Portales' influential political policies included unitarianism, presidentialism and conservatism which led to the consolidation of Chile as a constitutional, authoritarian and aristocratic republic with the franchise restricted to upper class men from the gentry.

Nonetheless, in the anarchy that was regnant in Chile at the time, there was no means of enforcing a monopoly as the government could not regulate sales of tobacco, tea, and liquor, and the company eventually went bankrupt.

[2][3] After the triumph of the conservatives in the Revolution of 1829, President José Tomás Ovalle y Bezanilla named him Minister of the Interior and Foreign Affairs on April 6, 1830 remaining until May 1831.

Portales set up a civil militia (which ended one of the worst stages of militarism in Chile's history); supported an oligarchic control for landowners, miners, and merchants; and made Catholicism the state religion.

In 1822, before his rise to power Portales wrote to a friend:Politics doesn't interest me, but as a good citizen I feel free to express my opinions and to censure the government.

Democracy, which is so loudly proclaimed by the deluded is an absurdity in our countries, flooded as they are with vices and with their citizens lacking all sense of civic virtue, the prerequisite to establishing a real Republic.

He believed in a peaceful but strong central government, and that in order to successfully run a state or country, citizens must be virtuous and patrioticand must consider the law as higher than any leader.

[citation needed] In order to bolster its standing, the Chilean government immediately imposed martial law and asked for (and obtained) extraordinary legislative powers from Congress.

The opposition to the Prieto Vial administration immediately accused Portales of tyranny, and started a heated press campaign against him personally and the unpopular war in general.

On June 3, 1837, Colonel José Antonio Vidaurre, commander of the Maipo regiment, captured and imprisoned Portales while he was reviewing troops at the army barracks in Quillota.

...we are inspired in the Portalian spirit that has fused together the nation...The figure and legacy of Portales has been praised by some historians like Ramón Sotomayor Valdés [es] and Alberto Edwards.

[6] Portales' remains, missing since his assassination, were found in March 2005 in Santiago's Metropolitan Cathedral during renovation projects, and were identified after forensic examination.

[7] On June 20, 2006, the remains were taken to the civic crypt of the Cathedral for a civic-religious re-burial ceremony attended by then-President Michelle Bachelet, along with several civil and military authorities.