Augusto Leguia
Augusto Bernardino Leguía y Salcedo (February 19, 1863 in Lambayeque - February 6, 1932 in Callao) was a Peruvian politician who twice held the constitutional presidency of Peru: from 1908 to 1912 and from 1919 to 1930. This last period, which adds up to ten years and ten consecutive months, the result of three successive re-elections, is known as the Oncenio. In total, he governed fifteen years, and won four presidential elections, being the Peruvian president who has governed the longest to date.
In his youth he studied business in Chile and participated in the defense of Lima during the Pacific War. A very skilled businessman, he made his fortune in the sugar industry and in the insurance sales sector. He began his political activism in the Civil Party. He was Minister of Finance and Commerce during the governments of Manuel Candamo Iriarte and Serapio Calderón, between 1903 and 1904. Later, keeping the same portfolio, he was president of the Council of Ministers of the first José Pardo y Barreda government, between 1904 and 1907. He immediately won the presidential elections of 1908, and governed until 1912. During this first period, he faced border problems with the five neighboring countries, of which he only managed to definitively solve those he had with Brazil (Velarde-Río Branco Treaty, September 8, 1909) and Bolivia (Polo-Bustamante Treaty, September 17, 1909). In the internal order he also faced a lot of turbulence. He bravely faced a coup attempt promoted by the brother and sons of Nicolás de Piérola. He separated from the Civil Party, which split in two. After finishing his term, he suffered harassment from the new government of Guillermo Billinghurst and went into exile.
Back in Peru in 1919, he participated in the presidential elections of that year, called by President José Pardo (who was then holding the presidency for the second time). He already envisioned his triumph, but, fearing that the government would not respect the result, on July 4, 1919 he carried out a coup, supported by the gendarmerie. He assumed power as provisional president and dissolved Congress, convening a National Assembly to replace him, whose mission would be to consecrate important constitutional reforms. This new Parliament elected him Constitutional President on October 12, 1919, and gave a new political charter to replace the old Constitution of 1860 (Constitution of 1920). Leguía remained in power, being re-elected in 1924 and 1929, after constitutional reforms. He called his government the "New Homeland", since he claimed that modernity began in the country with him. In this sense, he carried out important and numerous public works, both in Lima and in the provinces.
During his long tenure, Lima was modernized through the execution of public works, financed by loans and whose immediate purpose was to celebrate the Centenary of National Independence in 1921. He created the Reserve Bank and the Central Mortgage Bank, as well as the Tobacconists of Alcohol, Playing Cards and Matches. He legalized indigenous communities. He created the Civil Guard of Peru. He encouraged the construction of roads and irrigation works. He signed the Boundary Treaty with Colombia (March 24, 1922) and the Boundary Treaty with Chile (June 3, 1929), very controversial treaties that have motivated Leguía to be described as a "surrender", but which had the merit to put an end to long disputes with these nations, which previous governments could not resolve.
After eleven years of consecutive government (period known as the Oncenio), Leguía was overthrown by Lieutenant Colonel EP Luis M. Sánchez Cerro, on August 25, 1930, and was later arrested and interned in the Panóptico in Lima. There he became seriously ill and had to be transferred to the Callao Naval Hospital, where he died in 1932.
Birth and youth
Augusto Bernardino Leguía y Salcedo was born on February 19, 1863 in a large house at 708 Atahualpa Street in the Plaza de Armas of Lambayeque, as the son of Nicanor Leguía y Haro and María del Carmen Salcedo Taforo. He was a descendant of a Basque emigrant from the time of the viceroyalty, named Eustaquio Leguía, who in 1752 arrived in Chiclayo to establish the tobacconist, playing cards and stamped paper.
