ARGENTINA: Personalistas

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Hipolito Irigoyen, President of Argentina, who lives in a second floor apartment over a cigar store, has this in common with the Emperor Napoleon: none of his countrymen can regard him with indifference. He is loved and hated with gusto. So exuberant are his political supporters that they do not call themselves the Conservative party, or the National party, but the Personalistas Irigoyenistas (personal friends of Irigoyen) and a blind following of his leadership is their only platform. In congressional elections two years ago the Personalistas cinched President Irigoyen's hold on the Chamber of Deputies by carrying 20 Buenos Aires wards. Argentina has had a bad year, labor troubles, a poor wheat crop. Irigoyen enemies have multiplied. In last week's congressional election the Personalistas lost 33% of the votes cast for them in 1928. So decisive was the defeat that President Irigoyen was urged to demand the resignation of his entire cabinet, to preserve his own waning prestige.