By the Numbers

Two century-old political parties, the Colorados (Reds) and the Blancos (Whites)* fought it out again at peaceful elections last week, and the neat, sun-warmed little democracy of Uruguay looked as though it had been bombed by a fleet of flying saucers loaded with bingo cards. Every tree, pavement, building, car and lamppost wore a number. Uruguayans do not mind fracturing freely within their traditional parties, and 277 splinter factions were competing for office. Out of deference to the sanity of the Uruguayan voters, they all used numbers instead of names, and politicking became largely a matter of fixing the numbers in voters' minds by poster and paintpot. Of all the 277, no figure was more conspicuous, from the River Plate's beaches to the remotest pampas, than 15, the Colorado faction of jaunty ex-President (1947-50) Luis Batlle (pronounced Bat-zhay) Berres.

A Bonus for Votes. Several political inventions have helped spawn Uruguay's many factions. The most wondrous is the "double simultaneous ballot," which lets the voter pick the party he wants to win the major offices and at the same time choose candidates to fill these offices from the particular faction that he favors within the party. Also making for splintering is a freehanded provision of the law, designed to cover campaign expenses, that requires the government to pay each group $1.30 in advance for every vote it expects to get. (After the election, they have to pay back for every vote short of the estimate.)

The splinters' choices of numbers are determined largely by sentiment. A big faction of Colorados picked 14 because their party always sweeps Montevideo's Election District 14. Batlle Berres' even bigger group chose 15 because (except for unlucky 13) it was the closest thing to 14. Two splinters that regard themselves as friendly opponents of the 145 and the 155 took the numbers 1414 and 1515. Other Colorados chose 65 in honor of the revolution of 1865, and a Blanco faction picked 97 as a memorial gesture to the revolution of 1897.

A Sprig of Pine. Although voting is compulsory, Uruguay is much too democratic to enforce the law. "The people would vote against anyone who forced them to vote," an official explained. Because of the numbers game, issues were obscure, but most Uruguayans went to the polls mumbling 14, 15 or 97. Once out of the booths, they fell avidly to playing dice and roulette right in the open--for Uruguayan law also provides that on election day the police must ignore all such minor crimes as public gambling. In the final count, the Colorados (who have been in power for 89 years) beat the Blancos 387,803 to 266,960, and Batlle Berres easily won the Colorados' factional race.

What Batlle Berres and his 153 won was six seats on the nine-man, Swiss-type National Council, with Batlle Berres slated to be the first council president. His opponents charged that he is against the "multi-person executive," which replaced the office of President in 1952, and will try to get himself voted sole President again. Campaigning with his favorite lapel decoration, a sprig of pine, Batlle Berres promised simply to encourage industrialization and higher farm production. His record shows that he approves of Uruguay's mild socialism, disapproves of his powerful Argentine neighbor Juan Peron, in general likes the U.S.

*From the color of the hatbands their partisans wore in the furious civil warring before 1904.

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