“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

Cases like Lima’s and Ylla’s provided significant incentives for Canabarro and the
Ribeiros’ to use their substantial political and judicial power to dictate the property rights of
their allies across the border. Each side struggled to influence events in Uruguayan
courtrooms in order to establish their ability to dictate property rights back across the border
in Alegrete. In the process, they further fueled factional violence in the neighboring
republic. As conflicts across the border deepened in the early 1860s, Canabarro and the
Ribeiros worked to position themselves to benefit through their support for their colorado
allies. In doing so, they enhanced their ability to deploy resources in their political struggles
back in Brazil.
The 1863 Flores invasion marked a moment in which the local struggles over
borderlands legalities in Alegrete, Salto and the southern correntino borderlands all converged
with broader sovereign struggles. The reciprocal ties that sustained cross-border property
rights and commercial relationships pulled powerful figures like the Ribeiros, Canabarro and
even Mitre into sharp local clashes to define legal relationships. At the same time, the
clashes between them to secure their own political authority regionally and in Mitre’s case
nationally, propelled further conflicts in borderlands courts over legal relationships forward.
The northern Uruguayan borderlands became a crossroads where numerous actors labored
to define property rights, factional associations and national systems simultaneously. With
Flores’ campaign underway, the layers of local, national and international conflicts further
elevated the stakes throughout the periphery. A final, climatic clash to define private law
rights and national sovereignties in the borderlands loomed.
Conclusion
Político y de Policía del Departamento Coronel D. José A. Reyes, AGN. Salto. Jefatura (February 24,
1869); Al Señor Gefe Politico y de Policia del Departamento Coronel D. Eugenio Castro, AGN. Salto.
Jefatura (September 1, 1869).
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