Panamanian President. He served as president from January 16, 1931 until June 5, 1932. Alfaro received his law degree from Cartagena University in 1900, completing his Doctorate of Law and Political Science at the National Faculty of Law of the Republic of Panama in 1918. Shortly after Panama's independence in 1903, he began his service in foreign relations by joining the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where he would eventually attain status as under-secretary. He would later serve as Consul General in Barcelona, Spain, Secretary of Government and Justice, and Minister of Foreign Relations. He would twice serve as Envoy Extraordinaire and Minister Plenopotentiary to the United States, from 1922 to 1936, interrupted by his tenure as president. As vice president under Harmodio Arosemena, he attained the presidency upon his predecessor's resignation due to the Arnulfist coup referred to as the Community Action. In 1915, he sat as a judge on the Joint (Panama/United States) Commission of Claims, settling expropriation disputes stemming from Canal construction. He would continue to be involved in Canal related negotions perodically in various official capacities throughout the remainder of his life. He served on the National Codifying Commission, which established code of law for the new Republic, and assisted in drafting a new constitution in 1944. As a member of the United Nations, he served as chairman of the Relief and Recovery Administration to Latin American, chairman of the special committee which drafted the Spanish text of the United Nations' charter, and chairman of the committee drafting the text of the Convention on Genocide. He sat on the International Law Commission from 1949 until 1953, and as a judge in the Inernational Court of Justice in The Hague from 1959 until 1964, serving as vice president of the latter for three years. He was a professor of civil and international law at a number of Panamanian universities and founded the Panamanian Academy of the Language, the Panamanian Academy of History, and the Panamanian Institute of Hispanic Culture. For the posterity of his contributions, the Ricardo J. Alfaro Museum, Archive, and Library was established in Panama City.