Cañeros and colonos: Cane planters in Tucumán, 1876-1895

Journal of Latin American Studies

Volumn 38, Issue 1, 2006, Pages 123-147

  Juarez Dappe, Patricia ^a  

^a CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

AGROINDUSTRY; CROP PRODUCTION; INDUSTRY; SUGAR;

LATIN AMERICA;

EID: 33747795943     PISSN: 0022216X     EISSN: 1469767X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0022216X05000313     Document Type: Article

References (136)

1. El Orden, 18 Nov. 1893.
2. Alan Dye, Cuban Sugar in the Age of Mass Production (Stanford, 1998)
3. Peter Eisenberg, The Sugar Industry in Pernambuco: Modernization without Change, 1840-1910 (Berkeley, 1974)
4. Muriel McAvoy, Sugar Baron: Manuel Rionda and the Fortunes of Pre-Castro Cuba (Florida, 2003)
5. Manuel Moreno Fraginals, El ingenio: El complejo económico social cubano del azúcar, 3 vols. (Havana, 1978)
6. and Stuart Schwartz, Sugar Plantations in the Formation of Brazilian Society: Bahia, 1550-1835 (Cambridge, 1985).
7. Cesar Ayala, American Sugar Kingdom: The Plantation Economy of the Spanish Caribbean, 1898-1934 (Chapel Hill, 1999)
8. Alan Dye, Cuban Sugar
9. J. H. Galloway, The Sugar Cane Industry. An Historical Geography from its Origins to 1914 (Cambridge, 1989)
10. and Teresita Martínez-Vergne, Capitalism in Colonial Puerto Rico: Central San Vicente in the Late Nineteenth Century (Florida, 1992).
11. Michael Gonzalez, Plantation Agriculture and Social Control in Northern Perú, 1875-1933 (Austin, 1985)
12. Peter Klaren, Modernization, Dislocation, and Aprismo. Origins of the Peruvian Aprista Party, 1870-1932 (Austin, 1973)
13. Marcelo Lagos, 'The Organization of Jujuy's Sugar Ingenios in a Regional Context (1970-1940),' in James P. Brennan and Ofelia Pianetto (eds.), Region and Nation. Politic, Economy and Society in Twentieth-Century Argentina (New York, 2000), pp. 103-28
14. Ian Rutledge, 'The Integration of the Highland Peasantry into the Sugar Cane Economy of Northern Argentina, 1930-43,' in Kenneth Duncan, Ian Rutledge, Colin Harding, Land and Labour in Latin America: Essays on the Development of Agrarian Capitalism in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (Cambridge, 1977), pp. 205-28
15. and Daniel J. Santamaría, 'Migración laboral y conflicto interétnico. El caso de los migrantes indigenas temporarios en los ingenios saltojujeños,' in Daniel Campi (ed.), Estudios sobre la historia de la industria azucarera, vol. 2 (Jujuy, 1992), pp. 91-113.
16. Other sugar economies in Latin America resorted to uniform supply arrangements. Brazil's engenhos and Cuba's centrales obtained most of their cane from outside growers. Lavradores de cana represented an essential component in the Bahian sugar economy. In Cuba, centrales depended heavily on the supplies provided by colonos del central and colonos independientes. In stark contrast in the sugar economies of Peru, the West Indies, and Jujuy and Salta, mill owners monopolised the lands and opted for a vertical integration of their cane cultivation and milling operations. Pernambuco represents an interesting case since usineiros relied initially on fornecedores for the provision of the raw material but gradually bought up plantations and reduced their owners to the status of tenants. Richard Dunn, Sugar and Slaves. The Rise of the Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624-1713 (Oxford, 1973)
17. Alan Dye, Cuban Sugar
18. Peter Eisenberg, The Sugar Industry in Pernambuco
19. Michael Gonzalez, Plantation Agriculture
20. Ian Rutledge, 'The Integration of the Highland Peasantry into the Sugar Cane Economy of Northern Argentina,' pp. 205-28
21. and Stuart Schwartz, Sugar Plantations.
22. Congreso Nacional, Investigación Parlamentaria sobre Agricultura, Ganadería, Industrias Derivadas y Colonización, Informe de Antonio Correa (Buenos Aires, 1898), p. 38.
23. Bahian lavradores da cana socially 'remained an adjunct to the planter class, people of the same background but lacking the capital to achieve fully their goal of plantership'; Stuart Schwartz, Sugar Plantations, p. 304.
