Gregorio Luperón
(Puerto Plata, 1839-1897) Dominican patriot, hero of the Restoration War and main leader of the Liberals during the Second Republic.
Gregorio Luperón
Having achieved the independence of Haiti in 1844, the First Dominican Republic (1844-1861) had to suffer both the repeated attacks of the Haitians, that they threatened the national sovereignty, such as the dictatorial ways of the presidents who alternated in power during those years: Pedro Santana and Buenaventura Báez.At the end of his last term (1858-1861), Pedro Santana decided to annex the country to Spain; His idea was to put an end to the permanent threat from Haiti, but also to perpetuate himself in power, since he accepted in exchange the position of captain general of the new Spanish province of Santo Domingo.
The Baecistas continued to govern for three more years without their leader, whom they deposed to prevent the blue party from displacing them from power through a revolution.This took place in 1876 and, at the suggestion of Luperón, it was agreed to present as a candidate for the presidency Ulises Espaillat, an eminent citizen and politician with democratic ideas who won in the March elections of that year.Luperón accepted the post of Minister of War and Navy in the new cabinet.But barely seven months later, pressure from the Baecistas forced Espaillat to resign and returned power to Buenaventura Báez, Luperón's eternal political enemy, who, once again, had to go into exile.
During the following triennium, the Dominican Republic experienced a period of political instability and rapid alternations in government.Finally, in October 1879, the Liberals took power firmly.Luperón acceded to the presidency of a provisional government that, based in Puerto Plata, established a policy aimed at redirecting the country within the patterns of liberalism of the time: he established a progressive regime, tried to re-institutionalize the Republic and prepared the electoral process that, at the end of 1880, he granted power to Fernando Arturo Meriño (1880-1882), who was succeeded by some biannual liberal governments.
Gregorio Luperón retired to Europe as an extraordinary envoy and plenipotentiary minister.When he returned to the country, the executive of Francisco Gregorio Billini (1884-1885) appointed him delegate of the government in Cibao.From his new position he faced the revolutionary movement of 1886 in Puerto Plata and contributed to the coming to power, a year later, of President Ulises Heureaux (1887-1899), Luperón's former lieutenant in the War of Restoration and a prominent figure of the liberals.Heureaux finally brought stability to the Republic at the price of a radical ideological turn: he established a corrupt personalist dictatorship, strengthened the army, harshly repressed the opposition and ruined the public coffers, leaving the nation in the hands of foreign capital.
Disappointed by the dictatorial attitudes of the new leader, Gregorio Luperón unsuccessfully sought the support of the Haitian government to combat him.He was on the island of Saint Thomas when, in 1897, he became ill with cancer.Aware, Heureaux personally came to his aid.After hearing serious recriminations from their former boss and quietly accepting them, they reconciled.Luperon agreed to return to the homeland, for which they boarded the warship that had transported Heureaux to the neighboring island, and returned to Puerto Plata.There he died on May 20, 1897.
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