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Last appointed, first elected governor
Governor Carlos G. Camacho (1924 – 1979) served as not only Guam’s last appointed governor, but also its first elected governor after the Guam Elected Governor Act was passed in 1968. Camacho’s election in 1970 was the first time the people of Guam selected their own leader since the Spanish arrived on island. Camacho’s son, Felix Perez Camacho, was also elected governor of Guam in 2002 and 2006.
Camacho is remembered by many who knew him not only as the former governor, but as a dentist. He was educated at the Guam Institute and the Guam Evening High School until the Japanese invasion of Guam in 1941, when he was in the ninth grade. When he was finally able to resume his education after the war, he took and passed a college entrance examination and left Guam in 1946 to pursue his college degree at Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He then earned a doctorate in dental surgery at Marquette University in Wisconsin, returning to Guam to join the staff of the Guam Memorial Hospital.
A dentist first, then a politician
Camacho worked as a dentist at the Catholic Medical Center (present-day Guam Memorial Hospital), which opened in 1955, and also served as a captain in the U.S. Army Dental Corps for two years. He entered politics in 1964, running as a senatorial candidate for the Territorial Party (predecessor of the Republican Party) of Guam and winning a seat in I Mina’ Ocho na Liheslaturan Guåhan/the 8th Guam Legislature. He served as chairman of the legislative Public Health and Welfare Committee and was a member of four other committees.
In 1966 no candidates of the Territorial Party were elected. Camacho, along with Territorial Party colleagues, including Joseph Flores and Kurt Moylan, founded the Republican Party of Guam. Camacho served as chairman for the party’s Guam delegation to the National Republican Convention in Miami in 1968, where he met many high-ranking U.S. political leaders, including then-President Richard M. Nixon. The following year Nixon appointed Camacho to the position of governor and on July 1, 1969. At the young age of forty-four, Camacho succeeded Governor Manuel F.L. Guerrero as governor of Guam, with Kurt Moylan appointed as lieutenant governor.
Elective Governor Act
Camacho’s term as appointed governor lasted only eighteen months, due to the Elective Governor Act that was signed into law by the U.S. Congress in 1968, allowing for Guam’s citizens to choose their governor. The act took effect in 1970, when Guam’s first election was held.
Camacho’s term was best remembered for his Christmas 1969 visit to the troops from Guam who were fighting in Vietnam. He brought with him celebrated local singer Johnny Sablan. Camacho was welcomed enthusiastically by the Guam troops who held mini fiestas in his honor. The success of this visit boosted Camacho’s popularity on Guam, which helped him tremendously in the 1970 election.
Camacho at first selected prominent politician Senator G. Ricardo Salas as his running mate, but disagreements with Salas forced him to choose Kurt Moylan instead. The two ran unopposed in the Republican primary, while the Democratic primary was closely contested between former Governor Manuel Guerrero, Senator Ricardo Bordallo, and attorney and former Speaker Joaquin Camacho Arriola. After a close primary and a contentious runoff election in which Bordallo defeated Guerrero, Camacho defeated Bordallo in the general election by 11.6 percent of the 20,424 votes cast.
Times of economic prosperity
Camacho’s term as elected governor was marked by one of Guam’s greatest economic booms. He used the resources of the government to enhance economic opportunities by granting incentives through the Guam Economic Development Authority and offering various forms of assistance to the private sector. During his entire five and a half years in office, Camacho presided over one of the largest eras of hotel construction activities on Guam, with construction finishing or starting on the Kakue Hotel, Reef Hotel, Hilton Hotel, Okura Hotel, Fujita Tumon Beach, Continental Travelodge, and Guam Dai Ichi Hotel.
Camacho also initiated massive road projects that were continued by his successors, including the widening of Marine Corps Drive from Hospital Road north to Route 16 in Harmon, and the reconstruction of other major highways in the villages of Agat, Dededo and Tamuning, among others.
In 1974 Camacho ran for re-election but lost to Democrat Ricardo J. Bordallo in a runoff election, after the general election, by just 627 votes. Following his defeat, Camacho returned to his career as a dentist, continuing in private practice until his death on December 6, 1979.
Camacho legacy
Camacho was married to the former Lourdes Duenas Perez. They had seven children: Carlos, Felix, Thomas, Mary, Ricardo, Francis, and Victor. Felix Camacho was elected as senator to the I Mina’ Bente Dos na Liheslaturan Guahan/the 22nd Guam Legislature and served several terms before winning the 2002 gubernatorial election with Lt. Governor Kaleo Moylan, son of Carlos Camacho’s lieutenant governor, Kurt Moylan. In 2006, Governor Felix Camacho was elected to a second term, this time Dr. Michael Cruz as his lieutenant governor.
For further reading
Political Status Education Coordinating Commission. Hale’-ta – I Manfåyi: Who’s Who in Chamorro History. Vol. 1. Hagåtña: Political Status Education Coordinating Commission, 1995.
Rogers, Robert F. Destiny’s Landfall: A History of Guam. Honolulu: University of Hawai`i Press, 1995.
Sanchez, Pedro C. Guahan Guam: The History of Our Island. Hagåtña: Sanchez Publishing House, c.1988.