Azcárate y Lezama, Juan Francisco de (1767–1831)

Juan Francisco de Azcárate y Lezama (b. 11 July 1767; d. 31 January 1831), Mexican lawyer, writer, and leader of the struggle for Mexican independence. Azcárate studied jurisprudence and in 1790 became a lawyer of the Royal Audiencia. He taught courses at the University of Mexico and became a member of the Academy of Jurisprudence and the College of Lawyers. A distinguished lawyer, Azcárate was also interested in politics, becoming a member of the city council of Mexico City in 1803.

Azcárate played an important role during the imperial crisis provoked by Napoleon's invasion of Spain and the abdication of the Spanish monarchs, when the capital's city council, dominated by creoles, decided to promote autonomist interests. He was the author of the council's representación of 19 July 1808 to the viceroy against the recognition of any monarch but the legitimate one. An active participant in the meetings convened to discuss the creation of a governing junta, Azcárate was imprisoned during the coup d'état of 15 September. Freed in 1811, he rejoined the city council in 1814. He was a member of the governing junta in 1821 and one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Azcárate served in various diplomatic posts during the Augustín de Iturbide regime. In 1827 he was a member of the Committee of Public Education and the following year of the Tribunal of War and Marine.

See alsoMexico, Wars and Revolutions: War of Independence .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Enrique Lafuente Ferrari, El Virrey Iturrigaray y los orígenes de la independencia de México (1941).

José María Miquel I Vergés, Diccionario de insurgentes (1969), pp. 59-61.

Lucas Alamán, Historia de Méjico, vol. 1 (1985); Diccionario Porrúa de historia, biografía y geografía de México, 5th ed., vol. 1 (1986), pp. 244-245.

                                        Virginia Guedea