“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...
“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ... “MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...
age after the Guerra Grande’s divisive struggles. Rather than engaging in commercial enterprises and ranching as men like Urquiza and Flores had done, he received his education and training from the Uruguayan military school in Montevideo. During the Revolución de las lanzas, Latorre rose to the rank of colonel. He commanded infantry battalions against Aparicio’s blancos. Throughout the two-year conflict, he gained a reputation for both bravery, as well as professionalism. Contemporaries noted that forces under his command rarely committed “excesses” either against captured enemies or property. With weak civilian governments unable to impose order in the Uruguayan countryside, elites increasingly clamored for army to assume control and impose this type of discipline on the national as a whole. 54 Latorre heeded their call. He seized the government in early 1876. Using the military as his base of authority, Latorre then embarked on what Lauren Benton termed “a resolute strengthening of central political power” during the course of his dictatorship between 1876 and 1880. 55 At the center of this agenda was an alliance between the ranching elites and the national armed forces to secure the social order and with it economic prosperity. The most visible representation of this new alliance between the military and ranchers was the Rural Code. Actually enacted just before the coup, but substantially modified under Latorre’s regime, the Rural Code provided a host of draconian tools to protect property. Among other things, the Code reinforced existing vagrancy laws, required greater documentation to establish ownership of cattle and imposed stiff penalties for cattle theft. Answering calls from newspapers like El Progreso, the Code also reformed the rural 54 Washington Reyes Abadie, Coronel Lorenzo Latorre: Personalidad, Vida y Obra (Montevideo: Círculo Militar "General Artigas", 1986), 27-65. 55 Benton, "The Laws of This Country," 508. Latorre stepped down from the government in 1880. The military dictatorship continued under Máximo Santos until 1886. 324
police forces to better protect cattle. Likewise, it reconfirmed the social hierarchy in the countryside by including provisions like mandatory private surveys of property that were designed to favor powerful local ranchers with the economic resources to conduct those types of diligences. 56 The coercive power of the national military stood as the backstop to all these reforms. Thus, as national governments in the early 1870s repeatedly demonstrated their ability to defeat opposition forces in open combat, they also offered elites on their peripheries incentives to recognize their legitimate authority in the borderlands. These elements of coercion and compromise formed the twin pillars upon which support for national entities rested. War in the Brazilian Borderlands The efforts in Argentina and Uruguay to strike a balance between local legal norms and broader national structures were equally occurring in Brazil. Like in the rest of the Río de la Plata, the military conflicts associated with the Paraguayan War played an important role in the process. The war represented a much more direct and traumatic event for the Brazilian empire in general and Rio Grade do Sul in particular than for its southern neighbors. Paraguayan forces had invaded Rio Grande do Sul, capturing Uruguaiana in 1865. Even after allied forces drove the Paraguayans from Brazilian soil, however, Rio Grande do Sul remained the central staging area for the increasingly Brazilian-dominated conflict. The province also supplied the bulk of imperial military forces. 57 As it had in Argentina and to a much lesser extent in Uruguay, the Paraguayan War represented a truly national mobilization for the first time in the empire’s history. As the 56 Barrán and Nahum, Historia Rural del Uruguay Moderno, 499-516. 57 Kittleson, "The Paraguayan War and Political Culture: Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, 1865-1880," 106, Joseph L. Love, Rio Grande do Sul and Brazilian Regionalism, 1882-1930 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1971), 21-22. 325
- Page 283 and 284: Brazilian masters that resulted in
- Page 285 and 286: pursue further rights. They would p
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- Page 289 and 290: was also a personal enemy of Canaba
- Page 291 and 292: part of a broader narrative of conf
- Page 293 and 294: anything, Orientales.” 56 Gomez
- Page 295 and 296: anchers, like that of local Uruguay
