Simon Bolivar's Political Legacy and Key Documents

The Cartagena Manifesto of 1812

The Cartagena Manifesto (15 December 1812) is the first of Bolivar's capital documents. It was written by Bolivar when he was twenty-nine years old; there is a palpable quality that was remarkable in the statesman. He analyzes the causes of the collapse of the First Republic and proposes a strategy that seemed to materially result in the attack which crystallized in the Second Republic, formed after the epic of the Admirable Campaign.

The Prophetic Letter from Jamaica of 1815

In the Letter from Jamaica (6 September 1815), there appears the penetrating intelligence of Bolivar showing prophetic gifts. There is nothing of the magician or sorcerer; it is the straight and accurate view of a coherent political mind with the precision and balance that provides for the future according to data from the present. Bolivar responds to Mr. Henry Cullen, a good friend of "this hard America," who was interested in knowing the historical causes of our misfortunes.

It is noteworthy that Bolivar wrote this document in Kingston without any consultation and without yet having crossed the southern regions. However, despite such gaps, he dared to advance predictions that have been fulfilled with astonishing accuracy. Bolivar is a historian of the future, a historian of developing thought, with reference to historiosophy. Underlying economic, political, social, and ideological factors parade through his thoughts before anticipating that Spanish America would be divided into fifteen or more independent republics, that Mexico would be a Republic represented by a life-term executive—if it performs its duties with wisdom and justice—or that it would otherwise bring a monarchy supported by the military or aristocratic party.

The 1819 Speech of Angostura

The Speech of Angostura (February 15, 1819) is the principal of the Bolivarian writings. Composed amid the hazards of the campaign, it endorses abstract concepts among the most diverse circumstances. Bolivar could think and concentrate on his intellectual work even in the tragic crash of battles; as in merry holidays, nothing disturbed him. The Speech of Angostura was produced when the Republic was restored in its third and final stage.

Structure of the Angostura Address

The structure of this exemplary piece consists of:

• I. Introduction: Returning power to the people.
• II. Examination: An analysis of the critical time in which he lives.
• III. Presentation: The draft constitution in which Bolivar deploys a task of plural social knowledge, law, politics, and history; he enters the domains of sociology and philosophy to support his observations.
• IV. Synthetic Account: The speech continues with a synthetic account of the proceedings until then, all summarized under four headings: the abolition of slavery, land distribution, the institutes of the Order of the Liberators, and the ratification committed to the decision of parental death.
• V. Conclusion: There is an emphatic recommendation on the national debt, and it concludes with an inspired and enthusiastic projection regarding Gran Colombia.