Post-Abolition in the Atlantic World

Revista Brasileira de História ISSN 1806-9347

The Revista Brasileira de História integrates the portals Scielo, Redalyc and Periódicos Capes, accessible through the following URLs: http://www.scielo.br/rbh • http://redalyc.uaemex.mx • HTTP://www.periodicos.capes.gov.br

Indexing data bases: Scopus, ISI Web of Knowledge, ABC-CLIO, Hispanic American Periodicals Index (HAPI)

Revista Brasileira de História – Official Organ of the National Association of History. São Paulo, ANPUH, vol. 35, no 69, Jan.-June 2015. Semiannual ISSN: 1806-9347 CODEN: 0151/RBHIEL

Correspondence: ANPUH – Av. Prof. Lineu Prestes, 338 Cidade Universitária. CEP 05508-000 – São Paulo – SP Phone/Fax: (11) 3091-3047 – e-mail: [email protected] Revision (Portuguese): Armando Olivetti Desktop publishing: Flavio Peralta (Estúdio O.L.M.)

Revista Brasileira de História

Post-Abolition in the Atlantic World

ANPUH

Revista Brasileira de História no 69 Founder: Alice P. Canabrava August 2013 – July 2015 Editor in charge Alexandre Fortes, Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro, Nova Iguaçu, RJ – Brasil. E-mail: [email protected]

Editorial committee (RBH) Alexandre Fortes, Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro, Nova Iguaçu, RJ – Brasil Ana Teresa Marques Gonçalves, Universidade Federal de Goiás, Goiânia, GO – Brasil Carla Simone Rodeghero, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, RS – Brasil Cláudia Maria Ribeiro Viscardi, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Juiz de Fora, MG – Brasil Fátima Martins Lopes, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, RN – Brasil Frederico de Castro Neves, Universidade Federal do Ceará, Fortaleza, CE – Brasil George Evergton Sales Souza, Universidade Federal da Bahia, Salvador, BA – Brasil Hebe Maria da Costa Mattos Gomes de Castro, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Niterói, RJ – Brasil Julio Pimentel Pinto, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, SP – Brasil Lucília Neves de Almeida Delgado, Universidade de Brasília, Brasília, DF – Brasil Marluza Marques Harres, Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos, São Leopoldo, RS – Brasil Marcelo Cândido da Silva, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, SP – Brasil Regina Beatriz Guimarães Neto, Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Recife, PE – Brasil Selva Guimarães Fonseca, Universidade Federal de Uberlândia, Uberlândia, MG – Brasil Tânia Regina de Luca, Universidade Estadual Paulista Júlio de Mesquita Filho, Assis, SP – Brasil

Advisory committee (RBH) Adilson José Francisco, Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso, Cuiabá, MT – Brasil Altemar da Costa Muniz, Universidade Estadual do Ceará, Quixadá, CE – Brasil Célia Costa Cardoso, Universidade Federal de Sergipe, Aracaju, SE – Brasil Claudio Umpierre Carlan, Universidade Federal de Alfenas, Alfenas, MG – Brasil Edilza Joana Oliveira Fontes, Universidade Federal do Pará, Belém, PA – Brasil Élio Chaves Flores, Universidade Federal da Paraíba, João Pessoa, PB – Brasil Eurelino Teixeira Coelho Neto, Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana, Feira de Santana, BA – Brasil Fabiana de Souza Fredrigo, Universidade Federal de Goiás, Goiânia, GO – Brasil Hélio Sochodolak, Universidade Estadual do Centro-Oeste, Irati, PR – Brasil Hideraldo Lima da Costa, Universidade Federal do Amazonas, Manaus, AM – Brasil Jaime de Almeida, Universidade de Brasília, Brasília, DF – Brasil João Batista Bitencourt, Universidade Federal do Maranhão, São Luís, MA – Brasil Luís Augusto Ebling Farinatti, Universidade Federal de Santa Maria, Santa Maria, RS – Brasil Luzia Margareth Rago, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Campinas, SP – Brasil Maria Augusta de Castilho, Universidade Católica Dom Bosco, Campo Grande, MS – Brasil Maria Teresa Santos Cunha, Universidade do Estado de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC – Brasil Osvaldo Batista Acioly Maciel, Universidade Federal de Alagoas, Maceió, AL – Brasil

Editorial Assistant (RBH) Carolina Bittencourt Mendonça, Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro, Nova Iguaçu, RJ – Brasil ANPUH and the Revista Brasileira de História are not responsible for the opinions present at the published articles.

The Revista Brasileira de História publishes original articles in tune with the advances of contemporary historiographical production. It aims to act as a vehicle of promotion of historical research, writing and teaching practices. http://www.anpuh.org/revistabrasileira/public

contents

Foreword Alexandre Fortes and Hebe Mattos

Dossier: Post-Abolition in the Atlantic World

In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures, dance associations, and nationality in the writing of Francisco Guimarães (1904-1933) Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira

Revisiting “Family and Transition”: Family, land, and social mobility in the post- abolition period: Rio de Janeiro (1888-1940) Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa

Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship: the black peasantry of Morro Alto and the Republic that was Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer

The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa: strategies and alliances made by colored men in Brazil (1880-1919) Wlamyra Albuquerque

Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience among coffee workers in Rio de Janeiro (1931-1964) André Cicalo

The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity in the post-abolition period, Laguna (SC) Thiago Juliano Sayão

The Dangers of White Blacks: mulatto culture, class, and eugenic beauty in the post- emancipation (USA, 1900-1920) Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil: musical dialogues in the post- emancipation period Martha Abreu

Articles

Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez

A strike which endangered national security: the case of sugar and the struggle of workers for better living conditions Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s Helena Isabel Mueller

A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’: on the border between the political, intellectual, and religious spheres Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira

“We identify with civilization, within civilization”: Urban self-images in the Sertões of Bahia Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira

Negotiated division: the debates about Paraná province and the Imperial representative system, 1843 Vitor Marcos Gregório

Interview

Eric Foner Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu

Reviews

Labor, Environmental History, and Sugar Cane in Cuba and Brazil Aviva Chomsky

Assis, Arthur Alfaix. A What is History for? Johann Gustav Droysen and the functions of historiography Walkiria Oliveira Silva

Reis Filho, Daniel Aarão. Luís Carlos Prestes: um revolucionário entre dois mundos Jean Rodrigues Sales Foreword

The recognition of slaves and freed persons as historic subjects has ended up influencing studies about the destiny of those who were enslaved and their descendants in former slave societies after the legal abolition of slavery. While in Brazil the 1980s represented a landmark in the historiography of slavery, we can see the 2000s as being decisive for the historiography of the forms, conditions, and concepts of liberty in the post-abolition period. The production of books and documentaries, the holding of national and international events, and the formation of research groups using the terms ‘post-emancipation’ and ‘post-abolition’ from the north to the south of the country, are evidence of a significant field of investigation, committed to reconstituting trajectories, processes, and experiences of the liberty of the black population in Brazil and in the Americas after the legal prohibition of slavery. Due to the amplitude of the field many questions emerge. What does this signify about the post-abolition period as a historical problem? What are the meanings and limits of the legal revocation of slavery in the old slaveholding Atlantic societies? Can precise constructions be built of what this post-abolition period was? What are the meanings of the formal abolition of slavery? Are post-abolition and post-emancipation synonyms or distinct forms of looking at and researching the experiences of liberty and the legal meanings of the abolition of slavery? When did the post-abolition period start and end? What is the place of experiences of becoming free and of abolitionism in the nineteenth century? How have the politicization of the memory of slavery and the study of the present time contributed to delimit their chronological borders? In what ways does working with various concepts, sources, and methodologies question the classical thesis that blacks were ‘abandoned to their own luck,’ bringing to the center of the discussion debates related to the rights of citizenship,

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69001 Forewor d the worlds of free labor, racialization, racism, social mobility, migrations, gender relations, generations, access to land, education, and black and indigenous social relations in local, transnational, or comparative approaches? These are some of the questions focused on by the authors of the works published in the thematic dossier “Post-Abolition in the Atlantic World,” which is part of this issue of Revista Brasileira de História. Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira’s work opens the dossier with “In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures, dance associations, and nationality in the writing of Francisco Guimarães (1904-1933).” Francisco Guimarães’, or Vagalume, trajectory is used as a guidewire to dive into the universe of popular culture of the period. Miranda Pereira highlights the valorization of black agency in his columns about musical life and entertainment in Rio de Janeiro. Pereira situates the production of the popular Carioca columnist and dramatist as part of a process of dispute about Brazilian identity, among whose results were the establishment of samba as the “rhythm capable of representing nationality.” Two of the articles revisit the classic theme of black peasantry in the post- abolition period in the Southeastern and Southern regions of Brazil. In “Revisiting ‘Family and Transition’: Family, land, and social mobility in the post-abolition period: Rio de Janeiro (1888-1940),” Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa analyzes more than six decades of civil registers in the municipality of Nova Iguaçu, identifying the economic and demographic impacts of citri- culture on rural black families in the Rio de Janeiro and their strategies of social mobility. In “Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship: the black peasantry of Morro Alto and the Republic that was,” Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer looks at the political agency of black peasantry on the northern coast of Rio Grande do Sul in the struggle for citizens’ rights during the First Republic. Moving the focus to Bahia, Wlamyra Albuquerque also looks at the connections between the post-abolition period and citizenship in “The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa: strategies and alliances made by colored men in Brazil (1880-1919).” Focusing on the slave experience of the family of Teodoro Sampaio, Albuquerque demonstrates the connections, approximations, and distances between the two important Bahian political actors active at the end of the Empire and the beginning of the Republic. It thus offers

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Foreword the reader an innovative perspective of the context of the political actions of blacks and whites in the decades which follows Abolition. Two other articles look at the historiographic debate about continuities and ruptures between the slave experience and the working class movement. André Cicalo, in “Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience among coffee workers in Rio de Janeiro (1931-1964),” looks at this theme in relation to the port of Rio de Janeiro, making an innovative contribution in relation to the study of racialization of the occupational structure in the port. The theme of racialization reappears in “The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity in the post-abolition period, Laguna (SC),” by Thiago Juliano Sayão, which analyzes the hiding of race of color in Sociedade Recreativa União Operária (1903), founded by Afro-Descendants linked to the Irmandade de Nossa Senhora do Rosário dos Pretos (Brotherhood of Our Lady of the Rosary of the Blacks) in the city of Laguna, in Santa Catarina. The comparative perspective between the experiences of the two largest nations which passed through an emancipationist process in the nineteenth century are present in two papers in our dossier: “The Dangers of White Blacks: mulatto culture, class, and eugenic beauty in the post-emancipation (USA, 1900-1920),” by Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento, and “The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil: musical dialogues in the post-emancipation period”, by Martha Abreu. Nascimento analyzes, in texts and images published in American magazines, the emergence in the first decades of the twentieth century of a ‘pigmentocracy’ resulting from the intra- racial system of segregation based on skin tone. Abreu starts with the works of Du Bois and Coelho Netto to reflect on the similarities of the legacies of the canção escrava (slave song) – or ‘the sound of captivity’ – in the United States and Brazil. An interview by Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu with Eric Foner, a pioneering historian in the study of the post-emancipation period in the United States complements the thematic dossier of this edition. This volume includes six individual papers. Two of them present new results of research about the Brazilian workers’ movement between the 1960s and 1980s: “Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship,” by Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez, and “A strike which endangered national security: the case of sugar and the struggle of workers for

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Forewor d better living conditions,” by Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro. The social and political actions of intellectuals, religious, and Catholic organizations constitutes the common thematic field of “Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s,” by Helena Isabel Mueller, and “A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’: on the border between the political, intellectual, and religious spheres,” by Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira. In “‘We identify with civilization, within civilization’: Urban self-images in the Sertões of Bahia,” Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira analyzes memorialistic texts, journalistic reports, and photographs produced by the petty Sertanejo intellectuality in Bahia at the beginning of the twentieth century. Vitor Marcos Gregório, in “Negotiated division: the debates about Paraná province and the Imperial representative system, 1843,” analyzes the relationship between the creation of new administrative units and alterations in how the country’s political system functioned. The volume concludes with three reviews. In “Labor, Environmental History, and Sugar Cane in Cuba and Brazil,” originally published in English in the journal Social History, Professor Aviva Chomsky analyzes four recent books on similar themes, two of them dealing with Brazil (The Deepest Wounds: A Labor and Environmental History of Sugar in Northeast Brazil, by Thomas Rogers, and This Land Is Ours: Social Mobilization and the Meanings of Land in Brazil, by Wendy Wolford), and another two about Cuba (Blazing Cane: Sugar Communities, Class, and State Formation in Cuba, 1868-1959, by Gillian McGillivray, and From Rainforest to Cane Field in Cuba: An Environmental History since 1492, by Reinaldo Funes Monzote). Finally, Walkiria Oliveira Silva presents to the reader What is History for? Johann Gustav Droysen and the functions of historiography, by Arthur Alfaix Assis, and Jean Rodrigues Sales comments on the awaited biography Luís Carlos Prestes: um revolucionário entre dois mundos, by Daniel Aarão Reis Filho.

Alexandre Fortes Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro (UFRRJ), Instituto Multidisciplinar. Nova Iguaçu, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Hebe Mattos Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), Centro de Estudos Gerais, Instituto de Ciências Humanas e Filosofia. Niterói, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69

In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures, dance associations, and nationality in the writing of Francisco Guimarães (1904-1933) No ritmo do Vagalume: culturas negras, associativismo dançante e nacionalidade na produção de Francisco Guimarães (1904-1933)

Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira*

Resumo Abstract Francisco Guimarães, o Vagalume, foi Francisco Guimarães, known as Vagal- um dos mais populares cronistas e dra- ume, was one of the most popular jour- maturgos no Rio de Janeiro da Primeira nalists and playwrights in Rio de Janeiro República. Reconhecido pela posterida- during the First Republic. Recognized de pela publicação do livro Na roda do by posterity following the publication of samba, de 1933, nasceu na segunda me- the book Na roda do samba in 1933, he tade da década de 1870 em uma família was born in the second half of the 1870s de trabalhadores negros. Foi por isso in a family of black workers. Therefore, um dos muitos afrodescendentes que, he was one of the many Brazilians of Af- no pós-abolição, tiveram de buscar no- rican descent who in the post-abolition vos caminhos de sobrevivência e afir- period had to seek new ways of survival mação profissional. Vagalume o fez and professional affirmation. He did através de uma produção explicitamen- this through a journalistic career explic- te vinculada aos interesses e à lingua- itly linked to the interests and language gem dos trabalhadores negros e mesti- of Rio de Janeiro’s black working class, ços da cidade, cujas práticas dançantes e whose dances and carnival practices he carnavalescas sempre buscou registrar. always tried to register. Looking at his Com base em sua trajetória, o artigo se trajectory, this article seek to investigate propõe investigar como Vagalume aju- how Vagalume helped to define a new dou a definir novas bases para a cultura foundation for Brazilian culture during carioca e brasileira ao longo da Primeira the First Republic – a process in which República – em processo que teve na the affirmation of samba as the national afirmação do samba como ritmo nacio- rhythm was the most important result. nal seu resultado mais visível. Keywords: Francisco Guimarães; black Palavras-chave: Francisco Guimarães; cultures; national identity. culturas negras; identidade nacional.

* Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio). Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. leonardo@ puc-rio.br

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69002 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira

1933 marked a singular moment for Brazilian culture. Under the title Na Roda do Samba, Francisco Guimarães, who presented himself as Vagalume (firefly), published that year his writings about this music which had already become the favorite of Carioca bars and musical circles (Vagalume, 1933). Although it had been gaining support in Cariocas musical circles since the very beginning of the twentieth century, it was only during the 1920s when that syncopated musicality began to have its value recognized and praised by a large part of the educated world. Vagalume’s work represented a landmark in this still recent valorization, capable of helping establish its profile in the middle of a still rapid diffusion process. Representing, according to the author himself, “a dream turned reality” thanks to the help of a friend, the book was the fruit of Vagalume’s familairity with the African based musicality in the city and its principal subjects. Symptomatically, he opened with “posthumous tributes” to some of the best known names in black cultural production in Rio de Janeiro: the singer Eduardo das Neves, clown and compositor who became one of the most famous authors of modinhas and lundus in the city (Abreu, 2010); the compositor Sinhô, whose songs were a great success in bars and carnivals in the 1910s and 1920s (Cunha, 2005); the carnavalesco (Carnival artist) Hilário Jovino, said to have the Carioca ranchos (Cunha, 2001); and Henrique Assumano Mina do Brasil, an important alufá (a type of black Muslim religious leader in Brazil) from the Carioca black community (Lopes, 2004). At a moment when he recognized that samba was being “adopted in chic circles,” being “tapped out on phonographs,” and played on “radio programs,” he reflected on its profile based on its direct association with the cultural universe of individuals to whom he intended to pay tribute with his book. Black like them, and with whom he mingled in bars, terreiros, and botequins, Vagalume thereby gave shape to a book which had the declared “purpose of claiming the rights to samba and paying a respectful tribute to its creators, those who did everything to propagate it” (Vagalume, 1933, p.22). Although he did not present a history of the musical style, as it was limited to listing a handful of memories and cases linked to black music practices in Rio de Janeiro, Francisco Guimarães proposed to reflect on the process of the formation of samba as a rhythm. This involved differentiating it from the more strictly African musicality of cateretê, batuque, and jongo. Only “after being civilized,” he says, would this type of music be accepted as an element of Brazilian culture, capable of presenting the different segments of society. It was

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures this part of a process of intersecting, of the mixing of different traditions, which Guimarães characterized as the formation of this musical genre. However, it was not due to Vagalume’s work that 1933 deserves to be highlighted in Brazilian social thought. According to the memory projected for decades about national culture, that was the year reflection on nationality would be revolutionized by the young Gilberto Freyre, who published his most important work: Casa-grande e senzala (Freyre, 2003). On a path that was different from that taken by many of his predecessors, it was through miscegenation, understood as a positive characteristic of Brazilian cultural formation, that Freyre proposed to interpret the country in his work. It was no longer a stain on the nation, the African and Portuguese inheritance came to be seen by him as a motive of pride, capable of differentiating Brazil from other nations – an argument received with immediate enthusiasm in Brazilian lettered circles, marking a fundamental turnaround in ideas about national identity. As a result, the movement for the construction of what would come to be characterized as Brazilian culture from the 1930s onwards – a mestiça or mixed culture, with a strong base of cultural inheritances from enslaved Africans – has been taken since then to be a process of educated discovery. According to this interpretation, intellectuals and literati forged a strong and original image of the nation through the valorization of the supposedly primitive and original elements of its people, in a process in which samba was one of its strongest products (Vianna, 1995; Garramuño, 2007). Vagalume’s book was also published in 1933, five months before the appearance of Casa-grande e senzala, which therefore suggests other possibilities of understanding this phenomenon. Although the attempt to characterize samba as a mestiço rhythm, formed in the intersection of different musical traditions, at first sight seems to approximate Francisco Guimarães and the perspectives associated with Gilberto Freyre, it was not through History, or even the discovery of a national identity made abroad that he developed his work. To the contrary, his proposal of interpreting samba, already thought of as one of the first symbols of nationality, was the direct fruit of his long experience in the universe of recreational, associative, and religious practices of black workers in Rio de Janeiro, which he had accompanied as a columnist for decades. While many studies have demonstrated the relativity of the novelty of Freyre’s 1933 work (Abreu; Dantas, 2007; Lopes, 2009; Dantas, 2010; Pereira, 2010), accompanying Vagalume’s trajectory and production in previous decades, in order to understand the universe of references which gave form to his work, seems a good means of investigating with a new focus the same

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira process – in order to demonstrate how much the affirmation of a mestiça image for national culture during the 1920s, for which samba was one of its principal products, was also linked to the experience and agency of black subjects such as Francisco Guimarães.

