Argentine legislative election, 1920

The Argentine legislative elections of 1920 were held on 7 March. Voters chose their legislators and numerous governors, and with a turnout of 53.0%, it produced the following results:

Argentine Chamber of Deputies

Party/Electoral Alliance	Seats	Change	Votes	%
Radical Civic Union (UCR)	84	28	328,723	44.4%
Democratic Progressive	19	5	76,900	10.1%
Conservative	14	5	104,569	13.7%
Socialist	10	4	85,693	11.2%
Liberal Party of Corrientes	4	1	29,186	3.8%
Provincial Union (Salta Province)	3	1	8,092	1.1%
Autonomist Party of Corrientes	3	=	5,551	0.7%
Situationist UCR (Mendoza Province)	2	2	9,320	1.2%
Civic Concentration (San Juan Province)	2	2	7,575	1.0%
Others	14		87,716	11.5%
Invalid votes	3^a		18,790	2.5%
Total	158	38	762,115	100.0%

^[1]^[2]

Notes: a) Seats left vacant.

Background

A strong economy and a vigorous social policy helped make 1920 a banner year for President Hipólito Yrigoyen, whose UCR won 61 of the 102 seats at stake in the Lower House of Congress.^[3]

A CNCB community in Buenos Aires. Programs such as these catalyzed support for Yrigoyen amid a roaring economy.

Mar del Plata Mayor Teodoro Bronzini (light suit) and the new, Socialist city government, among the first in the Americas.

The party emerged victorious in the City of Buenos Aires, Entre Ríos, La Rioja, Santiago del Estero, and even in districts which had hitherto been dominated by either opposition parties (such as Buenos Aires Province and Tucumán), or dissident factions of the UCR (as in the case of Santa Fe).^[3] The party effectively displaced both the Socialist and Democratic Progressive parties in the highly comptetitive Buenos Aires district by supporting labor rights and advancing programs such as the National Inexpensive Housing Commission (CNCB), which added thousands of units to the capital's perennially strained housing supply.^[4] The addition of 38 seats to the Chamber of Deputies, partly as a result of the 1914 Census, further enhanced the UCR's sweep, and for the first time, gave them an absolute majority in the Lower House.

Socialists made modest gains in Congress, and won control of local governments in Zárate and Mar del Plata (the first in Argentina). The Democratic Progressive Party, organized by reformist Congressman Lisandro de la Torre from his Southern League in 1914, continued to make gains, and triumphed in Córdoba Province (though not in Santa Fe, de la Torre's home province). They displaced their former allies, the Conservatives (a holdover from the landowner-controlled National Autonomist Party, which was in power from 1874 to 1916), as the largest party in the minority. Conservatives continued to dominate the Senate, however, and much of Yrigoyen's legislation - notably the establishment of a national merchant marine - continued to encounter long delays. Nor had Yrigoyen been persuasive among the nation's governors, and at the time of the March 1920 elections, fully 14 had been replaced by presidentially-decreed federal intervention.

The removal of Governors by presidential decree had, by itself, helped discourage the establishment of dissident UCR factions, of which there were no fewer than five prior to the election; these elections left only Mendoza Province with a dissident UCR majority delegation. The most prominent such faction, that was led by Santa Fe Governor Rodolfo Lehmann and 8 Congressmen at its height, was weakened by his resignation at the end of 1919, and presented no candidates in 1920. The reformist governor's struggle with the La Forestal logging company, whose striking workers were brutally repressed by both company heavies and national troops, was more to blame for his departure than were differences with President Yrigoyen, and illustrated the limits of the era of pluralist government that began in 1916.^[5]^[6]

Elections and referendums in Argentina

Presidential elections	1854 1860 1862 1868 1874 1880 1886 1892 1898 1904 1910 1916 1922 1928 1931 1937 1946 1951 1958 1963 1973 (Mar) 1973 (Sep) 1983 1989 1995 1999 2003 2007 2011 2015 2019

Parliamentary elections	1854 1856 1858 1860 1862 1864 1866 1868 1870 1872 1874 1876 1878 1880 1882 1884 1886 1888 1890 1892 1894 1896 1898 1900 1902 1904 1906 1908 1910 1912 1914 1916 1918 1920 1922 1924 1926 1928 1930 1931 1934 1936 1938 1940 1942 1946 1948 (Mar) 1948 (Dec) 1951 1954 1957 1958 1960 1962 1963 1965 1973 1983 1985 1987 1989 1991 1993 1994 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2015 2017 2019

Provincial elections	1854 1856 1858 1860 1862 1864 1866 1868 1870 1872 1874 1876 1878 1880 1882 1884 1886 1888 1890 1892 1894 1896 1898 1900 1902 1904 1906 1908 1910 1912 1914 1916 1918 1920 1922 1924 1926 1928 1930 1931 1934 1936 1937 1938 1940 1942 1946 1948 1951 1954 1957 1958 1960 1962 1963 1965 1973 1983 1985 1987 1989 1991 1993 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2005 2007 2008 2009 2011 2012 2013 2015 2016 2017 2019

Referendums	1984

Notes

↑ Ministerio del Interior: Historia Electoral Argentina (Spanish)
↑ Nohlen, Dieter. Elections in the Americas : a data handbook. Oxford University Press, 2005.
1 2 Nómina de diputados de la nacion por distrito electoral: periodo 1854-1991. Buenos Aires: Cámara de Diputados de la Nación, Secretaría Parlamentaria, Dirección de Archivo, Publicaciones y Museo, Subdirección de Publicaciones e Investigaciones Históricas, 1991.
↑ Todo Argentina: 1920 (Spanish)
↑ Gianello, Leoncio. Historia de Santa Fe. Buenos Aires: Editorial Plus Ultra, 1978.
↑ Rock, David. Argentina: 1516-1982. University of California Press, 1987.

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