The North American Review/Volume 158/Number 448/Latest Aspects of the Brazilian Rebellion

by Salvador de Mendonça

LATEST ASPECTS OF THE BRAZILIAN REBELLION.

BY HIS EXCELLENCY THE BRAZILIAN MINISTER AT WASHINGTON, SALVADOR DE MENDONÇA.

The unexpected proclamation of the Brazilian Republic on the fifteenth of November, 1889, by a movement supported by the historical republican party and the land and naval forces of the nation, was followed at once by the establishment of a revolutionary dictatorship. There was no opposition worthy of the name. At the very moment when the last imperial cabinet was planning to inaugurate the third reign, preparing to dissolve the army and exterminate the democratic idea, which was already coextensive with the country, the last American monarchy was in its death throes. In all Brazil but one man was found to risk his life in defence of the decrepit institutions; and this man was a republican whom circumstances had made minister of marine and who resisted solely from a sense of duty to the dignity of his office. Even the husband of the prospective empress, the Count d’Eu, did not hesitate to surrender the right of succession in consideration of the offer of a round sum of money, and sent his sword as marshal of the army to the new minister of war, accompanied by a letter as memorable as despicable, in which he expressed his sorrow that circumstances did not permit him to serve Brazil under her new institutions—a sorrow inspired not so much by the loss of his sword and the honors of his high office as by that of its handsome salary. If he failed to receive the price of this sacrifice of his dignity to hie well-known avarice, it was because the aged emperor refused to sacrifice his own, which would not allow him to consent to any pecuniary transaction.

In forty-eight hours the revolutionary flood swept away all that remained of the empire, leaving nothing in its passage but the aged emperor and empress, who, surrounded by the imperial brood, were on the road to exile on board the “Alagoas,” whence the messenger dove sent forth found no longer a monarchical land ou which to rest her foot.

The provisional government set up by the revolution and accepted at once by the entire nation had at its head General Deodoro da Fonseca, and was composed almost entirely of historical republicans. The only exception was Ruy Barbosa, a former monarchist, a man whose learning is only equalled by his artfulness, and who, on the eve of the revolution, found, at the eleventh hour, the road to Damascus.

The first care of the new government was to give to the country, by means of dictatorial decrees, all the reforms indispensable to the new order of things, in order that the Brazilian republic might, like the Minerva of the ancients, spring into being armed from head to foot. Before it lay the unforeseen; even the republicans could hardly comprehend the entire inanity of the monarchical régime and the full extent of their easy victory. Indeed, history records no other example of such an almost phantasmagoric change from one system of government to another— without resistance, without protest, without armed strife, which have everywhere else been the baptism of liberty. The student, however, of Brazilian history would find this quite in accordance with the character of the people. The revolution of 1822, by which our independence was secured, was bloodless. That of April 7, 1831, which drove Pedro I. from the country, was also accomplished without bloodshed; and even in the “battle of the bottles” (garrafadas de Março) which preceded this movement, little damage was done beyond the breaking of a few Portuguese heads and the spilling of more wine than blood. In 1888 we accomplished the abolition of slavery "under the reign of the roses.” Every victory gained by democracy in revolutions in Brazil has been likewise bloodless. Up to the present time the shedding of blood has been the privilege of the monarchy : it alone made martyrs; it alone stained its victories with blood. Not to speak of the colonial period and the first reign, it is enough to recall the suppression of the revolutions of Rio Grande do Sul, of Minas and São Paulo, and of Pernambuco.

An explanation of this apparent phenomenon, which is doubtless attributable in a great measure to the character of the Brazilian people, involves a truth that is worthy of mention. The Brazilian Army, with the exception of the few occasions when the danger of national disintregration forced it to take part against the people, has always been found on the side of popular liberty. On April 7, 1831, it fraternized with the people; in 1888 it refused to act as slave-hunter in the forests where the slaves, who had abandoned the plantations of São Paulo, Minas, and Rio de Janeiro had taken refuge, thus helping forward the cause whose triumph was assured by the decree of May 13, 1888; and, lastly, on the morning of November 15, 1889, it refused to serve the monarchy as the last prop which could stay its downfall.

