Getulio Vargas1930 - 1954

Background to Vargas’ Rise to Power

• 1920’s – Growing conflict between urban bourgeoisie (industrialists quickly gaining prominence) AND conservative coffee oligarchy

• High, state sponsored coffee prices = greater demand for labor and increased costs in urban industry

• Tremendous Foreign Debt: By 1930 almost 1.2 billion dollars!!!

• By 1930, US investment in Brazil = 400 million dollars. US is chief trading partner.

• Economic Crisis! Great Depression 1929-1931: coffee prices drop from 23 to 8 cents a pound

ELECTION OF 1930

• ECONOMIC CRISIS SERVES AS BACKDROP

• Tremendous burden on working class (always suffering the most!) wage cuts, unemployment, etc.

• Growing rift between power brokers – urban vs. rural – forms two political coalitions…

CONSERVATIVE COALITION

• Made up of Rural Coffee Oligarchy (led by Sao Paulo ranchers, commercial bourgeoisie (import/exporters)

• THE OLD GUARD!

• Nominated Júlio Prestes for President

• STATUS QUO

THE LIBERAL ALLIANCE

• Made up of Urban Bourgeoisie/Industrialists, rural landowners (those who resented Sao Paulo’s dominance), and other splinter groups

• Demanded change!

• Depression was proof of bankruptcy of the old order.

• Nominated GETULIO VARGAS as their candidate

CAST A VOTE FOR THE LIBERAL ALLIANCE!

1930 Election Campaign – Handshakes and

Kissing Babies• Prestes clearly ran as an

advocate of latifundio, neocolonial, old-school interests

• Vargas offered CHANGE (not too radical – doesn’t want to scare away landowners)

Promoted industrial development, self sufficiency, social welfare programs (supported by working class and women) and political, judicial and educational reform

“We should move to action with a view to the progressive extinction of the latifundio, without violence, and support…the transfer of small parcels of land to agricultural laborers.”

- G. Vargas 1930 campaign

FIREWORKS!

• March 1930: Prestes, who had the clout, narrowly defeated Vargas in election rife with corruption.

• Vargas’ cohorts convince him to lead a COUP to overthrown the Conservative government

• RESULT: The old-school coffee oligarchy that had dominated Brazilian politics since 1894 was DEAD

“THE BOURGEOIS REVOLUTION”

VARGAS is the heart and soul of this movement from 1930-1954

Made up of a very heterogeneous group:• Industrial Urban Bosses• Anti Paulista conservative landowners• Leftists calling for nationalization• Women/Minority groups (Brazilian Balck

Front)• WORKING CLASS• Foreign Capital interests

WHOA! THAT’S A LOT OF GROUPS!

“Vargas’ strategy of attempting to balance and reconcile these conflicting interests helps to explain the contradictions and abrupt shifts of course that marked his career”

- Keen Pg. 363

INTRODUCING SUPER VARGAS THE JUGGLER!!!

Vargas’ Economic Measures

• Attempted to reform coffee industry but prices remained low throughout the 1930’s

• Diversified agriculture (KING COTTON)

• INDUSTRIALIZATION - spurned on by the Great

Depression - Ind. Production doubled

between 1931-36 - A self-sufficiency glimmer of

hope!

VARGAS’ POLITICAL TRIALS AND

TRIBULATIONS• Very “uncertain” - Left or Right?• Advocated a strong central

government• His “provisional” status as

President would continue indefinitely

• Attempts to appease Sao Paulo rivalry on both the upper and working class levels

• However…July 1932 counter-revolutionary coup carried out by Paulistas. FAILED

• Vargas does not punish them! Works instead to strengthen his relationship with them

Constitutional Reform 1932-1934

• 1932: New Electoral Code

- Voting Age from 21 to 18

- Established women’s suffrage

- Still denied votes to illiterates!

• 1934: Constituent Assembly elected, drafts a new constitution, and “elects” Vargas as president until 1938

1934 Constitution

• Central planning essential in industrial development of country

• Government “tutelage” over the working class, “a class to be courted through concessions but denied independence of action.”

- Shorter working hours

- Minimum wage

- Social Security Plan

“In exchange for these gains, the working class lost its freedom of action” - Keen pg 365-366

BUT…NO AGRAIAN REFORM!

• 85% of workforce worked in agriculture

• Labor reforms didn’t apply to them!

• The LATIFUNFUNDIO was left intact

• Promises for agrarian reform made by Vargas in 1930 campaign were forgotten!!!!

(SEE SLIDE #8!!)

1934 – Begins rightward shift

• Begins to lose liberal support• Brazilian Communist Party

emerges as vocal critic• Vargas and increasingly

conservative legislative assembly begins crackdown on left.

