Constitutional Document
The first Constitution of Uruguay dates back to 1830. Drafted by the Constituent Assembly, summoned in the Church of La Aguada in 1829, it was sworn by the citizens on 18 July 1830.
This political constitution was in force until 1918, when it was replaced by a new constitutional text.
Overview.
The 1830 constitution has been regarded as Uruguay's most technically perfect charter. Heavily influenced by the thinking of the French and American revolutions, it divided the government among the executive, legislative, and judicial powers and established Uruguay as a unitary republic with a centralized form of government. The bicameral General Assembly was empowered to elect a president with considerable powers to head the executive branch for a four-year term. The president was given control over all of his ministers of government and was empowered to make decisions with the agreement of at least one of the three ministers recognized by the 1830 constitution.
Like all of Uruguay's charters since then, the 1830 constitution provided for a General Assembly composed of a Chamber of Senators ("Cámara de Senadores"), or Senate ("Senado"), elected nationally, and a Chamber of Representatives ("Cámara de Representantes"), elected from the departments. Members of the General Assembly were empowered to pass laws but lacked the authority to dismiss the president or his ministers or to issue votes of no confidence. An 1834 amendment, however, provided for "juicio político", or impeachment, of the ministers for "unacceptable conduct".
As established by the 1830 constitution, the Supreme Court of Justice, and lesser courts, exercised the judicial power. The General Assembly appointed the members of the high court. The latter – with the consent of the Senate in the case of the appellate courts – appointed the members of the lesser courts. The constitution also divided the country into departments, each headed by a governor appointed by the president and each having an advisory body called a Neighbors' Council ("Consejo de Vecinos").
Although the 1830 constitution remained nominally in effect for eighty-seven years, it was actually too rigid to replace or modify. Successive "de facto" governments violated it repeatedly. In the 1878–90 period, the Blancos and Colorados, helped also by the Constitutional Party, initiated the framework for a more stable system through understandings called "pacts between the parties." This governing principle, called coparticipation ("coparticipación"), meaning the sharing of formal political and informal bureaucratic power, has been formally practiced since 1872.
References.
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