Vagalume’s invention

This history begins on 10 March 1904, when the readers of A Tribuna newspaper found on the third page of the paper a new column entitled Ecos Noturnos (Nocturnal Echoes). Signed by a certain Vagalume, the column established a clear counterpoint with the other series in the paper: Ecos, which occupied the important space on the first page with comments about the important political themes of the day. The actual title of the new section thereby indicated its difference in relation to these writings: instead of the more respectable themes dealt with, such as parliamentary debates or the actions of the municipality, it was the Carioca night scene which would be the concern of the columnist for the new space. In addition to the title of the column, the meaning of this difference was explained in the first column, traditionally used by columnists to present their program (Chalhoub et al., 2005). While not doing this directly, Vagalume presented instead the profile of his work in the first lines of his opening column, in which he acknowledged that the new column was the direct fruit of his work in the previous months in Jornal do Brasil, one of the most popular papers in the federal capital (Silva, 1988). Having started at the newspaper in 1898, the young Francisco Guimarães found himself responsible there for less prestigious sections, such as police reports. Seen by the men of letters of the time as of lesser importance, that would remove them from their pedagogical mission of educating readers – which instead could be exercised in their columns or in-depth articles (Pereira, 2004) –, this work as a reporter of petty daily facts served as a means of defining a field of interests for him and his own style of narration. In 1901 this experience led him to start his own column in the newspaper entitled Reportagem da Madrugada (Midnight Report),1 although it did not carry his name. It was a direct report about Carioca nightlife, with an emphasis on police and criminal questions. Although he was working as a reporter, he marked out a specialty, which would come to define his journalistic profile. It was based on this experience that Francisco Guimarães transferred in 1904 to A Tribuna newspaper, in which he started to sign his own column,

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures under the pseudonym Vagalume – whose tone and focus purposely approxi- mated that of the light news about the universe of the streets. Looking at the same daily themes of Carioca nightlife, narrated in a direct manner, without any great embellishments, he transformed that journalistic practice into his own style, capable of singularizing his columns in relation to the writing of his peers. It is no wonder that the column adopted the subtitle “reporting from midnight,” which directly linked the reader to his previous work in Jornal do Brasil – thereby mixing the subjectivity of the column with the supposedly direct perspective of the issues his narrative was concerned with. The novelty of this effort in relation to his previous writing would be unveiled in the continuation of his opening column, in which he indicated that the new column would encompass the most diverse scenarios of Carioca nightlife – not only of the police stations he had frequented as a reporter, but also cafés and theaters frequented by high society and the small bars and botequins. Not restricting himself to the central region, his reports would deal with a wide variety of neighborhoods: “Tijuca, Copacabana, Cascadura, Todos os Santos, Inhaúma, Engenho Novo, Caju, in all these places we think about at the same time without knowing which to them to prefer,” he explained.2 Such geographic diversity was associated with a social diversity, which led him to focus on various subjects: police, prostitutes, workers, artists, healers, musicians, amongst many other types of people habitually absent from the important spaces of the mainstream press, appear interwoven in his writings as parts of the urban fauna of the Carioca nightlife. Vagalume was not at that time the only columnist to try to approximate the reader of the large newspapers of the world with the world experienced by black Carioca workers. In different ways, other Carioca newspapers also tried at the beginning of the twentieth century to incorporate cultural practices associated with Afro-Descendants. No matter how much they adopted the cosmopolitan perspective of the valorization of a univocal model of progress based on a European and US example, the attempt to increase sales meant that many newspapers made efforts to incorporate themes and questions capable of attracting the interest of a wide range of readers – both those who wanted to read about questions of relevance to their daily lives and those who were curious about cultural practices of subjects who were distant from them (Pereira, 1997). Of special importance here are the columns written in Gazeta de Notícias from 1903 onwards by the young Paulo Barreto. Under the pseudonym João do Rio, he made a deliberate effort to thematize the world of the streets, whose soul he proposed to look for in columns marked by their “ethnographic

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira temperament” (O’Donnell, 2008). As was common in other writings of the genre, nonetheless, he adopted a perspective of estrangement, in which he left obvious his distance and judgment in relation to the practices he presented. In an inverse meaning, it was in consonance with the point of view and the experiences of the anonymous inhabitants of the city, especially the notívagos (night owls) and bohemians, that Vagalume proposed to write his column. Placing himself as part of this social universe which he intended to present, who dwelt in the cheap theaters, the nocturnal cafés, the deserted streets and squares, and the police stations, he described them without either exoticism or prejudice, as he did with the parties and elegant events of Carioca nightlight – a posture which singularized Francisco Guimarães in relation to the other journalists of his time. Therefore, the new column gave itself over to an attempt to treat with equity the different nocturnal spaces of the city, for which it was intended to recognize and valorize subjects and practices which the habitual readers of the mainstream Cariocas broadsheets were used to see as marginals or as exotic. An explanation for this difference can be sought in the actual social origins of Francisco Guimarães. Although he was part of the staff of some of the most important Carioca newspapers, his trajectory did not follow the traditional patterns of the lettered circles of the First Republic, for which reason he was almost forgotten by later studies about the period.3 Born in 1877 into a family of black workers whom he described as “poor, but hardworking” (Vagalume, 1933, p.241), he accompanied during his childhood the process of the dismantling of the old policies of landed power (Chalhoub, 2003). It was for this reason that many Afro-descendants had to look for new paths of survival and professional affirmation in the post-abolition period. In Guimarães’ case, this path was paved by the conjunction between luck and the education received in one of the Professional Institutes created to give a future to the young people who benefitted from the Lei do Ventre Livre.4 It was from there that he left to work as an auxiliary on the train on the Pedro II Railway, the current Central do Brasil (Efegê, 2007). In the middle of the mechanical work he met a journalist covering railway news for a newspaper from the capital. At the indication of the latter, who had recognized the talent of the young man for letters, he managed to start working with the press, helping the reporter with notes about railway events. Obviously, as was to be expected in a society that had recently escaped from the bonds of landed power, luck or dedication to studies was not enough for an individual such as Guimarães to guarantee his future. He also needed to be able to count on ties of protection which could guarantee that those

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures predicated could flourish. This was what he achieved in 1893, through his devotion to the republican project of Floriano Peixoto. When the Revolta da Armada (Navy revolt) broke out, the young Francisco enlisted as a volunteer in the Tiradentes battalion, which defended the legality of Floriano’s rule. After the suppression of the revolt he was appointed an “Honorary Ensign of the Army” (Vagalume, 1933, p.242) – after being awarded the rank of Captain of the National Guard, which he incorporated into his name. It was as a result of this singular trajectory that in 1896 Francisco Guimarães got a job in Jornal do Brasil (Coutinho, 2006), one of the most popular daily newspapers in the federal capital, commencing a trajectory in journalism he would not abandon until the end of his life. Starting with railway news, he gradually assumed tasks in other areas generally considered less important to the newsrooms of the period. He thus moved from the police columns to the section of general news, until he established himself in columns concerned with Carnaval, regularly published at the beginning of the year by the newspaper. Although he arrived in the newspaper world thanks to a combination of luck, studies, and protection networks, it was through his talent as a columnist that he achieved a differentiated space for himself. By singularizing himself in the journalistic scenario of the city, the success of his writings in Jornal do Brasil led him to him moving in 1904 to A Tribuna newspaper, where for the first time he would have his own column – whose purpose was to make a deliberate effort to translate the practices and customs of the different spaces of Carioca nightlight for the newspaper’s well-educated public. From a simple reporter, Francisco Guimarães transformed himself along these paths into an important agent in the process of exchanges and intersections between the world of his readers and the universe of practices and beliefs which he came to represent in his columns – on which, like a vagalume, he helped to throw some brief rays of light.

The columnist of the small bars

Among the spaces which he privileged to describe the strengthen and singularity of these practices and experiences unknown in the lettered world, one ended up prevailing over the others in his pen: that of the small dance clubs which had begun to spread through the poor suburbs and neighborhoods of Rio de Janeiro. Concerned with giving visibility to the recreational and dance practices of black and mixed workers scattered around the city, the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira reporter honed himself in the description of dances and maxixes held in modest bars of clubs formed by them, valorized in his column as spaces of morality and healthy entertainment. This was a phenomena which, although still new, could be easily recognized by any contemporary who frequented the Carioca nightlife. At the end of the nineteenth century, Rio de Janeiro was the stage for a powerful dance fever which spread through small clubs and societies dedicated to the organization of dances and parties throughout the city. Based on the elegant model of dance associations represented by large carnival societies, which were located in the central region of the city, these associations proliferated in the poorest neighborhoods, while those with a noted black presence had a special strength. By permitting the local inhabitants to weave and organize their ties of identity and difference, these recreational spaces constituted fundamental elements in experience of many Carioca workers – which made them not only a means of entertainment, but also a channel of expression, transformation, and resigni- fication of their usual customary recreation practices (Pereira, 2010; 2012). It is no wonder that the subject gradually imposed itself on Vagalume. This is what was clear in the third column of the series, published on 14 March 1904. Amongst other themes, Vagalume dealt with his incursion into Catumbi, where he visited the offices of Yayá me Deixa, one of the manycarnavalescos clubs formed by low income workers which at that time had begun to proliferate in the city. To the contrary of the coverage of the rest of the press, who preferred to see the activities of these clubs as something for the police columns, Vagalume insisted on showing its integration in the neighborhood. “That cordão full of grace, happy, and spirited which during the three days of carnivalesque merriment in honor Momo knew how to conquer the sympathy and applause of the inhabitants of Catumbi,” he explained, acknowledging the support received by the club from the local inhabitants. Similarly, he insisted on allowing the president of the club speak, who insisted on explaining that “the group has very good people as members” – giving the example, to prove this statement, of a newspaper seller who worked on the sophisticated Rua do Ouvidor.5 The same type of posture continued to appear in the series of various columns which thematized dances held by other similar small clubs. Visiting two weeks after a party of Paladinos da Cidade Nova, for example, he stated that the dance was “good and warm.” Although he recognized some deficien- cies in the musical band which entertained the party, stating that for this reason “the pounding was stronger,” to the great joy of those present. Moving on

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures afterwards to Club dos Repentinos, in Realengo, he reported that he had also found there “good music, much order, good women, much joy, great jokes and a hearty table.”6 Days later he talked about the Destemidos Diamantinos, a group organized in the suburb of Santíssimo, described as a “beautiful club” in which he met “very correct” people. What most called his attention, however, was the music played there – which in his words, “would resurrect a dead man.”7 Writing at a moment when a large part of Cariocas columnists did not tire of criticizing the “immutable melopoeia of tambourines” 8 which characterized black musicality, Vagalume sought to valorize the original syncopated beats which animated these small dances, in which he found a vitality and harmony which owed nothing to the elegant salons. Shown here is the meaning of his writings: approximating readers to practices and customs which they could find strange, due to the equivalence and the integration between them and the cultural forms they sought to valorize. Vagalume made his column a channel of expression in a positive perspective of forms of culture, dance, and music, which began to gestate in the confluence between the sophistication and harmony of the elegant dances of the large clubs and the traditional musical forms of black and mixed workers who frequented the small salons. He thus began to valorize the morality and order of their dances, contrasted in one of this columns with the frequent riots that occurred in the maxixes opened by two entrepreneurs. “The maxixe is a necessity, but its frequented by an orderly people,” he explained, highlighting that this “was exactly what did not happen in the maxixe on Rua do Espírito Santo, because there the owners do not have moral strength” 9 – to the contrary of what was shown in relation to the small dance societies. At a moment in which the republican regime was still trying to exert itself, a process of cultural communication between parts of society with divergent interests and logics was promoted, in a posture which helped to singularize it in the panorama of lettered production of the period. It was the strength of this singularity, guaranteed by the close relationship that he came to have in his column in A Tribuna with this universe of suburban associations, which guaranteed for him for almost two months of daily columns, his success as a columnist. When in May of this year the leadership of the newspaper changed, the prestige Francisco Guimarães had built up allowed him to attempt something more daring. Giving up the newspaper, leaving his column to the care of another columnist, he assumed the role of director of small newspapers aimed at this wide public of the streets – such as A Trepação, the first issue of which was confiscated by the police in May 1904, and O

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira

Vagalume, which lasted longer.10 The actual name of his longest-lasting paper clarified his connection with the narrative perspective opened by his column “Nocturnal Echoes”: it dealt with the consolidation, as a journalistic program, of the perspective launched in those 1904 columns, which would come to definitively mark the trajectory of Francisco Guimarães. However, after a few years the difficulties in maintaining these small papers led him back to the newspaper where he had started in journalism. On 22 January 1910, there appeared in the classified ads to Jornal do Brasil the announcement of the sale of O Vagalume. Although the note stated that the paper was “an extraordinary success, producing a monthly profit of 1:000$000”, Francisco Guimarães announced that he would sell it cheaply as he “found himself ill.” Nevertheless, his recovery did not last long. Due to his knowledge of the world of the suburbs, he was rehired a little more than four months afterwards by Jornal do Brasil to direct its first suburban agency, opened in Engenho de Dentro. With a “popular program,” the aim of the agency was, according to a report in Revista da Semana, not just to look for advertising and to collect news in a region often neglected by the large papers, but also to defend its interests – both denouncing the “violence practiced by the authorities in the distant suburb” and to defend “improvements” needed in the suburban area. For this reason it was argued that there was no one better to run the new agency than “this will of iron which everyone knows in Rio de Janeiro with the name of Francisco Guimarães,” a reporter who was then in the middle of “his days of glory.”11 As a consequence, Vagalume became the legitimate representative of the interests of lower income workers in the suburbs. It was no surprise that he was responsible for writing the sections dedicated to Carnival and the dance clubs scattered around the city. Published daily in Jornal do Brasil between 1910 and 1921, his columns systematically brought to the mainstream press, in a manner that was still not very usual, the daily activities of the small clubs and associations from the suburbs and poor neighborhoods. He always opened space for the festivities and parade of groups mostly consisting of black and mixed workers. This was the case ofMacaco é Outro, a carnivalesque group formed in the house of the famous Tia Ciata, in Praça Onze (Cunha, 2001), whose activities Vagalume always made sure to report. In addition to announcing their festivities and meetings, he gave space to the carnavalescos from these groups to publish the lyrics of the songs which they would bring to the streets in Carnival – which included verses such as this, transcribed from one of his columns in 1917:

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures

Há nos fundos de uma gruta Um macacão Que é nosso chefe, é batuta E sabidão [Deep in a grotto There is a monkey Who is our leader, he is tough And wise]

Quando sai a macacada O macacão Sai na frente da negrada O sabidão.12 [When the monkeys go out The monkey Is in front of the blacks The wise]

With allusions that only make sense to those who closely knew the social universe portrayed, verses like these highlighted the conquest of their own space within the mainstream media by those men and women who were part of these small associations. Through Francisco Guimarães’ columns, they came to express the force of practices and customs previously invisible to a large part of the reading public of these large papers. Not limiting himself to reproducing the notes and news he received from these clubs, Vagalume also encouraged and publicized as much as he could their activities – appearing at dances, reporting on their preparations for carnival or announcing all the events linked to it. In 1911 he also held the first rancho competition, in order to evaluate, in relation to various items, the beauty of the parades held on the Momo days by these small societies.13 In addition to giving space to a black musicality which was still not fully accepted by the top of Carioca society, Vagalume showed with this a posture of a sympathetic opening and identification with that universe of practices and experiences he had legitimized and valorized, making himself into an ally of these subjects whose practices and production he had helped to publicize. Francisco Guimarães thereby defined a model to cover the activities of these clubs which would be imitated by other papers, becoming standard in the large newspapers in the city. Due to this posture, which won him in the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira following decades the title “Dean of [Carioca] Carnavalesco columnists,”14 he became one of the best known and most celebrated columnists in the First Republic, counting on the explicit recognition of the members of these small groups. In 1911, the members of Ameno Resedá, one of the best known of these clubs, even released in his honor a song called “Vagalume” – which due to its popularity promised to be “one of the marches of greatest success” that year.15 Also in 1911, members of the recently created Carnavalesco group Maloca do Tuchá insisted on hanging a picture of the columnist on their wall – the only one paying tribute to an individual, among others which hailed some of their fellow societies.16 For having maintained the connection with the social universe in which he praised in 1913 by an editor from the newspaper A Época as a “real caboclo,” a “great comrade and friend of his friends.”17 Although columnists like him could be used to receiving tributes from carnavalesco clubs and their members, these acts showed that the reception given to Vagalume was very particular, as he was recognized in the clubs themselves as a legitimate representative of their interests.

Look at the samba!

By privileging the activities of these small dance clubs, gradually leaving aside the other forms of journalist action he had done when he first started as a journalist – such as police reports and suburban columns –, Vagalume progressively dived into a singular universe: that of the musicality which emerged out of the modest bars in which he was frequently present. The result is that in his columns Vagalume showed a process of the continuous reworking of musical traditions and beats of an African origin from which the rhythm which years later would come to be consecrated as samba took shape, whose profile he himself helped to shape in his 1933 book.18 Symptomatic of this is a note published in his column in Jornal do Brasil in 1919. It was about a declaration made to him by Donga, one of the composers to whom the invention of samba in Rio de Janeiro was generally attributed. Donga corrected information published previously by the columnist about the influence of Mauro de Almeida, who had been his partner in the production of the song “Pelo telefone”:

– Seu Vagalume, I am not the son of Mauro, nor is Mauro my father in sambas. He wrote the verses because he wanted to and it is even a really heavy weight, it takes a lot of work to put the music into my head.

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures

You were misinformed when you said that Maestro Januário and his nephew the professor instrumented my sambas. It is an injustice to ‘Pechinguinha’. – So ‘Pechinguinha’... – It is he who has instrumented my sambas.19

As much as musicians, composers, and foliões could at that moment treat the columnist with reverent respect, expressed in the formal way he was treated by the young Donga to Seu Vagalume, also evident in this citation is that they saw in him a reliable and legitimate channel to divulge their musicality. With a detailed description of the characters of the cultural universe permeated by samba, his reports became a means of contact and communication between distinct cultural universes which increasingly intersected in the mesh of the metropole.20 Rather than just discussing the practices and experiences of black and mestiço workers, Francisco Guimarães helped to forge new meanings for them, capable of transforming them on the basis of symbolisms that were socially broader. In addition to news and reports about black recreational practices included in his columns, they were also reworked in another type of production which help stimulate Vagalume’s popularity: theater plays, which showed the same type of approximation with the interest of the public which marked his columns. This is what can be noted in 1906, when what was apparently his first theatrical composition was presented: A Filha do Campo, written in partnership with the well-known black clown Benjamim de Oliveira.21 It was, according to the advertisement published at the time, a “dramatic farce in three acts... ornated with 17 beautiful songs.”22 The fact that it was presented in Circo Spinelli, and not in one of the many theaters in the city, indicated that it was aimed at a socially specific public, probably more familiarized with the circus ring than with the dramatic stages More revealing than where it was staged, was how long it remained open: the play ran in this circus until the end of 1909.23 As well as encountering success with his columns, he also made a name for himself as a playwright, an activity he would continue to exercise in an occasional manner over the following decades. While music had already appeared as a striking element in this first composition, in the continuity of his theatrical production Francisco Guimarães would prepare enredos (themes of sambas) whose content would point in an ever clearer manner to the black cultural universe portrayed in his columns. This is what happened in 1921 in the play O capadócio, in which small dance societies formed by Afro-Descendant workers played a leading role, such as

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira

Flor do Abacate, Reinado de Siva and Recreio das Flores;24 and Iaiá olha o samba, presented to police censorship in the federal capital in 1923, in which other clubs such as Ameno Resedá, Caprichosos da Estopa and Mimosas Cravinas appeared linked to the music style mentioned in the title of the play.25 The simple incorporation of these clubs in the theatrical scene did not represent any novelty. Shortly beforehand in 1912, Luiz Peixoto and Carlos Bittencourt, two journalists from the Carioca ‘upper middle class,’ had written the burleta (or musical comedy) Forrobodó, which was a great success on the Carioca stages. Its theme was centered on a fictitious dance club frequented by workers from a Carioca middle class community, whose forms of talking and enjoying themselves were satirized in the play. Although its authors managed in this way to give form to the “identity symbols and images for a population who did not recognize themselves in the identity projects prevalent among the elites” (Lopes, 2004, p.74), which apparently guaranteed the success of the play, they did this in a specific perspective: laughing at the recreational forms of others gave shape to the play. In the opposite sense, the compositions of Francisco Guimarães dealt with the incorporation of this world in a vision built from within, without ironies or estrangements, in order to show the strength of his singularity. It was thus an attempt to configure a space of effective -ex pression for this black recreation world, in order to highlight its strength, which presented the novelty of Vagalume’s plays. This difference was expressed in the image of these clubs represented in his plays. He brought to the fore many existing recreational societies, putting their members on stage with their songs and dances – something especially strong at a moment when black characters were still represented by white actors with blackface (Gomes, 2004) –, and made them the climax of his shows, and not just a simple comic ambiance. With this he presented with to a wider audience the strength of cultural productions which were no longer restricted to the space of the exotic, configuring it as the result of an original process of preparation whose strength was hailed in his theatrical compositions. Vagalume thus promoted an operation with a double meaning: while on the one hand he tried to attract and gain the sympathy of those who frequented these clubs for his plays, in order to guarantee their success, while on the other he helped to define for them a positive profile recognizable beyond the social circuits they frequented. As a result, Francisco Guimarães made these clubs a valuable element not only of the universe of black cultures through which they were created, but also the city itself – which had in carnival one of its principal elements of

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures identity. “They say and it is a fact, that Cariocas give Carnival the cavaquinho [a type of ukele],” said one of the characters in Iaiá olha o samba, while Pierrot recognizes that “the Carioca foliões are the most devoted admirers of Momo.” The same character proposes for this reason to show in the play “the strength of the marrow of Cariocas, and of the mocotó of the creoles” – in a still original association between the black world and the identity of the city itself. Not by chance, Rio de Janeiro had in the play as one of its greatest symbols, one the rhythms forged in these small bars: samba. “Listed majesty and judge the value of this ‘provocativérica’ and ‘molimoléfica’ dance”, Arlequim asked Rei Momo:

Iaiá olha o samba... Tão bom que ele é Nos faz turumbamba Na ponta do pé [Iaiá look at the samba… So good that it Made us turumbamba On the tips of our toes]

