Loyalty and Unity in Miguel de Lastarria and Francisco Magariños. Two Political Projects for the Río de la Plata between Restoration and the Liberal Triennium

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to approach the political scenario from the perspective of two life experiences that were influenced by the independence revolutions during the years of the Restoration and the Liberal Triennium. Reference is made to two figures, Miguel de Lastarria and Francisco Magariños, whose experiences in the revolutionary context of the Río de La Plata influenced their horizons of expectation and shaped their identities through positions of defense of, and loyalty to the Hispanic monarchy. In both cases, faced with a monarchical crisis, their political positions were defined by a stance of absolute loyalty to the monarchy, but translated into different political projects as solutions to the conflict. The analysis of these projects, in the changing context of the revolutionary situation at the beginning of the 19th century, allows us to observe the cultural transfers and the readjustments and modifications of behavior which, far from being incoherent, were inscribed in the logic of loyalty as a primary axis toward an adequate solution to the conflicts produced by the independence movements.