He completed his first studies in his hometown, at the Rosario Gallo and Pedro Mantilla schools, and later at the national school directed by Ricardo Saavedra. At 13 years of age, affected by a bronchial ailment, he was sent to Valparaíso, Chile, where he began business studies at the Goldfinch and Bluhm English College. At the end of 1878, he returned to Peru and after a brief stay in Lambayeque, he moved to Lima, where he was surprised by the outbreak of the Pacific War, when he worked in the commercial house of Enrique S. and Carlos A. Prevost..
In 1880, he enlisted as a sergeant in Battalion No. 2 of the Reserve Army commanded by Colonel Manuel Lecca and made up of merchants. He fought in Redoubt No. 1, during the battle of Miraflores, delivered on January 15, 1881.
After the war, she continued to work as an accounting clerk at Prevost. Once this was settled, he went to the Caucato farm, near Pisco, and back in Lima, he tried out as an exporter of sugar and rice to Chile, and hides to New York. He later got a stable job, as an insurance salesman representing the New York Life Insurance Company, which entrusted him with the founding of a branch in Guayaquil and the management of his business in Ecuador, Bolivia and Peru (1888). After the withdrawal of said company from the Peruvian market, Leguía traveled to the United States to render accounts.
In 1890, he married Julia Swayne y Mariátegui, and immediately moved to London, where, as agent of the Swayne Estate, he dedicated himself to the sugar business and entered into a contract with Lockett to form the British Sugar Company Limited (1896), an entity that owns industrial sugar production haciendas in the Cañete and Nepeña valleys, whose management he exercised for several years. In addition, once back in Peru, he managed the South America Insurance Company (1900).
He was also part of the first board of directors of Banco Internacional del Perú, founded in 1897.
Civilian and Minister of Finance
Despite not being born an aristocrat, his financial ability earned him much prestige and quickly linked him to the Lima oligarchy. He was admitted to the Civil Party, playing an important role in the election of Manuel Candamo as president in 1903, the first civilista to win the elections, after the remembered Manuel Pardo y Lavalle, founder of said party in 1871.
President Candamo appointed him Minister of Finance, a position he held from September 8, 1903, and which he held during the first days of Serapio Calderón's interim administration, until May 15, 1904. During the subsequent government of José Pardo y Barreda held the presidency of the ministerial cabinet, in the same Treasury portfolio, from September 24, 1904. After an exceptionally long ministerial period, he finished his duties on July 27, 1907, to launch himself as a presidential candidate in the 1908 elections.
His long tenure as Minister of Finance was successful and he did the following works, among others:
- He worked on a tax and loan plan to achieve the expansion of the public estate, thus moving away from the conservative political routine practiced until then in that field.
- He signed contracts to extend the railways of the centre and the south, until they were taken to Huancayo and Cuzco, respectively.
But what gave his personality the most prominence were his interventions in Parliament, where he defended his projects in innumerable speeches, loaded with verbosity and legal and technical erudition.
1908 Election
Leguía was the official candidate in the 1908 elections, that is, representing the Civil Party. The Democratic Party, at the request of its leader, the old caudillo Nicolás de Piérola, abstained from participating. Augusto Durand, head of the Liberal Party – a kind of zero to the left of the Democratic Party – tried to prevent the elections with a revolution in the style of the montoneras, but failed. Leguía was thus elected without resistance to exercise the presidential term of 1908-1912.
First government (1908-1912)
Leguía assumed the presidential command on September 24, 1908, replacing José Pardo y Barreda.
This mandate, which would be Leguía's first, turned out to be very turbulent, both internally and externally. In the international aspect, he faced the border problems with the five neighboring countries that, aware of the material limitations that weighed on Peru after the War of the Pacific, took advantage of the occasion to attack their territorial claims.
