José Ramón Villeda Morales

José Ramón Adolfo Villeda Morales

José Ramón Adolfo Villeda Morales (born November 26, 1908 in Ocotepeque , Honduras, † October 8, 1971 in New York City ) was President of Honduras from December 21, 1957 to October 3, 1963 .

Life

His parents were Dolores Morales Corleto and José María Villeda Chávez. He studied human medicine and edited the magazine Juventud Médica Hondureña , as well as El Universitario with other students . He was chairman of the Federación de Estudiantes Universitarios as well as foreign representative of the Juventud universitaria de Honduras . He became a doctor, obtained a doctorate in medicine and surgery, and worked at the Hospital de Occidente in Santa Rosa de Copán .

On April 25, 1936, he married the teacher Alejandrina Bermúdez Milla. They had six sons: Ramón Adolfo, Rubén Antonio, Alejandro, Mauricio, Leonardo and Juan Carlos.

In 1937 he received a grant from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation to specialize as a specialist in Berlin.

In 1940 he set up a practice in Tegucigalpa . He became chairman of the medical association in Tegucigalpa. He set up the first ambulance at Cruz Roja Hondureña , where thousands of poor people received free medical treatment. In 1948 he was an activist of the Partido Liberal de Honduras . In 1949 he was chairman of the Consejo Supremo Liberal party council. He founded the daily newspaper El Pueblo . In May 1953 he presented a party statute and a party program at a party convention of the Partido Liberal de Honduras .

On April 25, 1954, the party convention of the Partido Liberal de Honduras nominated José Ramón Villeda Morales as a candidate for president.

In the elections on October 10, 1954, José Ramón Villeda Morales was elected so often that Julio Lozano Díaz had him deported from Honduras and he went into exile in Costa Rica .

After the overthrow of Julio Lozano Díaz, he was sent as ambassador to Washington by the military junta under Héctor Caraccioli Moncada .

On August 21, 1957, the election of the delegates to the constituent assembly was called.

On August 26, 1957, he returned to Honduras. He was greeted by 100,000 people in San Pedro Sula .

He was elected President by the constituent assembly in November 1957 with 37 to 20 votes.

He concluded the Pacto de with Kenneth H. Redmond (* 1896 in Indiana), who had succeeded Sam Zemurray since 1951 , and Whiting Willauer (1906–1962), from March 5, 1954 to March 24, 1958, the US Ambassador to Honduras Agua Azul .

He took office on December 21, 1957.

Under his presidency, welfare benefits were introduced and new labor legislation was enacted.

Under his presidency, Honduras had comparatively attractive conditions for shipowners , which led to flagging out.

On July 12, 1959, Coronel Armando Velásquez Cerrato had the praesidia of the Policía Nacional , the telegraph office and the military academy occupied. José Ramón Adolfo Villeda Morales dissolved the Policía Nacional . He founded the 2,000-strong Guardia Civil , a party militia of the Partido Libaral de Honduras , which was paid by the Ministry of Justice and was involved in the Matanza de Los Laureles massacre on September 6, 1961 .

In April 1961, the Ramón Villeda Morales government broke off relations with the Fidel Castro government . Subsequently, Cuba was excluded from the Organization of American States .

Its policy corresponded to the US program Alliance for Progress .

Government cabinet

• Deputy: Francisco Milla Bermúdez, Juan Miguel Mejía, José Mejía Arellano
• Government and Justice Administration Minister: Lisandro Valle.
• Foreign Minister: Andrés Alvarado Puerto.
• Minister for Natural Resources: Francisco Milla Bermúdez.
• Minister of Health and Welfare: Rafael Martínez Valenzuela
• Finance and Economy Ministers: Fernando Villar, Jorge Bueso Arias
• Minister of Communications and Public Works: Roberto Martínez Ordoñez
• Education Ministers: Miguel Angel Mejía, José Martínez Ordoñez.
• Labor and Social Affairs Minister: Oscar Armando Flores Midence
• Minister of Internal Security and Defense: Antonio Molina Ortiz

According to the constitution, his term of office would have lasted until December 21, 1963.

The traditional power elite of Honduras feared that he would have been elected president in the presidential election on October 10, 1963 and that this mandate would have affected their position of power. On the morning of October 3, 1963, José Ramón Adolfo Villeda Morales was flown into exile on board a C-47 of the Fuerza Aérea Hundureña to Costa Rica and about 500 men of the Guardia Civil were shot. John F. Kennedy had diplomatic relations with the Oswaldo López Arellano regime set.

Under Ramón Ernesto Cruz he was accredited as Chairman of the Permanent Mission of Honduras to the United Nations on September 20, 1971.

The Ramón Villeda Morales International Airport in San Pedro Sula was named after him.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Kirk Bowman: Militarization and Democracy in Honduras, 1954–1963 . (PDF; 348 kB)
2. ↑ Dr. Ramón Villeda Morales . In: Der Spiegel . No. 52 , 1958, pp. 39 ( online ).
3. ↑ Hot flag! In: Der Spiegel . No. 52 , 1958, pp. 38–40 ( online interview on the shipping policy of the FOC countries).
4. ↑ Matías Funes, Matías Funes H, Matías Funez V .: Los deliberantes el poder militar en Honduras . Guaymuras, 1995 p. 229
5. ^ Alliance for Progress in the English language Wikipedia
6. ^ No he sido violin de muchas cuerdas . ( Memento of the original from December 15, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: La Prensa hn  
7. ^ Military coup No. 136 . In: Der Spiegel . No. 43 , 1963 ( online ).
8. ↑ Ramón Villeda Morales International Airport in the English language Wikipedia

predecessor	Office	successor
Héctor Caraccioli Moncada	President of Honduras December 21, 1957 to October 3, 1963	Oswaldo López Arellano