1919 Salvadoran presidential election

Campaign

Before the 1918 municipal election

A presidential election was scheduled to be held in El Salvador between 13 and 15 January 1919 in order to elect the country's president, who would serve from 1 March 1919 to 1 March 1923. All men were eligible to vote.

Incumbent president Carlos Meléndez was constitutionally prohibited from running for re-election. Due to this, Vice President Alfonso Quiñónez Molina (Carlos' brother-in-law) and Minister of Governance and Finance Tomás García Palomo (Carlos' friend and personal physician) were seen as the two most likely presidential successors. Carlos, breaking from the tradition of his predecessors, did not hand-pick a presidential successor. He never gave a reason for not picking a successor, but Minister of War, the Navy, and Aviation Enrique Córdova speculated that the reason was that Carlos did not want to have to choose between a friend or a family member.

Ahead of the 1918 municipal elections, both Quiñónez and Palomo used their political influences to get allies elected to the country's municipalities. Having allies in control of municipalities allowed both men to influence how votes would be cast in polling stations during the 1919 presidential election. Palomo convinced many military officers to support him, and Quiñónez accused him of attempting to influence the election. In mid 1918, Quiñónez established the National Democratic Party (PND) to support his presidential campaign as well as the Red League paramilitary. On 7 December 1919, the day before the municipal election, Córdova received several telegraphs warning him that militants supporting Quiñónez and Palomo were being mobilized. Quiñónez was supported by city workers while Palomo was supported by rural peasants. On election day, their militias engaged in violence at polling stations seeking to get their preferred candidates election. These clashes resulted in over 100 deaths and 200 injuries according to the United States legation to El Salvador. Quiñónez's candidates won the majority of municipal races once all votes were counted, but the violence resulted in few votes actually being cast.

After the 1918 municipal election

A few days after the municipal election, Carlos suffered an "attack of paralysis" (likely a stroke or a heart attack) and he resigned the presidency to Quiñónez due to poor health on 21 December 1918. Upon Quiñónez's ascension as provisional president, Palomo withdrew from the election due to not wanting to run against the now incumbent president. Although Quiñónez's municipal candidates had won and he was now unopposed, effectively guaranteeing him the presidency, Quiñónez also withdrew from the election as the constitution of El Salvador prohibited individuals from running for election if they held the presidency for six months prior to the end of a presidential term.

Quiñónez wanted to hand-pick Minister of Foreign Relations Francisco Martínez Suárez as the next president, but Martínez declined. Quiñónez then considered continuing to seek the presidency, but he eventually decided to appoint Jorge Meléndez, Carlos' younger brother, as the PND's presidential candidate one week before the election. Shortly after Jorge's candidacy was announced, landowner Arturo Araujo of the Salvadoran Laborist Party (PLS) announced his candidacy. In response, Quiñónez and Jorge installed Pío Romero Bosque, an ally and the president of the Supreme Court of Justice, as a third candidate and instructed polling stations to tabulate their votes in favor of Jorge first, Romero second, and Araujo third. Some polling stations were even instructed to tabulate votes in favor of Romero over Jorge. According to historian Erik Ching, Romero receiving more votes than Araujo was a part of Jorge and Quiñónez's plan to "humiliate" Araujo. On some occasions, Jorge's supporters traveled to multiple polling stations to cast multiple votes his favor. Ching described this voter fraud as "standard practice".

Results

In total, 185,492 votes were cast in the presidential election and 89,582 votes were cast in the vice presidential election. According to the final results, Jorge came in first with 166,441 votes, Romero came in second with 4,370 votes, and Araujo came in third with 1,022 votes. Quiñónez was elected as Jorge's vice president.

Aftermath

On 1 March 1919, Jorge and Quiñónez assumed office as president and vice president, respectively. Romero was appointed as the minister of war, the navy, and aviation. Araujo rejected the results of the election and plotted a coup to overthrow Jorge's government. Araujo's plot was discovered by Salvadoran authorities and he subsequently fled the country to Honduras in March 1920 after a shootout at his hacienda in Armenia. In May 1920, Araujo commanded an army numbering 300 to 1,000 men and invaded El Salvador, seeking to forcefully take the presidency for himself. He captured the municipality of Arcatao, but his army was soon defeated and he was forced to flee back to Honduras. Araujo was permitted to return to El Salvador in 1923.

During Jorge's presidency, he and Quiñónez sought to consolidate their power through the PND and eliminate any potential rivals both within and outside the party. The government also utilized the military and the Red League to force polling stations to ensure that the government's preferred candidate won in municipal elections. Jorge ruled El Salvador until 1923. when he was succeeded by Quiñónez; he ruled until 1927 when he was succeeded by Romero, who, instead of continuing the PND's political dynasty as expect, introduced democratic reforms and forced Quiñónez, Jorge, and their supporters to flee the country. Romero's democratic reforms culminated in Araujo being elected as president during the 1931 presidential election. His presidency was short-lived, however, as he was overthrown in December 1931 and his vice president, General Maximiliano Hernández Martínez became president and served until his overthrow in 1944.

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