24. Jorge Balán, 'Migraciones, mano de obra y formación de un proletariado rural en Tucumán, Argentina, 1870-1914', Demografía y Economía, X:2 (1976) pp. 201-34
25. María Celia Bravo, 'Sector cañero y política en Tucumán 1895-1930', unpubl. PhD diss., Universidad Nacional de Tucumán, 2000
26. Daniel Greenberg, 'The Dictatorship of the Chimneys: Sugar, Politics and Agrarian Unrest in Tucumán, Argentina, 1914-1930,' unpubl. PhD diss., University of Washington, 1985
27. Donna Guy, Argentine Sugar Politics. Tucumán and the Generation of Eighty (Arizona, 1980)
28. Carlos León, El desarrollo agrario de Tucumán en el período de transición de la agricultura diversificada al monocultivo cañero (Buenos Aires, 1999)
29. Roberto Pucci, La elite azucarera y la formación del sector cañero en Tucumán (1880-1920) (Buenos Aires, 1984)
30. Daniel Santamaria, Azúcar y sociedad en el noroeste argentino (Buenos Aires, 1986).
31. Besides published materials, this study employs the manuscript schedules corresponding to the Segundo Censo Nacional, Censo Económico y Social, Sección Agricultura. The manuscripts contain disaggregated information on plantation size, tenure arrangements, crops cultivated, and tools owned. For this particular study, I have utilised the schedules from the department of Cruz Alta. In 1895, Cruz Alta alone accounted for 40% of the area cultivated with cane, almost half of the sugar factories, and 35% of the total planters in Tucumán. Even though the department's land tenure patterns may not be representative of the province as a whole, the schedules shed light on planters' patterns of land use in what became the most important sugar area in the province.
32. El Orden was founded by Ernesto Colombres in 1883 and became the voice for anti-Roca sentiments in the province. In 1886 the newspaper changed ownership but maintained its political affiliations. The Colombres clan owned large landholdings planted with cane and had close political relationships with the Posse and Gallo families, both mill-owning families. The paper's unconditional endorsement of sugar interests reflected a more general support among Tucumanos for what was perceived as the province's principal industry. Other provincial newspapers from the period such as La Opinión, La Razón and later La Gaceta shared the same position regarding the sugar industry, despite different political affiliations. Tucumán's archives contain the complete collection of El Orden and incomplete runs of other newspapers. For the purpose of this research, El Orden provides invaluable information that has been cross-checked with other newspapers whenever possible.
33. Notarial records employed in this article include a sample of 24 contracts between planters and mill owners as well as 14 wills from cane planters with holdings of various sizes.
34. Vicente Quesada, Memorias de un viejo (Buenos Aires, 1889), p. 209.
35. Arsenio Granillo, Provincia de Tucumán. Serie de artículos descriptivos y noticiosos (Tucumán, 1872), p. 132.
36. Juan Manuel Terán, Informe del Departamento Nacional de Agricultura (Buenos Aires, 1875), n.p.
37. In 1855 Justo Maeso's annotated analysis of Woodbine Parish's work reported that almost half of the total provincial output was exported. Woodbine Parish, Buenos Ayres y las provincias del Río de la Plata (Buenos Aires, 1853), pp. 637-8.
38. Vicente Quesada, Memorias, p. 211.
39. Paul Groussac, Memoria histórica y descriptiva de la provincia de Tucumán (Buenos Aires, 1882), p. 441.
40. Juan Manuel Terán, Informe, n.p.
41. There is no evidence of the type of arrangements established between independent planters and mills during the years of primitive sugar production. However, it is likely that arrangements were personal and informal in nature. The introduction of contractual agreements with the industry's modernization after 1876 caused significant and lasting changes in relations between the groups.
42. Donna Guy, Argentine Sugar Politics, p. 4.
43. Since the amount of juice that can be extracted from the cane diminishes rapidly after it is cut, transportation improvements extended the potential area under cultivation.
44. Railway construction fostered the development of the sugar industry in many other regions in Latin America. Scholars agree that in Cuba the construction of railways on the east side of the island resulted in the unprecedented growth of the industry at the turn of the century. However, there is disagreement on the social impact of railway lines. In his traditional study on Cuban sugar, Ramiro Guerra y Sánchez argues that railways encouraged the formation of latifundia and the disappearance of the independent colono. Alan Dye's analysis of the Cuban sugar contends that railway construction should be understood in the context of the adoption of continuous process technologies which created additional demands for cane thus encouraging the rise of the colono group. Oscar Zanetti and Alejandro García's analysis provides an extremely thorough picture of Cuban railway history and its relevance to the development of the sugar economy on the island. See Ramiro Guerra y Sánchez, Azúcar y población en las Antillas (Havana, 1944)
45. Alan Dye, Cuban Sugar and Oscar Zanetti and Alejandro García, Sugar and Railroads: A Cuban History, 1837-1959 (Chapel Hill, 1998).