It is quite fashionable in Brazil, even in the democratic ranks, to cry out against militarism. The late emperor, who gloried in governing a nation of bachelors and doctors of law, had a natural aversion to military men, and the two parties under his government, Liberal and Conservative alike, did not fail to slight the two branches of the service which in recent years saw themselves excluded, not only from all share in the government, which would have been no great evil if done for the maintenance of discipline, but deprived even of their constitutional rights by the civil power, an abuse against which they ineffectually protested. While the Duke of Caxias and the Marquis of Herval were living, the army had still in them two defenders in the government ; but after their death both political parties, when in parliamentary opposition to the government, never failed to make use of the discontent of the military classes, until these discovered that they were merely serving as puppets, and in a single night they went over to the democratic ranks, and there they remain to this day, side by side with the people, supporting the constitution of the republic, not in obedience to the orders of any dictator, but inspired by their patriotic convictions.

One year after the proclamation of the republic the Constitutional Convention assembled, and, on the twenty-fourth of February, 1891, gave to Brazil its first republican constitution, modelled upon that of the United States of America ; and its members having, by virtue of their election, resolved themselves into the first constitutional congress, put an end to the provisional government created by the revolution. The constitutional régime however, had not arrived soon enough to prevent the evil results of the fever of speculation excited by the large issues of paper money authorized by Ruy Barbosa during his year of office as Secretary of the Treasury. Besides, the cabinet of the provisional government had been weakened by the withdrawal of the Secretaries of the Interior and Agriculture, Señors Aristides Lobo and Demetrio Ribeiro, two historical republicans. Under the advice of unwise counsellors, General Fonseca, even before his election as president, formed his second cabinet, in which the only historical republican was Señor Justo Chermont, all the other secretaries being taken indiscriminately from the ranks of the former monarchists. The writer does not wish to be understood as advocating the exclusion from the administration of men who had served in the time of the empire : the error lay in the selection of the individuals.

If, instead of having himself elected president, or allowing his friends to present him as a candidate, the chief of the provisional government had used all his influence towards the election of a civilian, such as Señor Saraiva or Señor Paulino de Souza, both prominent leaders in the former monarchical parties, Liberal and Conservative respectively, but both true patriots who had accepted the new order of things, he would at once have placed the new republic upon a broad and solid basis, and under a flag whose ample folds would have covered Brazilians of every shade of political opinion. Instead of so doing or of organizing a new cabinet entirely republican, the new president surrounded himself with men of very narrow views, and who did not, with a few exceptions, even understand the form of government into whose service they were called. This was a step backwards ; Congress insisted on following the path marked out by the constitution ; the executive could not agree with the Congress, and a conflict was unavoidable. Wisdom would have dictated a policy of conciliation, but that wisdom was lacking in the president of the republic. The cabinet, as might have been expected in view of its origin, clung obstinately to the old parliamentary usages which were wholly out of place under the new form of government. The result was the dictatorial decree of November 3, 1891, which in violation of the constitution dissolved the federal congress, and declared the capital of the republic in a state of siege.

From the two extremes of the union, the States of Para and Rio Grande do Sul, came the first outcries of protest against this attack on the constitution. Notwithstanding the approval, more or less sincere, by the governors of the other States, a revolution against the dictator broke out in the federal capital on the twenty-third of November, under the form of a revolt of the national fleet in the bay of Rio de Janeiro. Then, as now, Señor Custodio de Mello, who at that time was a member of the opposition in the Congress, headed the movement. A single high officer of the navy on that day opposed the revolutionary action of the squadron ; that officer was Saldanha da Gama, who eight days before had been promoted to the post of rear-admiral, and who at the time was stationed in Fort Villegaignon, with the command of which he had been intrusted by the republic. On that occasion, with a correct understanding of his duties as a soldier, he offered the first and only resistance to the attack of the revolutionists. In view, however, of his present position at the head of the rebel fleet in that same port, attacking the constitutional government of the nation, the rectitude of his proceeding on the former occasion is not so clear. He has exposed himself to the charge of defending the dictatorship, because, in violating the constitution, it threw discredit on a form of government with which he had no sympathy, though not because of the personal advantages he had gained under it. The dictator, recognizing the full extent of his error, to which his attention was called by a friendly power, and desiring to avoid bloodshed, resigned his office.

