The First of the Virtues: Justice and Enlightened Reformism in Portuguese and Spanish America

Abstract

This objective of this article is to analyze proposals for judicial reform in America within the context of Iberian Enlightened Reformism and, particularly, measures designed to ensure the improved functioning of the courts and the impartiality of the trials. Focusing on the Portuguese case, the study is based on the understanding that the Ibero-American world had a common background, reflected in a shared legal and political tradition of a jurisdictional, corporative and Catholic nature, that was to be transmitted to America and imposed its limits on the execution of the then-in-vogue Iberian reform projects for a more effective and “rational” administration of Justice.