In the internal order, he faced a coup attempt led by Carlos de Piérola, brother of Nicolás de Piérola, and the sons of this caudillo: Isaías de Piérola and Amadeo de Piérola. They led a group of discontents from the Democratic party and unexpectedly entered the Government Palace, finding Leguía in his office. The rioters asked him to sign his resignation. Leguia refused. Then, the rioters kidnapped him and took him to the Plaza de la Inquisición, where, at the foot of the monument to Bolívar, they ordered him to resign for the second time. Leguía again denied his resignation, saying firmly: "I do not sign." The public forces intervened, managing to rescue the president after a shootout that killed more than a hundred demonstrators (May 29, 1909). Despite not having participated in this revolt, Nicolás de Piérola had to hide from the persecution unleashed by the government. The opposition newspaper La Prensa was assaulted by government mobs and its editor, Alberto Ulloa Cisneros, was arrested.
The government, after a severe repression of the opponents (or those who were accused of being such), promoted a conciliation policy, which was completed with an amnesty law passed in 1911. But that same year, due to the renewal of the parliamentary third, it was proposed to impose its candidates by force, using a series of maneuvers, including the dissolution of the National Electoral Board. In this way, Leguía, of a personalist and authoritarian character, moved away from his party, the Civil, and formed his own group of supporters, called government civilists, who controlled Congress and the electoral bodies. In response, the rest of the civilista parliamentarians and other parties (liberal and constitutional) formed the Bloc, which made ardent opposition to the government.
In the last two years of this government there was an acute economic crisis, motivated by the accelerated internal indebtedness, the national defense expenses and the budget deficit.
Important works and events
International look
- The relations with Chile, already strained by the outstanding problem of Tacna and Arica's "provinces captivated", were further complicated by the so-called "incident of the crown". Under the previous government of Pardo the Cripta of the Heroes of Lima was inaugurated in honor of those fallen in the Pacific War, at which the Chilean Minister José Miguel Echenique Gandarillas offered on behalf of his country a crown of bronze laurels to be placed in the Cripta. The Peruvian chancellor then considered it a duty of courtesy to accept the offering, but after the change of government in 1908, the new Foreign Minister Melitón F. Porras rejected such a homage, since he considered that he did not respond sincerely to the feelings of Chile, at a time when he was attacking Peruvian residents in Tacna and Arica. The Chilean Minister withdrew offended his country. In view of the increased chilenization policy in these provinces, Peru broke its diplomatic relations with Chile in 1910.
- At the same time, border conflicts with Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador and Colombia increased. There are indications that behind all of them was Chile as a sluggard, it is even known that this country came to provide arms to Ecuador in full Peruvian-Ecuadorian tension of 1910.
- With Bolivia there was a danger of war, following the arbitral award issued by the president of Argentina José Figueroa Alcorta, which determined the border between Peru and Bolivia. Bolivian mobs attacked the Peruvian legation in La Paz and the military forces mobilized on both sides of the border, but the talks were happily restarted, culminating in the signing of the Polo-Bustamante Treaty (17 September 1909), agreeing on both sides for the enforcement of the arbitral award.
- With Brazil the limits of the Velarde-Río Branco Treaty were definitively fixed, signed between the Brazilian Foreign Minister José María da Silva Paranhos of Rio Branco and the Peruvian plenipotentiary Hernán Velarde (8 September 1909).
- With Ecuador, a serious tension broke out, as this country refused to accept the arbitral award of the king of Spain, which was not yet issued, but whose content became known and apparently contrary to Ecuadorian interests. The Ecuadorian press launched a violent campaign to discredit such arbitration. On April 3 and 4, 1910 there were serious hits against Peruvian legations in Quito and Guayaquil. Even the mobilization of troops on both sides was reached, but the intervention of the United States, Brazil and Argentina prevented the war (22 May 1910). In the face of the Ecuadorian attitude, the king of Spain refused to pronounce a sentence, so the border problem remained pending.
- With Colombia, an armed confrontation was reached, as Colombian troops occupied the right bank of the Caquetá River in Peruvian territory and refused to abandon it. The Peruvian army, led by Colonel Óscar R. Benavides, defeated the invaders in La Pedrera and occupied Puerto Córdoba (1911). However, in compliance with an agreement signed in Bogotá days before that weapons meeting, Peru disowned Puerto Córdoba and recognized La Pedrera as a Colombian post.