- Page 297 and 298: “complete proof of oriental natio
- Page 299 and 300: Uruguayan notaries. These included
- Page 301 and 302: Republic over issues of rivertine t
- Page 303 and 304: his cattle in 1858. 79 Recall also
- Page 305 and 306: of warfare in the borderlands furth
- Page 307 and 308: In effect, he hoped to exchange loy
- Page 309 and 310: guarantee their commercial relation
- Page 311 and 312: governments in Montevideo and Brazi
- Page 313 and 314: nineteen in the provincial militia
- Page 315 and 316: authority to contain the more radic
- Page 317 and 318: captured the city of Corrientes. To
- Page 319 and 320: Urquiza struggled to reorganize his
- Page 321 and 322: attle in March of 1870. 29 By the e
- Page 323 and 324: The national government sent an “
- Page 325 and 326: the reciprocal trading relationship
- Page 327 and 328: splintered into “traditional” a
- Page 329 and 330: country’s ranching elites. In res
- Page 331 and 332: these absurd and unwarranted charge
- Page 333: protect “the development of those
- Page 337 and 338: conspiracies, the steady stream of
- Page 339 and 340: matter was overblown and that repor
- Page 341 and 342: CHAPTER 8 NEGOTIATING NATIONS ALTHO
- Page 343 and 344: Local Legal Practices and National
- Page 345 and 346: pointed link between the “honor
- Page 347 and 348: personal interests, Guarch’s fact
- Page 349 and 350: Guarch first sought to tip the scal
- Page 351 and 352: following the order designated by t
- Page 353 and 354: history in 1877. 24 Salto’s first
- Page 355 and 356: twenty-five peso fine. 29 Leal prom
- Page 357 and 358: serves?” 36 He continued: “Does
- Page 359 and 360: abuses “no doubt flowed from the
- Page 361 and 362: political allegiances. Within the f
- Page 363 and 364: Operating within this relationship,
- Page 365 and 366: By the dawn of the 1880s, national
- Page 367 and 368: ejected this evidence, however, fin
- Page 369 and 370: with his son-in-law Alexander da Cr
- Page 371 and 372: not only to affirm these local find
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- Page 375 and 376: CONCLUSION IN 1887, THE GREAT URUGU
- Page 377 and 378: elationships and secure local court
- Page 379 and 380: economies to the forces of global c
- Page 381 and 382: ARGENTINA ARCHIVES CONSULTED BIBLIO
- Page 383 and 384: PUBLISHED PRIMARY AND SECONDARY MAT
age after the Guerra Grande’s divisive struggles. Rather than engaging in commercial<br />
enterprises and ranching as men like Urquiza and Flores had done, he received his education<br />
and training from the Uruguayan military school in Montevideo. During the Revolución de las<br />
lanzas, Latorre rose to the rank of colonel. He commanded infantry battalions against<br />
Aparicio’s blancos. Throughout the two-year conflict, he gained a reputation for both<br />
bravery, as well as professionalism. Contemporaries noted that forces under his command<br />
rarely committed “excesses” either against captured enemies or property. With weak civilian<br />
governments unable to impose order in the Uruguayan countryside, elites increasingly<br />
clamored for army to assume control and impose this type of discipline on the national as a<br />
whole. 54<br />
Latorre heeded their call. He seized the government in early 1876. Using the<br />
military as his base of authority, Latorre then embarked on what Lauren Benton termed “a<br />
resolute strengthening of central political power” during the course of his dictatorship<br />
between 1876 and 1880. 55 At the center of this agenda was an alliance between the ranching<br />
elites and the national armed forces to secure the social order and with it economic<br />
prosperity. The most visible representation of this new alliance between the military and<br />
ranchers was the Rural Code. Actually enacted just before the coup, but substantially<br />
modified under Latorre’s regime, the Rural Code provided a host of draconian tools to<br />
protect property. Among other things, the Code reinforced existing vagrancy laws, required<br />
greater documentation to establish ownership of cattle and imposed stiff penalties for cattle<br />
theft. Answering calls from newspapers like El Progreso, the Code also reformed the rural<br />
<br />
54 Washington Reyes Abadie, Coronel Lorenzo Latorre: Personalidad, Vida y Obra<br />
(Montevideo: Círculo Militar "General Artigas", 1986), 27-65.<br />
55 Benton, "The Laws of This Country," 508. Latorre stepped down from the<br />
government in 1880. The military dictatorship continued under Máximo Santos until 1886.<br />
324 <br />
<br />
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