At that time the revolutionists had on their side a large majority of the Congress, while the only dependence of the president was a minority of the army, little disposed to support the violator of the constitution. The vice-president of the republic, Marshal Floriano Peixoto, took the seat of the retiring president as his constitutional successor. The dominion of law returned ; the Congress continued its labors ; the Lucena cabinet, which had fallen with the dictator, was succeeded by another made up of republicans taken from the opposition to the former administration. The direction of public affairs took quite another shape, and the honesty of the government barred the doors of the treasury against the irruptions of the stock speculators and the brokers in government concessions. It was the beginning of a new era, full of promise for the consolidation of the republic. Peace was established in the States; the disaffected in Rio Grande do Sul lay down their arms. Paternalism disappeared from the economic policy of the state ; the government no longer sought its supporters in the stock exchange ; Señor Rodriguez Alves, Secretary of the Treasury, wisely closed his ears to the outcries of the speculators and to the crash of falling enterprises, prudently separating the public funds from all the transactions which for two years it had supported so disastrously for the national welfare. By the side, however, of the new president was Señor Custodio de Mello, bold and crafty, full of personal ambition and resentment. It was through his influence and by his advice that the removal of the governors of States who had approved the violation of the constitution was begun. Local revolutions broke out in all directions. The governors who had not already been deposed made haste to resign in anticipation of a similar fate. The truth is that in these removals the intervention of the federal government was rather negative than active, inasmuch as its action was almost entirely limited to a refusal to use the power of the federal government to maintain in their seats the legally elected governors. It is not less certain, however, that these depositions weakened the respect for lawful authority and confidence in the new institutions, violating as they did the fundamental principles of constitutional government.

The reorganization of the government of the State of Rio Grande do Sul was made altogether in accordance with the views of Señor Custodio de Mello until the moment when the monarchical designs of the so-called federalist revolution of Señor Gaspar Martins were revealed, and Marshal Peixoto considered it his duty to interfere in the local struggle by furnishing the governor of the State with federal troops to repel the invasion which was threatened on the frontier of Uruguay. It is not difficult to see that a State of the union bordering on the territory of a foreign nation needs particular attention in the case of a rebellion whose forces are recruited in that territory. From November, 1892, to April, 1893, as a secretary in the cabinet of Marshal Peixoto, Señor Custodio de Mello aided and approved the policy of the former in relation to Rio Grande do Sul. In April, however, Señor de Mello retired from the cabinet, accompanied by his colleague, Señor Serzedello Corrêa, who, though his talents entitled him to take the lead, was contented in this case to serve as a follower. So far, so good ; but a few months later, on the night of September 5, with the aid of thirty-six naval officers and half a dozen congressmen, Señor de Mello took possession of some of the vessels of the fleet and began the rebellion which is now tarnishing the good name of Brazil.

This rebellion has been prolific of manifestoes; they break forth in all directions. We have them from Señors Mello and Saldanha da Gama by turns proclaiming to the public their purposes and programmes, modifying them or denying them ; we have them even from Ruy Barbosa, who after stirring up anarchy in Brazil, and teaching disrespect for the institutions he helped to create, is now in a foreign country engaged in slandering his own, and serving as the mouthpiece of the rebellion.

Señor de Mello in his first two manifestoes declared that his purpose was to restore the supremacy of the republican constitution, to overthrow military dominion, and to restore peace and credit to Brazil. He accused the president of violating the constitution in various ways, among which he made prominent the veto of a bill in relation to the presidential election, attributing the veto to the alleged desire of Señor Peixoto for re-election. It is curious that instead of appealing to the ballot-box, in which under the republican form of government, the remedy for all political evils should be sought,—particularly since the election for the second Congress was to take place, at the end of October last ; and in the beginning of next March the presidential election will be held,—the rebel chief should propose to introduce into politics new methods of restoring violated constitutions, and should attempt to bring back peace and credit by cannon shots, and to destroy military dominion by military violence.

