“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

premised on cross-border trade and vecindad. Over the course of the 1830s, these clashes
would escalate into full-scale civil war. Consider the case of João de Silva Tavarez.
Throughout the 1820s, Tavarez had established a prosperous ranching operation that
stretched across Rio Grande do Sul and into the Cisplatine Province. He used his wealth
and position to gain a judicial office, becoming juiz de direito in the borderlands city of Herval
near the Uruguayan frontier. Tavarez saw his ranching operations ruined during the 1825
war. He later wrote that “he [had] lost all of his cattle, animals (horses and bulls) and some
slaves . . . that he [had] possessed in that province [of Uruguay].” 3 In order to recover from
his losses, Tavarez almost immediately began to rebuild his ranching operations in the new
Estado Oriental. Following the war, he reconstructed his original ranch in the Uruguayan
department of Cerro Largo. He further began expanding his commercial activities
throughout the borderlands in the early 1830s by entering into several contracts to move
cattle across the border into Brazil. In short, Tavarez turned to the same tactics as men like
Guarch, Lemos Pinto and Urquiza to develop cross-border commercial ties and local
allegiances.
Tavarez’s cross-border operations, however, came into conflict with efforts to
enforce new national divisions and identities during a legal dispute in the Cerro Largo and
Montevideo courts. 4 The proceeding arose out of a disagreement between Tavarez and
Tomas Sosa over a sale of land and cattle located along the Brazilian border in 1832. Sosa
agreed to sell his ranch in Cerro Largo to Tavarez. In exchange, Tavarez promised to
market both men’s cattle located on the property across the border in Brazil. Tavarez
3 Leitman, Raízes, 106, citing Jornal do Commercio, vol. XI, n. 3, p. 2 (January 4, 1837).
4 D. Juan Pineda en representación de D. Juan de Silva Tavarez, solicitando que D. Tomas Souza y
su esposa Doña Maria Montiel, comparezcan á formalizar sus demandas, según se les ordenó por el Alcalde
Ordinario de Cerro Largo, AGN-SJ. Montevideo. Civil: 1º Turno, S-15 (1835).
122