Appeals to justice constituted one of the venues through which the indigenous people of the Cauca territory made themselves heard between 1850 and 1885 in the context of the Confederación Granadina and the United States of Colombia. By means of written legal memorials and representations, this population addressed government authorities either to request plots of land individually or to collectively defend their resguardo lands and communal property. The article maintains that said manifestations constituted an indigenous form of participation in the construction of the state, in view of the fact that this use of the judicial system implied recognizing and strengthening both the liberal institution itself and the role of regional and local officials in the resolution of such requests.