Complete Thesis_double spaced abstract.pdf

while allegedly trying to escape custody (REMHI, 1999, 183-184). General Ubico also instituted
two significant changes to the Guatemalan military, he worked to professionalize the junior
officer corps by setting up a training system modeled after West Point in the United States and he
introduced austerity measures in the military, cutting the pay of the junior officers.
General Ubico was the last of the Liberal authoritarian leaders of this particular era; he
ruled from 1931 until a series of events led to his unceremonious ouster in 1944; his resignation
was preceded by Guatemala’s largest protests. General Ubico’s last acts of violence were
directed toward a “series of non-violent demonstrations by schoolteachers demanding higher pay
and democratic government” (Calvert, 1985, 4). General Ubico responded with his usual violent
tactics in an attempt to aggressively break up the teacher’s strike, he ordered his cavalry to charge
the demonstrators, “killing or injuring over 200 of them,” including a female school teacher who
became a symbol for the movement (Calvert, 1985, 4). This particular violent eruption was
coupled with the assassination of a prominent Guatemalan journalist; it was the beginning of the
end for General Ubico. After the student protests hundreds of Guatemala’s elite and
“professional businessmen” presented General Ubico with a petition demanding his removal from
office, the petition cited “311 leading citizens joined in a letter to the President expressing their
support for the teacher’s aims” (Grieb, 1976, 532; Calvert, 1985, 4). However, General Ubico’s
removal from office and the subsequent purging of the military officers loyal to Ubico from
Guatemalan government would not have been possible without the support of the
professionalized junior military officers, the expanding business and middle classes, and the
student organizations. General Ubico resigned shortly after receiving the petition.
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