Valorized as an element capable of singularizing Rio de Janeiro in the middle of the empire of folia, samba was affirmed as a positive product of Carioca cultural life. To distance it from the danger often associated with the circles which produced it, the lyrics of the song highlighted that it was only in the feet that he caused ‘turumbamba’ – a synonym of disorder and confusion in Carioca slang.26 However, not even for this did it stop being directly linked in the play to the social universe of the small clubs formed by black workers. It was due to the fact that the rhythm was fruit of this world that the play ended with the saluting of some of these clubs, who came on stage in the finale – such as Ameno Resedá, which was “the greatest glory of the small carnival”, or Reinado de Siva, formed by “brave and wild people.” By helping to define a positive image of types of music such as samba, Vagalume became a central piece in a growing circuit of cultural communication through which the recreational practices of black workers came to have a greater role in the mainstream media. Although he was no longer alone in this process of the valorization of the rhythm, now being praised by columnists with very diversified social profiles, the singularity of his position, matured since his 1904 columns, was expressed in the active role attributed in this process to subjects who were part of these small dance clubs – who were

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira responsible in his conception for the invention of those rhythms which reworked the ancestral musical traditions of Afro-Descendent workers in order to give them a palatable form for other social groups. Far from diluting the strength and singularity of black cultures, the transformation of samba into a musical style capable of representing the city and the country itself thereby represented, in the eyes of Vagalume, a positive affirmation of its vitality. Without restricting the universe of the music, this was a position matured in other dimensions of his reflection on the social inclusion of blacks. This was what was noted in 1923, when Robert Abbot, editor of the largest circulating black newspaper in the United States, gave a talk in Rio de Janeiro about racial segregation and its problems, at the invitation of the Center of the Federation of Men of Color.27 Abbot showed interest in Brazil, seeing in the country a racial reality different from the scenario of exclusion and prejudice which marked US society. Even though Francisco Guimarães had felt the power of local racism, having rooms denied to him in some of the largest hotels in the country, he made the Brazilian case a counterpoint to the explicit strength of racism and segregation in the United States (Seigel, 2009). This was what was reaffirmed in the congress held in Rio de Janeiro, whose title pointed to the valorization of something seen from the foreign eye of Abbot as a Brazilian peculiarity: “The true democracy is Brazilian, because it rests on humanitarian principles, established by human equality.”28 The ambience of integration and intermixing seen in Brazil, defined by one of the journalists who covered the event as an example of “ethnic democracy” was thus the counterpoint to the US example of the radical separation between the races –which “kept the two racial portions side by side and irreconcilable.”29 Although they were criticized by many activists at the time, especially those represented by the São Paulo black press, Abbot’s words seem to have been well received by Francisco Guimarães. According to the reports of contemporaries, as well as being “one of those who received Abbot,” he was also “present in all the tributes paid to him” (Efegê, 2007) – showing that he was not concerned with the latter’s integrationist position. Actually by valorizing the processes of exchange and sharing among races, Abbot pointed to a path similar to what had been tried previously by Vagalume: the valorization of integration based on intermixing and contacts, which would be a legitimate means of the social affirmation of the strength of black cultures. Although his insistence on valorizing a black culture often attacked by his colleagues in the press showed that he was distant from any conception of ‘ethnic democracy,’ it was through a similar logic that he would help to affirm in his writings the

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures value of cultural practices which were then hailed by others as an authentic foundation of national culture. It was thereby clear that it was not in an un- thinking manner that he incorporated in his columns subjects linked to the experience of black and mixed workers of his time. It was as a result of this fight in favor of the valorization of the cultural practices of black communities that Francisco Guimarães witnessed in those years the force achieved by rhythms that came from African musical influence. Actually several of the principal musicians who started to have their names associated with the formation of samba in the middle of the 1910s had received their musical initiations in the bars of these small clubs. For example, in a note published by Jornal do Brasil in July 1915 about a dance held by Fidalgos da Cidade Nova, it was stated that this would be enlivened by a “choro of strings led by the expert flautist Pexenguim and the brace columnist Sinhô on the piano” 30 – a direct reference to composers who would be later recognized as fundamental references for the establishment of samba. Pixinguinha in fact had had his first experience as a musician a few months before at the age of 15 in the carnival parade of Sociedade Dançante Filhas da Jardineira in which he played his flute (Cabral, 2007, p.19). As Francisco Guimarães recognized in 1933, it was in clubs such as Caprichosos da Estopa, Flor da Lira, Flor do Abacate and Recreio das Flores where the “people of the roda do samba” (samba circle) had been trained, who were “serving as a foundation or a mainstay for these small societies” (Vagalume, 1933, p.134). It thus does not seem by chance that in 1923 Francisco Guimarães celebrated his birthday in a party in Circo Spinelli, in which some of the best known composers associated with samba in this period, such as Sinhô and Caninha,31 took part. Seen by musicians and the members of the many dance clubs scattered across the city as a legitimate defender of their interests, in the 1920s he would reap the fruits of his long history in defense of the cultural practices of the world of black Carioca workers – which transformed him into a singular columnist in the middle of the lettered Carioca world. At a moment in which men of letters in the federal capital were enchanted by a radical cos- mopolitism based on a European model, which sought in the large European capitals the cultural model to be pursued in Rio de Janeiro (Sevcenko, 1989; Needell, 1993), it was through the deliberate valorization of cultural practices that were often condemned by their peers that Vagalume won recognition. However, this valorization occurred in a specific perspective. Far from taking these practices and customs as elements of affirmation of an exclusive ethnic identity, with an essentialist nature, he made the strength of dances and

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira songs, which he did not tire of propagandizing, a means of affirming the legitimacy and vitality of African cultural heritage adapted and integrated in the new times. Vagalume could in this way present them as part of the modern image of the nation which was trying to be built at the beginning of the 1920s, albeit from a very specific viewpoint – at a moment when other actors began to discover in the primitivism of popular traditions the mark of singularity capable of turning national cultures modern (Garramuño, 2007) –, the writings of Francisco Guimarães showed that there was nothing casual about this discovery – it was the fruit of a long struggle for legitimacy waged by him and the men and women of his social milieu. It was thus at the beginning of the 1930s, in the middle of controversies which tried to defined in a univocal manner the form and origin of the musical forms by then consecrated as the national rhythm, that Francisco Guimarães decided to defend this history with the book Na roda do samba. Fruit of a long history of cultural connections and clashes which had one of its principal agents and witnesses in Vagalume, the book was concerned with valorizing the agency of blacks in the configuration of that musical style capable of representing nationality. Far from seeing himself as a unique subject in this process, as if he were a type of cultural mediator redefining the directions of nationality, it was the many musicians, dancers, and anonymous foliões who participated on a daily basis in the dance universe portrayed in his columns and plays to whom the credits for the creation of the rhythm were attributed. Vagalume’s writing permits us to understand how, from the point of view of the black and mixed men and women like him, the process of the affirmation of this new image of connected nationality occurred from the 1920s onwards – which had as one of its supports the syncopated musicality gestated in the small bars, whose echoes we can still try to hear beyond the filters of modernist memory.

REFERENCES

ABREU, Martha. O “crioulo Dudu”: participação política e identidade negra nas his- tórias de um músico cantor (1890-1920). Topoi, Rio de Janeiro, v.1, n.20, jan.-jun. 2010. ABREU, Martha; DANTAS, Carolina. Música popular, folclore e nação no Brasil, 1890- 1920. In: CARVALHO, José Murilo (Org.) Nação e cidadania no Império: novos horizontes. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2007. CABRAL, Sérgio. As escolas de samba do Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro: Lumiar, 1996.

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures

CABRAL, Sérgio. Pixinguinha: vida e obra. Rio de Janeiro: Funarte, 2007. CHALHOUB, Sidney. Machado de Assis, historiador. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2003. CHALHOUB, Sidney; PEREIRA, Leonardo; NEVES, Margarida. História em cousas miúdas: capítulos de história social da crônica no Brasil. Campinas, SP: Ed. Uni- camp, 2005. COUTINHO, Eduardo Granja. Os cronistas de momo: Imprensa e carnaval na Primeira República. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRJ, 2006. CUNHA, Maria Clementina Pereira. De sambas e passarinhos, as claves do tempo nas canções de Sinhô. In: CHALHOUB, Sidney; NEVES, Margarida de Souza; PEREI- RA, Leonardo Affonso de Miranda (Org.) História em coisas miúdas: crônicas e cronistas do Brasil. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2005. CUNHA, Maria Clementina Pereira. Ecos da folia: uma história social do carnaval carioca entre 1880 e 1920. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2001. DANTAS, Carolina Vianna. O Brasil café com leite: mestiçagem e identidade nacional em periódicos, Rio de Janeiro, 1903-1914. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. Casa Rui Barbosa, 2010. EFEGÊ, Jota. Figuras e coisas da música popular brasileira. Rio de Janeiro: Funarte, 2007. FREYRE, Gilberto. Casa-grande e senzala. São Paulo: Graal, 2003. GARRAMUÑO, Florência. Modernidades primitivas: tango, samba y nación. Buenos Aires: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2007. GOMES, Tiago de Melo. Um espelho no palco: identidades sociais e massificação no Teatro de Revista dos anos 1920. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2004. LOPES, Antonio Herculano. Vem cá, mulata! Tempo, Niterói, v.13, p.91-111, 2009. LOPES, Nei. Enciclopédia brasileira da diáspora africana. São Paulo: Selo Negro, 2004. MARTIN, Denis-Constant. A herança musical da escravidão. Tempo, Niterói, v.15, n.29, jul.-dez. 2010. NEEDELL, Jeffrey. Belle Époque Tropical. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1993. O’DONNELL, Julia. De olho na rua: a cidade de João do Rio. Rio de Janeiro: Zahar, 2008. PEDERNEIRAS, Raul. Geringonça carioca. Rio de Janeiro: Briguet, 1946. PEREIRA, Leonardo. O carnaval das letras: imprensa e folia no Rio de Janeiro do século XIX. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2004. PEREIRA, Leonardo. O Prazer das Morenas: bailes, ritmos e cruzamentos culturais nos clubes dançantes da Primeira República. In: MARZANO, Andréa; MELLO, Victor. Vida divertida: histórias do lazer no Rio de Janeiro (1830-1930). Rio de Janeiro: Apicuri, 2010. PEREIRA, Leonardo. Sobre confetes, chuteiras e cadáveres: a massificação cultural no Rio de Janeiro de Lima Barreto. Projeto História, n.14, p.231-241, fev. 1997.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Leonardo Affonso de Miranda Pereira

PEREIRA, Leonardo. The flower of the union: leisure, race, and social identity in Ban- gu, Rio de Janeiro (1904-1933). Journal of Social History, p.1-16, 2012. SCHUELER, Alessandra F. Martinez de. Crianças e escolas na passagem do Império para a República. Revista Brasileira de História, São Paulo: Anpuh, v.19, n.37, set. 1999. SEIGEL, Micol. Uneven encounters: making race and nation in Brazil and the United States. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009. SEVCENKO, Nicolau. Literatura como missão. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1989. SILVA, Eduardo. As queixas do povo. São Paulo: Paz e Terra, 1988. SILVA, Ermínia. Circo-teatro: Benjamim de Oliveira e a teatralidade circense no Brasil. São Paulo: Altana, 2007. VAGALUME (Francisco Guimarães). Na roda de samba. Rio de Janeiro: Tip. São Be- nedicto, 1933. VIANNA, Hermano. O mistério do samba. Rio de Janeiro: Zahar, 1995.

NOTES

1 “Reportagem da madrugada”, Jornal do Brasil, 9 abr. 1901. 2 “Ecos noturnos”, A Tribuna, 10 mar. 1904. 3 One of the rare exceptions in this sense is the book by COUTINHO (2006), which focuses on the emergence of carnivalesque columns linked to the ‘popular’ world. 4 According to SCHUELER (1999), “the concern with the education of poor children and, consequently, proposals for the creation of schools, agricultural colonies, workshops, and professional institutes, were products of discussion and of the search for alternatives to resolve the problem of the so-called ‘transition from slave to free labor,’ especially in the post 1871 context.” 5 Vagalume, “Ecos noturnos”. A Tribuna, 14 mar. 1904. 6 Vagalume, “Ecos Noturnos”. A Tribuna, 4 abr. 1904. 7 Vagalume, “Ecos Noturnos”. A Tribuna, 18 abr. 1904. 8 Américo Brasiliense, “O carnaval no Rio”. Kosmos, fev. 1907. 9 Vagalume, “Ecos noturnos”. A Tribuna, 21 mar. 1904. 10 Arquivo Nacional, GIFI 6c 127; e Gazeta de Notícias, 24 nov. 1904. 11 “Vida suburbana”. Revista da Semana, 1º maio 1910. 12 “Macaco é Outro”. Jornal do Brasil, 2 jan. 1917. 13 “Carnaval”. Jornal do Brasil, 12 fev. 1911. 14 “Morreu Vagalume, o decano dos cronistas carnavalescos”. A Noite, 10 jan. 1947.

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 In the rhythm of Vagalume: black cultures

15 “Notas Diversas”. Jornal do Brasil, 7 jan. 1911. 16 “Grupo Carnavalesco Maloca do Tuchá”. Jornal do Brasil, 7 jan. 1911. 17 “Notas carnavalescas”. A Época, 30 jan. 1913. 18 In relation to the analogous processes of “intermixing and cultural creation” through the African musical inheritance, see MARTIN, 2010. 19 “Indiscrições”, Jornal do Brasil, 11 jan. 1919. 20 Without being limited to samba, this impulse is present in various other subjects dealt with by Francisco Guimarães in his writings – as in the case of Afro-Brazilian religiosity analyzed by him in January 1929 in the newspaper A Crítica in a series of stories entitled “Mistérios da mandinga”. 21 In relation to Benjamim de Oliveira, see SILVA, 2007. 22 “Circo Spinelli”. Gazeta de Notícias, 10 maio 1906. Then on stage in Largo da Pólvora, Niterói, the play reached the federal capital the following year, when the same circus performed in Boulevard São Cristóvão. Gazeta de Notícias, 18 abr. 1907. 23 O Paiz, 15 dez. 1909. 24 A Noite, 30 ago. 1921; e “O capadócio”, Arquivo Nacional, Serviço de Censura e Diver- sões Públicas, n.343. 25 “Iaia olha o samba”, Arquivo Nacional, Serviço de Censura e Diversões Públicas, n.433. 26 Cf. PEDERNEIRAS, 1946, p.64. 27 “A verdadeira democracia – Uma conferência do Dr. Robert Abott”. Correio da Manhã, 6 mar. 1923. 28 “Vida social. Conferências”. O Paiz, 13 mar. 1923. 29 “Democracia Étnica; mas politicamente uma ficção democrática”. ABC, 17 mar. 1923. 30 Jornal do Brasil, 3 jul. 1915. 31 O Imparcial, 26 jan. 1923.

Article received on January 27, 2015. Approved on March 8, 2015.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21

Revisiting “Family and Transition”: Family, land, and social mobility in the post- abolition period: Rio de Janeiro (1888-1940) 1 Revisitando “Família e Transição”: família, terra e mobilidade social no pós-abolição: Rio de Janeiro (1888-1940)

Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa*

Resumo Abstract O artigo é uma homenagem à historia- This article is a tribute to the historian dora Ana Lugão Rios, pioneira no estudo Ana Lugão Rios, a pioneer in the study do pós-abolição do Brasil. Com base em of the Post-Abolition period in Brazil. suas contribuições, o principal objetivo é Based on her contributions, the main ampliar as pesquisas sobre as experiên- aim of this paper is to expand the re- cias coletivas de famílias negras e o im- search of experiences of black families pacto sobre seu tamanho com a entrada and the impact on their size of market de produções agrícolas orientadas ao oriented production in the metropoli- mercado na região metropolitana da ci- tan area of Rio de Janeiro. With the re- dade do Rio de Janeiro. Com a redução duction of available land due to large- de oferta de terras em virtude da produ- scale orange production, black families ção de laranjas em larga escala, famílias temporarily grew in size in areas of negras adotaram como estratégia o au- small holdings, which enabled social mento no número de membros dentro mobility in certain extreme situations. da mesma unidade, o que, posteriormen- The civil registers of births from the te, possibilitou, em situações limite, mo- municipality of Nova Iguaçu from 1888 bilidade social. Para tanto, serão utiliza- – 1940 will be examined in order to dos os registros civis de nascimento do achieve this. município de Nova Iguaçu, entre os anos Keywords: post-abolition; family; social de 1888 e 1940, que, ao contrário dos en- mobility. contrados por Rios em Paraíba do Sul, são bem consistentes. Palavras-chave: pós-abolição; família; mobilidade social.

* Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro (UFRRJ). Três Rios, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69003 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa

In the defense of her Master’s in Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF) in 1990, Ana Lugão Rios placed at the center of the analysis black families from Paraíba do Sul.2 Using quantitative analyses of parochial and civil registries, her principal concern was demonstrating how black slave families were not dismantled after abolition in Brazil. Although she found their existence in the immediate post-abolition period, the fragility of information in the sources prevented her from accompanying the families over a longer period, or from evaluating the impact of access to land on the size of these families, since in neither the ecclesiastic nor civil records is color stated after the 1910s. To the contrary of what happened in the sources analyzed by Rios in Paraíba do Sul, I found in the birth and death records for the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro city that color was systematically declared between 1889 and 1939. Therefore, this paper has the aim of, in the first place, expanding and continuing the analysis of collective experiences of black families and of the impact of the expansion of orange production on black family structure after abolition. To the contrary of what is initially supposed, with the reduction of the offer of land due to the valorization of properties, the families tended to expand. As a result, in second place, I intend to analyze through limit cases how the strategy of constituting nuclear and extensive families affected the chances of social mobility. To reach these objectives I will crosscheck data referring to white, black, and mixed family structures over time – the civil status of parents, the presence of the name of the father, citation of the names of grandparents, and godparents. Moreover, the birth registers of the former municipality of Iguassú will be analyzed.3 The difference of this research in relation to what was cited previously consists of the temporal analysis, covering the following years: 1889, 1894, 1899, 1904, 1909, 1914, 1919, 1924, 1929, 1934 and 1939. At the same time I will crosscheck this information with three trajectories of blacks who were of social importance in this municipality: Gaspar José Soares – vereador (councilor) for five consecutive terms; Silvino de Azeredo – owner and editor of the weekly newspaper Correio da Lavoura; and Francisco Madeira – orange exporter.

Family and transition

Since the 1980s, the slave family and its structure over time have been the subject of research of Brazilian historians and Brazilianists concerned with studies of the colonial and imperial period in Brazil. Principally, they have sought to

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition” compare the family life of free whites, blacks, and mixed people with that of slaves.4 The great novelty of that decade consisted of the ‘discovery’ of the existence of family unity in the senzala (slave quarters) and how it affected the relationship between slaves and owners. In other words, the possibility of possessing a family opened space both for negotiation and for conflict (Reis; Silva, 2005), as well as maintaining some stability which sometimes reflected a differentiation and, why not, social mobility within slavery (Florentino; Góes, 1997). However, few researchers have accompanied families and the results of their actions after abolition. In the American case the analysis of various letters between black families, before and after abolition, allowed Herbert Gutman to identify “the family as the center around which the world of slaves turned, which also made possible the survival of African traditions and the creation of an Afro-American culture” (Gutman, 1976, apud Rios, 1990, p.48). While Gutman believes that this was possible during the period of slavery, when his analysis is extended to the later period, there is a perception that the family structure and the value attributed to it by enslaved blacks were perpetuated in the post-abolition period in the American south. In the Brazilian case, one of the first works to pay attention to the black family in the post-abolition period and access to land was Ao sul da história, by Hebe Mattos. In her research in the municipality of Capivary, in Rio de Janeiro state, Mattos found various black small landholders who a memory of slavery. According to her, economic desegregation in the municipality “opened conditions for the permanence of the poor population, to a large part formed by former slaves,” attracting a large part of the freed population due to the abundance of free land in which the agrarian organization was based on family labor (Mattos, 2009, p.135). However, in this book Mattos unfortunately does not examine the size, structure, and trajectories of families over the years. In her following work, concerned with the analysis of the meanings of liberty, she demonstrated that the slaves, when they created family ties, intercrossed hori- zontal and vertical relations of kinship, which when allied to networks of solidarity could improve living conditions (Mattos, 1995). She did not enter into details in her analysis of black families themselves in the post-abolition period, but pointed out that they were not undone at the ending of slavery. Concerned with tracing collective family trajectories of blacks during and after the period of slavery, Ana Rios debated with the classical bibliography. Her principal aim was to demonstrate the existence of black families in the post- abolition period and used for this civil and parochial birth and wedding records in the municipality of Paraíba do Sul. There she found the existence of nuclear

