Gómez Castro, Laureano (1889–1965)

Laureano Gómez Castro (b. 20 February 1889; d. 13 July 1965), president of Colombia (1950–1953). Born in Bogotá to middle-class parents from Ocaña, Norte de Santander, Gómez attended the Colegio de San Bartolomé and studied engineering at the Universidad Nacional (1905–1909). He was drawn, however, to politics. At twenty, he became editor of La Unidad, a Conservative paper, and remained at its helm until its demise in 1916. In the same period, he was elected to Congress and to Cundinamarca's Chamber of Deputies (1911–1916). His oratory was usually vehement and often wounding. President Marco Fidel Suárez resigned in 1921 rather than suffer Gómez's taunts. After serving as minister plenipotentiary to Chile and Argentina (1923–1925), Gómez returned home in 1925 to become public works minister. His ambitious infrastructure program was rejected by the Congress, and he left public service until 1931, when he was appointed envoy to Germany. Some months later he was elected senator, remaining in office until removed—for calumny—in 1943.

A Liberal victory in 1930 left a power vacuum among Conservatives that Gómez, through his editorials in Bogotá's El País (1932–1934) and El Siglo (1936–1948), sought to fill. He unremittingly opposed the regimes of Enrique Olaya Herrera, Alfonso López Pumarejo, and Eduardo Santos. Gómez's enthusiasm for Franco's Spain reflected his authoritarianism. The collapse, in 1945–1946, of Liberal unity brought in Gómez's choice, Mariano Ospina Pérez, a Conservative, as president (1946). The increasing political violence led to Liberal withdrawal from the cabinet, and as a result Gómez became foreign minister in 1948. Nearly lynched in the Bogotazo of 9 April 1948, he fled to Spain. Gómez returned in 1949, ran unopposed (the Liberals abstained from voting), and won the presidency. His term was marked by repression, extreme partisanship, and violence. Some infra-structural improvements were achieved, however, including stadia in Bogotá and Medellín, roads, and oil pipelines. With no Congress to answer to, Gómez sent a Colombian battalion to join United Nations forces in Korea (1951–1953). On 13 June 1953, he was overthrown by General Gustavo Rojas Pinilla and exiled to Spain. In 1956, joined by Liberal politicians at Sitges, Spain, Gómez founded the National Front. He died in Bogotá.

See alsoBogotazo; Suárez, Marco Fidel; Violencia, La.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

José Francisco Socorrás, Laureano Gómez, psicoanálisis de un resentido (1942).

Alberto Bermúdez, El buen gobierno … Laureano Gómez (1974).

James D. Henderson, Conservative Thought in Latin America: The Ideas of Laureano Gómez (1988).

Additional Bibliography

Abella Rodríguez, Arturo. Laureano Gómez. Bogotá: Espasa, 2000.

Henderson, James D. Modernization in Colombia: The Laureano Gómez Years, 1889–1965. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2001.

Sáenz Rovner, Eduardo. Colombia años 50: Industriales, política y diplomacia. Bogotá: Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Sede Bogotá, 2002.

                                    J. LeÓn Helguera