The charge in regard to the motives of the veto has no real foundation. In the opinion of a journal of the opposition the President could not have approved the bill in question, because its fifth article contained a twofold violation of the Constitution : in the first place, because it extended to the office of vice-president the ineligibility which the constitution limited to that of president; and secondly, because it extended to the entire presidential term the ineligibilty of the vice-president who had served as president, whereas, by the constitution it is limited to him who has thus served in the last year of the presidential term. It is the bill, then, that was unconstitutional, while the veto rests on the express declarations of the constitution. Besides this, Señor Peixoto was still farther removed from the suspicion of being actuated by a personal motive, inasmuch as his ineligibility was already established by the constitution, and in no way depended on the bill, whether approved or not.

It is a pity that the personal ambition of Señor Custodio de Mello will not permit so satisfactory an explanation of his conduct; but it furnishes a very complete one of his political changes and of the blindness which led him to expect that a repetition of the twenty-third of November, 1891, would render it easy for him to breakfast on the “Aquidaban” and dine in the executive mansion. Fortunately for republican institutions in Brazil the circumstances were changed and the men were different, and the coup-de-main was a failure. The Congress at once authorized the government to declare a state of siege, furnished the executive with all necessary means for the defence of the national institutions, and, as the immediate representative of the nation, exhorted the States to continue united in defence of the constitution. The session was closed twenty days after the outbreak of the revolt.

Everything went wrong with the plans of the rebels ; conspirators like Señors de Mello and Ruy Barbosa must have relied upon promises of support which they did not receive, owing to the energy of the lawful powers. There are two facts which support this assertion. A few days after the outbreak of the rebellion, Señor Ruy Barbosa, who from the very first night had kept himself in hiding, deemed it prudent to flee to Montevideo, and a banker who is said to have loaned a large sum to the rebels under promise of payment within eight days, seeing the time of settlement indefinitely postponed, concluded that he would do a better business by killing himself.

The chief of the rebellion said nothing about a political alliance with the monarchico-federalist rebels of the south ; and if credit be given to the revelations published in the press of Rio de Janeiro by Lieut. Brazilio Silvado, Señor de Mello would listen to no suggestion of alliance with Señor Saldanha da Gama, on account of the well-known monarchist opinions of the latter. As long as possible he avoided competitors for the lead in the movement; sent Captain Lorena to set up a Robinson Crusoe government in the Island of Desterro, on the coast of the State of Santa Catharina, and for such a government he had the hardihood to ask of foreign nations a recognition of belligerent rights. A refusal was quick in coming, and this was another disappointment.

It was not till early in November that the leader of the naval revolt found it necessary to invite Señor Saldanha da Gama to join in the movement. The republicanism of Señor de Mello is not of the true temper. Just as he had, when ordered by the provisional government, landed on the coast of Asia, a grandson of the ex-emperor, so he would be capable of landing on the coast of Brazil another, if not the same, grandson, if circumstances should so demand. This was a contingency evidently accepted by him to gain the coöperation of Señor Saldanha da Gama. The correspondent of the London Times, which is always well informed in regard to what is going on among the rebels, advised that paper, in November, of this new alliance. It appears that there was some reluctance on both sides to enter into an agreement, because a full month elapsed before Saldanha da Gama publicly declared for the rebellion.

Señor da Gama, who was doubtless the most distinguished officer of the Brazilian navy, both in character and in talent, had taken a position in regard to the rebellion which it was impossible to maintain, and which was unjustifiable from every point of view. At the beginning of the rebellion he declared himself neutral, and maintained a semi independent position while yet occupying the post of director of the naval school and having under his command the government establishments on the Cobras and Enchadas islands, and the schoolships. He had hoisted in these places the flag of the red cross of Geneva, which had already served as a cover for the sham neutrality of the friends of the rebels in the south, who under the cloak of humanity were receiving, instead of medicines and surgical apparatus, death-bearing munitions of war. Even after the mask of neutrality had fallen, the red cross flag continued to float over a hospital on Enchadas island, although its basement was occupied as a deposit for warlike stores.

