Fernando Alessandri

Who was Fernando Alessandri?

Fernando Alessandri Rodríguez was a Chilean political figure, candidate of the centre-right in Chile's 1946 presidential election. He was the son of Arturo Alessandri, who was president from 1920 to 1925 and again from 1932 to 1938, and brother of Jorge Alessandri Rodríguez, who was president from 1958 to 1962.

Alessandri was born in Santiago, the son of Arturo Alessandri Palma and of Rosa Ester Rodríguez. He completed his early studies at the Instituto Nacional, and later graduated as a lawyer from the Universidad de Chile on October 18, 1919. He became professor of Procedural law at the same university in 1922, and in 1924, he married Olga Lyon Vial, with whom he had one son, Fernando, who died at the age of three. After the death of his first wife he married for second time in 1954, to Juanita Izquierdo Huneeus, who survived him.

He joined the Liberal party in 1920, and participated actively in the Chilean presidential election of 1920 that was won by his father, Arturo Alessandri. During this first presidency of his father, he acted as the Secretary of the Presidency. As a lawyer he also drafted the project that eventually became the Organic Code of Chilean Tribunals.