46. Noel Deerr, The History of Sugar (London, 1949).
47. In 1882, as part of an overall revision, sugar tariffs were modified to a specific duty of five cents per kilogramme. The most important change in terms of government protection occurred in 1889, when a new tariff revision established duties of seven and nine cents per kilogramme for unrefined and refined sugar respectively.
48. Other Latin American sugar economies relied heavily on government protection for their growth. Pernambuco represents a paradigmatic case - state and federal authorities alike devised mechanisms to protect the industry ranging from official subsidies for the construction of usinas to schemes for immigration and a public banking system. See Peter Eisenberg, The Sugar Industry in Pernambuco.
49. Local entrepreneurs accumulated capital from investments in livestock, commerce, and flour-mills, among other ventures. Some were members of Tucumán's old Hispanic landed elite. French immigrants who had arrived to the province between 1810 and 1850 formed another important group among the sugar producers. These immigrants established durable relationships with the Hispanic elite through marriage and business. Finally a group of merchants from Córdoba migrated to Tucumán and became deeply involved in the sugar economy. Donna Guy, Argentine Sugar Politics, pp. 47-51.
50. The adoption of new technologies took place in different fashion depending upon each mill. Usually older mills such as Ingenio Concepción and Ingenio Esperanza proceeded gradually, bringing in new machinery over a period of several years. On the other hand, new mills such as Ingenio Lules and Ingenio La Florida adopted new technology all at once. By 1895 most of the province's mills had modernised their machinery.
51. In certain cases, prospective planters had fewer resources and resorted to tenancy. The information on this group is fragmentary. Contemporary observers and official reports from the period placed this group in the cañero category. Farms were rented from individuals instead of mills. They varied widely in size although a significant number of the units worked by arrendatarios were smaller than 50 hectares. Clearly, the payment of rent represented an additional burden and source of distress for tenants. However, they must have shared anxieties and expectations with cañeros, which justifies their inclusion as part of this group.
52. As Peter Klaren has demonstrated in his classic study, Northern Perú is a prototypical example of the concentration of land by the mills at the expense of the planter class. According to the author, capital intensive plantations took over the lands of small and medium haciendas, thus giving rise to the modern corporate sugar plantation and a process of dislocation among the region's population. Peter Klaren, Modernisation, Dislocation, and Aprismo.
53. Independent planters remained an essential component in Tucumán's sugar economy into the twentieth century. Their numbers increased from over two thousand in 1895 to 4,684 in 1914. However, their participation in sugar production should not obscure the fact that mill holdings increased rapidly in the province during the last decade of the nineteenth century and in the early twentieth century. It is difficult to gauge the growth of mill holdings in the province before 1888, since provincial reports such as those of Juan Manuel Terán and Eduardo Quintero are based on patente records that taxed only land under production - which was systematically underreported. In 1888, the mills owned 53,036 hectares. By 1895 the holdings had increased to 144,266 hectares. By 1914 mill lands extended over 223,517 hectares. These figures are consistent with other reports from the period that pointed to the expansion of mill plantations, in particular after the 1895 crisis of overproduction. In 1903 El Orden reported that 200 hundred small cañeros had lost their lands to the surrounding mills. In 1909 the same newspaper concluded that the CAT had expanded its plantations at the expense of small cañeros from the area. El Orden, 31 Aug. 1903 and 19 July 1909.
54. Emilio Schleh, La industria azucarera en su primer centenario, 1821-1921 (Tucumán, 1921).
55. El Orden, 14 Jan. 1890.
56. Juan Terán, Informe, n.p.
57. Boletín National de Agricultura, vol. 7 (Buenos Aires, 1883), p. 5.
58. For thorough and contrasting analyses of the group's origins see Maria Celia Bravo, Roberto Pucci and Carlos León. This article provides further evidence that supports Bravo's insistence on the diverse origins of the group.
