And I shall have my people come to choose
Two Peróns to wear their country’s crowns
In thousands in my squares and avenues
Emptying their villages and towns
Where every soul in home or shack or stall
Knows me as Argentina--that is all
--Evita

A New Argentina

As time passed, and it was obvious that Eva would never be accepted by the oligarchs, she dropped her long, formal name and became Eva Perón and eventually, simply Evita. She used the language of the common people in her speeches and this endeared her to the masses. And with this mass identification came affection and empathy.

Eva never seemed to wear out her welcome with the descamisados, and became the ideal of women all over the country. She had achieved the ultimate goal of many women, doing work that was needed and satisfying as well as being an undeniable power in the government while still acting wifely and feminine toward her husband. Eva’s dedication to Perón, his ideals, and his plan for Argentina, only increased as the years passed, and she drove herself and everyone around her in the same merciless way to achieve those goals. Only illness would ever take her away from her work.

If she did choose her path with a conscious or subconscious knowledge that her earthly years would be few, it explains many of her actions and methods. There is no doubt that she knew her body was frail and took longer to heal than most; the warning signs had come in Europe, but she chose not to heed them. Her frantic haste in brushing aside bureaucratic machinery, her twenty-hour workdays, and her famous temper were all signs of a woman in a hurry. She pushed aside any person or institution that threatened to block her path, and she often acted rashly, without thought of future consequences. While Perón hated details because they tended to diminish his grand plans, Eva hated them because they slowed her down.

In September 1947, Eva single-handedly pushed a bill for woman’s suffrage through the Chamber of Deputies, the Senate, and onto Perón’s desk for final approval. She may not qualify as a militant feminist in today’s terms because of her emphasis on the role of women as wives and mothers, but she succeeded in this case simply because she had the power to fight any male opposition. The magnitude of her achievement is not diminished by the obvious fact that then four million women owed their right to vote to Perón. Their votes would prove vital in the 1951 elections, thanks to an efficient organization set up by Eva immediately after the law was signed, and the formation of the Partido peronista feminino. The women could, of course, vote a Radical or Socialist ticket, but it’s clear Eva not only thought no one would want to vote for anyone but Perón, she later implied that a vote for the opposition was a treasonable offense.

The majority of Argentines who had voted Perón into office may have enjoyed his fatherly embrace at first, but their freedom was being stifled as he began to hug them too tightly. Women and men both had the right to vote now, but did anyone have the right to justice? Perón had completed his exorcism of anti-Peronists in the Supreme Court at the end of May 1949, and he proudly announced the selection of five new justices, all Peronists, which included his brother-in-law, Lucas Alvarez Rodríguez, Blanca Duarte’s husband.

Eva now owned all four major Buenos Aires radio stations, and gave frequent broadcasts on a wide range of subjects. She spoke often to women, usually about their rights as voters (and their obligations), their value to the country in their roles as homemakers, and tips on how to stretch their pesos and deal with shortages.

The nearly ideal conditions under which Perón had assumed office had degenerated badly by 1949, and the fabulous gold and foreign currency credits which had been more than $1,500 million in 1946 had dwindled to nothing. The markets for Argentina’s exports became unreliable thanks to Argentina’s exorbitant prices and lowered surpluses as well as direct competition from the United States. Argentina could still emerge as a world power, but it seemed less and less likely.

Perón’s program of nationalization of railroads, public utilities, and private industries was very popular with the workers, but it had been very costly. He’d been forced to use his sterling credits in Britain before they became valueless with time, and Britain had little to sell except their interests in the Argentine rail system. Perón bought quickly, overpaid, and was forced to augment his purchase with new equipment available only at black market prices. His dream of industrialization for Argentina was predicated upon swift mechanization of the agricultural system, and introduction of heavy industry so the country would be less dependent on imports of finished goods and metals. None of the industries seized by Perón was in very good shape. Everything owned by foreign interests had deteriorated during the long war and the general decay was further accelerated by the new Argentine management which was inexperienced in the ways of foreign machinery.

