“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

Mr. Guarch attempts to have Your Excellency interfere in these questions so as to
adopt resolutions that he finds more appropriate [conveniente]. But, you cannot legally
do such a thing. Your Excellency cannot advocate for the hearing and decision of
suits that are pending before the Courts and which are within their exclusive
competence. 23
The fiscal’s letter made clear that the national government would not directly intervene in the
dispute. They would leave the matter up to local judicial officials. For Guarch and Falcon,
the outcome no longer was in doubt. They dropped their pending claims before Mendoza in
Salto rather than litigating them. Guarch subsequently resigned from the JEA. Guimaraens
and his allies had successfully asserted their power to determine property rights within
Salto’s jurisdiction. In the process, they enhanced their personal and political reputation in
the town.
The local political struggle between Guarch and Guimaraens had been momentarily
resolved. However, the negotiations over the balance between local autonomy and
centralized authority occurring in Salto’s courtrooms around the case only intensified
throughout the mid-1870s. At first glance, that relationship appeared to be tilting inevitably
towards national authorities in Montevideo. Latorre’s 1876 military coup in particular
appeared to mark a fundamental shift in the relationship between the central government
and its northern peripheries. Latorre’s rise indeed reflected the growing role of the national
military in Uruguayan politics. Legal reforms also played a prominent role in Latorre’s
program. He promoted the professionalization of the rural judiciary. He also established
departmental judges with legal training [jueces letrados] for the first time in the Republic’s
23 Ibid.
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