Other important works
- The Guano Administrator Company was created (1909).
- The customs system was reformed in order to produce greater income for the State (1910).
- Act No. 1378 on work accidents was adopted on 20 January 1911, the first of the ten social laws that had been submitted by José Matías Manzanilla to Congress during the first Pardo government. This law stated that: "The employer is responsible for the accidents that occur to his workers and employees in the fact of the work or on the direct occasion of it. »
- A loan was obtained for the Peruvian Vapores Company to acquire modern units (1909).
- The sugar and cotton production was boosted.
- It sought to improve the agricultural production of the saw, such as wheat, potatoes, barley and corn.
- Support was granted to settlers to exploit the rubber in the Amazon.
Memorable events
- On October 13, 1909, the Lithuanian student Pedro S. Zulen, a mestizo of Chinese and Creole, founded in Lima the Pro-Indigenous Association "to defend the social interests of the indigenous race of Peru".
- There was the sacrifice of the Peruvian aviator Jorge Chávez, in September 1910, in Domodossola, Switzerland, after crossing with his plane the Alps.
- The scientific discovery of Machu Picchu's inca citadel, by the American explorer Hiram Bingham, occurred in July 1911.
- The journal was founded The Chronicle from Lima, in 1912.
- The so-called "Putin May scandals" were unleashed, given in light by an investigation sponsored by the British government that accused the prosperous Caucasian businessman Julio César Arana del Águila of committing crimes and abuses against the native population of the Putumayo River area. Those who conducted the investigation on behalf of the British government were the Irish Roger Casement, whose report gave the creepy figure of 30,000 human lives annihilated as a result of the warp exploitation, between 1900 and 1911.
- The first planes arrived in Peru (1911). Peruvian shippers Juan Bielovucic and Carlos Tenaud made the first flights in Peruvian territory.
The 1912 elections
In 1912, at the end of the presidential term, the government sponsored the candidacy of Antero Aspíllaga Barrera, but the last-minute candidacy of Guillermo Billinghurst rose up against her, who, supported by his overwhelming popularity, managed to suspend the elections and transfer the decision election to Congress. Although civilistas and leguístas predominated in this parliament, they agreed to satisfy the popular request. Billinghurst, a staunch anti-civilian, was thus elected president and succeeded Leguía. In compensation, Roberto Leguía, Augusto's brother, was elected first vice president.
Banishment. The 1919 elections
In 1913, Leguía was exiled to Panama by the Billinghurst government, moving to the United States and finally to England, where he lived until 1918, dedicated to his personal sugar business. In London he also held the position of president of the Latin American Chamber of Exchange and Commerce.
At the beginning of 1919, Leguía returned to Peru. The civilista José Pardo y Barreda was then governing in his second term, who, close to finishing his term, called for presidential elections, once again Ántero Aspíllaga being the government candidate. Leguía launched his candidacy and his electoral campaign was supported by the Constitutional Party (Cacerista) and the University of San Marcos and the Federation of Students of Peru (FEP). This last organization proclaimed him "Master of Youth".
Leguía presented himself as a standard-bearer of youthful desires to change the country's structures. His triumph was in sight, as there was no other more popular candidate, but alleging that his victory was not going to be recognized by the civilian government, he carried out a coup, supported by the gendarmerie (July 4, 1919).. Thereupon he assumed power as provisional president and dissolved Congress.
