convenience, or whenever an individual or a community felt no respect for the nominal government, a new confederation might be formed. Here then was another apple of discord in the Republic, and the two parties, after having been called "Royalists" and "Patriots," "Congresistas" and "Executivistas," "Conservaties," and "Liberals," now bore the names of "Federales" and "Unitarios."[1] Perhaps, to finish the list, I should give the name bestowed upon the latter party by Don Juan Manuel Rosas, that is, "salvajes inmundos Unitarios."
But the Argentine Republic is so situated geographically, that it is destined to a consolidation, whatever Rosas may say to the contrary. Its continuous plain, its rivers confined to one outlet, and therefore to one port, force it inevitably to be "one and indivisible" Rivadavia, who well understood the necessities of the country, advised the provinces to unite under a common constitution, and to make a national port of Buenos Ayres. Aguero, his supporter in Congress, said to the citizens of Buenos Ayres, "Let us voluntarily give to the provinces what, sooner or later, they will claim by force." The prophecy failed in one respect; the provinces did not claim the port of Buenos Ayres by force of arms, but by force of the barbarism which they sent upon her in Facundo and Rosas. Buenos Ayres feels all the effects of the barbarism, while the port has been of no use to the provinces.
I have been obliged to explain all these antecedents
- ↑ Federales, those who held to a confederation of the old provinces, or a union of states. Unitarios, those who advocated a consolidated central government.
