page_title: Salamá
section_title: Miguel Enríquez and president Barillas in 1892
hierarchical_section_title: Salamá / History / Miguel Enríquez and president Barillas in 1892
caption_attribution_description: Español: Templo de Minerva de Salamá en 1910.
context_page_description: Salamá is a city in Guatemala. It is the capital of the department of Baja Verapaz and it is situated at 940 m above sea level. The municipality of Salamá, for which the city of Salamá serves as the administrative centre, covers a total surface area of 764 km² and contains 65,275 people.
context_section_description: In 1892, president general Manuel Barillas called an election.  It was the first time a Guatemalan president had become tired of the office and it was also the first election in Guatemala that allowed the candidates to run propaganda in the local newspapers.  Among the candidates who ran for office were:
  Lorenzo Montúfar y Rivera: a well known a respected liberal intellectual. He was the only one of all candidates who made an engraving of his portrait to publish it in the newspapers and was accused of wasting resources for doing this.
  General José María Reyna Barrios: nephew of former president Justo Rufino Barrios and eventual winner.
  Miguel Enríquez: a Salamá landowner. Enríquez had been a liberal, but became a conservative after the persecution that he suffered from the Barillas administration.
  Barillas was unique among all liberal presidents of Guatemala between 1871 and 1944: he handed over power to his successor peacefully. When election time approached, he sent for the three Liberal candidates to ask them what their government plan would be. Satisfied with the response of Reyna Barrios, Barillas made sure a huge column of Quetzaltenango and Totonicapán Indigenous people came down from the mountains to vote for the general. The official agents did their job: Reyna was elected president and, so as not to offend the losing candidates, Barillas gave them checks to cover the costs of their presidential campaigns. Reyna Barrios of course received nothing, but he went on to become President on March 15, 1892.
  Only Enríquez was not compensated; on the contrary, after the elections he had to run away from his farmland in Salamá after being accused of sedition; he was captured and executed near Zacapa.
caption: Temple of Minerva, Salamá, 1910.
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