Spain also extended its monopoly on tobacco to the New World. Cuba's tobacco monopoly begun in 1717 was one of the first, but by the mid-to-late eighteenth century, the tobacco industries of virtually every Spanish colony in the Americas was under official control.(16)
Yet, Spain realized the continued dangers from contraband, and therefore before the state established the monopoly in Cuba, Spanish officials traveled to different regions of the island inquiring about the prices paid to vegueros by contrabanders, pirates and others.
Although paid at fixed prices that closely matched earlier ones, farmers resented state control of their industry, and opposed Spain's plan to purchase Cuban tobacco at low prices and sell it on the European market at inflated levels.
As in Virginia in 1682, farmers revolted, even destroying their own crops and those of surrounding farms. In all, the vegueros launched three separate revolts between 1717 and 1723, including one in late 1717 that prompted the resignation of Governor Vicente Raja, marking the "first violent expulsion of a Captain General" in Cuban colonial history.(
