Historiography of the May Revolution

The main topics of disagreement between Argentine historians are the specific weight of the diverse causes of the May Revolution, who were the leaders of it among the different involved parties, whenever there was popular support for it or not, and whenever the loyalty to the captive Spanish king Ferdinand VII was real or an elaborate masquerade to conceal pro-independence purposes.

Another disputed topic is the existence or not of the Operations plan, a secret document allegedly written by Mariano Moreno and setting harsh way for the Primera Junta to achieve its goals.

Historian Diego Abad de Santillán considers that the formula responded to Benito Lue y Riega's proposal of keeping the Viceroy in power along with partners or attachments, even though it was defeated at the open cabildo vote.

[4] Others, such as historian Félix Luna, feel the proposal shows such a level of balance among the relevant political and ideological parties involved that it can't be considered as merely the result of an improvised popular initiative.

Miguel de Azcuénaga was a military man with contacts in high society, and the priest Manuel Alberti represented the aspirations of the lower clergy.

Miguel Angel Scenna points out in his book Las brevas maduras that "such balance could not have been the result of chance, or from influences from outside the local context, but of a compromise of the parties involved".

Some points shared between those writings are the mentions to the British Invasions as a clear antecedent, the pride about the nonviolent nature of the Revolution at its first stages, the rejection to the later developments of the Argentine Civil War, and the description of the events as the recovery of the sovereignty delegated to the kKing.

Mitre regarded the May Revolution as an iconic expression of political egalitarianism, the conflict between modern freedoms and oppression represented by the Spanish monarchy, and the attempt to establish a national organization on constitutional principles as opposed to the leadership of the caudillos.

The canonical version claimed progress and justify the abandonment or delay the realization of democratic ideals in order not to risk the economic prosperity of society arguing that even then was not able to properly take advantage of political freedom.

Those authors did not work purely in intellectual fields, but took instead active part in the political events of their time, and strongly opposed the governor Juan Manuel de Rosas.

[17] The academic consensus of the end of the 19th century began to be questioned by the time of the World Wars, when liberalism lost its former hegemony and fascism and left-wing ideologies became important.

The senator from Corrientes J. Aníbal Dávila promoted the republication of old documents so that "the intentions of the antihistory of Argentina does not confuse the current generations, the masses and the youth with misleading slogans".

[20] José María Rosa would react by stating that the Revolution was carried out by the masses and that those were shadowed by other figures by liberal historians seeking to falsify history.

[23][24][25] The Primera Junta did not pledged allegiance to the Regency Counsel of Spain and the Indies, an agency of the Spanish monarchy still in operation, and in 1810 the possibility that Napoleon Bonaparte was defeated and Ferdinand returned to the throne (which would finally happen on December 11, 1813 with the signing of the Treaty of Valençay) still seemed remote and unlikely.

The Assembly of Year XIII was intended to declare independency, but failed to do so because of other political conflicts between its members; however, it suppressed mentions to Ferdinand VII from official documents.

However, Britain prioritized the war in Europe against France, allied with the Spanish power sector that had not yet been submitted, and could not appear to support American independentist movements or allow military attention of Spain being divided into two different fronts.

This pressure was exerted by Lord Strangford, the British ambassador at the court of Rio de Janeiro, expressing support to the Junta, but conditioned "...if the behavior is consistent and that Capital retained on behalf of Mr. Dn.

[27] Since Juan Bautista Alberdi, later historians such as Norberto Galasso,[28] Luis Romero or José Carlos Chiaramonte[29] held in doubt the interpretation made by Mitre, and designed a different one.

However, those revolutions pronounced themselves enemies of Napoleon, but did not face any active French military attack, which promoted instead fights between Spanish armies for keeping the old order of maintaining the new one.

Cornelio Saavedra spoke about the issue privately with Juan José Viamonte in a letter from 27 June 1811, addressing topics such as a known display of independentism by Máximo de Zamudio.

In them you can see by yourself it is expressly said that the British court declares not to feel itself compeled by any convention to sustain a part of the Spanish monarchy against the other, for reason of some remaining disagreement among them about the type of government, in which they have to rule their respective systems, under the condition that they recognize their legitimate sovereign, and they oppose the tyranny and the usurpation of the France.

Thus, if we did not recognize Ferdinand, Britain would have the right or feel itself obliged to sustain our enemies that do so, and would declare war upon us, same as if we did not despise Napoleon; and what forces does the poor viceroyalty of Buenos Aires have to resist this power in the first steps of its childhood?

The progressive Criollos and young people, represented on the Junta by Moreno, Castelli, Belgrano and Paso, aspired to far-reaching political, economic and social reforms.