Abstract

VELEZ RENDON, Juan Carlos. Lawyers, Notaries, Rábulas and Pencil-Pushers. Conflicts over the Practice of Law in Antioquia, 1821-1843. Estud. Polit. [online]. 2008, n.32, pp.13-51. ISSN 0121-5167.

This article addresses less visible but prominent questions in relation to the practice of law, the modernization of the judicial system and the establishment of the republican state in New Granada after 1821. It presents discussions related to the professionalization of law, existing since end of the 18th century, which acquired renown after republican judicial institutions were established that sought to create an efficient system in touch with society. Within, one finds debates on the places occupied by learned lawyers, as well as notaries, ''pencil pushers'' and ''rábulas'', who informally acted in the orbit of law practices. The article shows that these last figures were keys for the reception, application, adaptation, negotiation or veiled resistance of values, procedures, forms and legal rituals in local environments. Although they included an empirical education that permitted them to informally practice, and at times formally do so in court proceedings, these figures operated inside the judicial system without vocational training or degrees needed for support. It seems that they counted little politically, they had only moderate recognition and social standing, but they were keys for the practice, reformulation, challenge or refusal of some norms surrounding the judicial codes in local environments. In their daily and informal practice with rights and law, they put limits on the establishment and operation of the republican judicial system and, in general, they hindered attempts to modernize the state.

Keywords : Lawyers; Notaries; Rationalization of Justice; Law in Antioquia; History of Law; Modernization of the State; Antioquia-19th Century History.

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