• 1935 National Security Act – govt. has special powers to suppress “subversive” activities

• BCP crushed in November

VARGAS AS DICTATOR 1937-1945

• November 1938: After moving to the right more and more over a few year period, Vargas takes drastic action…

• Cancels 1938 elections

• Dissolves Congress

• Bans Political Parties

• Assumes full dictatorial powers!

BRAZIL UNDER THE GUN:

FASCISM???

ESTADO NOVO(NEW STATE)

• Repression reigns in Brazil - Press censorship

- “Subversives” jailed by the thousands! - Special Police established

• Rolled back progress on women’s rights and other minority groups

• Interestingly enough – very little organized resistance to the regime!

THE LITTLE GUY WITH BIG PLANS!

VARGAS’ FOREIGN POLICY LATE 1930’s

• Courted both Fascists in Europe (Italy and Germany) and the United States!

• Germany became chief market for Brazil Cotton

• German Bank – 300 Branches in Brazil

• In establishing relations with the fascists, it gave him bargaining power with the US

THE JUGGLING STATESMAN!

ESTADO NOVO ECONOMIC MEASURES

• State Intervention in economy more than ever before!

• 1940: Five Year Plan to expand heavy industry, develop hydroelectric power and railway network

• 1920 – Over 13,000 plants and 300,000 workers

• 1941 – 44,100 plants and almost one MILLION workers

• Big boom in foreign investment as well- 44 percent of total investment in stock companies by 1940

World War II – OPPORTUNITIES!

ECONOMIC:- Accelerated industrialization further

- Exportation of tremendous amount of raw materials

POLITICAL: -Played up on Axis/Allied rivalry:

Secured concessions from the U.S. to build HUGE iron and steel plant after Vargas’ warned he might turn to the Germans!

By August of 1942 Brazil declares war on Germany

Hmmmmm…..

AN AUTHORITARIAN DECLARING WAR ON

FASCISM? PARADOX ANYONE???

DOWN WITH THE ESTADO NOVO!!

• Political Trouble! Many interests groups demand an end to Vargas’ dictatorship as WWII draws to a close

• Urban worker discontent grows as well

• February 1945: RIOTS!

What is a dictator to do???

AH HA….

BRING BACK DEMOCRACY!!!!!

(huh???)

Presidential Elections called for on December 2,

1945!!!!• Vargas reestablishes political

parties and declares an open campaign season

• Oh, but announces he will not run!• Sets the stage for a grass roots

movement to convince him to do so.

• All the while, the guy makes a radical SWING back to the left, proclaiming himself to be a “father to the poor” (!!!!)

• This worries conservatives both at home and abroad.

• October 29, 1945: Vargas overthrown in a coup by military officers!

Dutra Period 1946-1951

• The very bland Eurico Dutra is elected President.

• Adopted Laissez Faire Economic Policy

• Fully opened Brazil to foreign investment

• Pro US, strong anti communist (What time is it? Cold War Time!)

1950 ELECTION:THE COMEBACK KID!!

VARGAS IS ELECTED

• Propelled into office on wave of discontent from Dutra’s failed leadership

• Workers, industrialists, urban middle class support him

• Inherited a doozy of an economic situation – trade imbalance and massive inflation

• His old school plans of state run industrialization had become very unpopular to foreign investors.

WHY??

VARGAS’ LAST ECONOMIC GASP

PETROBÁS: Proposed December 1951, Not passed by Congress until October 1953!-Oil company owned by public/private interests

- Government ownership of drilling and new refineries while private ownership of distribution

ELECTROBÁS: Same concept, but never got out of Congress!

THE TAILSPIN

• Labor and Leftists make a big comeback under a sympathetic Vargas regime.

• December 1951 demand an increase in minimum wage from Vargas – they get it!

• 1953: Hundreds of Thousands strike throughout the year to demand more worker rights

• 1954: Vargas’ Minister of Labor proposes doubling of minimum wage!

• Vargas falls under immense pressure from the right (military) to fire the minister and revoke the proposal.

• He complies and fires the guy, but afterwards denounces his opponents- Military, foreign investors and other conservative elements

THE END

• August 24, 1954: The military orders Vargas to resign or face forced removal from office.

• Vargas’ decision…

HE COMMITS SUICIDE!

I gave you my life—now I offer you my death.

Nothing remains. I have no fear. Serenely I take the first step on my road

to eternity and I leave life to enter history.

-An excerpt from Vargas’ Suicide Note

HIS LEGACY

“Vargas, oh he was the ‘father of the poor,’ as they used to say on the radio, but of course he was truly the mother of the rich!”

- Odette Pasquini

Brazilian Textile Worker

(Keen pg. 370)