A New Political Force

The doors of the rundown mansion in Caracas were open wide, and the crowd spilled out to the street. From a flag-draped speaker's dais inside, a red-faced orator roared into a microphone. "We are proud that the bankers don't like us.'' said Dr. Gonzalo Garcia Bustillos, 35. "The oligarchic classes hate us, and we are proud of it. Our strength is with the working class and with the youth.'' In front of him, a student claque chanted, "Less rich, less poor, less rich, less poor." and from outside came shouts of "Rusia no! Yanquis no! Latinoamerica si!"

The meeting was the first Caribbean conference of Christian Democracy, Latin America's newest and possibly its fastest-growing political force, though it has yet to win power in any of the hemisphere's 22 nations. Described by Garcia Bustillos, the Venezuelan Congressman who opened the meeting, as "international but not an International," the Christian Democrats declare themselves dedicated enemies of colonialism, capitalism and Communism. They preach a social revolution that must use orderly and just means. They advocate immediate agrarian reform, demand careful state regulation of corporate profits, and complete labor union, freedom. Says Leonidas Xausa, 28, city councilman in Porto Alegre, Brazil: "The future of Latin America will be decided between Christian Democracy and Communism."

Magna Carta. Latin America's Christian Democrats share a common heritage with the powerful European Christian Democratic parties, led by Germany's Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and Italy's late Premier Alcide de Gasperi. Like the Europeans, they base their philosophy on the famed Rerum Novarum encyclical of Pope Leo XIII, issued 70 years ago and known as "the Magna Carta of Labor" because it advocated labor unions and insisted that the state guarantee to the worker a fair share of the fruits of his labors.

The movement gained its first Latin American foothold in Argentina during World War I, spread to neighboring Uruguay and Chile in the late 1920s. But only in recent years, as the possibilities of progress and the perils of Communism have become increasingly clear to many Latin Americans, has Christian Democracy begun to show vitality. Chile, where the party has been operating for 25 uninterrupted years, is still its strongest bastion. Led by dynamic Senator Eduardo Frei, 50, the Christian Democrats won 20% of the vote in the 1958 presidential elections, believe that "within a few years" they will be the strongest of Chile's five major parties.

Campus Victory. In Venezuela, operating as the Copei party, Christian Democrats won a surprising 16% of the votes in the 1958 presidential elections, now cooperate in Winner Romulo Betancourt's coalition government, and won last month's hotly contested Student Federation elections at the University of Caracas, whose student leadership was once almost completely Marxist.

The party is weak and comparatively right-wing in Ecuador and Mexico, represented only in exile in the island dictatorships of Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Haiti. But in Peru, after only five years of existence, the Christian Democrats are in booming opposition to Conservative Prime Minister Pedro Beltran, have elected 13 Deputies and four Senators. Another success: Brazil, where President Janio Quadros, though styling himself an independent, remains a staunch supporter of the movement even though he was kicked out in 1954 for refusing to support a personally distasteful party candidate.

Christian Democratic politicos stress that they are not a secular arm of the Vatican, point out that they are often opposed by the church's conservative hierarchy. Some argue that their movement is guided more by Christian ethics than by specific religious dogma.

In Caracas last week, the 500 delegates from 17 nations put their Christian principles into resolutions. They "totally condemned all American dictatorships, traditional or Fidel Castro style," voted to back a Latin American common market, strive for "liberty without sacrificing justice and justice without sacrificing liberty." The Christian Democrats argue that they are in a life-and-death race with the Communists for the control of Latin America's revolution. They recognize that in some ways they are handicapped. Says Venezuelan Labor Leader Ramon Yllarramendy: "The Christian Democrats are bound by a sense of responsibility to promise only that which they know to be possible. The Communist revolutionaries can get fast results with empty but high-sounding slogans."

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