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Honduras Aborted Reform, 1954-63
The relative peace that Honduras had enjoyed for nearly
two
decades was shattered by a series of events during 1954,
Gálvez's
last year in office. Tension throughout the region had
been
increasing steadily as a confrontation developed between
the left-
leaning government of President Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán in
Guatemala
and the United States. Part of the confrontation involved
the
expropriation of United Fruit Company lands and charges
that the
Guatemalan government was encouraging agitation among the
banana
workers.
In 1952 the United States had begun considering actions
to
overthrow the Guatemalan government. Honduras had given
asylum to
several exiled opponents of Arbenz, including Colonel
Carlos
Castillo Armas, but Gálvez was reluctant to cooperate in
direct
actions against Guatemala, and the plans were not
activated. By
early 1954, however, a major covert operation against
Guatemala was
being organized, this time with greater Honduran
cooperation. One
reason for the cooperation was the Honduran government's
concern
over increased labor tensions in the banana-producing
areas,
tensions that the fruit companies blamed, in part, on
Guatemalan
influence.
Starting in early May 1954, the tensions escalated to
strikes.
First, a series of strikes broke out against United Fruit
Company
operations on Honduras's Caribbean coast. Within a few
days, the
strike spread to include the Standard Fruit Company
operations,
bringing the banana industry in the country to a near
standstill.
The strikers presented a wide range of grievances,
involving wages,
working conditions, medical benefits, overtime pay, and
the right
to collective bargaining. Initial government efforts to
end the
strike failed, and work stoppages began to spread into
other
industries. By May 21, the number of strikers was
approaching
30,000, and the nation's economy was under severe strain.
As the strike was spreading, Honduras was also becoming
more
deeply involved in the movement to topple the Arbenz
government in
Guatemala. In late May, a military assistance agreement
was
concluded between the United States and Honduras, and
large
quantities of United States arms were quickly shipped to
Honduras.
Much of this incoming assistance was passed on to
anti-Arbenz
rebels commanded by Castillo Armas. In June these forces
crossed
into Guatemala and after several days of political
maneuvering but
little actual fighting, Arbenz fled into exile, and
Castillo Armas
became president. With the specter of foreign influence
over the
strike thus removed, negotiations began, and the strike
ended in
early July. Labor leaders who had been accused of having
ties with
Guatemala were jailed, and the final settlement, which met
few of
the original demands, was signed with elements more
acceptable to
the government and the fruit companies than to the
workers. Despite
the limited gains, however, the strike did mark a major
step toward
greater influence for organized labor in Honduras and a
decline in
the power of the fruit companies.
In the midst of these conflicts, the campaign for the
1954
elections continued. Unhappy with some of Gálvez's
gestures toward
liberalization, Carías, despite his advanced age, decided
to run
for president and secured the PNH nomination. This move,
however,
split the party, and more moderate members broke away to
form the
National Revolutionary Movement (Movimiento Nacional
Revolucionario--MNR). Their nominee was former vice
president
Abraham Williams Calderón. The split in the ruling party
encouraged
the PLH, who united behind Ramón Villeda Morales, a
Tegucigalpa
physician who was seen as somewhat to the left of center
in the
party's political spectrum.
Both the campaign and the election were remarkably free
and
honest. On October 10, 1954, approximately 260,000 out of
over
400,000 eligible voters went to the polls. Villeda Morales
won a
large plurality with 121,213 votes, Carías received
77,041, and
Williams carried 53,041. The PLH also gained a plurality
in the
legislature. Under Honduran law, however, a majority of
the total
votes was required to be elected president; Villeda
Morales lacked
a majority by just over 8,000 votes. The stage was set for
a repeat
of the confusing paralysis of 1924 because the
constitution
required, first, that two-thirds of the members of the new
legislature must be present and vote to choose a president
and,
second, that the victor must receive two-thirds of the
legislature's vote. To complicate matters further, Gálvez
left for
Miami reportedly to obtain medical treatment although some
sources
claim he merely fled the country, leaving the government
in the
hands of Vice President Julio Lozano Díaz.
Unable to reconcile their differences and unwilling to
accept
Villeda Morales as president, the PNH and MNR deputies
boycotted
the legislature, producing a national crisis. The
constitution
provided that in case of congressional deadlock the
Supreme Court
of Justice would select the president. Dominated as the
court was
by Carías appointees, the PLH opposed such a course of
action. At
this juncture, Lozano Díaz suddenly suspended the
legislature and
announced that he would act as president until new
elections could
be held. He declared that he would form a national
government with
cabinet members taken from all major parties and received
pledges
of support from all three candidates in the 1954 election.
A
Council of State, headed by a PLH member but including
members of
all three major parties, was appointed to replace the
suspended
congress until a constituent assembly could be chosen to
write yet
another constitution.
