Abstract
This article makes a qualitative analysis of judicial records from the first decade of the 20th century - found in the National Archives - in order to reconstruct the role of legal practices, institutions, and concepts in the resistance and adaptation of Rio de Janeiro's property owners to the urban reforms made by Pereira Passos and Rodrigues Alves. We use as complementary sources: parliamentary debates and legislation, to understand the reforms' legal bases; legal books and journals, to study the evolution of relevant concepts, such as "property"; and newspapers, to contextualize and access extra-legal aspects of lawsuits, i.e., what does not appear in court records.
Key words:
urban reforms; property rights; Rio de Janeiro