The so-called neutral portion of the navy followed Saldanha da Gama into the ranks of the rebels, and on the ninth of December the first manifesto of the new rebel leader was distributed through the federal capital, and attached to the walls in the form of a placard. Señor Mello, up to this time the leader of the rebellion, was quite overshadowed by the prestige of his new recruit, and thenceforth occupied but a secondary place. In that manifesto the hopes of the monarchists found an expression too clear to be misunderstood:

”The logic, as well as the justice of events, would authorize the restoration by the force of arms of the government of Brazil to the place it occupied on the fifteenth of November, 1889, when, in a moment of surprise and national stupefaction, it was overthrown by a military sedition of which the present government is only a continuation. The respect, however, which is due to the will of the nation, freely expressed, demands that it should select, solemnly and on its own responsibility, the form of government to which it wishes to entrust its glorious destinies.“

A few hours later all Brazil knew that the rebels were playing their last card, and that card was the restoration of the monarchy ; but the reply that was given by Brazil to Señor Saldanha da Gama was the same as that it had given to Señor Custodio de Mello. The answer was that in defence of republican institutions the support of the nation would be given to the lawful government. The foreign support on which the new leader counted likewise failed him, and before the end of December he found himself under the ridiculous necessity of declaring that it was the government that had had the seditious manifesto printed, had posted it at the street corners, and had attributed to him the plan of submitting to the people the question of a monarchical or a republican form of government; whereas his purpose was merely to submit the question of the form of a republic best fitted to Brazil.

The truth is that the leadership of Saldanha da Gama is no better than that of Señor de Mello, since by his first manifesto he offended the republican rebels, and by his second destroyed the last hope of his monarchist followers. And so that type of military honor from whose mouth we were waiting to hear the words of the cavaliers of Fontenoy—”Tirez les premiers, messieurs les Républicains”—let fall from his gloved hands the báton of command. Now there is nothing left for him to do but what was done in the good old times when men’s words were worth more than the written law, by our ancestors, the stout knights of the battlefields of Aljubarrota, Centa, and India who went and asked their dead sovereigns in their tombs to release them from their vows of allegiance before surrendering to the enemy the positions they were set to guard. But Señor Saldanha da Gama has already two dead lords to awaken : the last emperor of Brazil, to return to him the sword which, without his permission, he put at the service of Señor Deodoro da Fonseca; and then the first president of the Brazilian republic, to give back to him the insignia of rear-admiral, which he received for serving the republic, and which, on the 7th of December, he offered to wear in the service of the Prince of Gram Pará.

The part taken by Señor Saldanha da Gama in the naval revolt brings with it at least the advantage of putting an end to the system under which any ambitious leader arrogates to himself the right to speak in the name of the nation, and of disclosing the plans of monarchical restoration which have been until now a cloud on the republican horizon.

From the fratricidal strife which is now going on, the new institutions must come forth victorious, for the reason that in spite of all the difficulties incident to the reorganization of the country under the new form of government, despite the errors of the republican administration and the campaign of slander waged against it abroad by Brazilians unworthy of the name, Brazil has made within the last four years a progress unexampled in the time of the monarchy. The revenues of the state, which in 1888 amounted to about $72,000,000, are estimated for the present year at $116,761,000. The immigration, which in 1888 reached 131,745, rose to 218,930 in 1891. The States, relieved of the yoke of centralization, have in four years doubled their production, and have in almost all cases an annual surplus, a thing unknown during the empire, and which now enables them to effect their local improvements on their own account. New interests have arisen, with new men to direct them, and these cannot be dispossessed without the employment of a force far greater than that possessed by the naval revolt.

The interest of foreign nations, which in our times is directed rather to the conquest of new markets for their products than to rebuilding thrones for unemployed princes, lies in the re-establishment of peace in the great South American republic. In the unlikely hypothesis of the victory of the restorationists in Brazil, peace would be impossible because the re-establishment of the monarchy would be but the beginning of a civil war of indefinite length, which could only end like the Napoleonic adventure in Mexico : with one querataro more and one emperor less.

Salvador de Mendonça.