“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

war progressed, it also produced a concerted campaign to modernize and professionalize the
armed forces. Elsewhere these forces tended to inexorably strengthen the power of the
central state. In Rio Grande do Sul, however, gaúcho liberals proved adept at navigating the
tensions between centralizing authority and regional autonomy in a way that eluded Urquiza.
Specifically, while Urquiza had seen his efforts to support the Paraguayan campaign collapse
at Basualdo, prominent elites in the Brazilian borderlands successfully used the war to
establish their loyalty to the empire. David Canabarro and Manuel Osório among others
directed significant portions of the campaign. Critically, Brazilian borderlanders did not
have to fear more radical federalist alternatives. Although in several instances, local rivals
like the Ribeiro family in Alegrete worked to undermine their authority, this opposition
largely came from political groups like the progressistas that depended on central authorities
for their own power. With their federalist flank secure, the war offered riograndense liberals
the opportunity to continue to advocate for provincial autonomy while fighting for the
imperial cause. As a result, by the early 1870s, the Liberal Party had become the dominant
force in the province. 58
As gaúcho liberals worked to secure their own autonomy, however, they were equally
careful to ensure that centrifugal forces did not get out of hand. Brazilian slave masters
forming the bulwark of the ascendant Liberal Party in Rio Grande do Sul equally shared the
concerns expressed by Uruguayan elites about popular dissent welling up from below.
During the course of the war, rumors swirled throughout the borderlands of impending
slave uprisings instigated by foreign agitators from Paraguay or the Estado Oriental. While
these claims often amounted to little more than paranoid fears of phantom slave
58 Love, Brazilian Regionalism, 73-75. Love notes that although the war facilitated the
centralization of the Brazilian political system, but that local and regional leaders remained
critical to the Liberal Party, particular under the leadership of Silveira Martins.
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