“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

still yet more cruel and greedy.” 58 Poyo argued that the Uruguayan government had to act to
curb these abuses and protect its citizens. He wrote: “If the government believes that all
these cases are trifles that do not merit its attention, and that do not offend the dignity of the
laws of the Republic, the best thing it can do is dismiss all of her diplomatic agents and
counsels in the empire as superfluous.” 59 Poyo drafted the letter in the connection with an
ongoing dispute over his own credentials. This likely influenced his thinking on the role of
diplomatic officials. Nevertheless, his comments reflected the growing sentiment among
elites in Montevideo that the protection of black citizens, particularly those that had served
the country in battle, was linked to the broader fate of Uruguay. Simply put, the country had
to retain the power to define and police the boundaries of its own political community or
else it forfeited its basic rights as a sovereign nation.
Throughout the 1850s, demands by blacks that their citizenship be respected
continued to vex diplomatic officials concerned with Uruguayan sovereignty. An excellent
example of this is Andrés Lamas’ complaints that Brazilian officials in the borderlands
routinely disregarded citizenship certificates issued to Uruguayans. Lamas himself had ample
experience in dealing with questions of citizenship. He served as the plenipotentiary envoy
to the Brazilian government from 1840 until 1876. He negotiated the 1851 treaties that
figured so prominently in frontier and national politics during the 1850s and 1860s. 60 Lamas
was also deeply committed to the “fusionist” movement in Montevideo. Recall that Lamas
had railed against “lawless” practices in Uruguay’s interior. The conduct of Brazilian
58
Juan José Poyo, Juan José Poyo a Sus Conciudadanos (Rio Grande: n.p., 1850), 15.
59
Ibid.
60
Although ostensibly a colorado, Lamas is a difficult figure to situate ideologically.
Lamas seemed to chase power, supporting both Berro’s blanco government and then later
Venancio Flores’ colorado rebellion when his campaign against the Berro government gained
strength in 1864.
284