59. Paul Groussac, Memoria histórica y descriptiva, p. 522.
60. Arsenio Granillo, Provincia de Tucumán, p. 99. One cuadra equals 2,066 hectares.
61. Archivo Histórico Tucumán (herein AHT), Protocolos, Serie C, Folios 346-9.
62. Pedro Alurralde, 'La crisis azucarera,' in Anales de la Facultad de Derecho y Ciencias Sociales, vol. 1 (Buenos Aires, 1902), p. 360.
63. AHT, Protocolos, Serie A, Folio 139.
64. República Argentina, Segundo Censo Nacional, Censo Económico y Social, Boletín de Agricultura, Boletin 27, Tomos 3-4, Folios 46-133.
65. Census data confirm that between the 1880s and 1890s Tucumán's total area under cultivation increased by 172%. Over the same period, the share of different crops in the province's agriculture production changed dramatically. Whereas cane increased 411%, maize and alfalfa experienced 75% and 85% increases respectively and wheat underwent a 35% reduction in the total area cultivated.
66. Henry St. John Wileman, The Growth and Manufacture of Cane Sugar in the Argentine Republic (London, 1884), p. 6.
67. Arsenio Granillo, Provincia de Tucumán, p. 110
68. Ramón Cordeiro et al. (eds.), Compilación ordenada, vol. 7. For a modern study on the costs of cane planting see Daniel Santamaria, Azúcar y sociedad, pp. 43-65.
69. For a dissenting view, see Carlos León, El desarrollo agrario.
70. A rather similar pattern is found in another important sugar area: Capital. In this department the number of holdings up to 10 hectares devoted to other crops was even larger (72%). The percentage of land under cane cultivation was 47% and under other crops 26%. Specialisation in cane also occurred in holdings larger than 50 hectares. In this case the land devoted to crops other than cane reached 5%. Even though more research needs to be done on the entire province, the sample could be considered as indicative of patterns of land use in sugar areas since the two departments accounted for 52% of the total acreage cultivated with cane and 40% of the province's independent planters. República Argentina, Segundo Censo Nacional, Censo Económico y Social, Boletin 27, Tomos 3-4, Folios 46-133.
71. Congreso Nacional, Investigación Parlamentaria, p. 49.
72. Paulino Rodríguez Marquina, Memoria descriptiva de Tucumán. La industria azucarera. Su presente, pasado y porvenir (Tucumán, 1888), pp. 168-77.
73. República Argentina, Segundo Censo Nacional, Censo Económico y Social, Boletín 27, Tomos 3-4, Folios 46-133.
74. Congreso Nacional, Investigación Parlamentaria, p. 38.
75. Sugar colonias in Tucumán were not comparable to those established in Santa Fe, Entre Rios, and Corrientes. In these areas, European immigrants and their families were granted plots to cultivate cereals, mostly wheat. However, more importantly, colonists eventually gained title to the land. Tucumán's colonias are comparable to those established in eastern Cuba during the process of centralisation that took place after the war for independence. Ezequiel Gallo, La pampa gringa (Buenos Aires, 1984)
76. and James Scobie, Revolution on the Pampas. A Social History of Argentine Wheat, 1860-1910 (Texas, 1968).
77. In 1892 the inventory of one colono in Colonia Sosa totalled $1,300 whereas his neighbour's amounted to $7,200. El Orden, 7 Jan. 1893 and La Opinión, 4 Jan. 1893.
78. República Argentina, Segundo Censo Nacional, Censo Económico y Social, Boletín 27, Tomos 3-4, Folios 46-133.
79. In 1889 Ingenio Los Ralos obtained only half of its cane from colonos; by 1904 all the cane processed by the mill came from its colonias.
80. El Orden, Nov. 1890 to Feb. 1891.
81. El Orden, 4 Feb. 1893.
82. This was the case for two Chilean citizens who entered a colonato arrangement in 1892 with Abraham Medina, owner of Ingenio San Vicente.
83. Despite the limitations presented by fragmentary evidence it is still possible to reconstruct planters' lives by piecing together information from census manuscript schedules, newspapers, contracts, wills, and the valuable photographs included in Manuel Bernardez's 1904 report of his visit to the province.
84. Manuel Bernárdez, La nación en marcha (Buenos Aires, 1904), p. 15.
85. Wills from Dr Exequiel Colombres and Luis Dode, AHT, Sección Judicial, Serie A, Caja 228, Expte. 3 and Sección Judicial, Serie A, Caja 187, Expte. 3.
