Parliamentary elections were held in Chile on 26 March 1837 during the presidency of José Joaquín Prieto. The election took place under a state of exception declared in preparation for the war against the Peru–Bolivian Confederation. Fifty-two deputies were elected to the Chamber of Deputies, while seven of the Senate's 20 seats were due for renewal. The results strongly favored the government, with contemporary accounts describing the election as largely uncontested and the academic reconstruction of the returns finding no identifiable opposition seats.

Background

The election took place during the conservative political order established after the Chilean Civil War of 1829–1830 and under the Constitution of 1833. Prieto had been president since 1831 and had begun his second five-year term in 1836.

The political system was dominated by the government and its conservative supporters. The electoral process was administered through municipal and electoral bodies established under the 1833 Constitution and its electoral regulations. The resulting Congress was the first elected under the constitutional system to serve the fifth legislative period, from 1 June 1837 to 31 May 1840.

The election occurred at a particularly tense moment. Chile was preparing for the war against the Peru–Bolivian Confederation, which had begun the previous year. The government used exceptional powers during the electoral process, and the regular operation of Congress was suspended or restricted during much of 1837 and remained interrupted during 1838.

Electoral system

The Constitution of 1833 established a restricted electoral system. Voting was limited to male citizens who met constitutional requirements concerning age, literacy and property, capital, occupation, income or usufruct. The electoral regulation required qualified voters to be entered in local registers before they could participate in elections.

Deputies were elected directly for three-year terms. The Constitution established representation at a rate of one deputy for every 20,000 inhabitants, or a fraction exceeding 10,000.

Senators were elected indirectly and served nine-year terms, with the Senate renewed by thirds. Seven senators were elected in each of the first two renewal cycles and six in the third.

The 1837 election therefore renewed seven regular Senate seats. The electoral colleges were formed at the provincial level, and their votes were subsequently scrutinized by the Senate.

Campaign and voting

The election was conducted under the state of exception associated with the preparations for war against the Peru–Bolivian Confederation. The Library of the National Congress describes the election as taking place while the regular functioning of institutions was suspended.

Contemporary accounts emphasize the limited public electoral activity surrounding the election. Ramón Sotomayor Valdés later characterized the 1837 election as one in which there were no newspapers, proclamations or public meetings devoted to electoral campaigning and described the country as having elected its representatives in silence. The same account noted that when Congress opened on 1 June, the government had the satisfaction of finding that almost all of the votes in both chambers were favorable to it.

The surviving electoral records illustrate the highly concentrated nature of voting in many districts. In Putaendo, for example, Miguel Dávila received all 133 recorded votes for deputy, while Santiago Mardones received the same number as his substitute. In Los Ángeles, Ángel María Prieto and Antonio Toro jointly received all 353 votes cast for the two deputy positions. In other districts, smaller numbers of votes were divided among several candidates.

An academic reconstruction based on the electoral returns compiled by Germán Urzúa Valenzuela identifies 36 deputy districts in 1837. Sixteen of them, or 44 percent, had more candidates than available seats. Two districts met the study's definition of a close contest, while no seats could be identified as having been won by opposition candidates.

Results

The election produced an overwhelming government majority. The available evidence does not support a reliable modern party-by-party seat table. Political groupings in the 1830s were not yet organized into the stable party structures that emerged later in the nineteenth century, and the contemporary records generally identify candidates rather than formal party affiliations.

Chamber of Deputies

Fifty-two deputies were elected. The academic reconstruction of the results found competition in 16 of the 36 districts for which information was available, but no identifiable opposition seats. Two districts qualified as close contests under the study's methodology.

The surviving municipal returns provide examples of the voting patterns. In Santiago, seven deputies were elected from a field in which the successful candidates received between 1,776 and 1,780 votes, while the principal unsuccessful candidates received only four votes each.

The deputies elected in Santiago were Rafael Valentín Valdivieso, Pedro Nolasco Vidal, Domingo Eyzaguirre, José Vicente Izquierdo, José Santiago Montt, José Antonio Rosales and José María Solar. The same election also selected Vicente Íñiguez, Ventura Marín and Antonio Toro as substitute deputies.

Senate

The Senate electoral colleges from the provinces met to select the electors whose votes were then scrutinized by the Senate. On 15 May 1837, the Senate declared Diego Portales, José Miguel Solar, Andrés Bello, Juan de Dios Vial del Río, Francisco Ignacio Ossa, Estanislao Portales, Ramón Formas and José Miguel Irarrázaval elected.

The eight names reflected the seven regular Senate seats being renewed together with José Miguel Irarrázaval, who was elected as a substitute for a vacancy from the previous triennium. The final scrutiny was based on 140 valid electoral votes after the Senate rejected the act from the Talca electoral college. Diego Portales received 138 votes, José Miguel Solar 140, Andrés Bello 139, Juan de Dios Vial del Río 137, Francisco Ignacio Ossa 119, Estanislao Portales 137, Ramón Formas 136 and José Miguel Irarrázaval 140 for the substitute position.

Portales never took his seat. He was assassinated on 6 June 1837 during a military uprising associated with the political crisis surrounding the war against the Peru–Bolivian Confederation.

Andrés Bello, who had been elected senator for the first time, subsequently began a parliamentary career that lasted until 1864. He served as a senator representing Santiago and Concepción and became one of the most influential intellectual figures in nineteenth-century Chile.

Aftermath

The election produced a Congress overwhelmingly favorable to the government. The fifth legislative period began on 1 June 1837, although the normal operation of Congress was disrupted by the political and military crisis surrounding the war. The Chamber and Senate nevertheless continued to conduct legislative and electoral business when permitted, while the Conservative Commission of the Senate operated during periods when Congress was not sitting.

The election was followed only months later by the assassination of Diego Portales, one of the leading figures of the conservative political order. Portales had been elected to the Senate in the 1837 election but was killed before taking his seat.

The overwhelming government victory also illustrates the limited electoral competition characteristic of the early years of the 1833 constitutional order. Although 16 of the 36 identified deputy districts had more candidates than available seats, the academic reconstruction found no opposition victories and only two districts with close contests. This combination of some candidate competition with an almost complete absence of successful opposition candidates distinguished the election from the more competitive parliamentary contests that emerged later in the nineteenth century.

See also

  • History of Chile
  • Politics of Chile
  • Chilean Constitution of 1833