Peronist Party

The Peronist Party, also known as the Justicialist Party, became the dominant force in Argentine politics by building and adapting a large electoral machine. Its history in this account shows how an elected party could command substantial political support without creating pluralism: it cultivated labor when that coalition was strong, later relied more heavily on patronage and vote-buying, and weakened institutions capable of constraining its leaders.

Origins and Political Base

Juan Domingo Perón built an alliance with trade unions and the labor movement after rising to national prominence as labor minister, a post he held following the 1943 military coup. That alliance became central to his successful presidential campaign in 1946 and gave the party an organized base among workers. The party’s later methods shifted with political circumstances: when military repression weakened the labor movement in the 1970s and 1980s, it turned increasingly to winning support through the distribution of favors and resources.

Conflict with the Supreme Court

Soon after Perón’s 1946 victory, his supporters in the Chamber of Deputies proposed impeaching four of the Supreme Court’s five members. The charges included the Court’s acceptance of the legality of the military regimes of 1930 and 1943—an accusation complicated by Perón’s own role in the 1943 coup—and its decisions striking down legislation, including the ruling that Perón’s new national labor relations board was unconstitutional. Nine months after the process began, the Chamber impeached three judges; the fourth had resigned. The Senate approved the motion, and Perón appointed four new justices.

The change freed Perón from an important political constraint. The reconstituted Court upheld the conviction of Ricardo Balbín, the leader of the main opposition party, for disrespecting Perón. The account presents the episode as a decisive weakening of judicial independence: the Court could have been one component of more inclusive institutions, but Argentina’s broader political system lacked the pluralism and wider social empowerment that might have sustained it against executive pressure.

A Lasting Pattern of Court Control

After Perón’s regime was removed in a 1955 coup, successive military and civilian governments appointed their own Supreme Court justices. The practice persisted even when Argentina experienced a democratic transfer of power. In 1990, Peronist president Carlos Saúl Menem inherited a Court appointed by his predecessor, Raúl Alfonsín, of the Radical Party. Before and after taking office, Menem tried to induce or pressure judges to resign; he offered Justice Carlos Fayt an ambassadorship, and Fayt rebuffed him by sending a copy of his book, Law and Ethics, inscribed with the note, “Beware I wrote this.”

Within three months of taking office, Menem proposed expanding the Court from five seats to nine, arguing, among other things, that it was overworked. The measure passed both chambers of Congress and enabled him to appoint four justices, giving him a majority. The account links this success to the precedent established under Perón: a court that might have constrained executive power became vulnerable to the incoming president’s political control. Menem’s subsequent effort to remove the presidential term limit through constitutional revision was checked not by independent institutions but by factions within his own party, which resisted his personal domination.

Electoral Power and Extractive Institutions

The party’s electoral success did not, in this account, amount to broad political pluralism. It won through a large political machine that bought votes, distributed patronage, and used corruption—including government jobs and contracts—in exchange for political support. Power remained concentrated, and the party faced few effective constraints when the military did not remove it from office. The treatment of the Supreme Court illustrates the limits of constitutional protections where institutions lack broad social support capable of defending their independence.

The same political logic shaped economic policy. Policies and institutions were designed to deliver income to supporters rather than establish a level playing field. Menem’s removal of the term limit, and the ability of governments to override property rights with little accountability, are presented as evidence that elections alone did not prevent arbitrary exercises of power. The party’s history therefore forms part of a wider argument about Argentina’s vicious institutional circle: political dominance and weak checks could persist across elected governments as well as military rule, leaving potentially inclusive institutions without a secure foundation.