86. AHT, Sección Judicial, Serie A, Caja 228, Expte. 23.
87. AHT, Sección Judicial, Serie A, Caja 203, Expte. 7.
88. República Argentina, Segundo Censo Nacional, Censo Económico j Social, Boletín 27, Tomos 3-4, Folios 46-133.
89. Ingenio Esperanza had 250 houses surrounding the plantation for its colonos and workers. A rather different arrangement existed at Ingenio San Pablo, where 600 houses accommodated 5,800 people including colonos and workers. Exposición Nacional, Album Argentino. Provincia de Tucumán. Su vida, su trabajo, su progreso (Tucumán, 1910).
90. In Ingenio La Providencia, colonos' houses were bigger and located in the middle of the housing complex, whereas workers lived in smaller apartments surrounding the colonos' living area. Vicente Padilla, El Norte Argentino (Buenos Aires, 1922).
91. Manuel Bernárdez, La nación en marcha, pp. 1-50.
92. As late as 1911 Georges Clemenceau described workers' dwellings as temporary encampments with huts made of cane trash. Georges Clemenceau, South America Today (New York, 1911).
93. The will of José Avila verifies this observation. He was a very small planter who owned five hectares of land with less than a quarter of a hectare planted with cane. The inventory listed very few material possessions that, according to the notary 'did not exist anymore since his sister had already taken care of them'. The will makes no mention of a house. A few fanegas of maize and the plot of land account for almost a third of the total value of Avila's goods, which totalled only $127.12. AHT, Sección Judicial, Serie A, Caja 187, Expte. 8. According to Groussac, a peon's monthly salary at the time of Avila's death was $12. Paul Groussac, Memoria histórica y descriptiva.
94. During the last quarter of the nineteenth century Tucumán's government joined the national trend to modernise its banking system, as the creation of the Banco Nacional, Banco Provincial, and Banco Hipotecario clearly demonstrates. However, only big planters and mills had access to institutional sources of credit. José Antonio Sánchez Román, 'La dulce crisis: Finanzas, estado, e industria azucarera en Tucumán (1853-1914),' unpubl. PhD diss., Instituto Universitario de Investigación Ortega y Gasset, 2001.
95. Since share payments consisted of payments in sugar for the cane delivered to the mill, they required the planters to pay more attention to cane quality in order to guarantee high sucrose content.
96. AHT, Protocolos, Serie C 8, Folios 409-11v.
97. 1 arroba equals 25 pounds.
98. Revista Azucarera, 1 Sept. 1894, pp. 201-5.
99. El Orden, 4 Sept. 1884.
100. AHT, Protocolos, Serie C, Folios 409-11v.
101. Pierre Denis, 'Tucumán y el azúcar', in Daniel Campi (ed.), Estudios sobre la historia, p. 19. Contemporary observers noted that lack of wagons to transport cane was a source of conflict among cane planters and mill owners, in particular during the 1880s.
102. AHT, Protocolos, Serie D, Folios 448-53.
103. AHT, Protocolos, Serie A, Folios 1520-2.
104. El Orden, 7 Aug. 1895.
105. Planters' limited access to institutionalised sources of credit put them in a very vulnerable position, especially during harvest time. The evidence indicates however, that planters managed to find alternative sources of capital, such as pooling financial resources. For example, in 1883 planters Narcisa Villafañe and Ramón de la Vega established a six-year partnership to plant cane. Villafañe contributed 100 hectares of land planted with cane and supplied with fences and a feeder canal. She also contributed 1,000 pesos to the partnership. De la Vega provided 3,000 pesos, labour and his administrative services, for which he received a 500-peso annual salary. AHT, Protocolos, Serie D, Folios 736-9.
106. Interest rates varied depending on whether they came from formal or informal sources as well as in accordance with the total amount loaned. Other causes for disparities in interest rates were likely related to the contract's stipulations such as length and type of arrangement (partnership or simple contract to supply cane) as well as the situation of the industry at the time. According to Sánchez Román's analysis, between 1880 and 1890 Tucumán's bank interest rates oscillated between 7% and 9% per annum. Rates paid in the informal sector showed larger fluctuations ranging from 10.7% to 16.3%. The author also points to the existence of 'professional lenders' who charged up to 48% per annum. José Antonio Sánchez Román, 'La dulce crisis'.
