stage for where we're going from
Speaker 1: here to understand how Central and South America are now
Speaker 1: free from Spanish domination and how eventually the Spanish Empire
Speaker 1: will come to its final denouncement in the Spanish American War.
Speaker 1: But that's a little bit away for now. We do
Speaker 1: now need to rotate back to Europe and begin to
Speaker 1: talk about really what the post Napoleonic world looked like
Speaker 1: in Europe and how the economic and social changes that
Speaker 1: are moving through your predominantly economic and industrial changes are
Speaker 1: going to now catapult this post Napoleonic Europe out of chaos,
Speaker 1: out of constant warfare, and into a position where Europeans,
Speaker 1: for a period of time up until World War One,
Speaker 1: are going to completely dominate the globe.