Gabriel González Videla

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Lore & Background

Gabriel González Videla was born in the coastal city of La Serena on 22 November 1898, the oldest of eighteen children. After graduating from the Liceo de La Serena, he studied law at the University of Chile, graduating in 1922. He became a freemason in 1924. He joined the youth wing of the Radical Party in 1915, later becoming president of the Radical Party from 1931 to 1937. He was elected deputy for the district comprising La Serena, Coquimbo, Elqui, Ovalle, Combarbalá, and Illapel in 1930, and again in 1933 and 1937. In 1939 he resigned because President Pedro Aguirre Cerda named him ambassador to France, then to Portugal (1940), and finally to Brazil (1942). In 1945, he was elected senator for the provinces of Tarapacá and Antofagasta and represented Chile at the United Nations conference in San Francisco.

Reader's Guide

González Videla's presidency is marked by a dramatic shift from including Communist ministers in his first cabinets (1946–1948) to outlawing the Communist Party under the 1948 Law of Permanent Defense of Democracy. After a fallout with his Communist allies—they demanded more cabinet seats, which he refused—he expelled them from his cabinet and then banned them completely. He also broke relations with the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries. A pro-communist miners' strike in Lota was brutally suppressed. Demonstrations against what communists called 'la ley maldita' led to the declaration of martial law but were successfully repressed. In 1948, González Videla learned of a plot by some Armed Forces members to install Carlos Ibáñez as president; he ordered the arrest of the coup leaders, including General Ramón Vergara, though Ibáñez was absolved. After outlawing the Communists, he ruled with the support of the two right-wing parties, the conservatives and the liberals. The Communist Party remained illegal until 1958. Historians have established that the United States encouraged a crackdown on Chilean Communists and expanded loans and investments afterward, but no conclusive evidence has come to light that the US directly pushed him to act. González Videla also granted women the right to vote in 1949. After his presidency, he left the Radical Party in 1971 and from 1973 until his death in 1980 became an active participant in the government of Augusto Pinochet, acting as vice president of the Council of State from 1976 onwards, helping draft the current Chilean constitution of 1980.

Did You Know?

• González Videla was the oldest of eighteen children.
• He became a freemason in 1924.
• He represented Chile at the United Nations conference in San Francisco in 1945.
• A coup plot against him in 1948 was called the 'Pig trotters' plot' because the leaders met in a restaurant specializing in that dish.
• Women were granted the right to vote in Chile in 1949, during his presidency.