The South American Republics, Part 1 of 2

by Thomas Cleland Dawson

In 1873, 1874, and 1875 the question which most absorbed public attention was the imprisonment of the bishops of Pará and Pernambuco by the civil authorities. The lower ranks of the priesthood were uneducated, and real interest in religion had largely been confined to women and the lower classes. With the growth of liberal ideas among the laity the Church awoke to the necessity of a reformation. These two bishops were leaders in this counter-movement, and they selected the Masonic Lodges as a point of attack. In spite of the nominal prohibition of the Church, Free-Masonry had been permitted in Brazil since 1821, and the lodges had become mere social clubs and philanthropic societies. Free-Masons were members of those semi-religious brotherhoods which take charge of local church feasts and constitute the most important link between the lay and spiritual worlds in Brazilian communities. The two militant bishops ordered that the brotherhoods should expel their Masonic members or suffer the penalty of losing their right to use the church edifices. Where these orders were not obeyed interdicts were laid. The progressive element and the magistracy took the side of the Masons, but the bishops were not without their supporters. The government insisted that the obnoxious interdicts be withdrawn: the bishops refused to yield, and were prosecuted in the civil courts and sent to prison. The Princess Isabel was believed to be on the priests' side, and while the excitement gradually died out and things went on as before, a wider breach than ever had been created between the progressive and conservative classes. Like the slave-owners devout Catholics now felt that they could no longer depend on the imperial system to protect them against the rising tide of radicalism.

The financial difficulties growing out of the great panic drove Rio Branco from power in 1875, and a succession of Conservative Cabinets struggled along until 1878. The question of electoral reform came to the front, for every one was sick of the absurd system in vogue, and the leaders of both the historical parties hoped for great things from a radical change. The Emperor was opposed to giving up the indirect method of voting, but was anxious to try some lesser reforms. On his return from the United States and Europe in 1877 he virtually instructed the Cabinet to put through a bill drawn after his suggestions, but the Prime Minister resigned because the Emperor insisted that the change could not be made by an ordinary statute, but must go through the tedious process of an amendment to the constitution. The Emperor called in a Liberal Cabinet and a new Chamber was elected.

The Liberal ministry continued in power until 1880, and then fell, partly because it had lost its hold with the Liberal majority, and partly because of the riots in Rio over the street-car tax. A law had been passed compelling each passenger to pay a cent in addition to the regular fare. The people refused, burned the cars, cut the harness in pieces, threw the conductors off, and fought the police until the business of the city was brought to a standstill. The Emperor called upon a cool and experienced politician, José Antonio Saraiva. But the latter refused to take office unless he should be allowed to push through the election bill in the form of an ordinary law. Right here the Emperor suffered a great defeat. He thought himself obliged to yield, and the vigorous minister at once secured the passage of a radical law which completely transformed the electoral system. Suffrage was confined to the educated and property-holding classes, but the electors voted directly for deputies, and the country was divided into districts each of which chose a single deputy. The electoral body was now permanent, and each deputy was responsible to a definite constituency. Saraiva resigned the moment his bill was enacted into law, and every precaution was taken to ensure that the election of 1881 should be free from any suspicion of official pressure. The result was a revelation to the small-bore politicians of the old régime. One hundred and fifty thousand voters registered out of an adult male population of about three millions, and ninety-six thousand voted. The new members were divided nearly equally between the two historical parties—the Liberals getting sixty-eight and the Conservatives fifty-four. Two ministers were defeated for re-election and many of the contests were decided by small majorities. In subsequent elections the Saraiva law proved not to be so effective, and since it is not in the Latin nature to be satisfied with gradual improvement, the liberal movement, of which the electoral law was a symptom, swept on with increasing violence until the beneficent law was uprooted along with the mistaken system on which it had been painfully grafted.