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa and extended families from the slavery period, but ran into difficulties accompanying them after abolition. The sharp reduction of references to color in both types of register after the 1910s prevented a temporal analysis of collective family trajectories of these agents. The final chapter of her thesis “which was intended to accompany the black family until 1920, ended up being to a great extent a chapter in which there are presented some speculations about what happened to these families during this period in Paraíba Sul” (Rios, 1990, p.100).5 Given the difficulties in accompanying the collective experiences and trajectories of blacks in the post-abolition period, the use of Oral History is presented as one of the solutions. Around the centenary of abolition, Queiroz and Janotti (1988) held various interviews with direct descendants of former slaves in the state of São Paulo. This initiative, linked to US experiences, such as the readings oriented by Professor Allen Isaacman (1996) and the works of demographic analysis through interviews carried out by a group of researchers in the 1980s in Central Africa,6 could have influenced the Ana Rios’ following work – her doctoral dissertation. The application of qualitative analysis to testimonies of children and grandchildren of former slaves in the coffee-growing Southeast of Brazil resulted in the obtaining of various narrative coincidences in the narratives of individual and family trajectories (Rios; Mattos, 2005). Later research was also dedicated to finding these individual trajectories to reach family experiences. Nevertheless, in these works there was an abandonment of the research of collective experiences, with only individual trajectories or of one or two families of former slaves and their descendants in the post-abolition period being looked at. Parochial and civil registers were only used to consult names and close family relations.7 Therefore given this hiatus, it became necessary to reach the collective experiences, involving more than two groups, as well as the limit situations they went through. Different from what occurred in these works, in the former municipality of Iguassú, in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro, I managed to obtain data about the collective experiences of black families. And herein lies the originality of this article. Among the years 1889 - 1939, the category color was mentioned 99.4% of the time in the records analyzed in the First Civil Register of Nova Iguaçu. In this way these records became a significant source and an important means of reaching the post-abolition experience in the region. Before analyzing the documentation, it is necessary to list certain exceptions. Skin colors in the civil registers, to a great extent, appeared to be divided into white, mixed, and black. It was also possible to locate other categories of color

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition” which did not remain constant throughout the period, namely: moreno (dark- skinned), clara (light-skinned) and fula (African). In a dictionary of Portuguese published in 1890, the colors are represented in various manners. White, as a noun means only that someone is of “the white color,” while as an adjective it is the “color of lime, clean, snow, milk.” Or in a better definition, “white man; opposite to mixed, black.” While for mixed men there is the following definition: “a dark color between white and black; a man of color, mulatto, of mixed blood.” For women there is the following citation: “a woman of color. This name is generally used in Brazil, instead of mulatto, as the latter has a depreciative or offensive meaning.” According to Moraes, in 1890 the black was someone from “black race; the race of men characterized by black skin; the Ethiopian race” (Silva, 1890). In 1899, according to Cândido de Figueiredo, the definition of colors does not appear to have changed much in relation to what was previously cited, only including colors not previously listed (Figueiredo, 1899). What most calls attention, at least in this dictionary, is that in the color black reference is made to the slave past “a black inhabitant of Africa; a black slave.” In Simões da Fonseca and Laudelino Freire and João L. de Campos’ dictionaries, published in 1926 and 1939 respectively, no important differences emerge in the definitions of color. For white the definition remained as “what has the color of snow, of lime, of milk,” with there being only a clear reference of the past of this group in the second dictionary, in which it is referenced as “Sir, Boss” (Fonseca, 1926; Freire; Campos, 1939- 1944). It should be emphasized that the change of meaning of these categories, which certainly occurred between 1889 and 1939 (Correia, 2006), is not the aim of this research, therefore, it was chosen to respect the nomenclature present in the documentation – white, mixed, and black. In relation to sub-registers – a problem of demographic history sources in Brazil –, it is possible to observe in the period in question a more intensive search of the civil register in relation to births than deaths. Despite the high mortality rate due to infecto-contagious diseases in the region, such as malaria and tuberculosis (Pereira, 1970), was well known and indeed of public knowledge, the deaths sub-registers massively surpassed those of birth. Despite this, the data analyzed accompanied the population increase compared to the censuses, and the sub-registers occurred in all the groups, without racial distinction. In this way, even if not possible to demographically analyze the region using them - as could be done for the previous centuries using ecclesiastic documentation –, it is possible to obtain interesting and important evidence of population growth and family structure between 1889 and 1940.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa

Family in the Metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro

Few researchers work with slave families in the second half of the nineteenth century in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro. In his analysis of the parish registers of the freguesia of Nossa Senhora do Pilar, between 1871 and 1888, where the municipality of Duque de Caxias is now located, Nielson Bezerra came upon the existence of a peculiar family. Production was not on a large scale, concentrating on the manufacture of flour, while the slaves consisted of few Africans, most being Creoles. The plantations were small and mid-sized, having an average of thirty slaves per team (Bezerra, 2012, p.118). Bezerra perceived that the name of the father did not appear in the documentation for the large majority. Seeking to answer this question, Robert Slenes stated that stable unions between slaves happened on a large scale on the large properties. Added to this, there could also exist marriages called ‘illicit,’ which were approved neither by owners not the Catholic Church (Slenes, 1999, p.96). Nevertheless, the lack of a father in the records was replaced by an intense presence of godparents. Godparentship exercises an important role within slavery, since it extended family ties and “was an instrument for recreating and adapting codes of African origin” whose purpose was to “unite people with a similar history and conditions in a common and comprehensible universe: kinship” (Rios, 1990, p.55). At times godparenting crossed the barrier of the judicial condition of those involved, since “through it [the slaves] multiplied the ties of spiritual kinship, inside and outside slavery” (Machado, 2006, p.50). As a result, adopted as a social mobility strategy, both internal and external to the plantations, godparenting tended to link the family of the baptized child to people at an equivalent or higher level in the social hierarchy (Brügger, 2007). In this way, even in the absence of the father, godparents were important figures for family configuration and were present in all the records of the region (Bezerra, 2012, p.111, 116). Unfortunately there is no other data about the trajectories of slave families from the other municipalities for a comparison, as there is also no other information about the quantity of alforrias (emancipated slaves) in the last decades, or even about the amount of free slaves shortly after 13 May 1888. It is only assumed that, since the region functioned in a peripheral form in the state economy, and since the number of slaves was much lower in comparison with Vale do Paraíba, there slavery lost force much more quickly. With the crisis among the small producers of flour, sugarcane, and coffee, and the consequent fall in the value of properties (Pereira, 1977), I wish, initially, to state here that

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition” it was possible that these black workers had access to small roças (a type of area to plant crops). Before continuing the discussion about the size of families in the post- abolition period, it is necessary to identify what I will call them. There are three types of family structure: nuclear, extended, and complex. In the first case are those in which the father, mother, and children are the center of the family. Similarly, due to the large quantity of legally informal families, it is necessary to state that in cases in which children are illegitimate (the parents are not married), but the name of the father appears, the family should be configured as conjugal. As a result, the extended family is identified by the presence of other relatives, such as aunts, grandparents, and grandchildren who live with a conjugal family. Finally, there is the complex family, in which in addition to relatives, there are also ‘aggregates,’ in other words people who do not have blood ties with the conjugal family (Johnson, 1978, p.628). With the intention of also demonstrating the existence of the black family in the post-abolition period in the metropolitan region, it became necessary to find other indicators. Initially, the repetition of names of grandparents and other relatives in the children can be highlighted. According to Rios (1990, p.49), this was a manner of “expressing, in the various slave-holding regions, an important reference in their lives: the family.” Although the citation refers to the period of slavery, the same strategy was adopted in the post-abolition period. According to Fraga Filho (2006, p.296), names and surnames were transmitted “to children and grandchildren, certainly as a form of defining and strengthening the ties between generations.” The repetition of the name is not the subject of this article,8 nevertheless, it is important to highlight that in the civil registers analyzed, of the blacks and mixed residents of the former municipality of Iguassú, there is a repetition of names, at least of grandparents, in 8% of entries. Another indicator of the strengthening of the family in the post-abolition period is godparenting. As I stated, it was adopted as an important strategy for expanding family ties, as well as social mobility, during slavery. Nevertheless, godparenting, as a research theme, has not received the same treatment in the post-abolition period. Souza, in her analysis of settlements in the interior of Bahia, came upon a singularity in the parish registers in comparison with those found in the old municipality of Iguassú. In Bahia after 1888, the parish priest continued registering the ‘color’ of individuals. Crosschecking the information referring to godparents with witnesses and oral interviews, she reached the conclusion that godparenting “became a form of acquiring advantages in the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa commitment assumed with godfathers or godmothers, although this did not signify a reduction of socially existing distances.” Surely, “the spiritual kinship established there was a strategy for the construction of sociabilities which aimed to exchange personal help, as well as to establish a relationship of de- pendency” (Souza, 2014, p.8). The practice of godparenting, even with the new clothing, remained as a social strategy in the post-abolition period. The strength of the nomination of godparents was so much that in the first years after the opening of the notary office in 1889, the difficulties faced by its staff in setting up the civil register in Iguassú, due to the recent separation that had occurred between Church and state, could be easily observed. It is possible to observe the result of the dispute in the first civil registers of births, in which the clerks, apparently still badly informed about what to enter, registered information that was unnecessary for the civil world, such as the name of godparents and the date of baptism.9 Obviously, there is clearly a need to expand the study of godparenting in the post-abolition period, which can help in the re-discussion of clientelism in the Brazilian rural world (Rios, 2007). The construction of a kinship outside parental relations has to be highlighted, as it was built through godparenting, between people declared as black and mixed. Even when non-residents, it is plausible to suppose that both in Bahia and in the Metropolitan region of Rio, godparents who were not relatives were present in the lives of black families.

Land and family

In the first years following the declaration of the Lei Áurea (the law which freed the slaves), the local coffee production crisis appeared to have directly impacted families in the old Iguassú municipality, who apparently changed after the 1920s. Between 1872 and 1890, the population changed by about 20%, falling from 31,654 residents to 25,119 in the census.10 Many apparently left the region in search of more economically advantageous regions. Probably this migration had a seasonal nature, since there are no reports, much less evidence, of a large scale definitive stampede to other regions of the states of Rio de Janeiro. This appeared to change after the 1920s, when the population growth reached the former level of around 33,000 people. Nevertheless, what most calls attention in Figure 1 is the significant growth of the population in the 1940s. According to the census of this year, the population reached 140,606, a demographic increase of 300% in only 20 years, the result of migration, principally from Vale do Paraíba and the Northeast (Costa, 2013).

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition”

Source: Civil registers of births of the 1o Ofício de Registro de Pessoas Naturais of the municipality of Nova Iguaçu: 1889, 1894, 1899, 1904, 1909, 1914, 1919, 1924, 1929, 1934, and 1939.

In the censuses it is not possible to accompany the social composition through color over the years. Apparently in the 1872 and 1890 censuses there was a movement towards miscegenation, which could have been proved if the following census, from 1920, had included ‘color’ in its data, which unfortunately did not occur. Only 50 years later would color reappear again in the census, and here whites emerged as a the large majority in relation to blacks and mixed. Even without the declaration of color, it is possible to demonstrate important information from the chart: after the 1920s large-scale migration began to the municipality of Nova Iguaçu. The analysis of migrants – where they came from, trades, and family, amongst other themes – has already appeared in a previous work, and in this article shall not be looked at (Costa, 2013). In this research, my intention is to analyze the residents of the region only. Due to the lack of information about color in the 1920s, and in order to compare the trajectories of whites, mixed, and blacks in the municipality of Iguassú between 1889 and 1940, I sought other sources. As I have stated, my research of the civil registers of births became an excellent and possible mechanism to overcome the lack of information for a 50 year period about the black and mixed population in the Baixada Fluminense region. One of the first questions in relation to the source refers to the permanence over time of access to

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa the bureaucracy of the state and the family. After all, in the immediate post- abolition period, it appears that there were no hindrances to the use of notary offices, nor to the formation of families by those leaving slavery. With the aim of understanding this process, a comparison needs to be made with the data already presented, until the 1940s. Between 1889 and 1939, the conjugal situation of parents of children registered as white, mixed, and black appears to have changed a lot. Figure 2 compares the percentages of numbers of marriages in the years in question. It should be noted that there was a progressive increment of the conjugal family in all colors. After the establishment of the civil register of births, for all colors there was a very significant reduction of single fathers and, despite a small peak in 1939, it never returned to the level of 1889. After 1894, in almost 80% of registrations the parents of white children declared themselves married in the notary office. Mixed people began with a much lower number (30%) in 1889 and ended in 1934 with almost 70% of children having married parents. Less than 20% of children declared as black had married parents in the first year of the notary office, but for mixed persons, this figure almost reached 60%. Although the parents of children registered as black and mixed married less, even with the reduction of marriages in 1939 due to conjunc- tural situations which will be discussed below, it is worth noting here that the amount of fathers declaring themselves married increased significantly until 1934.11 If the research problem is family size, attention should be paid not only to the legitimacy of the relationship of the parents, but also the name of the father and the mother in the civil registers. A large part of children in the first years of existence of the civil register were declared as ‘natural,’ in other words, the child of single parents. However, this did not prevent the name of the father being declared in some registers.12 In Figure 3, for the children registered as white, after 1894 the name of the father was present in more than 90% of cases. This number was modified for those of mixed descent, since they started in 1889 with a very low percentage; while, from 1894 onwards, the statistical similarity with white children increased. The trajectory of the presence of the name of the father of black children was no different from the others: in 1894, in less than 10% of entries was the father present or at least had the name cited; however, from 1909 onwards he appears in almost 80% of entries. In these, although a lower presence of fathers was found, this does not mean that the father was absence from the life of the child.

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition”

The absence of the name of the father in the register can be explained by different factors. In 1894, Laurentino Ferreira dos Santos declared the birth of his daughter, who was black and legitimate, the daughter of himself and his wife, Alice Ferreira dos Santos. Unfortunately, it was a stillbirth, and perhaps due to this fact, no name was given, however the names of the grandmothers were present on the register. On the paternal side were Ricarda da Conceição, and on the maternal, Rosa Maria da Conceição. The father was from a baker from Jacarepaguá, in the Federal District, but lived in Belford Roxo.13 Perhaps this register can help to explain the absence of fathers of children registered as black and mixed during the first years the notary office operated. Due to the economic decline of the region, there began to occur seasonal migrations, probably greater among men of an adult age, preventing them from being present at the birth or at the time of registration. However, other studies have also demonstrated that in the first years of the post-abolition period, a large part of the family configuration of the black and mixed population was formed of women: maternal grandmother – mother – children (Souza, 2012, p.95). What is most important to highlight in this chart is that after 1914, with the elimination of fines for late registrations, the name of the father was present in almost the same proportional for all colors.

Key: Whites (Brancos); Mixed (Pardos); Blacks (Pretos). Source: Civil registers of births of the 1o Ofício de Registro de Pessoas Naturais of the municipality of Nova Iguaçu: 1889, 1894, 1899, 1904, 1909, 1914, 1919, 1924, 1929, 1934 and 1939.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa

Another good indication of family configuration over the years can be found in the value given to the citation of grandparents at the moment of registration. Just to reinforce this, it should be noted that Figure 4 was constructed based on the citation of the names of grandmothers, therefore, it is not possible to establish if they were present in the daily life of the children or if they had already died when the registration was made. Nevertheless, the use of their names is a clear indication of the valorization of ancestrality, even when these relatives were not alive or lived far away. Despite few blacks and mixed citing the name of all grandparents at the beginning of the twentieth century, after 1919 the number of birth registrations in which they were cited rose gradually. It cannot be categorically affirmed, but it is possible that the increase of the citation of grandparents’ names for non-white children points to an expansion of family ties, and they may even configure extended families. As a counterpart of these analyses, looking at the final years of the civil register, 1934 and 1939, and comparing both the civil registers of births and deaths, the increase in single people of all colors in 1939, even when not so latent, was evident. In this year, the Baixada Fluminense region received a range of migrants from various parts of the country – notably from Vale do Paraíba and the Northeast – due to the expansion of the offer of labor propelled by orange exports (Costa, 2013). Most migrants were male, therefore their arrival in the region probably modified the matrimonial market, since it

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition” expanded the ratio of males, making it harder for a large part of the male residents in the region to get married, as well as aggravating the dispute both for labor and small properties (Costa, 2014). In summary, what it is worth highlighting after the analysis of the figures is the significant increase of people over the years indicating that they were married and the change in family structure. In other words, in the first years after abolition and until the 1920s, black and mixed families were characterized by a conjugal family. However, from the 1930s onwards this changed to an extended family. The action of registering in paper the conjugal situation of the parents is a clear indication of the valorization of the legitimacy of matrimony in itself. Comparing the groups, in first place it is clear that both mixed and, principally, blacks were much slower than whites to legitimate the family unit. Both Hebe Mattos and Ana Rios had criticized in the introduction to the book Memórias do cativeiro, the idea that the recently freed slaves did not have the capacity to form families in the post-abolition period, due to the violent process experienced during slavery (Rios; Mattos, 2005). However, none of them demonstrated the construction of families and their reinforcement over time by part of these groups in relation to access to land ownership and changes in the orientation of subsistence production towards the market.

Key: Whites (Brancas); Mixed (Pardas); Blacks (Pretas). Source: Civil registers of births of the 1o Ofício de Registro de Pessoas Naturais of the municipality of Nova Iguaçu: 1889, 1894, 1899, 1904, 1909, 1914, 1919, 1924, 1929, 1934, and 1939.

Based on these figures it is possible to delimit some stages in the change of family size during the implementation of large-scale orange production in

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa

Iguassú. In the final years of the nineteenth century, the current municipality of Nova Iguaçu underwent a large crisis in coffee production. The local administration was still based in the old town, which centered its commercial exchanges in the river with the same name, serving as a commercial entrepôt between the city of Rio de Janeiro and the interior of the state. However, during the nineteenth century, more specifically in the second half, the old Villa de Iguassú lost importance, with the principal villain being the train. At the end of the nineteenth century, the train accumulated the functions of passenger transport and, principally, carrying coffee production to the port of Rio de Janeiro (Pereira, 1977, p.53-54). Despite its secondary role, the old municipality also produced some coffee. Although the Baixada Fluminense was on the path of migrants to Vale do Paraíba, at the turn of the twentieth century, it was much more economically devastated than the latter (Pereira, 1977, p.86-87). There was no great projection of the region in comparison with the cities of Vale do Paraíba, and the planting of coffee that still existed there had been stagnating from much earlier, which even caused the departure of people, as I have demonstrated. From this data, it can be affirmed that in the first years of the twentieth century, due to the economic stagnation, there was abundant cheap land in the old Iguassú municipality (Silveira, 1988). Compared with the figures of family structure, in the initial years, due to the economic context, it can be concluded that in non-commercial areas of plantations, where land was abundant and controlled by few landowners, it was common to find conjugal families in each settlement. This happened due to the ease in obtaining lands, since younger children or newly-weds left their parents’ house more quickly. In turn, this meant that they were all separated in their own landholdings: grandparents, parents children, and grandchildren. This family structure changed considerably at the beginning of the 1920s, since although coffee growing was declining, orange production was gaining importance. Oranges had long been planted in Rio de Janeiro. Produced on small landholdings, called chácaras, in the second half of the nineteenth century they were only sold in the internal market. At the turn of the twentieth century, orange production spread through Rio de Janeiro. Plantations which had been in economic crisis were abandoned and/or subdivided. This was a typical scenario which the production of oranges required, in other words, the small landholdings called chácaras (Pereira, 1977, p.114). Comparing the charts presented above, the commencement of orange production in the 1920s had little impact on family size. The population

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition” remained on small properties; after all, since commercial production was only beginning, it was possible to link subsistence farming and extra work on producing properties. This occurred because of the seasonal demand for labor in the orange groves, since efforts were concentrated in planting and harvesting. As a result the expansion of the population in areas of small landholding and the growth of market production was symbiotic: small properties provided most of the seasonal labor for harvests, while the orange market grew, permitting small farmers to complement their subsistence production (Johnson, 1978, p.638). With the increase of orange exports there was an impact of family size, since due to land valorization there was a concentration of landholdings. It is worth noting that the majority of orange plantations were concentrated in the central district of the municipality of Nova Iguaçu, which in 1932 held 83% of orange groves (Pereira, 1977, p.125), something corroborated in the 1920 and 1940 censuses. Despite the increase in the quantity of small landholdings, at the same time there occurred a process of land concentration. With this it became easier to perceive that the properties located in these regions became more valorized; therefore, the stabilization of the poorest part of the population was hindered. With greater difficulty in obtaining small landholdings, as can be observed in the comparison of the mentioned figures with the economic context, it can be noted that the black and mixed family structure was modified. Due to these factors, possibly in Iguassú “the traditional family in commercial agricultural lands [came to be] normally composed of parents, children, married children and their wives, and other relatives” (Johnson, 1978, p.630). This type of organization in an extended family in the same property could have permitted black and mixed families, as poor peasants, to expand individual responsibility for survival. With the difficulty of obtaining access to small landholdings, the strategy of forming extended families – which at times had the support of non- parents, such as godparents – in market oriented areas, probably allowed survival and, in some cases, the social mobility of individuals from these groups

Social mobility and individual trajectories

Family organization became an important strategy for social mobility in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro city. Family size “could influence the possibilities of saving money and acquiring property” (Monsma, 2010, p.527). While in the immediate post-abolition period individuals of different colors

