In the run-up to the Third (Second) Carlist War (1872-1876), the implementation of the treaties concluding the First Carlist War was faced with tensions arising from the Spanish Government's attempt to alter by "faits accomplis" the spirit and print of the agreements in respect of finances and taxation, the crowning jewels of the Southern Basque Country's separate status along with the specificity of the military draft. Following the instability of the I Spanish Republic (1868) and the struggle for dynastic succession in Madrid, by 1873 the Carlists made themselves strong in Navarre and expanded their territorial grip all over the Southern Basque Country except for the capital cities, establishing "de facto" a Basque state with a seat in Estella-Lizarra, where claimant to the throne Carlos VII had settled. The ruling Carlist government included not only judiciary arrangements for military matters but the establishment of civil tribunals, as well as its own currency and stamps.