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The Phillip Holcomb Government
Phillip Holcomb Government – 1946-1952
Holcomb’s time at the helm of the National Coalition would help enshrine much of the precedent that would regulate the party’s inner workings for years to come: he inaugurated the format by which its leaders are selected – albeit accidentally – when he came out as the candidate by acclamation when none of the other parties could reconcile the other proposals; and he would subsequently propose that an Oriental MP be selected as Speaker of the House, to make them stakeholders in the new order.
It functioned along similar lines as his wartime cabinet, which reinforced the Coalition’s nature as a tenuous power-sharing arrangement between its constituent parties; decisions were ultimately made at the highest level between party leaders, and the Prime Minister didn’t quite appoint members of his cabinet so much as he divvied up the posts and allowed the leaders to distribute them as rewards for loyalty and as an opportunity to groom hand-picked successors as under-secretaries and junior ministers.
The most significant precedent he would set was the matter of succession: after leading the new formation to an even larger victory in the 1950 election, he would step down halfway through the parliamentary term to give its numerous stakeholders time to gel around a new figurehead in time for the next general election. In 1952, the nod would go rather surprisingly to the leader of the Christian Democrats, as the Alliance failed to rally around a single name.
His government is fondly remembered, primarily as a result of his wartime service, but the Oriental Railroad Trust (a proposal that likely no other leader could have cajoled the other parties into supporting) would enamor the Oriental population to him for years, and his broad popularity was the main reason he’d been considered as the only logical choice to helm the House as Speaker after independence.
But it would not be entirely without controversy: the decision to turn the National Union into a mainstream party was poorly received not just in Platte, but in its neighbors, and his international efforts were constantly stymied by his personal animosity towards Argentine President Juan Perón, culminating in a heated row when the government discovered that the Justicialist leader had surreptitiously started purchasing stocks in the ORT and hoped to use those stocks as leverage against the most obvious conduit for British influence in the region. He would ironically use an expropriations law written by none other than former Communist leader Elliott Moses to stop those efforts, and it’s even alleged that the explicit ban on private ownership of ORT stocks was proposed by Moses in private correspondence with his former colleague.
Well into his 70s by the end of his tenure, he wouldn’t be able to enjoy his retirement for long, the toll of over a decade at the helm in some of the most trying times in the country’s history catching up with him in 1953, dying at the age of 77.
Holcomb Cabinet (1946-1952)
It would play a pivotal role in the formation of the National Coalition, and not all of it was above board: its owners lobbied the Alliance heavily to join, and most notoriously, they were the first to rehabilitate the National Union in the press after dismissing them as crypto-fascists during the war.
Holcomb’s time at the helm of the National Coalition would help enshrine much of the precedent that would regulate the party’s inner workings for years to come: he inaugurated the format by which its leaders are selected – albeit accidentally – when he came out as the candidate by acclamation when none of the other parties could reconcile the other proposals; and he would subsequently propose that an Oriental MP be selected as Speaker of the House, to make them stakeholders in the new order.
It functioned along similar lines as his wartime cabinet, which reinforced the Coalition’s nature as a tenuous power-sharing arrangement between its constituent parties; decisions were ultimately made at the highest level between party leaders, and the Prime Minister didn’t quite appoint members of his cabinet so much as he divvied up the posts and allowed the leaders to distribute them as rewards for loyalty and as an opportunity to groom hand-picked successors as under-secretaries and junior ministers.
The most significant precedent he would set was the matter of succession: after leading the new formation to an even larger victory in the 1950 election, he would step down halfway through the parliamentary term to give its numerous stakeholders time to gel around a new figurehead in time for the next general election. In 1952, the nod would go rather surprisingly to the leader of the Christian Democrats, as the Alliance failed to rally around a single name.
His government is fondly remembered, primarily as a result of his wartime service, but the Oriental Railroad Trust (a proposal that likely no other leader could have cajoled the other parties into supporting) would enamor the Oriental population to him for years, and his broad popularity was the main reason he’d been considered as the only logical choice to helm the House as Speaker after independence.
But it would not be entirely without controversy: the decision to turn the National Union into a mainstream party was poorly received not just in Platte, but in its neighbors, and his international efforts were constantly stymied by his personal animosity towards Argentine President Juan Perón, culminating in a heated row when the government discovered that the Justicialist leader had surreptitiously started purchasing stocks in the ORT and hoped to use those stocks as leverage against the most obvious conduit for British influence in the region. He would ironically use an expropriations law written by none other than former Communist leader Elliott Moses to stop those efforts, and it’s even alleged that the explicit ban on private ownership of ORT stocks was proposed by Moses in private correspondence with his former colleague.
Well into his 70s by the end of his tenure, he wouldn’t be able to enjoy his retirement for long, the toll of over a decade at the helm in some of the most trying times in the country’s history catching up with him in 1953, dying at the age of 77.
Holcomb Cabinet (1946-1952)
- Prime Minister – Phillip Holcomb (Conservative)
- Speaker of the House – Aristides Martinez (Popular)
- Chief Whip – Jason Alexander (Alliance)
- Foreign Minister – Malcolm Whitman (Conservative)
- Economy Minister – Thomas Bailey (Alliance)
- Justice Minister – Mark Cunningham (Conservative)
- Health Minister – Albert Crowley (Christian Democrats)
- Defense Minister – John Hamm (National Union)
- Labour and Social Services Minister – William Paxton (Christian Democrats)
Montevideo Telegraph – A Tory Institution
View attachment 468429
Whereas the Communist Party’s relationship with the River Star was an explicit case of political party and its official publication, the Telegraph’s nature as virtual mouthpiece of the Conservative Party of Platte was simply the product of mutual convenience. Founded in 1874, it became the favorite paper for the City’s fledgling financial industry, and by the time of the National Coalition, it functioned as the voice of the country’s commercial and Anglo elites (the Oriental elites would gravitate towards El País instead, founded a year later).View attachment 468429
It would play a pivotal role in the formation of the National Coalition, and not all of it was above board: its owners lobbied the Alliance heavily to join, and most notoriously, they were the first to rehabilitate the National Union in the press after dismissing them as crypto-fascists during the war.
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