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa already had the experience of the conjugal family, this allowed not only permanence in the Baixada Fluminense region, but an improvement in material living conditions until the 1940s. In the first years of the post-abolition period, Rios found three trajectories of freed slaves and their descendants. The first referred to temporary migration between plantations in search of stable employment. In the figures presented above this is clear, since due to the coffee crisis in the coffee area the black and mixed population seasonally migrated to other regions, including the city of Rio de Janeiro, with the aim of maintaining possessions and family. The second trajectory dealt with the so-called ‘lands of the black’: rural black communities which possessed the property and the collective use of the land.14 However, the trajectory which most interests us her is the third one, of individuals and/or families who obtained small properties at the turn of the twentieth century.15 Blacks and mixed, landholders living on subsistence agriculture in the municipality of Nova Iguaçu, found themselves in a privileged situation when the commercial and export production of oranges began. They were neither expelled from large properties nor did they have to migrate to other regions in search of seasonal work. In their small roças, they were able to live with adult children and other persons. Analogous experiences have demonstrated how in the peripheral regions of the city of Rio de Janeiro the existence of family and access to land became important strategies for social mobility.16 In the Baixada Fluminense there was a possibility for social mobility for blacks, motivated by family legitimation and organization. Similarly, it was possible to find three trajectories of blacks who ascended socially in the region: Silvino de Azeredo, Francisco Madeira, and Gaspar José Soares. Silvino Hypollito de Azeredo founded in 1917, in the old Iguassú municipality, the weekly newspaper, still functioning today, entitled O Correio da Lavoura. Using genealogical research, Álvaro Nascimento did not manage to find evidence that proved the slave descent of Silvino; however, his grandson, Robinson de Azeredo, current editor of the newspaper, stated that his grandfather was a “mulatto, almost black.” Silvino studied until the third year in the courses of Pharmacy and Medicine, taught mathematics and was elected president of the Caixa Auxiliadora dos Empregados das Capatazias (Assistance Fund of the Employees of Capatazias). In the newspaper, the principal reports encouraged improvements in the region in the areas of health, hygiene, and education, amongst others. However, in the pages of the newspaper, there is

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition” no indication of a racial identity discourse, although every month there was an article reflecting on the Lei Áurea (Nascimento, 2013b). Francisco Madeira was principally concerned with the economic aspect of local society. According to his daughter, Almerinda, they lived in a distant part of Nova Iguaçu, called Cabuçu, but after her father’s life improved they moved to the center of the municipality, where she still lives. There Francisco was able to invest in the education of his daughters, one of whom had having a long career in the judiciary (Nascimento, 2013a). Francisco himself was a lieutenant in the army, where he was involved with the Revolt of Copacabana Fort, and imprisoned for this. As a producer and exporter of oranges, he managed to buy some trucks, as well as travelling to Argentina with the authorization of the federal government in the 1930s (Nascimento, 2013a, p.4). However, following the decline in orange production in the 1940s, he moved on to other activities. Apparently he sold his part in the citric business and his trucks, and opened a small commercial business in the center of the current municipality of Nova Iguaçu, in 1947. The third trajectory is that of Councilor Gaspar José Soares. Born on 17 June 1864, son of the Portuguese José Maria Mendes Soares and the local resident Maria José da Conceição. Due to the constant repetition of names in the registers, it was not possible to obtain more information about the mother’s origin, but it is presumed that Gaspar received the inheritance of color from her. He married twice. His first child came from his first marriage; Alberto de Freitas Soares born in the post-abolition period on 17 August 1894. At the age of 34, on 29 July 1899 he married for the second time, to Maria de Sá Bittencourt, with whom he had three more children. Gaspar José Soares died at the age of 90 on 13 May 1955 (Pessoa, 2014). To the contrary of the two other life histories, Gaspar was active in local politics. He was a councilor in the old Iguassú municipality from 1889, remaining there for five consecutive mandates. Even though he was well known, he never achieved a position within the council chamber, losing various times in internal elections. Unfortunately, it was not possible to monitor his struggle in politics, as the minutes of the Council are lost. Outside of politics he exercised various economic activities in the region as a businessman, a sub-chief of police, a school delegado, lieutenant in the National Guard, orange producer, landholder, and owner of the telegraph building in the municipality (Pessoa, 2014). In none of these trajectories, analyzed from various sources, was there any mention of a family memory of slavery. It is enough to remember that the quantity of slaves existing there in the final quarter of the nineteenth century

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa was nothing compared to Vale do Paraíba. Probably their ancestors were freed much before 1888, which could have help their relatives obtain properties before the weakening of slavery. Added to this, as Hebe Mattos states, the distancing of the memory of slavery and the stigma of the being enslaved meant that this was lost in the human mass, facilitating integration and later ascension (Mattos, 1995). It is still not possible to state how solid and lasting was the social mobility of these three example trajectories. For Francisco Madeira, apparently, the small grocery store he bought in 1947 was not at all safe, since the police acted with enormous vehemence to curb illegal games nearby. What remained of his fortune was the house where his children and grandchildren still live (Nascimento, 2013c). For Gaspar José Soares, the political and economic capital were apparently lost during the Vargas administration and were not perpetuated by his children. For this reason it was not possible to accompany his family trajectory until the present, and his actions as a councilor were silenced in the memory of the city of Nova Iguaçu. While for Silvino Azeredo and his descendants, social mobility was converted into political status. The journal is still published and is quite influential; nevertheless, it operated in a badly kept warehouse and seems not to have resulted in material gains for his descendants.

Final considerations

In this article, in tribute to Ana Maria Lugão Rios, I sought to expand the research about the collective experiences of black families and the impact on their size of the entrance of market oriented production in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro city. To the contrary of the bibliography cited – which is dedicated either to the slave family or individual trajectories –, this work intends to contribute historiographically to the comprehension of collective histories of the lives of blacks, whether or not they were the direct descendants of former slaves, in the post-abolition period. Part of the originality of the text consisted of the analysis of civil registers of births in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro. In this region it was possible to encounter references to the category ‘color’ in practically all the records, which was not observed in other research about the same period and theme. With the purpose of demonstrating both the existence of the black families and their permanence and transformation in the first decades of the twentieth century, I observed in the records references to the legitimacy of the couple’s matrimony, the presence of the name of the father and grandparents.

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition”

It was thus possible to observe that both black and mixed families were present and expanded over the years. The impact of family size could be linked to economic changes in the region. In the first years following abolition and until the 1920s, black and mixed families were characterized as conjugal, but after the 1930s they became extended. In the first cohort analyzed there was an abundance of vacant land, many plantations were subdivided and/or abandoned, which to an extent allowed all family members to possess a small piece of land. Entering the 1930s – at the peak of the commercial production of oranges – there was a reduction in the offer of land, due to the valorization of properties. As a result few managed to keep their properties, obliging the rest of the family to concentrate in the same household. The strategy of creating nuclear and extended families affected the chances of social mobility in the region. For the old residents who managed to organize themselves in extended families and to obtain small properties, social ascension was possible. I thus found three individuals of importance in the region: Silvino Hypollito de Azeredo, Francisco Madeira, and Gaspar José Soares – founder of the newspaper O Correio da Lavoura, an important citric trader, and a councilor for five consecutive mandates, respectively. For blacks and mixed persons, whether or not direct descendants of former slaves, in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro city, the family was the axis around which their world turned. The existence and perpetuation of the family over the years made possible the survival, creation, and transmission of their social and cultural traditions (Rios, 1990, p.48), at the same time that the obtaining of extensions of land allowed the social mobility of some, even if this was fragile.

REFERENCES

ALMEIDA, Alfredo Wagner B. de (Org.). Terras de preto no Maranhão: quebrando o mito do isolamento. São Luís: Centro de Cultura Negra do Maranhão (CCN-MA) e Sociedade Maranhense de Direitos Humanos (SMDH), 2002. AZEVEDO, Eliane S. Sobrenomes no Nordeste e suas relações com a heterogeneidade étnica. Estudos Economicos, São Paulo, n.13, p.103-116, 1983. BEZERRA, Nielson. A cor da Baixada: escravidão, liberdade e pós-abolição no recôn- cavo da Guanabara. Duque de Caxias, RJ: APPH-Clio, 2012. BRÜGGER, Silvia Maria Jardim. Minas patriarcal: família e sociedade. São João Del Rei, séculos XVIII e XIX. São Paulo: Annablume, 2007.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa

CORREIA, Margarita. A discriminação racial nos dicionários de língua: tópicos para discussão, a partir de dicionários portugueses contemporâneos. Revista Alfa, São Paulo, v.50, n.2, p.155-171, jul.-dez. 2006. COSTA, Carlos Eduardo. De pé calçado: família, trabalho e migração na Baixada Flu- minense, RJ. (1888-1940). Tese (Doutorado em História Social) – Programa de Pós-Graduação em História Social, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ). Rio de Janeiro, 2013. COSTA, Carlos Eduardo. Faltam braços no campo e sobram pernas na cidade: Migra- ção e trabalho no Pós-abolição brasileiro. Baixada Fluminense (RJ, 1888-1940). In: ABREU, Martha; MATTOS, Hebe; DANTAS, Carolina. Histórias do pós-abolição no mundo atlântico: identidades e projetos políticos. vol. 2. Niterói, RJ: Ed. UFF, 2014. DANTAS, Carolina V. Manoel da Motta Monteiro Lopes (1867-1910). Trajetória e itinerários de um político negro no pós-abolição. In: ENCONTRO DE PÓS-DOU- TORES DO PPGH/UFF, 1-2., 2010. Niterói. Anais... Niterói: Ed. UFF, 2010. FERREIRA, Marieta de M. Em busca da idade do ouro: as elites fluminenses na Primei- ra República (1889-1930). Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRJ, 1994. FETTER, Bruce. Demography from scanty evidence: Central Africa in the colonial era. London: Lynne Rienner, 1990. FIGUEIREDO, Cândido de. Novo dicionário da língua portuguesa. Lisboa: Tavares Cardoso e Simão, 1899. FLORENTINO, Manolo; GÓES, José Roberto. A paz das senzalas: famílias escravas e tráfico atlântico, Rio de Janeiro, c.1790-c.1850. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasi- leira, 1997. FONSECA, Simões da. Dicionário da língua portuguesa. Rio de Janeiro: Garnier, 1926. FRAGA FILHO, Walter. Encruzilhadas da liberdade: histórias de escravos e libertos na Bahia (1870-1910). Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2006. FREIRE, Laudelino de O.; CAMPOS, João Luís de. Grande e novíssimo dicionário da língua portuguesa. Rio de Janeiro: A Noite, 1939-1944. GUIMARÃES, Elione Silva. Terra de preto: usos e ocupação da terra por escravos e libertos (Vale do Paraíba mineiro, 1850-1920). Niterói, RJ: Ed. UFF, 2009. GUTMAN, Herbert. The black family in slavery and freedom, 1750-1925. New York: Pantheon Books, 1976. ISAACMAN, Allen. Cotton is the mother of poverty: peasants, work, and rural struggle in colonial Mozambique, 1938-1961. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1996. JOHNSON, Ann Hagerman. The impact of market agriculture on family and household structure in nineteenth century Chili. Hispanic American Historical Review, Durham, v.58, n.4, p.625-648, 1978.

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition”

LONER, Beatriz Ana. Antônio: de Oliveira a Baobab. In: GOMES, F.; DOMINGUES, P. Experiências da emancipação: biografias, instituições e movimentos sociais no pós-abolição (1890-1980). São Paulo: Selo Negro, 2011. MACHADO, Cacilda. As muitas faces do compadrio de escravos: o caso da Freguesia de São José dos Pinhais (PR), na passagem do século XVIII para o XIX. Revista Brasileira de História, São Paulo, v.26, n.52, p.49-77, dez. 2006. MATTOS, Hebe Maria. Ao sul da história: lavradores pobres na crise do trabalho escravo. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 2009. MATTOS, Hebe Maria. Das cores do silêncio: os significados da liberdade no Sudeste escravista: Brasil século XIX. Rio de Janeiro: Arquivo Nacional, 1995. MATTOSO, Kátia de Queirós. Ser escravo no Brasil. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1982. MONSMA, Karl. Vantagens de imigrantes e desvantagens de negros: emprego, propriedade, estrutura familiar e alfabetização depois da abolição no oeste paulista. DADOS – Revista de Ciências Sociais, Rio de Janeiro, v.53, n.3, p.509-543, 2010. MOTTA, José Flávio. Corpos escravos, vontades livres: estrutura de posse de cativos e família escrava em um núcleo cafeeiro (Bananal, 1801-1829). Tese (Doutorado em Economia) – Departamento de Economia, Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo, 1990. NASCIMENTO, Álvaro P. 13 de maio: memória da escravidão e educação nas páginas do Correio da Lavoura. In: FORTES, Alexandre et al. (Org.) Cruzando fronteiras: novos olhares sobre a história do trabalho. São Paulo. Fundação Perseu Abramo, 2013b. NASCIMENTO, Álvaro P. Francisco Madeira, a visibilidade de um comerciante negro no pós abolição: economia e mobilidade em Nova Iguaçu. In: XVII SIMPÓSIO NACIONAL DE HISTÓRIA (ANPUH), XVII., 2013, Natal. Anais... São Paulo: Anpuh, 2013c. NASCIMENTO, Álvaro P. Trajetórias de duas famílias negras no pós-abolição: Nova Iguaçu, século XX. In: ENCONTRO ESCRAVIDÃO E LIBERDADE NO BRASIL MERIDIONAL, VI., 2013, Florianópolis. Anais... Florianópolis: Ed. UFSC, 2013a. PALMA, Rogério da; TRUZZI, Osvaldo Mário Serra. O pós-abolição e suas dinâmicas de sociabilidade: lógicas familiares e relações interpessoais no oeste paulista cafeeiro. Revista Brasileira de Estudos Populacionais São Paulo, v.30, n.2, jul.-dez. 2013. PEREIRA, Waldick. A mudança da vila. Duque de Caxias, RJ: Arsgráfica, 1970. PEREIRA, Waldick. Cana, café e laranja: história econômica de Nova Iguaçu. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 1977. PESSOA, Valdirene. Gaspar José Soares: a trajetória de um negro na política fluminense no pós-abolição (1890-1950). Monografia – Departamento de História e Economia, Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro (UFRRJ). Seropédica, RJ, 2014.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa

QUEIROZ, Suely Robles; JANOTTI, Maira de Lourdes. Memórias da escravidão em famílias negras de São Paulo. Revista do Instituto de Estudos Brasileiros, São Paulo, v.28, p.77-89, 1988. REIS, Isabel Cristina. A família negra no tempo da escravidão: Bahia, 1850-1888. Tese (Doutorado em História) – Universidade Estadual de Campinas. Campinas, 2007. REIS, João José; SILVA, Eduardo. Negociação e conflito: a resistência negra no Brasil escravista. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2005. RIOS, Ana Maria Lugão. Família e Transição: famílias negras em Paraíba do Sul, 1872- 1920. Dissertação (Mestrado em História) – Programa de Pós-Graduação em His- tória, Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), 1990. Niterói, RJ, 1990. RIOS, Ana. Campesinato negro no período pós-abolição: repensando Coronelismo, enxada e voto. Cadernos IHU Ideias, São Leopoldo, RS, n.76, p.1-19, 2007. RIOS, Ana; MATTOS, Hebe. Memórias do cativeiro: família, trabalho e cidadania no pós-abolição. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2005. ROCHA, Cristiany M. Histórias de famílias escravas. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2004. SILVA, Antonio de Moraes. Diccionario da lingua portuguesa. 8.ed. rev. e ampl. Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, 1890. SILVEIRA, Jorge Luís Rocha da. Transformações na estrutura fundiária de Nova Iguaçu durante a crise do escravismo fluminense. Dissertação (Mestrado em História) – Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF). Niterói, 1988. SIQUEIRA, Ana Paula P de. As relações familiares estabelecidas no cativeiro e no pós- -abolição em Palmas-PR. Tempos Históricos, Toledo, v.16, p.151-171, 2012. SLENES, Robert Wayne. Na senzala, uma flor: esperanças e recordações na formação da família escrava, século XIX. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, 1999. SOUZA, Edinelia Maria O. Compadrio e sociabilidades na Bahia pós-abolição. In: ENCONTRO ANPUH, XVI., 2014, Natal. Anais... São Paulo: Anpuh, 2014. SOUZA, Edinelia Maria O. O pós-abolição na Bahia: hierarquias, lealdades e tensões sociais em trajetórias de negros e mestiços de Nazaré das Farinhas e Santo Antonio de Jesus – 1888/1930. Tese (Doutorado em História Social) – Programa de Pós- Graduação em História Social, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ). Rio de Janeiro, 2012. WEIMER, Rodrigo de Azevedo. Os nomes da liberdade: experiências de autonomia e práticas de nomeação em um município da serra rio-grandense nas duas últimas décadas do século XIX. Dissertação (Mestrado) – Departamento de História, Ins- tituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas, Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos (Unisinos). São Leopoldo, RS, 2007.

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Revisiting “Family and Transition”

NOTES

1 I would like the thank the Humanities Project of CNPq and Faperj for the funding from the Faperj Note 10 Grant. 2 Professor Ana Maria Lugão Rios belonged to the teaching staff of the Department of the Post-Graduate Program in Social History in UFRJ until 2012, when she died. Among her works, Memórias do cativeiro stands out as it expanded the discussion about the post- -abolition period in Brazil (RIOS; MATTOS, 2005). 3 The former municipality of Iguassú consisted of the current municipalities, emancipated from the 1940s onwards: Japeri, Queimados, Duque de Caxias, Belford Roxo, São João de Meriti, Nilópolis, and Nova Iguaçu. 4 I do not intend to debate all here, but it is enough to cite the classic works: MATTOSO (1982); FLORENTINO (1997); SLENES (1999); MOTTA (1990); ROCHA (2004); REIS (2007). 5 This difficulty in the analysis of the birth and death registers, which impeded a temporal analysis prevented a temporal analysis of the family structure, was also encountered by Hebe Mattos (MATTOS, 1995). 6 During the colonial period in Angola no consistent demographic censuses were carried out and the few existing records are extremely flawed. With the aim of resolving these problems and implementing future public policies, this group organized and created a new work methodology which, based on interviews, made population estimates for the colonial past (FETTER, 1990). 7 See: MOSNMA (2010); PALMA (2013); NASCIMENTO (2013a); WEIMER (2013); SOUZA (2012); SIQUEIRA (2012). 8 For a more profound reflection on the role of the name during the period of slavery and later, see: GUTMAN (1976); WEIMER (2007); AZEVEDO (1983). 9 “Number one. Birth Certificate. On the second day of January in the year of the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ ... whose child was baptized with the name of Maria, as there was no time to bring it to church, maternal granddaughter of Juniana do Espírito Santo, with the godparents being the declarant and Rozalina Luiza Xavier, he a newspaper seller and she a domestic worker, resident in this parish...” (Registro Civil de Nascimento de Nova Iguaçu do 1o Ofício (RCN), livro 1, p. 1 reg. 1, de 1889, emphasis added). 10 In the 1872 and 1890 censuses the municipalities of Iguassú and Estrella were added, which on the occasion consisted of almost all of Baixada Fluminense. 11 Among the single men it was possible to find promises of marriage in the civil registry. In the 14 registers found, all concentrated in 1889, those present referred to the consented matrimony in the Catholic Church and not to civil marriage. Five white couples and one only mixed registered their intentions in a notary office. 12 One of the few cases in which a child is declared as ‘natural’ and the father is cited is that

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 23 Carlos Eduardo Coutinho da Costa of Carmello. His father, José Baroni, went to the notary office on 2 February 1899 to declare the birth of his child, of the male sex, white, and ‘natural’ legitimacy in the location of Rangel. The father is from Italy and the mother, Josélia Maria da Conceição, from this state; the paternal grandparents are mentioned and only the maternal grandmother is on the register (RCN, livro 6, reg. 355, ano de 1899). 13 RCN, livro 4, reg. 58, ano de 1894. 14 In the region of Baixada Fluminense, it is possible to find some of them, such as Maria Conga, in the municipality of Magé. In relation to the question, cf. GUIMARÃES (2009); MATTOS (2005, 2006); ALMEIDA (2002). 15 Previous research has shown that in the metropolitan and rural regions that it was possible for former slaves to obtain small properties (MATTOS, 2009). 16 See: LONER (2011); DANTAS (2010); NASCIMENTO (2013c).

Article received on January 29, 2015. Approved on February 22, 2015.

24 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship: the black peasantry of Morro Alto and the Republic that was1 Sr. Sidão Manoel Inácio e a conquista da cidadania: o campesinato negro do Morro Alto e a República que foi

Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer*

Resumo Abstract O presente artigo tem o objetivo de ana- This article aims to analyze the possi- lisar as possibilidades de conquista de bilities of conquest of citizen rights by direitos cidadãos por parte do campesi- the black peasantry of Rio Grande do nato negro do Rio Grande do Sul duran- Sul, the southern Brazilian state, during te a Primeira República, tomando o lito- the First Republic. This state’s northern ral norte do estado como locus de coast is our locus of observation. We observação. Contesto, ou ao menos bus- contest, or at least try to relativize, the co relativizar, a historiografia que enfati- bibliography that emphasizes the limi- za as limitações e obstáculos desse seg- tations and obstacles faced by this pop- mento populacional, oriundo da ulation group, which emerged out of escravidão, para atingir tais prerrogati- slavery, to reach these prerogatives. We vas. Procuro demonstrar os esforços e try to demonstrate attempts and success eventuais êxitos no alcance desses objeti- to achieve these aims through three im- vos por meio de três grandes questões: o portant questions: the regular payment pagamento regular de impostos, o acesso of taxes, access to police and justice, and à polícia e à justiça e a atuação militar. involvement in the military. Palavras-chave: campesinato negro; Keywords: black peasantry; post-aboli- pós-abolição; cidadania. tion; citizenship.

