CHILIAN ADMINISTRATION IN TACNA - ARICA THE PRESENT SITUATION IN THE PROVINCE A RESUME OF PROGRESS MADE "THE SOUTH PACIFIC MAIL" CALLE O'HIGGINS 63. VALPARAISO 1923 A Translation of the President's Message to "The South Pacific Mail" For the influential English Periodical published in Chile: "The South Pacific Mail" The only justifiable contests between nations are those in which their noblest and most vigorous energies are expended in stimulating human progress, and for their common welfare, based upon the solidarity of interests and the brotherhood of man. A convinced believer in these noble and generous ideals, I assumed office impelled by the irresistible resolution to serve my country, setting a fixed course towards the solid, definite and lasting peace of the South American Continent. This lofty motive inspired my action with regard to the Washington Protocol. The end aimed at Was not limited only to the final liquidation of the results of the War of the Pacific, but constituted our contribution to the tranquillity of the continent, and an efficacious means of regaining the old and traditional friendship which united us to Peru in the most solemn and transcendental moments of our common history. ARTURO ALESSANDRI, President of Chile. His Excellency, Don Arturo Alessandri, President of the Republic of Chile, 1920-25., TACNA-A RICA EARLY IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY Neglect of Provinces By Peruvian Administration. In the following article the results of the Chilian Administration of the provinces of Tacna and Arica are presented in an authoritative form for the first time in the English language. It will be admitted that under the present regime the region has made extraordinary progress, which is the most practical testimony to the wisdom and efficiency of the Chilian Administration. During the period of Peruvian domination, these provinces failed to attain prosperity or even to reap the common advantages that democratic rule, well understood and well applied, diffuses throughout the body politic of Republics. The abandonment in which they were left by the Central Government of Lima became eventually too painful to be endured by the inhabitants of the beautiful and historic region that now flourishes under the protection of the Chilian flag. This explains the fact that in the year 1836 the Corporations of Moquegua, Tacna, Arica and Locumba presented a statement to the Government, manifesting their desire to be annexed to the Republic of Bolivia. In the corresponding documents is shown with painful clearness the administrative disorganisation and indifference of the Government of Peru. The municipal authorities of Moquegua state, among other matters— "We refrain from speaking of the Constitution that has governed us, for it is well known to all thinking people to be full of political anomalies and may be regarded as the source and origin of the disturbances that have taken place, and in itself, merits universal animadversion." Tacna's Desire For Separation. The authorities of Tacna, referring to their own town, say, "Let it be declared separated from its capital, Lima, since that place has been the focus of the conspiracies whence have sprung the revolutions, one after the other, from which we have suffered, from which capital we have received no assistance whatever in the state of urgent necessity to which the province has been reduced in consequence of the terrible earthquakes of the years thirty-one and thirty-two; since Commerce, the only support of the Province, has been reduced practically to nothing through the lack of interest of that Government in its prosperity and, finally, since experience has demonstrated that it will never rise from the state of depression and misery in which it is at present so long as it is dependent on that Capital." Despair of the Future. For their part the authorities of Arica, justifying their solemn demand for "the creation of a new Department composed of their province, that of Moquegua and Tarapaca, to be absolutely independent of Arequipa and Lima, base their opinion, like those of Tacna, on the abject and depressed condition in which they found themselves and to which they had been reduced by the political administration, whether through indolence or through the continual changes taking place in the Peruvian capital, the prejudicial effects of which had been suffered since the Independence, and, finally, for other sufficient reasons that have led the said provinces to despair of their future." The Arica Customs-House. They thus emphasise the third declaration of their "energetic and praiseworthy" utterance—"The city of Arica, so far as it is concerned, unites itself to the Bolivian nation and forms an integral portion of its family." The authorities in Locumba "Do not believe that their flattering hopes of bettering their lot are fallacious when they seek to put to flight so many calamities brought about by