But the most destructive force of all in the "New Argentina" was the promise of new jobs, new opportunities for training in skilled work, and high paychecks in unionized industries which lured tens of thousands of people into Buenos Aires. The population outside the capital actually fell during the 1940s as factories multiplied. The estancieros had lost their incentive when Perón instituted export price controls, and now there were not enough men to keep the production levels at even their pre-1945 standard. The lands slipped into idleness, but the oligarcic position was as secure as it had always been, because land values soared.

The faltering economy could still have been controlled, had nature not chosen that moment in Argentina’s history to be uncooperative. When the first of what would be a three-year drought hit the country in 1949, the agricultural industries had not been sufficiently mechanized to absorb the shock. There were still too few exports of non-agrarian goods to make up for a huge import/export and foreign currency imbalance. The factors which had contributed to the mid- and post-war boom were short-term and could not have been expected to continue. Argentina found herself unable to fulfill any of her trade agreements and there were rumors that the national dish of Argentina--beef--would soon have to be rationed.

For the worker, however, the honeymoon with Juan and Eva had just begun; they not only had good, well-paying jobs; now they had educational opportunities, paid vacations, pensions, national health care, a better chance for homes of their own, and a sense of class unity and self-respect. They finally had someone in power who listened and then acted on their problems, for Eva’s door was open to all. She was usually over-generous with her bounty, but that made them love her all the more; she not only cared about their grievances at work, she asked about their families. She tried to provide for them too, and she could, because she had founded the largest single enterprise in the history of Argentina.

Charity and Social Aid

The Fundación ayuda social Eva Perón (Social Welfare Foundation) seemed, at the outset, to be a respectable and feminine project for the wife of the president, allowing her to assume a matriarchal position of benevolence. But the Fundación also was the means Eva used to avenge herself on the ladies of the Sociedad de beneficencia who had denied her the honor of becoming their president. As Eva’s organization gathered momentum, the Sociedad was denied government support, and finally was declared illegal.

Eva attracted world-wide notice by showering food, clothing, and medical assistance on victims of disasters from China to the United States, but the majority of her work was centered inside Argentina. The charity organization looked its best when judged by its accomplishments, but though very visible, they were often more show than substance. She built a children’s fairy tale village at a cost of several hundred thousand dollars, but there is no evidence that children ever occupied it, or that it served any purpose other than propaganda; every visitor who wished evidence of the Fundación’s good works was taken to it for an impressive tour. The hospitals built by the Fundación were usually in places where they could be seen by all, rather than in the remote spots of the country, where they were really needed. Much of the low-income housing for the ever-growing working class in Buenos Aires was often beautifully finished on the outside, replete with statuary, but an empty shell on the inside.

The summer resorts for workers, who had their first paid vacations ever under Juan and Eva’s rule, were, however, completed and enjoyed by many over the years. The resorts, homes for old people, young women and orphans were furnished in a lavish style by Eva, who was obviously remembering the squalor of her own early surroundings. She said she wanted only the best for the occupants, since they would all be living in luxury one day, but it never seems to have occurred to her that the transition back to mud pueblo might be difficult for those who had just spent two weeks in such surroundings.

All Eva asked in return for her good works was the love of her descamisados, and they gave it to her freely. There was truth in her idea that "charity" demanded groveling gratitude, while "social aid" asked for no thanks, permitted recipients some measure of self respect, and solved the problem, rather than covering it up.

A loyal member of the party whose niece benefited from Eva’s largess remembers, "My niece was newly married and like most young couples in Buenos Aires, they couldn’t afford both an apartment and furniture. She wrote to Ayuda social and sure enough, Eva arrived one day with a truck. It contained an entire housefull of furniture. Imagine you are that girl with something you could have never gotten on your own and you’re in the Plaza de Mayo for a rally. You are the most enthusiastic of all. Eva has bought you--your life and your soul."

Eva was also responsible for a series of human rights acts, including special decrees for the aged, women, workers, and children. Long overdue, these new rights--no longer something belonging only to the privileged few, were the touchstone of Eva’s social welfare philosophy.

Eva was positive that her Fundación ayuda social would cure the problem of poverty in Argentina, though she knew nothing could be done overnight. She also knew only too well how demeaning poverty could be and though she used the Fundación for publicity and propaganda, she never expected anyone to get down on their knees to her in gratitude after she helped them. All she knew was that there were millions she could help, and so she set out on a quest for the money with which to reach her goal of making the rich less rich and the poor less poor.

