undertook on his own responsibility to declare the entire
province independent, alike of Spain, Peru, and the United
Provinces of La Plata. This action was too precipitous, not to
say presumptuous, to suit Bolivar and Sucre. The better to
control the situation, the former went up to La Paz and the
latter to Chuquisaca, the capital, where a Congress was to
assemble for the purpose of imparting a more orderly turn to
affairs. Under the direction of the "Marshal of Ayacucho," as
Sucre was now called, the Congress issued on the 6th of August a
formal declaration of independence. In honor of the Liberator it
christened the new republic "Bolivar"--later Latinized into
"Bolivia"--and conferred upon him the presidency so long as he
might choose to remain. In November, 1896, a new Congress which
had been summoned to draft a constitution accepted, with slight
modifications, an instrument that the Liberator himself had
prepared. That body also renamed the capital "Sucre" and chose
the hero of Ayacucho as President of the republic.

Now, the Liberator thought, was the opportune moment to impose
upon his territorial namesake a constitution embodying his ideas
of a stable government which would give Spanish Americans
eventually the political experience they needed. Providing for an
autocracy represented by a life President, it ran the gamut of
aristocracy and democracy, all the way from "censors" for life,
who were to watch over the due enforcement of the laws, down to
senators and "tribunes" chosen by electors, who in turn were to
be named by a select citizenry. Whenever actually present in the
territory of the republic, the Liberator was to enjoy supreme
command, in case he wished to exercise it.