The Significance of the September Revolution

Abstract

N FEBRUARY 19, 1852, Justo Jose de Urquiza, governor of Entre Rios, made a triuimphal entry into the city of Buenos Aires.' On July 13, 1853, he had to flee from that city under the escort of a foreign diplomatic representative. Much more was compressed between these dates, however, than the ups and downs of another Argentine caudillo. The traditional economic struggle between the port of Buenos Aires and the inland river ports along the Parana and Uruguay, the rivalry of provincianos and porteiios, the supremacy of a central authority versus a loose confederation of provin-ces, immediately arose in their many guises to haunt the military victory which Urquiza had won over Juan Manuel de Rosas, governor of Buenos Aires and for almost two decades the de facto ruler of Argentina. Argentines have long judged their leaders in personalist terms. Detractors and supporters of the Rosas regime or of the Urquiza reorganization have often forgotten that behind those leaders lay economic factors and traditional sentimeints far more important than the character of a provincial governor or a national leader. It was true that porteio. support for Rosas had faded to the extent that Robert Gore, the British charge in Buenos Aires, wrote a month before the battle of Caseros: