“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

elative independence from Montevideo now that Flores was no longer in power. Much like
Urquiza had done throughout the 1860s, the new Uruguayan president, Lorenzo Battle,
struggled to chart a course between forces in the capital that wanted to impose national
authority on the countryside and the colorado dissidents demanding autonomous control over
their local affairs. Lacking the personal reputation to cement such relationships, however,
Battle largely contented himself with serving as the pragmatic head of “a federation of
regions.” 45
López Jordán’s revolution in Entre Ríos transformed the ongoing skirmishes
between national authorities and local elites into a full-scale war by reigniting factional
divisions in the Estado Oriental. The exiled blancos in Entre Ríos joined the dissident
federalists in an open revolt against the weakened colorado government in Montevideo.
Timoteo Aparicio, a prominent blanco caudillo, launched the Revolución de la lanzas by crossing
the Uruguay from Entre Ríos and capturing Salto. For the next two years, regular and
irregular forces from both sides swept across the Uruguayan countryside. The violence once
again devastated the ranching industry. When the conflict finally ended in 1872, the blancos
proved much more successful than López Jordán at securing local space within the new
Uruguayan national system. Specifically, they obtained an agreement to control several
interior departments. This effectively established their factional authority over selective
areas of localized justice.
With the end of the Revolución de las lanzas, the Uruguayan state appeared to fragment
back into a collection of regions only marginally governed by the country’s central
authorities. A series of weak civilian national governments failed to reign in the violence.
Regardless of faction, the disorder throughout the early 1870s weighted heavily on the
45 Barrán and Nahum, Historia Rural del Uruguay Moderno, 221.
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