Gabriel Terra
president of Uruguay (1873-1942)
José Luis Gabriel Terra Leivas (1 August 1873 – 11 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.
Life
Born in Montevideo, Gabriel Terra spent part of his childhood and adolescence on his father's (José Ladislao Terra) 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.
“Gabriel Terra” enters the record as president of Uruguay (1873-1942). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Gabriel, Terra and president can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q277922. VIAF identifies the subject as 75286727. The Library of Congress control number is n85130800. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1873, 1942, 1931 and 1933.
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