By: Veronica Guerra and Luisania Brito

Relevant Features of the Period:• The country was governed by a elitist, conservative and oligarchy group whose central figure was general Jose Antonio Páez.

• The public administration was effective, since 28,5% of the debts from the separation of Gran Colombia were paid.

• Páez abolished the taxes needed for the entry of goods in the cities. (1830 and 1835) Taxes needed for the export of coffee and cocoa were eliminated in order to increase the amount of exports.

• He raised taxes on goods that were from the United States to protect the national agriculture.

• The economy was great, until the crisis of 1841-1845 which was caused by the falling prices of exported products in the international market.

Relavant Features of the Period:• The coffee production took over the cocoa and it became the main export good. It stayed as the main export during the whole agriculture period of Venezuela.

• A policy of economical liberalism was adopted. Although it benefited the interests of the commercial bourgeois , it harmed the low class level agricultures.

• The governments of this period had to face the manifestations of regional caudillismo.

Governmental Work:• Immigration of European and Canarians started. In 1834, the Colonia Tovar was founded in the Aragua state with all the German immigrants.

• Within the ruling oligarchy anti-Bolivarian sentiment decreased, which allowed the transfer of Bolivar’s remains from Colombia to Caracas in 1842.

• The flow of money was deficient causing the first monetary minting (cast). Therefore, the use of money from other nations was valid.

•The social economy association Amigos del País, founded in 1829 and the construction of roads, stimulated agricultural production.

Legislative Work:• Congress in 1830 approved to establish a centralist government. This gave some autonomy to the provinces and separated public powers.

• The Ley de Hurto was created to confront those who roamed the plains with impunity in armed bands.

• The Ley Manumisión de Esclavos ordered to raise the age to 18-21 years for the slave’s children to serve.

• The enactment of the Ley sobre Libertad de Contratos, (April 10, 1834) Ley de Espera, and Quita (1841) upheld the principle of usury.

Church Relations: • The nation took decisions that affected the Catholic’s Church interests:

- They established that the prelates of the Church had to swear to the national Constitution in cathedrals. - The Church could not be “a state in a State (estado dentro de un Estado)”. - The freedom of worship was allowed. - The tithes ( 10%) that were paid to the church were eliminated and the state took care over all the ecclesiastical expenses. - Decree (Ecclesiastic Patronage) was rectified (Church subjected to the State).

Caudillos:• January 1830, José Tadeo and José Gregorio Monagas proclaimed the state of Oriente in opposition to the separation of Venezuela from Gran Colombia.

• Some provinces stood up and proclaimed the restoration of the project for Gran Colombia. People condemned the Constitution of Valencia and ignored the provisional government, and offered the leadership to Jose Tadeo Monagas.

• War of Guerrillas and peasant insurrections.

• Dec. 1846, electoral year. 283 politics (including Zamora and Guzman), were condemned to 10 years in prison.

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Reform Revolution:• A movement in Caracas the 8th of July 1835 with the purpose of overthrowing president Jose Maria Vargas and reform the Constitution.

• Mariño y Carujo demanded to Vargas to resign to presidency, but he denied. So, Vargas was captured and expulsed to Saint Thomas island.

•Vargas continued in the presidency until he resigned in April 1836.

• The power was given to Andres Navarte, Jose Maria Carreño, and Carlos Soublette.

•Militarists and Civilians: Caudillo present at the highest government position; the militaries thought that the presidency should be given to those who had earned that right on the battlefield.

Elections:

• During elections, liberals and conservatives clashed in the middle of a peasant insurrection.

• The Paecistas supported the candidacy of Rafael Urdaneta, and liberals Leocadio Antonio Guzman.

• Urdaneta died and Guzman was accused of treason by the authorities and sentenced to death.

•José Tadeo Monagas, Páez’s new candidate, won the elections. Once in office, Monagas commute the death sentence of Guzmán to an exile. Eventually, he took out the Paecistas and incorporated in key positions his friends into the government.

Relevant Features:

•The country was ruled by a closed circle of relatives and friends of the Monagas.

• Jose Gregorio Monagas (brother) was favored by the national vote in 1850. Then, Jose Tadeo was re-elected in next presidential term, and in 1857 he reformed theConstitution, lengthening the period from four to six years, with possibility of reelection, which served as a good excuse for the opposition to overthrowhim in 1858.

Legislative Work:

• In 1849, the death penalty was abolished; all condemned prisoner were sent to jail.

•The Ley de Espera y Quita wasreformed in 1849, and it set a new deadline of six years as a benefit of suspension for debtors.

• Jose Gregorio Monagas became well-known in history thanks to the Law on Abolition of Slavery, adopted on March 24, 1854.

Governmental Work:

•Trade and navigation agreements were signed; laws were passed in maritime post, decrees were issued for the railway concession in Puerto Cabello to San Felipe. In 1855, the steamship "Orinoco" was launched in Ciudad Bolivar .

• In 1856, Jose Tadeo Monagas had to face the Dutch and US claim over Isla de Aves. He had to negotiate the withdrawal of Dutch ships that blocked the port of La Guaira.

• A new political division of the territory rose from 13 to 21 the Venezuelan provinces, and fixed the boundaries between Maracaibo and Trujillo.

• Throughout the country there was no political or social peace. •In 1848 Monagas separated definitely from the conservatives. The rupture was caused by a series of measures taken by the President that were considered arbitrary. In January 24, Congress intended to sanction Monagas, but a group of his followers assaulted the room and forcibly subjected to parliamentarians. Santos Michelena got killed and Jose Tadeo Monagas imposed his autocratic will. •Paez got impatient and rebelled in Calabozo, but was defeated in Los Araguatos on August 5, 1848, held in the castle of San Antonio at Cumana, and expelled from the country in 1850.