The annual budget for the Fundación was over $100 million annually, and possibly as much as $600 million per year. The money came from many sources, large and small. From the owners of businesses, she asked for "voluntary" contributions, and if she met with resistance, a system of persuasion was set in motion. Using the growing force of union members, there was no difficulty in finding minor health, building, or safety infractions which could be used to fine or close down an ungenerous company. This encouraged most businessmen to hurriedly send in a substantial amount of money to the Fundación.

The oligarchs found themselves in a vulnerable position for the first time in memory. They were not only out of power, politically, it looked as though the current situation would not change in the foreseeable future and the growing voice of the classes below them and the crumbling social structure made it clear that the days were gone when the oligarchs could run the country as though it were their personal playground.

If Eva’s violent hatred of the oligarchy was excessive, it was only fueled by their loathing of her. They never gave her a chance for a fair hearing--though it is probable she would have been rejected in any event--and she was criticized and ridiculed by many who had never laid eyes on her. The very magnitude of their hatred and their preoccupation with sordid stories of her days as an actress gave Eva the one thing she could not have gotten in any other way: complete power over their lives. She could and did make life miserable for her neighbors on the elegant Avenida Alvear, from placing fish vendors outside the posh Jockey Club windows to dragging their daughters off to jail for small infractions and housing them with prostitutes.

Eva’s Robin Hood-like determination worked well at first, since the post-war economy could support her maneuverings. She also managed to skim a percentage off the top from most business transactions, often netting five-figure sums from lucrative government contracts. This process did not change the existing methods of doing business in Argentina, but merely changed the owner of the palm which was greased, in time-honored tradition.

Congress regularly appropriated money for Eva’s social work and it often came from the proceeds of one of Perón’s expropriations of land or industries. Money also came from penalties for infractions of the law, back taxes, the casinos at Mar del Plata, and state lotteries, but it was the workers themselves who furnished the most regular income.

Tributes from every CGT-affiliated union poured in as each tried to outdo the generosity of the other. When union members received a wage increase from Eva, a portion of it was funneled back to the Fundación. Every year, by congressional order, each employed person in the country donated one day’s pay to Eva. One year, when Eva asked that this be increased by an additional day’s pay, there was such an outcry that she was forced to back down. However, the CGT treasurer discovered that giving the money back to the people would have involved such a massive bookkeeping operation that it was nearly impossible, so Eva quietly accepted the money for the second time.

Mention must be made of Eva’s Swiss bank accounts. There is no doubt that they existed; both her brother and Perón went to great pains to try and recover the money from them after she died. There is no evidence that they succeeded. How much money was in the accounts and what happened to it will never be known, nor will the sources of the money. As for her motives, she certainly was aware that governments in South American had notoriously short tenure, and should she and Perón be driven into exile, they would need cash. Eva lived in fear of being reduced to the level of poverty which marked her first twenty years of life, and she was not about to let it happen again.

Since Eva believed that she was truly helping her people, it is unlikely that she felt she was "stealing" from them. Though later altered by Perón to make himself the beneficiary, the intent of her will was that her money, jewels, clothes, and works of art were to be given to or held in trust for the descamisados, in anticipation of the day when she would no longer be there to tend to their needs.

Meanwhile, despite Eva’s acquisitive nature, the standard of living for the average man had increased considerably, even with the demands of the Fundación. Though wage levels would later fail to keep pace with inflation, the buying power of the lower classes was still greater than it had been prior to 1945. That fact, plus their improved self-image form the major achievements of the Perón regime. The lasting value to those affected can be measured by the durability of Peronism and the growth of the Santa Evita cult over the years. Never again would the elite treat the workers as personal vassals and no government would ever be able to ignore their power as a cohesive force. The most that post-1955 governments were able to do was to suppress this group, for no man has emerged who has been strong enough to tap the very real resource of its power.

The Endless Days

Today, as from 1945-1952, there is still widespread interest in Eva Perón’s day-to-day activities, particularly while Perón was president. Between 1948 and 1951, her news value seldom attracted notice outside South America, even though she spoke at all the major Peronist rallies.