In a undated letter in the possession of the granddaughter of the recipient, a person by the name of Saturnino Bernardo Souza, in addition to the habitual pleasantries in which he wished good health to Manoel Inácio Marques, presented some figures from a current account he held. I cite this document due to the manner in which Saturnino addressed Manoel Inácio: Sr Sidão. – an

* Fundação de Economia e Estatística (FEE), Rio Grande do Sul. Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil. rodrigo. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69004 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer abbreviation of citizen – Manoel Inácio.2 Manoel Inácio Osório Marques (1847-1906) was a slave from the Morro Alto planation, who had assumed the surname of his former master when freed (1884). Living with his first cousin Felisberta, also a slave, he left a large number of descendants who, with the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of other slaves, demanded the right to the lands of the old plantation, as they had been recognized as “remnants of quilombos.” Morro Alto quilombo is located on the frontier between the Gaucho municipalities of Osório and Maquiné, on the northern coast of Rio Grande do Sul. The territory demanded today covers Morro Alto (a junction between a branch of Highway BR-101 and RS-407), Aguapés, Barranceira, Faxinal do Morro Alto, Ramalhete, Borba, Ribeirão, Despraiado and Prainha. There slaves had once raised cattle and planted sugarcane. Nowadays their descendants carry out the same activities, but also plant bananas, extract min- erals, and form the seasonal labor force for the summer Gaucho beaches. Manoel Inácio, said by his descendants to have been the son of the senhor (literally the lord, the plantation owner), was a specialized captive: a carpenter, he was able to accumulate a nest-egg which allowed him acquire land from the plantation family for his own family. Nor was Tampouco Felisberta a slave who worked on the plantations: rather she worked on domestic tasks, which gave her descendants a certain sense of distinctiveness. The idea of citizenship already seemed to be incorporated in experience of the region, at least as the vocative used by Saturnino to address Manoel. The meaning of this citizenship in the rural areas of Rio Grande do Sul at the beginning of the twentieth century has to be substantialized, especially considering that it approached by the historiography under the sign of incompleteness. Although the idea of citizen should be denaturalized – due to its variable and contextual historic dimension –, in Morro Alto at the beginning of the twentieth century it was the order of the day. The aim of this article is therefore to problematize disputes over access to citizenship and modes of relationship with the state apparatus, investigating three aspects: attempts at regularizing landholding, use of the judicial system, and military engagement. Some studies, even while they do not deny the real difficulties for citizen participation between 1889 and 1930, have questioned the perception of the rural population as a body easily manipulated – an electoral ‘corral’– by powerful ranchers (Rios, 2007; Mattos, 2012). This vision was frequently part of a widespread stigmatization diffused by the ideologues of the Vargas Era about the period which preceded them. Seen as a moment of backwardness, chaos and disorganization, the ‘Old’ Republic was little by little crystalized in the

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship political imagination as a moment of fraudulent political procedures and the dominance of the ‘coronel’ over the population. In accordance with this perspective the people were incapable of collective action. However as Gomes and Abreu note, “still unknown, basically due to a lack of studies, a rich movement of actors – intellectuals, workers, sectors of the middle and working classes – involved in the field of political tradition” (Abreu; Gomes, 2009, p.4). The purpose of this article is to give a response to his historiographic demand, in relation to the former slaves and their descendants on the north coast of Rio Grande do Sul in the post-abolition period. They were not social subjects stripped of will and they used the possibilities available to them, aiming at inserting themselves as citizens. In his study of social movements simultaneous and subsequent to abolition in the Recôncavo Baiano region, Fraga Filho (2006, Epílogo) highlighted in the struggle for the expansion of spaces of citizenship one of the meanings leant by former slaves to liberty, and one of the objectives aimed at when the appeal to racial hierarchies sought to hinder the exercise of civil equality. Although he did not expand on this as much as it deserved, it is of great relevance that he postulated it, especially because of some works of reference which tend to problematize citizenship in the post-abolition period from a negative perspective. Following the steps of the Bahian historian, I propose here an investigative exercise – diminutive of course, since it is restricted to a narrowly delimited region and to a very reduced family base sample – into how descendants of slaves linked liberty and citizenship, to the extent that each term in the pair was reached and expanded through the affirmation of the other. What was found was an active posture in relation to the state, and not always reactive, since occupying its spaces and having it as an interlocutor were possibilities incorporated in their strategies for life in freedom. For the investigation, I gathered a very wide diversity of documents: interviews stored in the Laboratory of Oral and Image History of Fluminense Federal University (Laboratório de História Oral e Imagem da Universidade Federal Fluminense – hereafterL ABHOI-UFF), family documents ceded by residents of the region and copied by me, as well as sparse papers from notary offices and public administration collected in archives in Rio Grande do Sul, such as Osório Public Archive and the Public and Historical Archives of the State of Rio Grande do Sul. The methodology used to deal with this wide variety of documents was the reconstitution of individual and family trajectories – such as those of Manoel Inácio Marques and his descendants – of a segment

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer recognizable as belonging to the local elite of the black peasantry of the region. I discovered that it managed to establish itself in its own glebe. I admit that this is not a representative segment of the local population in statistical terms, therefore the conclusions extracted from here are not intended to generalize the case. Nevertheless, they point to interesting paths for new research that do not necessarily refer to the north coast of Rio Grande do Sul: while they do not exactly indicate shared behavior, at least they show available possibilities which, despite not being in the reach of everyone, could lead to the relativization of some apparent interpretative consensuses. A focus of this nature contrasts with some established historiographic narratives about the question. For conciseness, I chose to look at the bibliography from the 1980s onwards, not dealing with classic readings, such as Florestan Fernandes (Fernandes; Bastide, 1971; Fernandes, 1965). Nevertheless, my criticism is also directed at the São Paulo Sociological School, since this also emphasized the lack of access of blacks to citizenship. In a more recent approach, José Murilo de Carvalho (1987), in his study of the implementation of the Republic, directed his focus at the frustrations of contemporaries in relation to the new regime. In studies of the First Republic there is a tendency to privilege the urban, although, for example, in 1920, 73.56% of the population of Rio Grande do Sul lived in rural zones (Fundação de Economia..., 1981, p.127). Carvalho perceived a divorce between the Republic, city, and citizenship, lecturing about the “Republic that never was,” in other words it focused on abortive republican projects, as perceived by the inhabitants of the capital. However, at no moment did he intend to generalize his analysis beyond the reality of Rio de Janeiro. Nevertheless, the Republic is melancholically characterized by an unsubstantiated citizenship. In a more recent work, the same author relativizes some of his positions, admitting possibilities of active citizenship even during the imperial period, consolidated in the abolitionist movement. Nevertheless, he defined those who participated in the urban revolts of the First Revolt as “a sketch of a citizen, even in negative,” since their perception of the state was merely reactive and purposeful (Carvalho, 2008, p.75). While there was apathy, the specific idea of citizens’ rights and the duties of the state was measured by an implicit pact of non-interference in their private lives, and not by an intention to participate in this. Although it does not depart from a victimizing posture of blacks after 1888, and with all the merits of highlighting the exclusion barriers to which those leaving slavery were submitted, Cunha and Gomes point to the

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship contingent nature of the citizenship obtained, qualifying the condition of ‘citizen’ with the prefix ‘almost.’ They highlight that the national citizenship project was frequently imposed from top down and far from being passively accepted, it could be appreciated under the sign of refusal – in the triviality of daily practices. We are thus distant from Carvalho, since inaccessible citizenship is presented as possibly refused.

The fact is that the experience of the shaping and resistance to this reluctance have been understood as adjustment strategies, of acceptance – at times passively – of the political projects which conceived the ‘national citizen.’ The idea of accentuat- ing and underlining the provision nature of the statute of citizenship – the title of almost citizen – is justified by a desire. Emphasizing the comprehension of the cases and experiences of the refusal of the disciplinary project which judicially created the figure of the citizen and the national. These practices are far from constituting examples of resistance of social criticism wrapped in a single political discourse, and much more present in trivial situations experimented in daily work routines, in relations with the state and official institutions, in interpersonal relations experienced in domestic spaces, in short at every moment when the game of power of the exercise of equality between men and women marked by their social origin or color is being played. (Cunha; Gomes, 2007, p.14)

However, the evidence that I will present demonstrates that avoidance in relation to the state dimension – whether due to the limited possibilities for exercising citizens’ rights unless in situations of state interference, or due to the rejection of inserting themselves in disciplinary projects – was not an option taken by all. Some descendants of slaves made themselves into taxpayers, became involved in legal cases, became soldiers. It is not believed that this occurred in terms of a state framework; to the contrary, it seems that these forms of interlocution with the state apparatus could have been used to allow the obtaining of individual aims. While these approaches have the merit of highlighting the unequal conditions faced by descendants of slaves in their insertion of a free society, mini- mizing their capacity for actions in the sense of a search for citizenship presented as hindered. It appears that this is the challenge faced by scholars involved in the analysis of the possibilities of citizen actions of former slaves in the post-abolition period: not ignoring the obstacles faced to insert themselves as citizens in life after captivity, but also not belittling their organizational capacity and their willingness to conquer the rights of citizenship.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer

Taxes paid on time

We have a series of receipts for the payment of land taxes, preserved by relatives of Manoel Inácio until the present day. Starting in 1899 they run until 1941, with some interruptions. The documentation is relevant for the writing of an agrarian history of the presence of the family in the region and, in a context of land demands, as proof of continuous territorial occupation until the 1940s, at least. More than this, it demonstrates a type of initiative on the part of black peasantry in their interlocution with the state apparatus, to the extent that it presents a concern in keeping up to date with taxes – something which could probably be easily evaded –, as well as with the esteem for the maintenance of the receipts for these payments. The black peasants of that family regularized the situation of their land in terms of property tax in a systematic form through the First Republic. This practice can be seen as an extortive activity by some governors who, there can be no doubt about this, imposed them; nevertheless, it also represented a manner of regularizing and proving ownership over the land. It was for no other reason that these papers were preserved by their descendants, who were actually illiterate. They are more than just receipts for a tax disagreeably paid: they are also symbols of pride for participating in state channels and evidence of land ownership and its regularity vis-à-vis the government. I argue that if all that what was involved was the rejection of invasive state interference, and reactive action against this intrusion, on the part of the ‘sketches of citizens’ or ‘almost citizens,’ they simply would have not paid the land taxes. To the contrary, they interacted with the state power through the channels prescribed for this, and not to ask for benefits. The possibility of becoming part of the government machine through extraordinary means was desig- nated by Carvalho as estadania, or ‘state-ship’ (1987, p.65). The case analyzed by me, however, indicated effective citizen participation. This is the reason I refuse the define the Republic as negative: I seek to qualify it, I ask myself about which Republic it was, what it could have represented for the group I study. It is not enough to identify the negation of citizens’ rights; it is also fundamental, turning things upside down, to ask about how people saw citizenship. Axt underlined that part of the political program of the Partido Republicano Rio-Grandense (PRR – Rio Grande Republican Party) was the replacement of export taxes and property transmission taxes with land tax. The Castilhistas believed that this was a manner of reducing the fiscal burden on production, and it became, along with export tax, the foundation of the state’s

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship tax revenues (Axt, 2011). From the point of view of this author, it was a way for the Castilhista-Borgista state to expand control over economic activity. He demonstrates that productive sectors identified land tax as a “lien on property ownership” and that its implementation counted on strong resistance of estan- cieiros, independent of party affiliations. According to Axt, land tax not only harmed livestock farmers, but above all landowners in the colonial regime. We can also, however, expand this conclusion to small producers in general, since it was not only Italian and German colonists who were minifundiários in Rio Grande do Sul at the turn of the nineteenth to the twentieth century (Silva, 2004; 2009). Axt, in summary, shows that “through the land tax PRR governments transferred resources from rural landholders and especially from small landowners in the colonization region to mercantile and financial sectors and to large exporters” (Axt, 2011, p.352). From what the documentation in the power of the grandchildren of Manoel Inácio and Felisberta indicates, there was a municipal tax on land before that established by Castilhos, and which coexisted with it for a period. The family kept tax receipts from the Municipal Intendency dated from 1899 with the value of 2000 réis, and another paid, also to the municipality of Conceição do Arroio, with the value of 2$500 réis, in 1905. A book in the Historic Archive of Osório registered the taxes paid to the municipality in 1904, in accordance with the 19 December law. The taxes were invariably either 2$500 réis, as paid by Manoel Inácio, or 5$000. Instead of measuring the extension of each property and charging the due tax, the Intendency grossly divided landholdings into two bands and attributed to the former the venal value of one conto (i.e., one thousand) réis and to the second 500,000 réis, charging respectively 5$000 and 2$500 réis in taxes. The predominance of smaller properties can be verified: 1386 out of 1736, or 79.84%. Included in this aggregate are most the relatives of Manoel Inácio who figured among the taxpayers, but there was also his half-sister, Herculano Pastorino, who prospered at the point of figuring in the higher land band. The preservation of the documentary corpus constitutes a manner of proving possession of that land: being taxpayers to the public coffers, their rights over the family portion remained uncontested. Ana Rios (2007, p.15) underlined the political connotation of land acquisition by freed families, since this implied a “clear desire for legal protection and greater independence in relation to landowners than the unexceptional arrangement of informal occupations and submission of clientele networks.” Mutatis mutandis, the same reasoning can be used for the example of regularization of the landholding situation through the payment of taxes.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer

Table 1 – Rural land tax payers belonging to the family of Manoel Inácio Marques (1904)

Relationship Value Amount Page District Register Name with Manoel of to pay Inácio goods Belizário Manoel 4 1 133 Natural son 500$000 2$500 de Oliveira

7 1 218 Felipe Angélico Brother 500$000 2$500

Herculano 9 1 306 Half-brother 1:000$000 5$000 Pastorino Luiz Eufrásio 14 1 497 Brother-in-law 500$000 2$500 Marques

15 1 525 Manuel Inácio ––– 500$000 2$500

Romão Inácio Father-in-law 18 1 641 500$000 2$500 Marques and uncle Source: Arquivo Público de Osório – Antônio Stenzel Filho, códice Autoridades Municipais-05.

I did not find in the Historic Archive ofO sório any record of rural taxes, except for the 1904 fiscal year. Furthermore, the only records of municipal taxes in the power of the granddaughter of Manoel Inácio refer to the fiscal years of 1899 and 1905. It is probable that this source of revenue was removed from municipalities with the creation of the state land tax in 1902, and its implementation in 1903. The family kept state receipts for the fiscal years of 1904 and 1905, concomitant to the rural tax for the intendency of Conceição do Arroio. The value paid by the state government was proportional to the extension of the land in hectares3 – 35, in the case of Manoel Inácio Osório Marques – and not in function of arbitrarily bands of land size. After this year, we have a long series of state taxes, which indicates the extinction of municipal taxes. Covering the period 1904-1940, the payment receipts conserved have rare interruptions. However, the documents available do not necessarily refer to the entirety of the land, since the payment of taxes was divided between the widow Felisberta and her children. The total of tax declarations by the mother and her children does not exist for each year, with the exception of the years of 1906, 1910, 1919-1922, 1935 and 1940. For each year, however, there are documents for at least one declarant. Felisberta paid 19 of the 41 tax receipts

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship held by her granddaughters – or the 34 tax receipts signed after the death of Manoel Inácio – which indicates that the former slave was a lady zealous about the conservation and regularization of the legal situation of the family land. The conservation of documents, given that she did not know how to read them, could have been useful for when they needed them – as they stated in a testimony to me (Weimer, 2008, chp. 2). More than the regular payment of taxes, the act of guarding them in the hope of proving land ownership, in some eventuality, contrasts with any attempt to perceive this population as marginal to the action of the state, in which they participated according to their possibilities. Another example researched reinforced this line of argumentation. In 1913 the inventory of Manoel Marques da Rosa, belonging to the old landholding family, was opened. In the middle of this document, it was discovered that Hermenegildo Luís Francisco, at the same time nephew and related through marriage to “Sr. Sidão Manoel Inácio,” worked in a non-paid form for the deceased. 300$000 réis were reserved from the total estate of the deceased to, only at the moment of his death, to pay Hermenegildo for “services he rendered.” He was a member of that black peasantry, but he had been born free: his mother, Serafina Francisca Pastorina, sister of Manoel Inácio, had been alforriada (freed) in 1867, at the age of nine.4 The most tenuous connections with captivity did not prevent this form of semi-servile labor relationship which, nevertheless, allowed the access to be won to a quinhão (share) of land, which was finally rewarded with half of a sítio in Espraiado upon the death of the member of the landowning family. Nevertheless, the negotiations for the payment of Hermenegildo were slower than expected. In April 1915, a petition was presented asking for the adjudication of the 25 braças of which he was heir. The argument he used was the need to “receive the form for the payment of the respective tax.”5 I mean, the plaintiff actively sought in court his condition as a taxpayer. It is possible, and even probable, that this was only an argument to accelerate the adjudication of his property. Nevertheless, to use it, the plaintiff believed that it could be convincing and therefore nothing much beyond the cultural logic and current practices of that time. In becoming taxpayers – and it would have been very easy not to pay taxes –, they made themselves into citizens. But for what reason make the payment of taxes such as great space for carrying – or better symbolizing – citizen participation? Citizenship was umbilically linked to the land question. It was directly proportional to the autonomy conquered in relation to large land owners. Affirming the condition of black peasantry of least dependence on

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer fazendeiros was to respond less to their excesses, “do not endure outrages,” “do not roll on the road” and “control yourself.” These expressions are recurrent among the interviewees. While the “peasant project” was a great ambition (Machado, 1994; Mattos, 2005b), the taxes paid were a manner of symbolizing the conquest of this condition. I present here an initial condition to this discussion, which is inspired by a single – albeit rich –documentary corpus; referring furthermore to a family of the local elite. For the others, however, the interlocution with the police and judicial apparatus was another sphere for the possible exercise of citizenship.

Searching for legal protection

On 15 September 1928, Anacleto Bibiano Fortes sought the police, asking for a forensic examination of his wife, Eliza, who had been assaulted on the previous day by his brother-in-law and the latter’s son, José.6 The conflict had dragged on, from what can be understood from the records, for years, due to the proximity of the undivided lands of the brothers Anacleto, André, and Cipriana, in the place called Borba, on the outskirts of Morro Alto. In effect, in 1923, on the death of their mother Marcelina Cristina Marques, the children did the inventory, equally dividing into strips, fields, and banhados (wetlands) the land which measured 110 meters in front of Borba and 34 hectares in the Ribeirão.7 It turned out that the activities of a producer could interfere with the others, implying or maximizing enmities. This was what happened with the brothers André and Anacleto. When there were no fences marking the boundaries between properties and roças (small farms), one important cause of conflict was when animals belonging to one person would ruin the crops of his neighbors. According to the victim, she had sent three of her young sons to round up pigs which had been housed on the lands of their uncle. They returned crying because as well as having been prevented from taking the animals, André Marcelino Fortes and José Fortes had threatened to hit them. Eliza then sent her two older sons, called Luiz and João, to get the pigs, but they similarly repelled. According to her testimony, the boys reported the following:

we were bringing the pigs because they are ours, then André took out a club and his son José pulled out a knife and a club, hitting her sons and threatening them with the knife. Elisia then said to José: “let my sons take the pigs out of here because they are mine and not yours; do you want to kill my sons?” After that she ordered the

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship

boys to get the pigs, André and José Fortes again attacked her, the declarant, and her children, hitting her; at this time another son of the declarant arrived, with the name José Luiz Marques, I mean, José Luiz Fortes, and said to the aggressors: “so you want [8v] to kill my mother?” To which José son of André answered “I want to kill this mare and you can look for whatever authorities you want.”

I do not intend to enter into details. For now, it is enough to say that the courts considered the accusation of aggression to be unfounded, based on the version of the accused that it was legitimate self-defense. What was in play was a tacit recognition of the right of poor peasants to defend their roças when damaged by neighbors’ animals. It is enough to highlight that the accused had challenged Eliza “to look for whatever authorities you want,” which she did. While the courts were not the preferential for resolving conflicts, they were was used for extraordinary situations. With the aim of inciting and challenging the other party as an extraordinary possibility, it is revealed as being an alternative for the resolution of problems. Dealing with another ethnic group – but from the same social class –, Maíra Vendrame (2013) found that conflicts among Italian peasant immigrants were generally resolved through extrajudicial channels. The courts were used when all other resources had been exhausted. In these situations, we can say that the black peasantry of Morro Alto turned to the courts, not staying outside it. When André Marcelino Fortes won the case, a previous problem was resolved (Manoel Cipriano da Rosa, nephew of both involved, stated that he “knew there had been intrigues for more or less a year and a half, and the cause was the question of the roça”)8 which could not be resolved through the usual community channels – whether peaceful of violent. We can say the same about the conflict which opposed Leopoldina Florentina da Silva, beaten with a brake by her rival Esmeraldina Maria dos Santos, a resident of Morro Alto, on 15 November 1932. Florentina went to the police for a forensic examination, and Esmeraldina was denounced on 14 December. Once again, I will not detain myself with the details, when what interests me is that, once again, we have a history of rivalries between the aggressor and the injured party, which only became judicialized at a later moment. In effect, Esmeraldina had borrowed a parasol belonging to the daughter of the victim and had damaged it. After that they had come to throw insults and threats at each other.9 In the end Esmeraldina was acquitted, a decision in which the opinions of the neighbors about the temperaments of the two women weighed a lot. In a previous study, I noted that Florentina was rejected by

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer her neighbors, very possibly for having caused “undesired interference in local conflict resolution logics.” “Florentina liked to ‘cause fights and riots,’ ‘she was not well behaved,’ she was ‘a gossip about other people’s lives’ and ‘badly behaved and was always fighting with her neighbors, seeking to live in constant riots’,” these were some of what the locals said. The judicial system was subject to the influence of these local ideas, as a bad reputation in the local community had an impact on the judicial decision that went against her:

This local perception of justice apparently ‘contaminated’ legal operators – at the least they let themselves be influenced by the perception which neighbors had of the defendants. Stated otherwise, there was a local idea of justice in which legality was not impermeable. The appreciation of the behavior by neighbors was not only taken into account, but requested as a key part of the elucidation of criminal events. (Weimer, 2011, p.175, italics added)

We, therefore, not only have black peasants zealous of their rights, ready to use police stations and courts when the traditional channels for resolving problems were exhausted, but they were also capable of influencing the judicial system with their local ideas of rights. Moving beyond the influence of the judicial system, involvement in armed conflict can at times be thought of as the exercise of an ‘armed citizenship.’ Next, we will look at the significance given to this term.