The Oncenio de Leguía
Leguía called a plebiscite to submit to the vote of the citizens a series of constitutional reforms that he considered necessary; Among these reforms, it was contemplated to elect the President of the Republic and the Congress at the same time, both with terms of five years (before, the presidential term was four years and Parliament was renewed by thirds every two years). He simultaneously called elections to elect the representatives of a National Assembly, which during its first 30 days would be in charge of ratifying the constitutional reforms, that is, it would act as a Constituent Assembly, to later assume the function of ordinary Congress. This Assembly was installed on September 24, 1919 and was chaired by the sociologist and jurist Mariano H. Cornejo (government ideologue). One of the first tasks of said Assembly was to count the votes of the previous presidential elections, after which it ratified Leguía as the winner, who was proclaimed Constitutional President on October 12, 1919. The current Constitution (that of 1860) was changed by the Constitution of 1920, promulgated on January 18 of that year.
This second government of Leguía would last for eleven years, since, after constitutional reforms, he was re-elected in 1924 and 1929. For this reason, he is known as ONCENIO and also as the "New Homeland", since he tried to modernize the country through a change in relations between the State and civil society.
The Oncenio is subdivided into the following periods:
- Provisional Government of Leguía (jul. - Oct. 1919).
- Second Constitutional Government (oct. 1919 - Oct. 1924).
- Third Constitutional Government (oct. 1924 - Oct. 1929).
- Fourth Constitutional Government (oct. 1929 - Aug. 1930).
It is worth remembering that the first constitutional government of Leguía was from 1908 to 1912 (a period that the Peruvian collective memory has tended to forget and only remembers the Oncenio).
It was a time when public liberties were restricted. The printing presses of the newspapers El Comercio and La Prensa, the most important in the country, were attacked by mobs controlled by the government. La Prensa, where the opposition had sheltered, was confiscated, virtually ending freedom of expression. The opposition was swept away in parliament, which became a docile instrument of the Executive. Municipalities elected by popular vote were put an end to, being replaced by personnel handpicked by the government. Political opponents were persecuted, imprisoned, deported and even shot. Leguía created his own party, the Democratic Reformist.
The figure of the president was flattered to extreme limits: Parliament granted him the title of "Prócer de la República" (1928); His ministerial cabinet gave him a portrait of himself in oil: "We have not found anything worthy of offering you: only your own effigy," explained the minister Pedro José Rada y Gamio; he was made a member of the Royal Spanish Academy and doctor honoris causa of the Faculty of Sciences of the University of San Marcos, without having studied at any university; He talked about the "Century of Leguía", the "Giant of the Pacific", the "Jupiter President", the "Wiracocha", and he was compared hyperbolically with characters such as Bolívar, Julio César, Alexander the Great, Napoleon Bonaparte, etc.
A notable event of this period was the pompous celebration of the Centennial of Independence in 1921, whose central act was the inauguration of Plaza San Martín, in the center of Lima. A gigantic public works program was financed with loans obtained from abroad.
In the political aspect, the first modern parties arose that brought together the middle and popular sectors of reformist or revolutionary tendencies: the Aprista Party, founded by Víctor Raúl Haya de la Torre and the Peruvian Socialist Party, founded by José Carlos Mariátegui.
At the cultural level, the literary and artistic movement called Indigenismo manifested itself. Peruvian literature shone with figures such as Ventura García Calderón, Enrique López Albújar, César Vallejo, José Carlos Mariátegui, Alcides Spelucin, Carlos Oquendo de Amat, Alberto Hidalgo, Alberto Guillén, among others.
In the economic aspect, the dependence towards the United States increased notably due to the large loans contracted to the North American banks to carry out public works; the debt reached 150 million dollars in 1930. Already at the end of the regime, the world crisis of 1929 would directly affect the population and was the factor that accelerated the fall of Leguía.
Main works and important facts
- The Constitution of 1920 was promulgated, which established a five-year presidential period (formerly four), the integral renewal of the parliament parallel to the presidential renewal, the regional congresses in the north, center and south, the semi-parliamentary regime, the responsibility of the cabinet to each of the chambers, the recognition of indigenous communities, the impossibility of suspending individual guarantees, etc.
