# Liberal Party (Bolivia)

The Liberal Party (Spanish: Partido Liberal; PL) was a liberal political party in Bolivia active between 1883 and 1979. It was one of two major parties, alongside the Conservative Party, that dominated the politics of Bolivia from 1884 to 1920. The Liberals constituted the primary opposition to the Conservatives from 1884 to 1899 and ruled continuously from 1899 to 1920 after taking power in the Federal War. Liberal rule ended in 1920 when the party was ousted in a coup d'état. The Liberals remained intermittently influential and electorally competitive until the Bolivian National Revolution of 1952, and it finally lost its legal party status in 1979, during the democratic transition.

## History

The Liberal Party was formally founded in 1883 by Eliodoro Camacho. The party espoused freedom of religion, a strict separation between church and state, legal acceptance of civil marriages and divorce, and strict adherence to democratic procedures. When the party took power in 1899, it moved the base of the presidency and the Congress to La Paz, which became the de facto capital city. The Supreme Court remained in Sucre. To this day, Sucre is the de jure capital of Bolivia while La Paz acts as the de facto seat of government.
Between 1899 and 1920, all of the presidents of Bolivia were members of the Liberal Party, supported by the tin-mining oligarchy until the Republican Party took power in a coup in 1920.
The last Liberal president was José Luis Tejada Sorzano, who served between 1934 and 1936.
By 1940, however, the party had formed a Concordance with their erstwhile Republican opponents to counter the rising tide of radical or revolutionary parties. The Concordance supported the candidate Enrique Peñaranda.
In 1947, the Liberal Party's Luis Fernando Guachalla narrowly lost to Enrique Hertzog of the Republican Socialist Unity Party (PURS).
In the 1951 elections, Tomás Manuel Elío ran for the Liberal Party but received far fewer votes than the winner.
For the 1966 elections, the Liberal Party was a component of the Democratic Institutionalist Alliance, with the PURS's Enrique Hertzog as the coalition's presidential candidate and the PL's leader, Eduardo Montes, as his running mate. They polled 11,400 votes (01.13%) and came sixth.
For the 1978 election, the PL fostered relations with the Nationalist Union of the People (UNP) and its candidate, Juan Pereda. The party put forward Montes as Pereda's running mate but was passed over in favor of Alfredo Franco. As a result, the PL scrambled to form its own ticket, nominating Montes for president, accompanied by Raúl Monje for vice president. The party failed to meet the filing deadline for ballot access and was consequently barred from competing by the Electoral Court. It ultimately resigned to endorsing Pereda's candidacy.
When elections were rerun in 1979, the PL was among several minor fronts not granted legal party status by electoral authorities. On 29 April 1979, the Electoral Court announced that the PL and sixteen other parties had not met the necessary prerequisites to be allowed ballot access, rendering them effectively defunct.

## Electoral history

Electoral history of the Liberal Party :
| Year | Presidential nominee | Presidential nominee | Votes | Votes | Votes | Result | Ref. |
| Year | Presidential nominee | Presidential nominee | Total | % | P. | Result | Ref. |
| 1884 | | Eliodoro Camacho | 8,202 | 27.14% | 3rd | Lost | |
| 1888 | | Eliodoro Camacho | 7,183 | 20.86% | 2nd | Lost | |
| 1892 | | Eliodoro Camacho | 10,607 | Does not appear | 2nd | Lost | |
| 1896 | | José Manuel Pando | 16,709 | 45.60% | 2nd | Lost | |
| 1904 | | Ismael Montes | 32,884 | 76.45% | 1st | Won | |
| 1908 | | Fernando Eloy G. | 24,017 | Does not appear | 1st | Annulled | |
| 1909 | | Eliodoro Villazón | 32,543 | 93.50% | 1st | Won | |
| 1913 | | Ismael Montes | 77,731 | 98.86% | 1st | Won | |
| 1917 | | José Gutiérrez G. | 73,705 | 88.09% | 1st | Won | |
| 1925 | | Daniel Salamanca | Does not appear | Does not appear | 2nd | Annulled | |
| 1931 | | Daniel Salamanca | 38,282 | 78.76% | 1st | Won | |
| 1934 | | Juan María Zalles | 6,642 | 40.78% | 2nd | Annulled | |
| 1940 | | Enrique Peñaranda | 58,060 | 85.99% | 1st | Won | |
| 1947 | | Luis F. Guachalla | 43,634 | 46.74% | 2nd | Lost | |
| 1951 | | Tomás M. Elío | 6,530 | 5.18% | 5th | Annulled | |
| 1966 | | Enrique Hertzog | 11,330 | 1.13% | 6th | Lost | |
| 1978 | | Eduardo Montes | Disqualified | Disqualified | Disqualified | Lost | |
| Source: Mesa Gisbert 2016, pp. 168–228, 413–416 ||||||||