Maragatos and pica-paus

The 1893-1895 Civil War in the region of Morro Alto, despite being taken as defining of experiences of liberty in the post-abolition period (Weimer, 2008), was a process that virtually did not exist in the memory of their descendants. This absence is intriguing. It is not silence about a painful past, in the terms of Pollak (1989), but specifically a forgetfulness: there is no opposition, resistance, or demonstration of suffering about the subject, but an estrangement about a question which is alien to them and memories that are always imprecise. The Federalist Revolt is interpreted, roughly speaking, as a movement of the rural elite of Rio Grande do Sul, members of the old monarchist parties, reacting to the establishment of the Republic and the rise to power of a minority group of radical and exclusivist republicans, grouped in the Partido Republicano Rio-Grandense (PRR), under the leadership of Júlio de Castilhos.

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship

The Federalists, also called Maragatos – on the outbreak of the war –, were in favor of a parliamentarian political system, while the republicans, called Pica- Paus, defended presidentialism. The political chronicle of the revolutionary process is much more complex than this general outline, as it was full of fac- tionalism, variations, and programmatic variations, alliances, and dissidences. What is important is that the Federalist forces were centered around the frontier with Uruguay, from where they marched towards the states of Santa Catarina and Paraná. I do not intend to contribute to the analysis of the political history of the Civil War here, which is already very well documented. In my Master’s thesis I focused on the social history of the participation of former slaves in the Civil War (Weimer, 2008, chp. 3), concluding that no automatic alignment of the freed slaves with any of the conflicting factions was observed, nor any unquestionable loyalty to the parties of their former masters, nor rebellion and necessary opposition to them. I found, first, the non-existence of significant ideologies between Pica-Paus and Maragatos in relation to the question of the social insertion of former slaves, which could justify the majority participation with or other group. I also noted a situational game and micropolitics, involved in which were the social relations formed during slavery, which determined where engagement would be more convenient. In summary, it was a privileged moment to bargain for better living conditions. Barcellos et al. (2004, p.147) attribute the tribulations resulting from the Federalist Revolt in the Morro Alto region to the spatial movements of former slaves to more tranquil regions, accompanying the families of their owners. Fifteen telegrams sent to the police chief of Conceição do Arroio, Antônio Marques da Rosa – belonging to the landholding family of Morro Alto –, between February and November 1893, show that there was a strong possibility that the Federalists would coming down from Cima da Serra and attack the vila of Conceição do Arroio – the former name of Osório. If this had happened, the Morro Alto plantation would have been overrun by the Federalists. It belonged to the Marques family, allied to the Castilhistas, and was occupied by its former slaves. The documents demonstrate a growing anxiety in Conceição do Arroio and a growing expectation about the arrival of the Federalists, which intensified in September, with numerous urgent telegrams, becoming more scarce and desperate in October and November. The same authors (2004, p.130) gathered evidence of Maragato harassment in the old Morro Alto plantation, including the fire in the house of Coronel Marques (Silva, apud Barcellos et al., 2004, p.130).

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer

In my thesis, I suggested the possibility that the acquisition of lands by former slaves had been facilitated by the devaluation of land resulting from the Federalist Revolt. This was certainly not the case of Manoel Inácio and Felisberta, who on the occasion of the war were already established on the land of Espraiado, acquired in 1890.

These restrictions do not annul the fact that various communities were able to use the better conditions offered by the years of war, and those immediately following, with the devaluation of devastated lands and the pauperization of the former landholders. Access to land was facilitated by this situation. (Weimer, 2008, p.235)

The memories of residents in the region involved an abstract remem- brance of the Civil War which, nevertheless, can be applied to various other ‘Revolutionary’ episodes in the south of Brazil. In addition to the Federalist Revolt, the 1923 and 1930 ‘revolutions,’10 closer chronologically, involved the same generically remembered characteristics: • Flights to the forest were carried out with the purpose of self- protection and hiding herds and products; • Compulsory military recruitment was imposed by the different sides involved; • Soldiers obtained resources from residents by force and by request; • The practice of desertion, once this was possible, indicates that there was no great ideological adhesion to the forces mobilized.11 More than an imprecision of memory in relation to the diversity of ‘revolutionary’ situations in the south of Brazil, from the scenario presented the existence of an ethnotext can be noted (Joutard, 1980, p.176-182; Mattos, 2004; 2005a). This term is taken to mean a common cultural substratum among individual interviews, regularities – rarely presented – which indicated a collective narrative about the determined episode. It can be understood from the mutual comparison of various interviews. although it is informed by the research interests of the interviewer, it emerges as a text related to collective memories about not one specific ‘revolution,’ but a sequence of conflictive processes which could affect that community. If the memories had fused into a collective text about indistinct wars, it would be natural that most of the memories about episodes of conflict would

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship be attributed to what was, par excellence, the ‘revolutionary’ process of Rio Grande do Sul: the Farroupilha War. Pesavento highlighted that this is associated with acts of bravery and romanticism, and had, at least according to the regionalist discourse, kept Rio Grande do Sul united during the Empire, while the Federalist Revolt represented in the regional imagination, in addition to some very sinister episodes, the internal division of the state (Pesavento, 1993). Edite Maria da Rosa, for example, possessed a dagger which she said, after some hesitation, that her paternal grandfather, João Colona, has used in the Farrapos War. Interviewed, she concluded that he fought in the Farrapos with Duque de Caxias – although this would not have been possible chronologically. The insignia on the scabbard of the grandfather’s dagger bear the coat of arms of the Republic. Actually her grandfather had been a police inspector in Conceição do Arroio – according to her own report –, linked to the Partido Republicano Rio-Grandense, and as such, despite being a black man, found spaces for empowerment. Can this alternative form of participation in state mechanisms be considered citizen participation? Certainly not, if we consider Marshall’s (1967) classic approach, which characterized citizenship in terms of universal access to rights defined as civil, political, and social, with this tripartite division of his authorship, being chronologically and logically related to the English reality. These rights may or may not be concomitant. It is based on this reference that José Murilo de Carvalho thinks about the idea of citizenship, and these are the parameters which allow him state that “[members of the Army] sought greater participation through belonging to the state, in other words, this did not involve so much citizenship but what we can call state-ship” (1987, p.50, original italics). In effect, the universality generally associated with the exercise of citizenship cannot be verified in the case of a privileged and specific insertion through the military condition. However, later the same author lays out some positions by highlighting the importance of being attentive to the specifities of the Brazilian reality before transposing Marshall’s model:

Nevertheless, it appears to me that a more correct interpretation of the political life of countries like Brazil demands that other forms of participation be taken into account, less formalized and external to the legal mechanisms of representation. It is also necessary to verify to what extent, even in the absence of an organized political people, there existed a sentiment, even a diffuse one, of national identity. This sentiment, as has been observed, almost always accompanies the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer

expansion of citizenship, although it is not confused with it. It is a type of complement, sometimes a compensation, of citizenship seen as the exercise of rights. (Carvalho, 2008, p.66)

Would it be over-provocative to propose that the so-called ‘state-ship’ constitutes a Brazilian type of citizenship, or also a path to it, not imagined by Marshall? Did it involve a specific disposition of a relationship with the state, a form of assuring rights – exercised and conquered in a particular and familiar environment – completely different form the expectation of classic citizens’ rights listed by the English sociologist? Much ink has been used in the discussion about the relationship between the public sphere and the private exercise of power in Brazil, as well as about the relations of particular dependence which permeated the state space. A deepening of this discussion is outside the objectives of this article, also because any conclusion in this sense using only the case in question would be premature. Nevertheless, it is Carvalho himself who points to the complexity of national citizenship formation process, the English example cannot be taken as a model. However, the previous example of citizens zealous about keeping their tax payments up to date points to the existence of situations of citizenship closer than those listed by Marshall. It is not known by which mechanisms João Colona became a police inspector, while details about his relations with members of Partido Republicano are ignored Nevertheless, this certainly was an open possibility – in the interlocution with the state apparatus – to ascend socially and guarantee a better life for him and his relatives. He established himself as a producer of foodstuffs in Morro Alto, as we will see below. Whatever the case, he was not ‘bestialized’ by the serious social disputes – principally in Rio Grande do Sul, where there was a civil war – which followed the proclamation of the Republic. Although Edite remembers João Colona’s narratives as referring to the Farroupilha War, it is in her that we can find the most precise discourse about the Federalist Revolt, because her grandfather had been a police inspector in the republican regime, which indicates a not inconsiderable position within the state machine. According to her reports, he fought in the forest and had been involved in situations where life or death were at play:

Edite – Ah, the war... My grandfather..., he told us... Just that he made us afraid, he said that he had taken part in the war, that they spent days marching through the forest, pursuing, right, that they had fought, and had no fear of dying, right, brave, so... He was a, how can I say it, an inspector, at that time it was called inspector,

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship

right, as well as the mayor, the... the mayor, no, the police chief, right, there was the deputy police chief, right, how is it, the inspector. Rodrigo – Inspector? Edite – Yes, inspector, he was an inspector, so he arrested criminals. As my brother was a young boy, so for him, he knew more, he had... Knowledge of life, so he said that to be a man, you had to be courageous, brave; but we joked that no, that he would kill everyone. No, what happens, either him or them, it was one or two, they had to choose, and often he killed people because they had to kill.12

The case of Edite’s grandfather seems to be an exception, to the extent that he was part of a black ‘elite’ who rose to a position of inspector among the republican forces. He thereby had a committed relationship with Partido Republicano Rio-Grandense (PRR), regularly performing police tasks. The majority of recruits, however, apparently joined without any solid party connection – whether due to more tenuous ideological ties, episodic interests established on a microscopic scale, or pure and simply due to forced recruitment (Weimer, 2008, p.220-236). This appears to have been the case of the father-in-law of Manoel Inácio Filho, the only other person mentioned, apart from the paternal grandfather of Edite, who had a more specific report of participation in the Federalist conflict. To the contrary of João Colona, Hermenegildo Luiz Francisco, already mentioned as the father-in-law of one of Manoel Inácio’s children and the Pica-Pau inspector, had fought alongside the maragatos – but this is not remembered with much certainty and little attention was given to this information. He was not a member of the armed forces, but a black peasant from the region. In addition, he was forcefully recruited and as soon as he could abandoned the Federalist forces. In this case, to the contrary of what was mentioned above, the war undoubtedly was alien to his anxieties, perspectives, and convic- tions, and so the struggle was abandoned at the first opportunity. There can be no doubt that no type of exercise of citizenship was at play here. However, this Maragato would marry his daughter with the son of a Pica- Pau – thereby overcoming the very high level of mutual hate which emerged in Rio Grande after a civil war in which high – and imprecise – demographic percentages were murdered, a large part being decapitated. This abstraction of partisan antagonism perhaps might be an index of how much that conflict was indifferent to Hermenegildo, who opted for a citizen participation through, as we have seen, taxes and land. In this case I do agree with Carvalho: he was interested in being left in peace, not so much in relation to taxes, but in relation

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer to the need to not see labor for peasant production removed or having their animals expropriated or their milk stolen – by Pica-Paus or Maragatos. For the future father-in-law of his daughter, in turn, military toil was nothing more than a mechanism for accumulation to purchase land and ascend to the condition of black peasant. The 1893-1895 Civil War created profound traumas and bitter divisions in Gaucho society. However, this must not have been so definitive among the black population of Morro Alto. At least this is what is indicated by the alliance between a Pica-Paus family and a Maragatos one when João Colona and Hermenegildo Luiz Francisco married their children José Inácio da Rosa and Maria Hermenegilda da Rosa, parents of Edite. José Inácio da Rosa acquired land in the proximities of the region his wife was from, and today their children have their land there. In other terms, João Colona fought, but his son also became a small producer of foodstuff. Social ascension by military means was covered by the same ‘peasant project’ which led Manoel Inácio, at the close of the nineteenth century, to acquire land in Espraiado with the aim of producing food. Lands which, once again, fulfilled the role of autonomization in relation to the large landowners.

Final considerations: citizenship and the internal diaspora

In the middle of the twentieth century, many residents abandoned Morro Alto to try their luck in the city. This departure, called “internal diaspora,”13 can be perceived as a response to the débâcle of peasant family production, due to the subdivision of productive units. However, the reconstruction of their lives in a new environment was not only the result of difficulties for the social reproduction of the peasant family unit, since it also obeyed in many cases a conscious attempt to reach citizenship rights, with a different profile from what had been sought from those who preceded them. A significant part left to obtain the social rights created in the Vargas Era, difficult to access in the countryside. However, even for the rural population, the struggle for access to citizens’ rights did not start in 1930. It is curious to perceive that in the first generation born after slavery (or at times after the ‘free womb’ law), family labor occurred in parallel to the exercise of a citizenship expressed in the task of regularizing their landholding situation with the state, for which there was a desire to establish a link through the payment of taxes. Moreover, when the local ways for resolving problems were exhausted, the police were sought or their quarrels were judicialized – and

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship this was not done only by segments of the elite of the local population. Although forced recruitment indicated a posture alien to political issues, and soldiers could not vote, participation of a family member as a police inspector indicated everything but indifference in relation to state representation mechanisms. The military apparatus was a mechanism available to the blacks of the region to seek participation in the state, but it also configured a form of access to land: as we have seen, the military project was a means for the peasant project in itself, a project which also had significant political implications. In summary, people – and not just the best situated – interacted with the state apparatus through various channels established for this. They were not mere sketches of citizens: it was sought to outline, define, and color their citizenship to the extent it was possible, with all the possible and available ink and pencils. Objective gains was aimed at, but also those symbolic ones resulting from “feeling like a Brazilian citizen” – and, thereby, removing themselves from the stain of captivity.

REFERENCES

ABREU, Martha; GOMES, Ângela de Castro. A nova “Velha” República: um pouco de história e historiografia. Tempo, v.13, n.26, jan. 2009. AXT, Gunter. Gênese do estado burocrático-burguês no Rio Grande do Sul (1889-1929). Porto Alegre: Paiol, 2011. BARCELLOS, Daisy Macedo de (et al.). Comunidade negra de Morro Alto: historici- dade, identidade e territorialidade. Porto Alegre: Ed. UFRGS, 2004. BITTENCOURT JUNIOR, Iosvaldyr. Maçambique de Osório: entre a devoção e o es- petáculo: não se cala na batida do tambor e da Maçaquaia. Tese (Doutorado em Antropologia Social) – Programa de Pós-Graduação em Antropologia Social, Uni- versidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). Porto Alegre, 2006. CARVALHO, José Murilo de. Cidadania no Brasil: o longo caminho. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2008. CARVALHO, José Murilo de. Os Bestializados: o Rio de Janeiro e a República que não foi. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1987. CUNHA, Olívia Maria Gomes da; GOMES, Flávio dos Santos. Quase-cidadão: histórias e antropologias do pós-emancipação no Brasil. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 2007. FERNANDES, Florestan. A integração do negro na sociedade de classes. São Paulo: Dominus; Ed. USP, 1965.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer

FERNANDES, Florestan; BASTIDE, Roger. Brancos e negros em São Paulo. São Paulo: Cia. Ed. Nacional, 1971. (Coleção Brasiliana, 305). FLEXOR, Maria Helena Ochi. Abreviaturas: manuscritos dos séculos XVI ao XIX. Rio de Janeiro: Arquivo Nacional, 2008. FRAGA FILHO, Walter. Encruzilhadas da liberdade. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2006. FUNDAÇÃO DE ECONOMIA E ESTATÍSTICA. De província de São Pedro a Estado do Rio Grande do Sul – Censos do RS 1803-1950. Porto Alegre: Fundação de Eco- nomia e Estatística, 1981. JOUTARD, Philippe. Un projet régional de recherche sur les ethnotextes. Annales. Économies, Sociétés, Civilisations, année 35, n.1, p.176-182, janv.-févr. 1980. KOUTSOUKOS, Sandra Sofia Machado. O valor da aparência In: FIGUEIREDO, Lu- ciano. A era da escravidão, revista de História da Biblioteca Nacional no bolso, Rio de Janeiro: Sabin, p.79-82, 2009. MACHADO, Maria Helena. O plano e o pânico: os movimentos sociais na década da Abolição. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRJ; São Paulo: Edusp, 1994. MARSHALL, T. H. Cidadania, classe social e status. Rio de Janeiro: Zahar, 1967. MATTOS, Hebe Maria. A vida política. In: SCHWARCZ, Lilia Moritz (Coord.) His- tória do Brasil Nação. vol. 3. A abertura para o mundo (1889-1930). Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva; Madrid: Fundación Mapfre, 2012. MATTOS, Hebe Maria. Prefácio. In: COOPER, Frederick; HOLT, Thomas C.; SCOTT, Rebecca. Além da Escravidão: investigações sobre raça, trabalho e cidadania em sociedades pós-emancipação. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2005b. MATTOS, Hebe. Marcas da escravidão: biografia, racialização e memória do cativeiro na História do Brasil. Tese (Professor Titular em História) – Instituto de Ciências Humanas e Filosofia, Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF). Niterói, 2004. MATTOS, Hebe. Memórias do cativeiro: narrativa e identidade negra no antigo Su- deste cafeeiro. In: RIOS, Ana; MATTOS, Hebe. Memórias do cativeiro: família, trabalho e cidadania no pós-Abolição. 1.ed. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2005a. PESAVENTO, Sandra J. Revolução Federalista: a memória revisitada. In: POSSAMAI, Zita. Revolução de 1893. (Cadernos Porto e Vírgula, 3). Porto Alegre: Prefeitura Municipal de Porto Alegre, 1993. POLLAK, Michael. Memória, esquecimento, silêncio. Estudos Históricos, Rio de Janei- ro: CPDOC/FGV, v.2, n.3, 1989. RIOS, Ana. Campesinato negro no período pós-Abolição: repensando Coronelismo, enxada e voto. Cadernos IHU Ideias, v.5, n.76, p.1-19, 2007. SILVA, Marcio Antônio Both. Babel do novo mundo: povoamento e vida rural na re- gião da mata do Rio Grande do Sul (1889-1925). Tese (Doutorado em História) – Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF). Niterói, 2009.

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Mr. Citizen Manoel Inácio and the conquest of citizenship

SILVA, Marcio Antônio Both. Por uma lógica camponesa: caboclos e imigrantes na formação do agro do planalto rio-grandense (1850-1900). Dissertação (Mestrado em História) – Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). Porto Alegre, 2004. VENDRAME, Maíra. Ares de vingança: redes sociais, honra familiar e práticas de jus- tiça entre imigrantes no sul do Brasil (1878-1910). Dissertação (Mestrado em His- tória) – Programa de Pós-Graduação em História, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS). Porto Alegre, 2013. WEIMER, Rodrigo de Azevedo. “Na qualidade de vizinha que era”: solidariedade vi- cinal entre os camponeses das localidades de Aguapés e Barranceira através de processos criminais. Conceição do Arroio, RS, República Velha. In: ALVES, Cla- rissa de L. S.; MENEZES, Vanessa T. Mostra de pesquisa do Arquivo Público do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul: produzindo história a partir de fontes primárias. Porto Alegre: Corag, 2011. WEIMER, Rodrigo de Azevedo. Os nomes da liberdade: ex-escravos na Serra Gaúcha no pós-Abolição. São Leopoldo: Oikos; Ed. Unisinos, 2008.