civil war, by the upheavals of nature and of politics," and they unanimously agree, "in behalf of their present and future welfare" to this declaration—"That Locumba is in sympathy with the separation decreed by the capital of the Province of the Department, and with the creation of a new Department made up of the three on the South coast, Tacna, Tarapaca and Moquegua." Official Provincial Protest To Lima. It must not be supposed that these recollections of a long past time reflect only accidental and transitory circumstances, to be excused in the early days of civic experiment and development. Not so. In March, 1878, The Governor's Residence and General Post Office, Tacna. that is to say, a year before the war with Peru, the representatives of Tacna sent to the Central Government in Lima a new statement, complaining of the decadence of the Department, occasioned by the state of abandonment , into which it had been allowed to fall; asking for more efficacious attention to its interests and hinting at a more energetic protest in case their petition was not listened to. They express themselves as follows—"However, if the precepts of economic and political science are neglected, if the thousand claims acquired by the Department are forgotten, and it is still abandoned to its own efforts; if, finally its unjustifiable and unnecessary sacrifice is consummated, it is our duty to raise still more loudly our voices to protest in the name of the people that have delegated to us their powers. Señor Minister, we request you to bring this document to the notice of the Supreme Government, in order that it may take the matter into consideration at the time of settling the customs question with Bolivia. Signed:—M. Tadeo Vargas.—Lucas Vargas.—José M. Gurrucha- ga.—Luis Ureta.—Celestino Vargas.—Hernán Lobe.—Juan L. Vidal.— Francisco Cabero." An Autocratic Reply. The President of Peru, without attending to the legitimate aspirations of the Department of Tacna and without even giving explanations on which might be founded the hope of better times, dictated, under date March 26th of 1878, a decree to submit to trial, the "Councillors of the Departmental Council of Tacna who took part approving the agreement of the 18th of the same month and suspending them from the exercise of their functions, in ' ' V>T* " 'VrtWij Road under Construction to Quilla. which they be replaced in conformity with the law and existing decrees." Such were the conditions of life in Tacna and Arica, and such the ctate of mind of the inhabitants on the eve of the war of 1879. Death-Blow To Commerce. It is true that these towns enjoyed, once upon a time, certain commercial advantages, since Bolivia, seeking an outlet to the sea, sent her products along the valley of Tacna, whence they continued their road to Arica, and since the importations for Bolivia followed the same route in the opposite direction. There was then a certain movement of pack animals and muleteers swarming on the mountain tracks. But the Government of Lima gave the death blow to the commerce of Tacna and Arica by constructing the Railway from Mollendo. The Peruvian Government did not then trouble itself even to be courteous to the territories which it now desires to revindicate for itself and over the fate of which it has filled America with romantic and doleful dirges. The construction of the Mollendo railway, which turned ir>'o other channels the commercial interchange with Bolivia, completed the economic decadence of Tacna and Arica, flinging them into apathy and the funeral silence of towns on the way to disappearance. A "Spurious Race." In fact, before 1879, Tacna and Arica had spiritually and practically detached themselves from the Peruvian metropolis, since in the eyes of the central administration they figured as a spurious race and because, on the Fresh-water Tanks and Reservoir for flushing drains, Arica, situated 49 metres above sea level. other hand, they had suffered the convulsive fits of political agitation that, made them far from Lima, the nest of the ambitions of popular leaders, whence issued in due course anarchic revolts. Turn in Fortune's Wheel. In the long run the wheel of fortune turned in favour of Tacna and Arica and their discontented inhabitants. The Chilian Administration, in consequence of the Treaty of Ancon, bent all its efforts to advance the progress of the zone newly incorporated with its dominions. If it be permitted to attribute a moral significance to the zeal shown by the Chilian authorities for the welfare of these provinces, it might be deduced that the Government of Santiago always understood that the negotiation carried through with General Iglesias implied the definite handing over to Chile of the territories that now appear as the subjects of litigation. It is difficult otherwise to comprehend the preference with which the Government of Chile has watched over the development of that region and the welfare of its people.