Arturo Frondizi Ércoli (Paso de los Libres, October 28, 1908 – Buenos Aires, April 18, 1995) was an Argentine lawyer, journalist, teacher, statesman, and politician. He was elected president of Argentina and governed from May 1, 1958, to March 29, 1962, when he was overthrown in a military coup. His government was characterized by its strong developmentalist policies (inspired by Rogelio Frigerio), that was less promoted by the State and more oriented to the development of heavy industry as a consequence of the entry of multinational companies.
A member of the Unión Cívica Radical (UCR) from the 1930s, Frondizi was one of the leaders who revived that party in the 1940s by founding the Intransigence and Renewal Movement, which opposed the military's role in politics. In 1946, he became national deputy for the city of Buenos Aires and unsuccessfully ran for vice president in the 1951 elections. After the Revolución Libertadora that overthrew President Juan Perón in 1955, Frondizi led the radical faction within the UCR that criticized the dictatorship against the faction led by Ricardo Balbín, which was closer to it. This led to the split of the party and the formation of the Intransigent Radical Civic Union (UCRI). Frondizi and Balbín faced off in the 1958 presidential elections with Peronism banned, and Frondizi won by a landslide, thanks to an agreement he or his entourage made with Perón, under circumstances that remain unclear.
Frondizi's labor, oil and education policies sparked sharp conflicts, with large demonstrations and strikes by the labor and student movements, as well as numerous attacks against the government. Frondizi responded by signing the Conintes Plan, which placed protesters under the jurisdiction of military tribunals and prohibited strikes. His foreign policy sought closer relations with the United States under John F. Kennedy, but maintained an independent line, supporting the Cuban Revolution, receiving Fidel Castro in Buenos Aires, and even meeting secretly with Che Guevara to try to mediate conflicts between the United States and Cuba, without success. He deepened international relations with Asian countries by making his first presidential visit to Indonesia, India, and Israel, and signed economic agreements with the Soviet Union. Following repeated pressures from the military, Frondizi was overthrown by a coup on March 29, 1962. He was detained by the military and prevented from participating in the 1963 elections.
During the National Reorganization Process, Frondizi maintained a wait-and-see attitude toward the military regime, while also being critical of some of the economic measures adopted by the regime. During the Falklands War in 1982, Frondizi and Raúl Alfonsín were the exception in the Argentine political landscape in opposing the conflict.
On April 18, 1995, Frondizi died of natural causes at the age of 86 in Buenos Aires.
Arturo Frondizi was born on October 28, 1908, in Paso de los Libres, Corrientes Province, Argentina. He was the thirteenth child of Isabella Ércoli de Frondizi and Giulio Frondizi. The couple, shortly after marrying, arrived in Argentina in the early 1890s from the Italian city of Gubbio. Giulio had learned the art of masonry from his father and made a comfortable living as a construction contractor.
The couple had a total of fourteen children, eight boys and six girls: Luidina (b. 1887), Ubaldo (b. 1888 and died at a young age), and Tersilia (b. 1889), all born in Italy, and Américo (b. 1896, future graduate in pharmacy), María (b. 1897 and died at a young age), Virginia (b. 1899, future primary school teacher), Ricardo Amadeo (b. 1900, future famous English teacher), Giulio (b. 1901, future civil servant), Isabella (b. 1903), Oreste (b. 1905, future civil servant), Silvio (b. 1907, future politician and lawyer, as well as a Trotskyist theorist, who would be assassinated by the Triple A in 1974), Liduvina (b.?), Arturo (b. 1908) and Risieri (b. 1910, future philosopher and rector of the University of Buenos Aires).
The family relocated to Concepción del Uruguay in 1912. Arturo and Silvio traveled in 1923 to the province of Buenos Aires, accompanied by their father. They attended the Mariano Moreno National School, where Risieri would also study later. In 1925, before completing the last year of high school, Arturo tried to enter the Colegio Militar de la Nación, but was deferred.
In his youthful days, Arturo demonstrated minimal academic achievement, being more inclined towards sports, especially fútbol and boxing, than academic activities. Arturo was part of the youth division of Club Almagro from 1920 until 1926, competing as a central defender in the fourth division. This makes him the only Argentine president known to have competed as a registered football player in official AFA competition. In 1926, a serious fracture in his arm occurred during a match, forcing him to cease playing the sport for a long period. This, combined with his increased involvement in law and politics, marked a turning point that led to his eventual withdrawal from the sport.
During his later years of secondary education at the Colegio Nacional Mariano Moreno, Frondizi shifted his attention to his studies. During his fifth year of secondary school, his academic performance significantly improved, allowing him to earn recognition for his academic excellence. He became an accomplished student, participating in the school journal Estimulen.
Frondizi identified with Yrigoyenismo when he was a teenager and studying in high school. Hipólito Yrigoyen, "the father of the poor", had been elected president when Frondizi was eight years old and served his term when Frondizi was 14. For the first time in Argentine history, a president had been elected by secret and compulsory vote, in massively attended elections. Despite this, and throughout his university career, Frondizi had a negative view of political activity and vowed never to set foot in a local party.
In 1927, he entered the Law School of the University of Buenos Aires, where he graduated in July 1930. He refused to accept his diploma with honors, due to his refusal to receive it from the then de facto president José Félix Uriburu, who had overthrown Yrigoyen on September 6 of the previous year. His opposition to the dictatorship that overthrew Yrigoyen led him to participate in a demonstration on May 8, 1931, during which he was arrested and remanded to the custody of the provisional government.
His brother Silvio Frondizi filed a habeas corpus petition, the first in a life dedicated to defending political prisoners. The judge, however, also ordered the imprisonment of Silvio Frondizi, and both brothers were detained together for twenty days in the National Penitentiary located on Las Heras Street in Buenos Aires, a prison that Arturo would order demolished when he was president.
Frondizi said that this arrest convinced him to put aside his plans to teach in order to embark on a career as a politician. At the end of 1932, he was arrested for the second time and after being released he joined the Unión Cívica Radical.
In December 1933, he would be arrested for the third time, suspected of being involved in an uprising against the national government.
He led the Argentine League for the Rights of Man, the nation's first recorded human rights organization, upon its founding in 1936. In December of that year, he narrowly escaped an assassination attempt while addressing a crowd.
During the European conflict that would lead to World War II, Frondizi adopted an anti-fascist political stance from 1936, in opposition to the traditional neutralist stance that Argentina had held since World War I. By then, he was already known for his partisan activity, participating in number of ideological organizations. On May 1 of that year, he gave a speech on behalf of the UCR at a massive event of the Confederación General del Trabajo (CGT), where he shared the platform with the CGT's general secretary, José Domenech; former Radical president Marcelo T. de Alvear; Mario Bravo and Nicolás Repetto of the Socialist Party; Paulino González Alberdi for the Communist Party; and Lisandro de la Torre for the Democratic Progressive Party. Later that year he gave a lecture on the problem of antisemitism, as seen by an Argentinian, at the Enrique Heine Israelite Society.