- The Directorate of Indigenous Affairs was established at the Ministry of Development and the Department of Public Works.
- The celebration of the “Indian Day” was established every 24 June.
- Agricultural centres and agricultural schools were established in rural areas.
- Important works of irrigation were carried out on the coast; among them in the pampa of Imperial, in Cañete; and in the pampas of Olmos, in Lambayeque. We also studied the irrigation of the pampas of La Joya, in Arequipa.
- The Vial Conscription Act (1920) was given which forced all men 18 to 60 years of age to work free of charge for 6 to 12 days a year, in the construction and opening of roads. The same basically affected the indigenous population, because it was the one that, because it was unable to pay in money the exoneration of the service, had to fulfill the compulsory service. More than 18 fakenbsp000 km of roads were built and more than one hundred million suns were invested.
- Emprestites of U.S. banking and capitalists were made for different public works. The US bankers not only assured their interests but demanded participation in public business.
- Lima, Arequipa, Cuzco, Trujillo, Huacho, etc. were built.
- The construction of the Callao sea terminal began.
- Many streets of the city of Lima were paved.
- The construction of Plaza San Martín was completed in the context of the celebration of the centenary of Independence in 1921.
- The house was donated for the Mariscal Andrés Avelino Cáceres to the Benemérita Sociedad Fundadores de la Independencia for its institutional headquarters in 1924.
- Lima Golf Club was inaugurated on 28 May 1924 in the San Isidro district, a golf club founded mainly by members of the British colony residing in Lima. Leguía officially inaugurated the club's facilities.[chuckles]required]
- The Archbishopric Palace was built, the construction of the Palace of Justice began, as well as the reconstruction of the Government Palace, which had suffered a fire.
- The construction work of the avenues Leguía (now Avenue Arequipa), the Progreso (now avenue Venezuela), La Unión (today avenue Argentina); all of them in the city of Lima.
- The Reserve Bank (1922), the Mortgage Bank (1929) and the Agricultural Credit Bank were established.
- The Gran Hotel Bolivar was built in the center of Lima, which was opened in 1924, during the celebrations for the centenary of the battle of Ayacucho.
- The School of Civil Guard and Police was established by Spanish instructors (1919). The Guardia Civil replaced the former gendarmerie in the task of maintaining internal order.
- Two international treaties shall be signed:
- Treaty with Colombia: Signed on March 24, 1922 and approved by Congress in 1927. This meant giving Colombia a territorial portion between the Caquetá and Putumayo rivers and the so-called Amazonian Trapecio. When the treaty was made public, it caused great resistance among the Peruvians who inhabited the affected areas, thus a conflicting state emerged between the two nations that sharpened in 1933.
- Treaty with Chile: This treaty ended the issue bordering Chile, after 45 years of the signing of the Treaty of Ancon of 1883. It was signed on June 3, 1929, in Lima. Both parties renounced the realization of the many times postponed plebiscite (initially agreed to decide the fate of the captive Peruvian provinces of Tacna and Arica), and agreed on the following arrangement: Tacna would return to the bosom of the Peruvian homeland, but Chile would stay with Arica.
- The lawsuit with English and Americans for the rights owed to the State for the exploitation of oil at the site of La Brea and Pariñas had a unfortunate solution for the interest of the State by signing the illegal Paris Award of 1922. Happily, later governments would not recognize it.
- National railways were given to the English of the Peruvian Corporation (1928).
- There was a boom in agro-industrial products such as cotton, sugar cane and some minerals such as copper, lead and zinc.
- The Centenary of the Independence of Peru was held in 1921, and the centenary of the battle of Ayacucho in 1924.
- Foreign immigration was fomented, although it only had significant growth from Japan.
- Laws were given in favour of workers, such as compensation for service time and a farewell notice.
- The Las Palmas Aviation School was created.
- The first fighter planes, the first hydroplanes, and the first submarines arrived in Peru.
