Vives, while a stern governor, did not actually play the part of a despot. He held his office until May 15, 1832, when he was succeeded by Don Mariana Ricafort, a tyrant of the most pronounced type. His rule left one continuous record of oppression and misgovernment. No better person to encourage in the hearts of thinking Cubans an eagerness to be rid of Spain could have been chosen, for he was thoroughly hated and despised. His rule continued two years, and then, in 1834, the reins of government were taken into the hands of General Don Miguel Tacon. The eastern department of the island was commanded at this time by General Lorenzo. Tacon, one of the most famous of the nineteenth century Captains-General, was a man of small mind and great stubbornness, shortsighted, narrow and jealous. He was exceedingly vain, grasping for power, and a tyrant of the most pronounced type. He took many privileges from the wealthy inhabitants of the island, and he seized for himself the power, which had theretofore been a municipal function, of naming the under-commissaries of police in Havana. Like all people of extremely arbitrary nature, Tacon was an arrant coward at heart. He was perpetually in terror of being assassinated, and upon the slightest pretext had anyone whom he considered dangerous to his rule thrown into prison. The life of no Cuban who happened to offend the Captain-General was safe at this time. In 1836 there occurred in Spain the revolution of La Granja, when the progressive triumphed over the moderate party, and the Queen Regent was obliged to proclaim the old Constitution of 1812, granting Cuba representation in the Spanish Cortes, and to summon deputies from Cuba. The news of this triumph reached Santiago de Cuba before it did Havana, whereupon General Lorenzo, in command there, immediately proclaimed the Code of Cadiz, and ordered an election for deputies to the Cortes. He reestablished the constitutional ayuntamiento, declared the press free, reorganized the national militia and put his department on the same footing that it had been in 1823. Tacon was furious when knowledge of this action reached him. He had no power to compel General Lorenzo to retract, but he summarily cut off all communications with his department and laid his plans to invade that territory, and by military force to restore his own absolute government and do away with representation for Cuba in the Spanish Cortes. Perhaps nothing that he could have done could have added more to his unpopularity. He was hissed in the streets, and plots were made against his life.