Her big public moments were usually for the benefit of the descamisados, and had little international impact. The news that Eva had worked another twenty-hour day taking requests from the workers or the poor was hardly worth noting. If she had truly longed for fame and glory, she could have easily stage-managed the Fundación into a showcase for herself, extending her benevolent presence only on special occasions. As it was. her daily chores were small and insignificant parts of what would have one day become an impressive body of work. This was the route she had chosen: to help people by ones and twos, knowing that she worked most effectively on a personal basis. Her days were spent opening supermarkets, soccer matches, and harvest festivals. She spoke to women, children, sheepherders and pipe fitters in groups ranging in size from ten to ten thousand. She would fly 500 miles to a tiny provincial union office and then go miles by car across the dusty plains to deliver a basket of food or a sewing machine.

She supervised a tremendous enterprise which included newspapers, radio stations, a chain of food stores opened under the Fundación’s control, as well as tending to construction of buildings and the manufacture of clothing, shoes and other soft goods to be dispensed as social aid. She met with ambassadors, visiting journalists, foreign dignitaries, union leaders, cabinet members, and ministers; but she always found time every week to meet with the people, too. They told her what they wanted from Perón’s "New Argentina" and she told Perón. They felt dignified, important, and cared for.

When Eva was not personally at hand to relate the latest achievements of Perón, she could always be heard on the radio and seen in the newsreels. Her face covered the newspapers and her smiling portrait gazed down on schoolchildren and government workers throughout the entire country. She filled the eyes and ears of her supporters and opponents alike, but she also filled the hearts of the former, because they knew she was one of them.

Eva’s sincerity is hard to doubt. No one would willingly subject themselves to six years of such an exhausting schedule had it only been for effect. The results of her work were always difficult to measure but she never gave any indication that she planned to change her schedule or curtail her daily contact with the people at any time in the future. In fact, she created an organization that would not have been able to function without her constant attendance; it faltered if she was gone for just a day. The only breaks in routine (and resultant halt in all of her projects) came when she was ill, and that was far more often than was ever officially acknowledged. Whenever bedridden, her first public statement was always that she was anxious to return to the people and her work. And that is exactly what she did; so the sincerity of her words cannot be doubted.

Perón and Eva were the Prince Charming and Cinderella of Argentina. They faced their foes and their friends together, and there was never a whisper that their married life was less than perfect. Everyone acknowledged that they could have had little home life together, considering their respective schedules, but they gave every indication that they were a truly happy couple. Their open gestures of affection were rarely displayed in public, but there were a few times when the depth of their mutual dependency was apparent. Perón’s unblushing tears as he praised his wife at the dedication of her children’s village as well as his staunch support of all her programs betrayed his profound respect for her achievements. Eva had always praised Perón to excess, comparing him to Napoleon and even Christ, but there was one public moment that probably showed the woman underneath the smile more than at any other time in her life. It was on October 17, 1951 when Eva was speechless with emotion that she took refuge in Perón’s arms and wept on his shoulder in despair and sadness. Their marriage may have been one of convenience, but the pinnacle of power had become a lonely place occupied only by the two of them.

Neither Eva nor Perón had any close friends, all advisors of any intelligence or ambition had been purged back in 1946 and 1947. They had no one but each other to share the triumphs, plans, scheme, and daydreams as well as the fears which must have come many times during their rule. The sharing, and the fear, proved to be a bond much stronger than love.

La Prensa Goes too Far

But it was "Love" that became the recurring theme of Peronism. The indoctrination of over eight million Argentines to Perón’s third political position between capitalism and communism which Eva dubbed justicialismo required simply repetition rather than understanding. Eva’s two books, La razón de mi vida and Historia del peronismo tell of many problems, but only one solution: The "heart of Perón". She convinced the workers, she convinced the poor, and it seems she convinced herself. But the emphasis on love and Perón’s record of achievements were not enough. The regime used the press but never manipulated it so that it could do more than simply react to the opposition. The views of the otherwise-minded became more important because of the regime’s lack of offensive strategy.

The suppression of the press was a massive undertaking, particularly since Perón insisted that it be done "legally." The radio and film industries had been peronista controlled by 1946, but they were never used fully for propaganda, only to carry speeches and events. Eva’s ownership of a number of newspapers and magazines provided a good showcase for peronismo, but their effectiveness dropped off as the economy faltered. Because of the slowness of the suppression methods, much of the damage was done before the last free presses disappeared.

