“Lands to the Indian, Mines to the State” was first put forth as a slogan by the socialist writer Tristán Marof in 1926 and gained ground after the Chaco War, capturing revolutionary aspirations to recast society and economy. The calls for agrarian reform from the left accompanied the growing levels of organization and mobilization in the countryside during the 1930s and 1940s. When the Revolutionary Nationalist Movement (mnr) came to power in April 1952, it sought to cement an alliance with the rural sector which, according to the 1950 census, still represented 73 percent of the population. Only...