As soon as electoral reform was out of the way abolition became once more the dominant question in Brazilian politics. Though the majority of Liberals were abolitionists and the doctrine was one of the official principles of the party, the various Liberal Cabinets which succeeded each other from 1881 to 1884 managed to dodge the dangerous issue. Finally the Dantas ministry faced it squarely. A bill was introduced prohibiting the sale of slaves, establishing an emancipation fund, and freeing slaves as fast as they reached the age of sixty. A terrific parliamentary battle followed and the project was defeated by only seven votes—forty-eight Liberals and four Conservatives voting for it, and seventeen Liberals and forty-two Conservatives against. The Emperor dissolved the Chamber and the excitement over abolition became national. The abolitionists subsidised newspapers, held public meetings, and marched through the streets in procession carrying pictures representing the torturing of slaves. No means were spared which might aid to rouse the national conscience. The negroes were advised to revolt, and assistance was openly promised to them. The elections of 1884 were violently contested, instead of being free from fraud and protest like those of 1881. Nor did the government so conscientiously abstain from interference. Nevertheless the Chamber elected did not differ materially in its composition from that which had preceded it. Sixty-five of the one hundred and twenty members of the new House were Liberals, but of these fifteen were opposed to abolition. For the first time avowed republican members were elected—three being returned, and two of them came from São Paulo—Prudente Moraes and Campos Salles, the first two Brazilians to hold office avowedly as republicans and who reaped their reward by becoming two decades later the first two civil presidents of the republic. No election was ever held in Brazil which was so earnestly contested and which constituted so genuine an expression of the wishes of the people. Nevertheless, on the main question—that of abolition—the result was apparently a drawn battle.

With the meeting of the Chamber in 1885 the agitation broke out afresh. The crowds on the Rio streets hissed anti-emancipation deputies, and there was a bitter fight for the control of the organisation of the Chamber. It was soon evident that the Dantas ministry could not force abolition through, and it resigned. Saraiva was called in and he skilfully arranged a compromise. With the aid of Conservative votes he passed a bill for gradual and compensated emancipation. This done, he resigned. The Liberal party was disorganised and dissatisfied with him, and he did not deem it worth his while to try and hold it together. The quarrelling Liberal majority was aghast when it was announced that a Conservative Cabinet would take the reins of government. The Emperor had begun to show decided symptoms of a failure of his mental powers and was ceasing to be a controlling factor in parliamentary affairs. Saraiva's resignation further exacerbated the Liberal leaders against the imperial system, and at the same time continued to lose ground with the slaveholders.

In the election the Liberals had no chance and largely refrained from voting. The governing classes shrank from the probable consequences of abolition; the temper of the country seemed to have cooled; the election reform of 1881 had not proven in practice to be of much value. Though not so absolute as before, the provincial governors resumed their control of the result, and returns were made according to the wishes of the ministry in power. One hundred and three Conservatives received certificates and only twenty-two Liberals, and most of the latter came from the interior where official pressure could least easily be applied. Not a republican was returned, and the declared abolitionists had almost disappeared, although every one knew that the final blow to slavery could not long be deferred.

The new administration devoted itself to the finances. Since 1871 the deficits had been continuous; one sarcastic statesman said amid applause that "the empire is the deficit." The issue of paper money had been excessive. Better times began in 1886. A loan of six millions sterling was contracted for on favourable terms; from forty per cent. below par the currency rose to par in the succeeding three years; imports and exports increased by leaps and bounds; and the revenue grew seventy-five per cent. in a single year. The production of coffee in São Paulo, and of rubber in Pará and Amazonas reached unprecedented figures; foreign immigration was subsidised and a systematic propaganda to secure it undertaken. From thirty thousand it ran up to one hundred thousand a year, and the apprehensions that emancipation would cause a dearth of labour were largely quieted. Government subsidies had kept up the building of railroads during the years when the treasury was most embarrassed, and naturally went on more rapidly when prosperity came. When the Paraguayan war ended there were only 450 miles of railroad in the country. In the decade that followed 1450 were built, while from 1880 to 1889 five hundred miles a year were constructed.

The Conservative Prime Minister, Baron Cotegipe, struggled hard through 1886 and 1887 to save the remnants of slavery, but intelligent and unprejudiced opinion was nearly unanimous for the entire abolition of the disgraceful and barbarous institution. Project after project was presented, each one more radical than the last. The slaves began to flee from the plantations. The army refused to aid the police in capturing them. The poor old Emperor had gone abroad, sick and failing, leaving Isabel as regent. Her advisers, mostly priests and foreigners, told her that the delay was endangering the dynasty. Cotegipe resigned and John Alfredo was made Prime Minister for the especial purpose of passing an emancipation act. When Congress met in May, 1888, the speech from the throne announced that the imperial programme was absolute, immediate, and uncompensated emancipation. The prestige of the Crown was sufficient to hush nearly all opposition. Within eight days the law had passed both Houses and been signed by the princess. The votes against it were hardly numerous enough to be worth counting. Only Cotegipe and a few devoted monarchists stood in their places and read aloud the handwriting on the wall, prophesying the sure and speedy overthrow of a monarchy which had thus cast off its surest and most natural supporters.

EMPEROR DOM PEDRO IN 1889.