Couto, José Bernardo (1803–1862)
Couto, José Bernardo (1803–1862)
José Bernardo Couto (b. 1803; d. 1862), Mexican jurist, politician, and writer. Couto studied jurisprudence and humanities at San Ildefonso, Mexico City. In 1827 he became a lawyer, and in 1828 served in the Veracruz legislature. He was counselor of state in 1842 and minister of justice in 1845. Couto was one of the Mexican commissioners during the peace negotiations with the United States in 1847–1848. A distinguished jurist, he was known for his radical anticlerical views in his youth, particularly because of his Disertación sobre la naturaleza y límites de la autoridad eclesiástica (1825). Decades later he retracted his anticlerical position in Discurso sobre la constitución de la iglesia (1857).
Couto was a supporter of the arts, particularly painting and sculpture, and served as president of the governing committee of the Academy of San Carlos. In addition, he was a writer of note, translating Horace, publishing various novels and volumes of verse, and contributing to the Diccionario universal de historia y geografía.
See alsoMexico: 1810–1910 .
BIBLIOGRAPHY
José Rojas Garcidueñas, Don José Bernardo Couto (1964).
María Del Refugio González, "Ilustrados, regalistas, y liberales," in The Independence of Mexico and the Creation of the New Nation, edited by Jaime E. Rodríguez O. (1989).
Jaime E. RodrÍguez O.