José Rufino Pompeyo Echenique Benavente (November 16, 1808 – June 16, 1887) served as the 12th

President of Peru The president of Peru (), officially the constitutional president of the Republic of Peru (), is the head of state and head of government of Peru. The president is the head of the executive branch and is the supreme head of the Peruvian Armed ...

from 1851 to 1855. He participated in the

Peruvian War of Independence The Peruvian War of Independence () was a series of military conflicts in Peru from 1809 to 1826 that resulted in the country's independence from the Spanish Empire. Part of the broader Spanish American wars of independence, it led to the dis ...

and the Peruvian Civil Wars of 1834 and 1843–44. Echenique won the 1851 Peruvian presidential election to succeed

Ramón Castilla Ramón Castilla y Marquesado (; 31 August 1797 – 30 May 1867) was a Peruvian ''caudillo'' who served as President of Peru three times as well as the Interim President of Peru (Revolution Self-proclaimed President) in 1863. His earliest p ...

. Under his government, the first civil laws of Peru were promulgated, and slavery was abolished. The finalizing phase of the construction of the

Tacna Tacna, officially known as San Pedro de Tacna, is a city in southern Peru and the regional capital of the Tacna Region. A very commercially active city, it is located only north of the border with Arica y Parinacota Region from Chile, inland f ...

Arica Arica ( ; ) is a commune and a port city with a population of 222,619 in the Arica Province of northern Chile's Arica y Parinacota Region. It is Chile's northernmost city, being located only south of the border with Peru. The city is the ca ...

railroad was also completed. Echenique was overthrown by the Liberal Revolution of 1854 led by Ramón Castilla in 1855 after a ball hosted by his wife, Victoria Tristán. He served as the President of the Chamber of Deputies in 1864, and

President of the Senate President of the Senate is a title often given to the presiding officer of a senate. It corresponds to the Speaker (politics), speaker in some other assemblies. The senate president often ranks high in a jurisdiction's Order of succession, succes ...

from 1868 to 1871. His son, Juan Martín Echenique, was also active in Peruvian politics. Echenique hosted the

Post-Impressionist Post-Impressionism (also spelled Postimpressionism) was a predominantly French art movement that developed roughly between 1886 and 1905, from the last Impressionist exhibition to the birth of Fauvism. Post-Impressionism emerged as a reaction a ...

painter

Paul Gauguin Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin (; ; 7 June 1848 – 8 May 1903) was a French painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramist, and writer, whose work has been primarily associated with the Post-Impressionist and Symbolist movements. He was also an influ ...

and Gauguin's mother in his presidential home in central Lima from 1849 to 1854, during Gauguin's childhood. Echenique is credited with stating that the country ought to change its racial demographics to " improve the race", which was reflected in the immigration efforts promoted under his government that brought a number of Germans and Austrians, Irish,

Spaniards Spaniards, or Spanish people, are a Romance-speaking ethnic group native to the Iberian Peninsula, primarily associated with the modern nation-state of Spain. Genetically and ethnolinguistically, Spaniards belong to the broader Southern a ...

and other Europeans to Peru.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Echenique Benavente, Jose Rufino 1808 births 1887 deaths People from the Department of Puno Peruvian people of Basque descent Presidents of Peru Presidents of the Senate of Peru Presidents of the Chamber of Deputies of Peru Defense ministers of Peru Leaders ousted by a coup

See also

References