The press in Argentina was a hardy group, and there were three newspapers that had established reputations for objectivity in reporting that were well-known outside the borders of the country.

La Vanguardia was the voice of the Socialist party and had opposed conservative and Radical regimes with a valiant spirit. Eventually it fell to strong-arm peronista tactics, after being shut down six times between 1943 and 1947.

La Nación, one of the top two papers in the country, followed the lead of many other papers and kept its doors open by the simple method of never printing a word--pro or con--about the government or Buenos Aires politics in general. The editorials concentrated on subjects far removed from politics and they filled their limited pages with stories of American film stars and shipping notices. But La Prensa, the premier South American paper, would not fall in line so meekly.

Perón’s legislation had all but smothered the opposition shortly after he unveiled his new constitution in 1949. The staggered elections for the senate were all changed to coincide with the presidential elections giving the opposition no chance to acquire additional seats in off-year elections. The minimum number of seats required to be held by members of the opposition was reduced from fifty-two to ten. Perón eliminated trial by jury altogether (though it had never been a regular feature of Argentine justice). Social and economic goals of the regime were written into the new document, and individual liberty was recognized as a right, but not at the expense of the state.

One law had a direct bearing on the news media, and that law stated that descato (contempt or disrespect) for any employee of the government would be punishable by fine or imprisonment. Truth was not a legal issue here, and the law was written so as to allow the widest possible interpretation. This is the law that was used to close down radio stations, magazines, and newspapers, as well as proving effective in silencing members of the opposing political parties and other assorted enemies of the regime.

Most of the oligarchs had felt the long arm of the law by 1950, and were forced to relate the latest gossip about "la señora" (Eva) away from listening ears of servants, taxi drivers, and restaurant waiters, The law of descato was primarily enforced through a network of paid informers who were anxious to gain favor in Eva’s eyes as well as a few pesos in their pockets for information. Eva’s constant contact with the people put her in an ideal position to enlist the help of a million descamisado blue collar workers.

Freedom of speech, public and private, was now a thing of the past. The traditional forum where dissenting voices could be heard without fear of reprisal had been the Chamber of Deputies. After the new law took effect, peronista deputies simply stripped the offender of his congressional immunity before arresting him for descato. Laborista leader Cipriano Reyes and the highly respected Radical party chief, Ernesto E. Sammartino, were victims of these tactics.

Suppression of the last important free paper, La Prensa, became a necessity when two enterprising reporters discovered a wildcat railroad workers strike in progress. Both the Radical and Socialist parties had large numbers of supporters, and the reporters also found a deep schism in the peronista ranks. Their article was scheduled to be published on January 26, but the government was compelled to prevent this.

Prior attempts to close the paper had been unsuccessful because La Prensa was a generous and benevolent employer, providing its employees with free libraries, pensions, recreational facilities, medical and legal clinics. The CGT could not offer them any more. From October of 1948 on, decree had followed decree, cutting down the maximum size allowed for all newspapers until it stood at eight pages; Perón had also confiscated all newsprint owned by La Prensa, claiming a nationwide shortage. But these small annoyances had not fazed Alberto Gainza Paz, publisher of the paper that was called the "New York Times of South America." The story on 26 January revealed one other thing which had to be concealed: Perón had called out the army to quell the riot on the railroad tracks during the wildcat strike and this was something he had promised never to do. So the CGT machine roared into action in the early hours of the 26th, and one of its member unions, the news vendors, walked out, refusing to deliver the paper unless a series of impossible demands (including a share of the profits) were met. The plant was closed.

On Labor Day, Perón proudly presented the paper to the CGT for its use as an official house organ, and he said that La Prensa had "exploited the workers...[and] was an elaborate instrument of treason in the country."

The loss of that last free voice in Argentina was felt all over the world. On the day the La Prensa plant was closed, flags atop the building housing the New York Times were flown at half staff in mourning.

Go to: Chapter 6: SANTA EVITA (1951-1952)

Bibliography



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Text ©1980, 1999 by Sylvia Stoddard