“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

Sosa almost immediately responded. He filed another petition in Montevideo
challenging Tavarez’s proposed deposit. In particular, Sosa argued that the embargo over
the disputed assets had to remain in place until the contractual matter could be resolved
because any guarantees coming from Cerro Largo were inherently unreliable. In making this
argument, Sosa squarely placed the issue of whether Amaro in fact was a vecino of Cerro
Largo before the Montevideo court. Sosa argued that Amaro was “an unknown person,” in
essence lacking the requisite connections to the local forum. 8 Sosa elaborated that Amaro
could not guarantee the debt because “he was a Brazilian citizen whose interests, in addition
to being in the countryside, were located so close to the border that they disappear from one
day to the next.” 9 He finally noted that if the court accepted any guarantee, the assets
needed to be transferred to Montevideo and away from the lawless border and its blurred
national boundaries.
Tavarez was incredulous. He wrote to the court:
Your honor, it is public and notorious and surely your mercy will not ignore that
[Amaro] is a substantial landowner and one of the principal hacendados in Cerro
Largo, possessing a large fortune consisting primarily of lands populated by
considerable herds of cattle sufficient to satisfy the requested financing six times
over. 10
Tavarez argued that these possessions, rooted in webs of cross-border commerce,
represented the touchstone of vecindad. As proof, Tavarez pointed to fact that Amaro had
served as alcalde ordinario in Cerro Largo on numerous occasions. He declared: “If the quality
being a Brazilian subject was not an obstacle to fulfill that post, there is even less reason for
it to preclude him from serving as a guarantor, even more so when the only thing required of
8 Ibid., 140bis.
9 Ibid., 143.
10 Ibid., 141.
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