Lozano Díaz began his period as president with a broad
base of
support that eroded rapidly. He unveiled an ambitious
development
plan to be financed by international loans and increased
taxes and
also introduced the nation's first labor code. This
document
guaranteed workers the right to organize and strike but
gave
employers the right of lockout and forbade strikes in
public
services. The code also embodied some social welfare and
minimum-
wage provisions and regulated hours and working
conditions. All
these provisions gained him some labor support, but in
later months
relations between the president and labor began to sour.
As time passed, it became clear that Lozano Díaz had
ambitions
to replace the traditional parties with one that he
controlled and
could use to help prolong his hold on power. He reduced
the Council
of State to a consultative body, postponed elections, and
set about
forming his own party, the National Unity Party (Partido
de Unidad
Nacional--PUN). The activities of other parties were
limited, and,
in July 1956, Villeda Morales and other PLH leaders were
suddenly
arrested and flown into exile. A few weeks later, the
government
crushed an uprising by 400 troops in the capital. Public
opinion,
however, was becoming increasingly hostile to the
president, and
rumors of his imminent fall had begun to circulate.
Following the August 1956 uprising, Lozano Díaz's
health began
to deteriorate, but he clung stubbornly to power.
Elections for the
legislature in October were boycotted by most of the
opposition,
who charged that the process was openly rigged to favor
the
president's supporters. The results seemed to confirm this
charge,
as the PUN candidates were declared the winners of all
fifty-six
seats in the congress. The joy of their victories was
short,
however. On October 21, the armed forces, led by the
commanders of
the army and air force academies and by Major Roberto
Gálvez, the
son of the former president, ousted Lozano Díaz and set up
a
military junta to rule the country.
This coup marked a turning point in Honduran history.
For the
first time, the armed forces had acted as an institution
rather
than as the instrument of a political party or of an
individual
leader. The new rulers represented younger, more
nationalistic, and
reform-minded elements in the military. They were products
of the
increased professionalization of the 1940s and 1950s. Most
had
received some training by United States military advisers,
either
in Honduras or abroad. For decades to come, the military
would act
as the final arbiter of Honduran politics
(see Political Dynamics
, ch. 4;
Consolidation and Organizational Maturity, 1963-80
, ch. 5).
The military's largest problem was the holding of
elections for
a legislature and the selection of a new president. A
system of
proportional representation was agreed upon, and elections
were
held in October. The PLH won a majority, and in November,
by a vote
of thirty-seven to twenty, the assembly selected Villeda
Morales as
president for a six-year term beginning January 1, 1958.
The new PLH administration undertook several major
efforts to
improve and modernize Honduran life. Funds were obtained
from the
International Monetary Fund
(IMF--see Glossary) to
stabilize the currency and from the
World Bank (see Glossary) to begin
paving a highway from the Caribbean coast to the capital. Other
efforts were undertaken to expand education. The greatest attention was
devoted to passing a new labor code, establishing a social
security system, and beginning a program of agrarian reform.
The reform program produced increasing opposition among
the more
conservative elements in Honduran society. There were
scattered
uprisings during Villeda Morales's initial years in power,
but the
military remained loyal and quickly crushed the
disturbances.
Military support began to evaporate in the early 1960s,
however.
Waning military support was in part a result of rising
criticism of
the government by conservative organizations such as the
National
Federation of Agriculturists and Stockraisers of Honduras
(Federación Nacional de Agricultores y Ganaderos de
Honduras--
Fenagh), which represented the large landowners. The shift
in the
military's attitude also reflected concern over what were
viewed as
more frequent rural disorder and growing radical
influences in
labor and peasant groups. Deteriorating relations with
neighboring
states, notably Nicaragua, also contributed to the
tension. The
major causes of friction, however, were the president's
1957
creation of the Civil Guard (Guardia Civil)--a militarized
police
commanded directly by the president rather than the chief
of the
armed forces--and the prospect of another PLH victory in
the 1963
elections.
The elections were scheduled for October 1963. As in
1954, the
PLH was confronting a divided opposition. The PNH
nominated Ramón
Ernesto Cruz, but a faction split off and ran the son of
ex-
president Carías. The PLH ignored the wishes of their
president and
nominated Modesto Rodas Alvarado, a charismatic, highly
partisan
figure believed to be to the left of Villeda Morales. All
signs
pointed to an overwhelming victory for the PLH, an outcome
that the
military found increasingly unpalatable.
Rumors of a coup began circulating in late summer of
1963. The
United States endeavored to make clear its opposition to
such
action--even dispatching a high-ranking officer from the
United
States Southern Command in the Panama Canal Zone to try to
convince
the chief of the armed forces, Air Force Colonel Oswaldo
López
Arellano, to call off the coup. Villeda Morales also tried
to calm
military fears, taking the carbines away from the Civil
Guard and
opposing plans for a constitutional amendment to restore
direct
command of the military to the president. All these
efforts failed,
however. Before dawn on October 3, 1963, the military
moved to
seize power. The president and the PLH's 1963 presidential
candidates were flown into exile, Congress was dissolved,
the
constitution was suspended, and the planned elections were
canceled. Colonel López Arellano proclaimed himself
president, and
the United States promptly broke diplomatic relations.
Data as of December 1993
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