- In 1920, the Ministry of Marines was created, becoming independent of the Ministry of War. In 1929, he became the Ministry of Marine and Aviation.
- The first National College of Women of Peru was established in 1927 by R.S. 1291.
Overthrow
The world crisis of 1929 had very serious effects on the national economy of Peru. The worker sectors, directly affected by the rise in the cost of living and the shortage of subsistence, were the first to raise their protest. The army also showed its discontent. The obvious administrative corruption, through which relatives or friends of the president benefited throughout the regime, as well as the signing of treaties with Colombia and Chile with territorial cession, further accentuated the opposition to the government. Subversive actions and assassination attempts on the president were rumored.
On August 22, 1930, Commander Luis Miguel Sánchez Cerro, in command of the Arequipa garrison, spoke out against the government. The revolutionary movement spread rapidly through the south of the country. Also in Lima the atmosphere was favorable for the revolution. To control the situation, Leguía tried to form a military cabinet, but in the early hours of the morning of August 25, the Lima garrison requested his resignation.
Leguía accepted and resigned command, which remained in the hands of a Military Government Junta chaired by General Manuel María Ponce Brousset. Two days later, he would hand over power to Sánchez Cerro, who arrived in the capital by plane.
Death
Leguía was embarked on the cruise ship Almirante Grau bound for Panama, but the revolutionaries demanded his arrest and ordered the return of the ship. Leguía was transferred first to the island of El Frontón and then to the Panóptico or central penitentiary in Lima. The former president's residence was stormed by the crowd and also those of the main members of his government.
Elderly, sick, incommunicado, without medical assistance, Leguía endured long suffering, cared for only by his son Juan Leguía Swayne, who voluntarily accompanied him in his confinement. He lived 14 months locked up in a precarious nine-meter cell squares, whose only window was boarded up. During his time under arrest, none of those he considered his allies and friends visited him or cared for him. Only when his prostate disease worsened and he contracted bronchopneumonia was he transferred to the Callao Naval Hospital. There he died on February 6, 1932 and was buried in the Baquíjano Cemetery. Years later, his remains were transferred to the Presbítero Maestro Cemetery, accompanied by a silent crowd. Decades later, Haya de la Torre would say that Leguía was the best Peruvian president of the 20th century, recognizing him as the one who "modernized" Peru,.
Offspring
Leguía married Julia Swayne y Mariátegui, granddaughter of the hero Francisco Javier Mariátegui, in 1890, with whom he had six children: Augusto, José, Juan, Lola Virginia, Carmen Rosa and María Isabel. Subsequently, Leguía was widowed and did not remarry. Being a widower, he had four more children: Carmen Leguía Larriviere, Ricardo Nicanor Leguía Olivera, Enriqueta Leguía Olivera and Joaquín Leguía Gálvez.
As President of the Republic, he held the position of Born President of the Benemérita Sociedad Fundadores de la Independencia and was also a member of the National Club.
| Predecessor: Pablo Sarria | Minister of Finance and Trade of Peru 8 September 1903-27 July 1907 | Successor: Germán Schreiber Waddington |
| Predecessor: Alberto Elmore | President of the Council of Ministers of Peru 24 September 1904-27 July 1907 | Successor: Agustín Tovar Aguilar |
| Predecessor: José Pardo and Barreda Constitutional President | Constitutional President of Peru 24 September 1908-24 September 1912 | Successor: Guillermo Billinghurst Constitutional President |
| Predecessor: José Pardo and Barreda Constitutional President | Temporary President of Peru by coup d ' état 4 July 1919-12 October 1919 | Successor: Augusto B. Leguía Constitutional President |
| Predecessor: Augusto B. Leguía Temporary President | Constitutional President of Peru 12 October 1919-12 October 1924 12 October 1924-12 October 1929 12 October 1929-25 August 1930 | Successor: Manuel María Ponce Brousset Chairman of the Board of Government |