“ In 1907 Jose Espalter was tasked with drawing up a party program that would include constitutional refor, separation of Church and State, municipal autonomy, and labor legislation. The program favored reduction of condumption taxes and the enacting of progressive taxation, not of the magnitude that would despoil private fortunes but rather “a limited and moderate progression, whose rate oscillates between certain limits.” In addition, the State had a right to intervene in labor questions, but “It is a matter of elevated inspiration and exquisite tact.” At the end of the Batlle's first government in February 1907, the National Convention of the Colorado Party met and formulated a declaration of principles. These were "Reform of the Constitution; universal suffrage, that is, authorization to vote in favor of all citizens; election of the President of the Republic directly by the people; proportional representation of the parties; autonomous municipalities; the rights of assembly and association are not expressly enshrined in the Constitution and that gap must be filled; separation: of Church and State; easy naturalization of foreigners; decrease in consumption taxes, establishing instead a progressive tax; solution of problems related to capital and labor, within the limits of justice, law and freedom." Following the end of his first presidency, Batlle went on an extended tour of Europe and other foreign parts. By December 1909, agitation was begun by the Colorado Party to make him their candidate in 1911. A small conservative anti-Batlle sentiment within the Colorado Party "was lost in a growing tide of enthusiasm for a renomination." On July the 3rd 1910 Batlle’s candidacy was unanimously proclaimed by the party’s national committee. Batlle stated in a letter to the party’s committee while he was in Europe the kind of platform he could stand for. Apart from his reiterated advocacy of an eight-hour day, Batlle "took a stand for popular instead of legislative election of the national president; for proportional representation of parties in the congress; for assurance of such workers’ rights as those to life, health, and culture; for full protection of children, women, the ill, and the aged; for free and assisted immigration; for free public instruction in all its levels and obligatory education at the elementary level; for assistance to stock raising and agriculture and the stimulation of national industry; for the organization by the state of all services social interest." According to one study, "Truly it was a