Gabriel Terra

José Luis Gabriel Terra Leivas (1 August 1873 – 15 September 1942) was a Uruguayan lawyer and statesman who served as the 26th constitutional president of Uruguay from 1931 to 1933 and as dictator until 1938. He led a traditionalist and corporatist regime known as the March dictatorship, because the self-coup that he led took place on 31 March 1933.

While in power, Terra promoted the 1934 Constitution, which after being approved by the citizens through a nationwide referendum, officially abolished the collegiate executive established in 1917 and guaranteed rights such as gender equality and women's suffrage, as well as the legalization of homosexuality.

In 1938, he became president of the state-owned Banco de la República Oriental del Uruguay. That same year, he left the position due to a stroke, remaining paralyzed for four years until his death in near-extreme poverty on 15 September 1942.

Born in Montevideo, Gabriel Terra spent part of his childhood and adolescence on his father's (José Ladislao Terra [es]) farm and studied Law at the Universidad de la República while also specializing in economic and financial science, graduating in 1895. He practiced as a lawyer and Justice of the Peace at the end of the 1890s and he was a professor at the Higher School of Commerce (known since 1935 as the Faculty of Economic Sciences and Administration) beginning in 1901. He was a national deputy from 1903 to 1907, minister of Industry, Labor and Public Instruction from 1907 to 1911. He founded the industrial oxygen production company CINOCA in 1908 and was a member of the National Constituent Assembly of 1917, Minister of the Interior from 1919 to 1921, and member of the National Council of Administration from 1926 to 1929. He was Constitutional President between 1931 and 1933, but became a de facto president from March 1933 to May 1934 after launching a self-coup. However, he once again became a de jure Constitutional President until June 1938. Terra was president of the Banco de la República Oriental del Uruguay in 1938. However, he suffered a stroke that same year, causing him to remain paralytic for four years until his death in 1942. Terra died in poverty, dying in an armchair on the early morning of 15 September 1942. At his funeral he received the corresponding state honors, and the country entered a mourning period. His remains were accompanied by hundreds of thousands of people along the procession. However, due to his presidency beng very controversial, his coffin was spat on by editors of the newspaper El Día, causing a fight to break out. The location of his grave is unknown.

Terra graduated as a lawyer in 1895 from UdelaR and had a lengthy political career, being a national deputy, he was deputy, minister of Industry, Work, and Public Instruction, a member of the 1917 Uruguayan Constituent Assembly, and member of the National Board of Directors. He was affiliated to the Colorado Party, although he was often independent of the dominant positions of its leader, José Batlle y Ordóñez. Terra advised all Uruguayan governments between 1904 and 1938.

Graduated as a lawyer in 1895, he was deputy minister to the President Claudio Williman, member of the Constituent Assembly in 1917, Minister to the President Baltasar Brum and member of the National Board of Directors. He was an expert in economic and diplomatic issues, areas in which he advised all the Uruguayan governments between 1900 and 1938, he was a member of the Colorado Party, although many times independent of the dominant positions of its leader, José Batlle y Ordóñez.

In 1920, Terra presented a bill providing for the creation of a National Cooperative Institute. This formed, according to one study, "a type of consumer cooperative under public law, limited to State officials and supported by the Bank of the Republic." The scope of the initiative was expanded by the National Council of Administration to cover all the inhabitants of the Republic, and although it was sanctioned with modifications by the House of Representatives the initiative was detained in the Senate without ever obtaining approval.

His candidacy for the presidency in 1930 was opposed to the Luis Alberto de Herrera, leader of the National Party who obtained 47.26% of the votes cast, compared to 52.02% in favor of Terra.