107. Annual interest rates above 10% were quite common not only in Tucumán but in other regions in Argentina and Latin America as well. For example in Santa Fe, Gallo argues that rates fluctuated around 12% during the 1880s. In Buenos Aires Adelman's analysis confirms that borrowers were paying between 6% and 12% per annum in 1895. In Pernambuco, Eisenberg found that rates oscillated between 8% and 11% during the 1880s. In Cuba Bergad observed that planters were paying interest rates as high as one per cent per month in the 1850s. Santiago Gallo, La pampa gringa, p. 240
108. Jeremy Adelman, 'Agricultural Credit in the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1890-1914', JLAS, vol. 22, no. 1 (Feb. 1990), p. 83
109. Peter Eisenberg, The Sugar Industry, p. 64.
110. Laird Bergad, Cuban Rural Society in the Nineteenth Century (New Jersey, 1990), p. 174.
111. Congreso Nacional, Investigación Parlamentaria, p. 47.
112. AHT, Protocolos, Serie D, Folios 1729v-33v.
113. AHT, Protocolos, Serie D, Folio 1277.
114. Congreso Nacional, Investigación Parlamentaria, p. 231.
115. The author of the play was Alberto García Hamilton, a member of Tucumán's sugar elite. A synopsis of the play was published along with reviews in El Orden in April 1909.
116. Other problems affecting sugar areas that resulted in increasing tensions between the two groups were labour shortages, competition for railway cargo space, inadequate road systems, and unmarked property boundaries.
117. AHT, Sección Judicial, Serie A, Caja 196, Expte. 32. The mill paid the planter the amount owed immediately after the case was taken to court.
118. As part of a campaign in defence of the planters, in August 1895 El Orden published a series of articles entitled 'En defensa del cañero', encouraging the government to participate more actively and the group to form a union to defend their interests.
119. AHT, Sección judicial del Crimen, Caja 99, Expte. 12. The planter and peons involved in the incident were acquitted for lack of evidence.
120. In 1875, in his annual message to the legislature, the governor observed the need to regulate water resources to avoid more conflicts. Ramon Cordeiro, Compilación ordenada, vol. 6, p. 357.
121. In his 1883 report on the Salí River, ingeniero Lana y Sarto observed that as a result of uncoordinated irrigation, the river was losing 10% of its volume through evaporation. Ramón Cordeiro, Compilación ordenada, vol. 9, p. 82.
122. To avoid their extreme dependence on mill water resources, planters contracted water from other farmers, as was the case of planters Romualdo Mora and Zacarías de la Zerda, who agreed to build an aqueduct and share irrigation rights. AHT, Protocolos, Serie D, Folios 1377-8.
123. AHT, Sección Judicial, Serie A, Caja 262, Expte. 19.
124. Ramón Cordeiro, Compilación ordenada, vol. 9, pp. 79 and 119.
125. El Orden, 4 May 1896.
126. In his 1897 report Antonio Correa mentioned that lack of trust permeated the transaction since it was a common occurrence for 1,000 kilograms of cane to be weighed as low as 500 to 600 kilogrammes.
127. El Orden, 5 June 1885.
128. In 1903 Lucas Córdoba decreed that two inspectors of weights should supervise cane weighing. The real motivation for the government's intervention was to prevent tax evasion. In 1908 inspectors were replaced by public officials who visited mills to monitor the accuracy of the scales used.
129. AHT, Sección Judicial del Crimen, Caja 168, Expte. 6.
130. AHT, Sección Judicial del Crimen, Caja 235, Expte. 24.
131. It is worth noting that when confronting workers or the national authorities, planters and mill owners presented a unified front.
132. The conflict has been reconstructed using El Orden, La Opinión and criminal court records.
133. The real reason behind the conflict is unclear, although it is likely that changes in tax policies might have played a significant role. When the problems started the provincial legislature was discussing a bill that proposed additional taxes on sugar. The new taxes, characterised as extraordinary, affected the final product and not the raw material. The contracts between Medina and his colonos had been signed before the bill had been drafted. Since the arrangement had stipulated a ten-year commitment, the new taxes would have fallen upon the mill owner. Therefore, by revoking the contracts, Abraham Medina could renegotiate new deals that included any possible change in sugar taxes.
134. El Orden reported daily updates on the colonos' situation. Moreover, the paper included editorials discussing the miserable living and working conditions of the farmers and urged the provincial authorities to intervene. La Opinión, a paper politically aligned with Medina, reported the mill owner's side of the conflict.
135. Violent events in Santa Fe's agricultural colonies must have convinced the authorities to be receptive to the colonos' pleas in order to prevent further violence.
136. It is likely that the entire group settled their disputes along the same lines as San Martín, although lack of evidence prevents a case by case analysis.