Background
In the 1940s, the Costa Rican political scene came to be dominated by Rafael Ángel Calderón, a medical doctor who served as President of Costa Rica from 1940 to 1944.10 The Constitution forbade consecutive reelection, so Calderón's National Republican Party had fielded as its candidate for the 1944 elections law professor Teodoro Picado, who was perceived as a weak figure controlled by Calderón.
The Picado administration resorted several times to the use of military force in order to keep the peace, and pro-Calderón elements within the military institution would often become involved in street violence, which helped to sully the image of the military in the minds of the people. The Costa Rican communist movement, organized in the Popular Vanguard Party led by congressman Manuel Mora, was allied to Picado's government and contributed to the unrest by deploying its militia against the opposition. As the violence grew, supporters of the opposition began to carry guns, and the police began to threaten the use of firearms rather than just beating demonstrators.
Disgust with the government's violent reprisals against the opposition led to the Huelga de Brazos Caídos, a strike that stalled commerce in Costa Rica for seven days. Pro-Calderón and communist demonstrators began to sack those businesses that participated in the strike, and Picado was forced to respond to the strike with force by intimidating merchants and professionals and threatening workers with dismissal and military service. By the end of the strike, police and military forces patrolled the streets, and San José appeared as if under a state of siege.5
Calderón himself was the ruling party's candidate for the election of 1948 and there were widespread fears that the government would intervene to ensure his triumph against his main opponent, journalist Otilio Ulate.10 To assuage these fears, Picado's government for the first time in Costa Rican history placed the election under the control of an independent Electoral Tribunal.
Read more about this topic: Costa Rican Civil War
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