NOTES

1 Research financed by CNPq, Fapergs Capes, during the doctorate and post-doctoral in- ternship in Unisinos. 2 Letter provided by the granddaughter of Manoel Inácio, Aurora Inácia Marques da Silva. The Flexor dictionary of abbreviations registers Cidm as an abbreviation of citizen. Howe- ver, this book registers abbreviations from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, and this specifically refers to the 1700s and 1800s. It is possible that in the twentieth century this form of summarizing a word may have been altered, especially because it was an informal document and not an official one. Furthermore, it should be noted that the C, Ç, and S appear to be interchangeable, because city can be spelt as Cide, Çide and Side (FLEXOR, 2008, p.87 and 382). Finally, the suffix dão is closer to the oral pronunciation that the spelling “dm”. 3 According to the text of the law: “[p.7] The President of the State is authorized to a: [p.9] Article 5 – Charge taxes on rural properties, to the amount of 0.2% of their venal value and 10 rs. per hectare, carrying out the respective allotment during the first semester of the fiscal year and collecting the tax in the second. § Single paragraph – When the government starts to collect this tax it shall be obliged to abate from export taxes, at its judgment, the value equivalent to the amount budgeted for rural properties.” Arquivo Histórico do Rio Grande do Sul (hereafter AHRS), Livro 0636 de Legislação. 4 Arquivo Público do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul (hereafter APERS), Cartório de Órfãos e Ausentes (hereafter COA) de Conceição do Arroio, estante 159, caixa 026.0306, auto n. 99, inventário de Isabel Maria Osório, ano de 1867.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Rodrigo de Azevedo Weimer

5 APERS, COA de Conceição do Arroio, estante 159,caixa 027.0334, auto 789, inventário de Manoel Marques da Rosa, ano de 1913. 6 APERS, Cartório de Civil e Crime (hereafter CCC) – Comarca de Santo Antônio da Pa- trulha, termo de Osório, estante 114b, caixa 027.0293, auto 786, ano de 1928. Processo Crime: réus – André Marcelino Fortes e José Fortes, ofendida – Eliza Luiza Marques. Re- querimento de Anacleto Bibiano Fortes. 7 Document belonging to the Fortes family, reproduced in BARCELLOS et al., 2004, p.474. 8 APERS, CCC – Comarca de Santo Antônio da Patrulha, termo de Osório, estante 114b, caixa 027.0293, Auto 786. Processo Crime: réus – André Marcelino Fortes e José Fortes, ofendida – Eliza Luiza Marques. Depoimento de Eliza Luiza Marques à Polícia, f. 8-8v e depoimento de Manoel Cipriano da Rosa, f. 32. 9 Criminal case against Esmeraldina Maria dos Santos, processo criminal n. 830, caixa 027.0297, Fundo: Comarca de Santo Antônio da Patrulha 1893-1957, Subfundo: Vara de Civil e Crime, Arquivo Público do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul. Behind the apparent ba- nality of the case, it has to be taken into consideration that since the slavery period parasols and shoes functioned as symbols of distinctiveness (KOUTSOUKOS, 2009). Not just any artifact was broken by the aggressor. 10 For example, Mr. Manoel Francisco Antônio was eight during the 1930 Revolution, and remembers on this occasion of taking refuge in the forest with his relatives in order not to be obliged to serve in the military. Interview with Mr. Manoel Francisco Antônio on 16 Oct. 2010 in Osório (LABHOI-UFF). 11 Interview with Ms. Edite Maria da Rosa on 10 Jun. 2010 in Ribeirão do Morro Alto (La- boratório de História Oral e Imagem – Universidade Federal Fluminense; hereafter LA- BHOI-UFF); Interview filmed with Ms. Eva Marques Correia on 12 Mar. 2010 in Caconde (LABHOI-UFF); Interview filmed with Ms. Diva Inácia Marques Terra on 12 Mar. 2010 in Osório (LABHOI-UFF); Interview filmed with Ms. Aurora Inácia Marques da Silva on 13 Mar. 2010 in Osório (LABHOI-UFF). 12 Interview with Ms. Edite Maria da Rosa on 10 Jun. 2010 in Ribeirão do Morro Alto (LABHOI-UFF). 13 Expression proposed by BITTENCOURT JUNIOR, 2006, p.285.

Article received on January 12, 2015. Approved on March 6, 2015.

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa: strategies and alliances made by colored men in Brazil (1880-1919) Teodoro Sampaio e Rui Barbosa no tabuleiro da política: estratégias e alianças de homens de cor (1880-1919)

Wlamyra Albuquerque*

Resumo Abstract O artigo busca analisar, com base em The goal of this text is to analyze the po- episódios protagonizados por Teodoro litical participation of colored men in Sampaio e Rui Barbosa, condições e for- Brazil between 1880 and 1919 by de- ma de atuação política de homens de scribing the experiences of Teodoro cor, entre 1880 e 1919. A trajetória de Sampaio and Rui Barbosa. Sampaio’s Sampaio nos permite perceber como um trajectory shows us how a colored man homem de cor, constituído num dos raised in one of the most traditional mais tradicionais redutos escravistas nas strongholds of slavery in the Americas Américas, interpretou as relações e a interpreted the relations and the politi- gramática política que o forjaram como cal grammar that shaped his character in sujeito no pós-abolição. Teodoro Sam- the post-abolition period. Theodoro paio atravessou a década de 1880 bus- Sampaio spent the 1880s trying to gather cando arregimentar recursos financeiros financial and political resources to pur- e políticos que garantissem a compra da chase the manumission of his three alforria dos seus três irmãos e a consoli- brothers and consolidate his career as an dação da sua carreira de engenheiro. Já engineer, while Rui Barbosa, a jurist, Rui Barbosa, branco, jurista, jornalista e journalist, and liberal politician, was a político liberal, viveu o mesmo período fervent advocate of the abolition of slav- empenhado na campanha emancipacio- ery. In 1919, Sampaio, already a reputa- nista e na luta abolicionista. Em 1919, ble engineer, supported Rui Barbosa’s Sampaio, já renomado, apoiou a campa- presidential campaign. The previous nha presidencial de Rui Barbosa. Naque- history of slavery and citizenship of the la ocasião, o passado escravista e a cida- black population justified both of these dania da população negra justificaram as men’s political viewpoints. The refer-

* Universidade Federal da Bahia (UFBA). Salvador, BA, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69005 Wlamyra Albuquerque posições políticas de ambos. As fontes ences used in this article include speech- utilizadas são discursos, jornais, corres- es, newspaper cuttings, personal corre- pondência pessoal e inventários. spondence and inventories. Palavras-chave: Teodoro Sampaio; Rui Keywords: Teodoro Sampaio; Rui Bar- Barbosa; emancipacionismo; pós-aboli- bosa; emancipation; post-abolition peri- ção; cidadania. od; citizenship.

The letter written by the engineer Teodoro Sampaio (1855-1937) to Manoel Lopes da Costa Pinto, the Viscount of Aramaré, on 13th March 1882 was replete with appeals for generosity, charity and protection. First, as if to make sure that the language he was using was appropriate for such an appeal, the engineer penciled a draft, carefully choosing his words and refining the text. As was customary, he wished him good health and lasting prosperity and only then informed the Viscount of his desire to fulfil the promise made to his brother, Ezequiel:

The promise to free him must be fulfilled now, despite the difficulties I am facing, particularly as I find myself in the throes of organizing home and household. I ask Your Excellency to do this slave a great service, lowering the price of freedom with the generosity that Your Excellency has always shown, particularly towards us.1

With “organizing home and household,” Teodoro Sampaio was referring to his move to the city of Alagoinhas in Bahia, where he had been hired by the government as an engineer to oversee the extension of the Bahia/São Francisco railroad. By then, at the age of 27, he was already an experienced and reputable engineer, having completed a course in engineering at the Polytechnic School in 1876. Two years later he became part of the Hydraulic Commission, created by Counsellor Sinimbu to assess the country’s ports and potential for inland navigation. As we will see in the next few pages, it was as a candidate for this commission, made up of various technicians from the US, that Teodoro Sampaio was said to have suffered what he defined as prejudice; which, for him, was rare in Brazilian society at the time. He was organizing home and household due to his marriage with Capitolina Moreira Maia, a colored woman, on 18th January 1882, some months before the move to Alagoinhas. Very little is known about her, apart from varying comments about her mental health problems, and even Teodoro Sampaio himself does not mention her in his autobiography.2

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa

Figure 1 – Teodoro Sampaio and Capitolina, n.d. Source: Pereira, 2012, p.37.

Apart from his wife, he also enjoyed the company of his mother, the freedman Domingas da Paixão do Carmo, who he described as “a black woman of notable beauty in her race.” 3 She was given the task to deliver the letter to the Viscount of Aramaré: more than just a mere courier, freedman Domingas probably played an important role in negotiations. As a rich historiography shows, in most cases, family members effected the purchase of manumission (Slenes, 2011; Reis, 1998). Thus, by negotiating Ezequiel’s manumission with her former owner, freedman Domingas was perhaps attempting to restore family ties that had been weakened by the logic of slavery adopted in the engenho Canabrava (Canabrava sugarcane Mill). Although there is no reliable information on the date and circumstances of Domingas’ manumission, it is quite possible that she was freed when Teodoro Sampaio was born in 1855. Although no manumission document for Sampaio was found, it is also possible that any birth in captivity may have been kept

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Wlamyra Albuquerque quiet due to the social standing that he attained.4 Her other children – Martinho, Ezequiel and Matias – all older than the engineer, remained captive until 1880. Teodoro mentions his father as being “white and a cultured man from a family of farmers” (Pierson, 1971, p.375). In 1865, Teodoro Sampaio was taken from the engenho Canabrava to Rio de Janeiro by the priest Manoel Fernandes Lopes where he obtained his primary and secondary education at the Colégio São Salvador.5 He only returned to Bahia, and consequently, to family life in 1878, 13 years after graduating in engineering from the Polytechnic School. It is interesting to note that, having escaped the interprovincial slave trade – the main threat to families of slaves in the Recôncavo Baiano at the time – one of Domingas’ children was sent away to study at the age of 10 while others were destined to work as slaves on the sugarcane plantations of the engenho Canabrava until the abolition of slavery. Between 1865, when Teodoro Sampaio left for Rio de Janeiro, and 1884, when Matias was manumitted, the Domingas family experienced quite different types of legal status and conditions of freedom than those typical to Brazilian slavery in the 1800s. In the letter to the Viscount, the announcement that he was in the throes of organizing home and household was a prompt for Teodoro to ask him to “do this slave [Ezequiel] a great service, lowering the price of freedom with the generosity that Your Excellency has always shown, particularly towards us.” Placing himself at the mercy of the generosity of this slave owner, the reputable engineer endorsed the rules of deference and subservience which governed the business of manumission at the time. He was not only aware of the rules but legitimized them. In an undated manuscript “Um engenho de cana-de-açúcar no Recôncavo”, he paints the following picture of the lord of the Recôncavo Baiano engraved in his memory:

The lord of the sugar mill in those times did not consider himself highly thought of unless his slaves prided themselves on their master... The old slaves who had provided good service deserved kind references so that the overseer did not mistreat them or fail to assign them their customary rations ... Humane, it is true, was the nature of the lord of the engenho do Recôn- cavo de Santo Amaro. Barbaric treatment and degrading punishments were not customary for the cultured people that the majority of the lords of the sugarcane mills of the Recôncavo were.6

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa

But it was still necessary to negotiate manumission, even in this gentle and idyllic captivity, governed by “cultured people” who aroused the pride of subordination in their subordinates. As such, the negotiation involved not only the acknowledgement of the “incommensurable humanity” of the lords of the Recôncavo, but also financial resources. In the emotionally provoking letter to the Viscount, to ensure the funds for the purchase the engineer states that he will “resort to using for this purpose” some savings, however “this is not a burden, because it is an expense which I make from my heart and with the best will in the world, and I am certain that Divine Providence will not forsake us.” Furthermore, assuming that the deal has already been done, he promises to send two bonds, or cash, as soon as possible. At the end of the letter he makes further statements as to his confidence in the “goodness that has always characterized Your Excellency, your sincerity of heart, that is able to understand these difficulties” and therefore “will hear us and deign to reply to us.”7 It is tempting to think that Teodoro Sampaio, with his well-written letter on headed paper, was merely reproducing a mechanism which endorses subordination to gain something which was under the lord’s control, as was common with manumission in the 1880s. According to Ademir dos Santos, the engineer “temporizes, considering the two sides of this contradictory relationship” (Santos, 2011). In my view, rather than temporizing, he was using the ties he had established with the Viscount of Aramaré’s family, relying on the “protection,” “goodness” and “generosity” the slave owner had shown to him throughout his life, not only with respect to manumission, but also, and principally, in relation to the affirmation of his own freedom: ever since leaving the engenho Canabrava, Teodoro Sampaio had plunged himself into a relationship with the Costa Pinto family with the same tenacity with which he entered the navigable waters of the River São Francisco. According to Eul-Soo Pang, who carried out an important study about the sugar industry which analyzed the Costa Pinto family’s political links and investments, the family was one of the most powerful and enterprising members of the aristocracy in Bahia and founded the first mechanized sugar mill in the State of Bahia in 1880 in the parish of Bom Jardim (Pang, 1979, p.24). According to Pang, Francisco Antonio de Costa Pinto, the Count of Sergimirim, Antonio da Costa Pinto Junior, and Manuel Lopes da Costa Pinto, the Viscount of Aramaré, comprised the “patriarchy of the modernization of agriculture in the nineteenth century.” 8 They also founded the Imperial Instituto Baiano de Agricultura in 1859, when, during the visit of Pedro II to

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Wlamyra Albuquerque the Northern Provinces, the Santo Amaro Railroad Company was idealized (Pang, 1979, p.35-36). Thus, Following Eul-Soo Pang’s argument, the Costa Pinto family were the vanguard of modernization among the rich aristocrats of Bahia, since they realized that the organization of owners and structuring a system to transport production were fundamental steps to increase their fortunes and political prestige. For Robério Souza, the improvement of the transport system also reaffirmed the agricultural elite’s dreams of making Salvador the main economic center of the Northeast. The Costa Pinto family therefore represented an audacious plan to increase financial prosperity and political power (Souza, 2011, p.9). In fact, the fortune and prestige afforded to the Viscount of Aramaré between the 1860s and 1880s, were far from inconsiderable. In May of 1859, he registered the lands of two sugar mills (Aurora and Canabrava), one in the parish of Bom Jardim, and the other in Santo Amaro. The latter, where Teodoro Sampaio was born, had an area of over 1,100 tarefas of land with massapé soils. He had happy memories of his childhood in Canabrava and remembered the signs of wealth of the Costa Pinto family with blatant nostalgia in a very particular piece about the political culture that characterized the lord’s family, the captives and their family members. Although, unfortunately, this text was not dated, its nostalgic tone suggests that it was written after the end of slavery. Recalling his time in captivity, Teodoro Sampaio shows us how a “colored man,” in one of the most traditional strongholds of slavery in the Americas, interpreted the relations and the political grammar that forged him as a subject in the post-abolition period. His memories are enmeshed by the routine of the lord of the sugar mill, as the following extract shows:

I was born under the sacred roof of the chapel of the Canabrava sugar mill which at the time was the property of the prominent farmer and head of the important Costa Pinto family from the Recôncavo de Santo Amaro. In those times, the wealthy lords of the sugar mills were accompanied by a small entourage. Apart from the commemorative days when the people from the neighborhood flocked in numbers to participate in the merriments and dinners ...the families flaunted their luxurious silverware, and expensive linens with fine embroidery ... Days in which the Lords’ taste, wealth, and urbanity showed their worth, the peculiar aspects of family life, characteristic of the merciless and invincible monotony of existence in the country.9

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa

It is interesting to note that the entrepreneurship of this “modernizing patriarchy,” made up of refined and “cultured people” who, according to Teodoro Sampaio, were humane and benevolent in their treatment of slaves, coincided with his career aspirations. In 1872, when the Count of Sergimirim presided over the Imperial Instituto Baiano de Agricultura, the construction plans of the railroad which would connect Bom Jardim to Santo Amaro were forwarded to the provincial government. One of the main enthusiasts of this project, and ally of the Costa Pinto family, was the minister Cansanção de Sinimbu, who appointed Teodoro Sampaio to the Hydraulic Commission in 1878.10 In the autobiography, commissioned by Donald Pierson, Sampaio mentioned that his career started when he became a member of this commission, and that on that occasion he experienced an “incident” which helped him to “explain a case of prejudice which is rare today in this country.” After being recommended for the post, he was excluded from the official appointment published by the government because he was “the only colored man in the brilliant commission, and this fact appeared shocking to the spirit of the official of the minister’s [Sinimbu] Office, all the more so because the commission was made up of technicians from the US, who did not appreciate the company of colored men. I was therefore eliminated and experienced the first thorn of prejudice among us.”11 Teodoro makes it clear that the case was quickly resolved, thanks to a senator who informed the minister of the incident in time to remedy it. Thus, the political alliances that met the interests of the Costa Pinto family included not only intervening in the Sampaio’s career, but also reversing the consequences of the “prejudice” of which he was victim in a decisive moment of his career. In turn, apart from loyally committing himself to the political and economic plans of his protectors, he resorted to another distinctive strategy: exalting his professional competence, thus affirming his status as a free and honorable man. For him, as soon as he joined the team of US technicians, the “cloud of prejudice” quickly dissipated thanks to the acknowledgement of his work, and he had “the honor to win the healthy esteem and friendship of those who served the profession over the years...” 12 Thus, his attributes as an engineer outweighed the “quality” of being a colored man. Teodoro Sampaio did not miss an opportunity to endorse this argument. Mentioning the occasion when he had to present sketches, plans and calculations regarding the naviga- bility of the River Parapanema to Emperor Pedro II, he highlights that, even though he was still dressed for fieldwork, the monarch made him sit down to his right and showed great interest, not only in the information provided by the engineer about his explorative studies, but also about Indian customs and

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Wlamyra Albuquerque languages. Such interest led Teodoro Sampaio to conclude that Pedro II was “the most unprejudiced Brazilian of his time” (Pierson, 1971, p.379). In 1883, a year after the transaction that resulted in Ezequiel’s manumission, and a year before the manumission of Matias – the last of Sampaio’s brothers to be freed – he invited the Viscount of Aramaré’s nephew, João Ferreira de Moura, to be the godfather of his first son, Fructuoso Sampaio. Justifying the invite, Sampaio said that he wished “His Excellency to be his protector, as Your Excellency was for me” (Santos, 2011, p.2). João Ferreira was one of the heads of the Liberal Party in Santo Amaro, vice president of the Province of Bahia in 1867, and member of the Council of Ministers. He was well aware that by making João Ferreira de Moura his son’s godfather he would ensure his son the material, social and symbolic benefits that the proximity to this powerful family afforded. By inviting João Ferreira to hold his first-born son at the baptismal font, he sought to affirm and strengthen the bonds established with the family. Sampaio’s own professional success and prestige also seemed to have had an influence on this relationship as the register of Matias’s manumission, written by the hand of the Viscount of Aramaré in 1884, suggests:

Figure 2 – I present this letter of freedom to my Creole slave named Matias, more or less 35 years of age, who is able to enjoy his freedom as if he had been born of a free womb, which I grant in deference to the good qualities of his relatives, for which I receive no indemnification. Engenho Aramaré, 28th September 1884. Source: IGHBa, Acervo Teodoro Sampaio, caixa 5, documento 8.

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa

Let us look at the details of this case of freedom. The manumission of the Creole Matias without any charge was justified in deference to the good qualities of his relatives, of whom Teodoro Sampaio was obviously the most illustrious. Perhaps in those times (1884), the fact that Teodoro Sampaio’s brother was a slave could have caused embarrassment, not only to Teodoro, but also to his allies: “the landed elite and the business classes.” Furthermore, we should not forget that Domingas, who was a “high quality” slave, may have been involved in this negotiation; after all, Matias’ manumission was the last needed to reunite her family outside of the fences of the engenho Canabrava. Matias lived with Teodoro Sampaio in his home in the Rua da Misericórdia (Mercy Street) in Salvador up to his death on 11th September 1911.13 However, under such circumstances, not even the supposed kindness of the lords, Teodoro’s professional competence, or the maternal perseverance of Domingas was not enough to guide the designs of the Costa Pinto family. Matias’ manumission was registered in a quite peculiar context, on 28th September 1884, the anniversary of Law of Free Birth enacted in 1871. In June 1884, Manoel Pinto de Souza Dantas, leader of the Liberal Party in Bahia took command of the Council of Ministers in the Court; and then, on 15th July, Rodolfo Dantas, his son, introduced a bill written by Rui Barbosa into the Chamber of Deputies which called for the emancipation of slaves, creating a major controversy related to the “questão servil” (servile problem). The main point of disagreement was the article that provided for uncompensated emancipation of all slaves over the age of sixty. According to Joseli Mendonça (1999, p.30), “the servile problem had not provoked such heated emotions in the Brazilian Parliament perhaps since 1871.” The discussion of the bill in the Chamber of Deputies sparked a heated political debate across the country, robbing the slave owners of their dreams and encouraging abolitionists and slaves. José do Patrocínio wrote in the Gazeta da Tarde that, although it was early to say whether the bill was actually good, “it was a pleasure to observe the hate of the agricultural oligarchy towards it.” 14 Although he insinuated that he had no knowledge of the Bill written by Rui Barbosa, José do Patrocínio judged that the bill would bring benefits to the abolition movement. He himself contributed to drafting the bill. In a letter to Rodolfo Dantas, Patrocínio recommends that certain issues should not be left out of the bill, such as the “recognition of the Law of 1871,” and commits himself to sending books and speeches with highlighted excerpts: “it would be a great pleasure to send you everything I have relating to this

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Wlamyra Albuquerque subject.” Patrocínio judges that the “enormous talent” of Rodolfo Dantas, together with that of Counsellor Rui “could give an exact idea of how much shame and how much humiliation this morally degrading and economically impoverishing institution has cost us.” 15 That year, given the heat of parliamentary debate, the abolition movement gained momentum across the country, leading the sugar aristocracy to position themselves in face of the startling loss of legitimacy of slavery (Chalhoub, 2003). It is well known that Dantas did not survive the political crisis, and in 1885 the Emperor dismantled his ministry and invited the senator José Saraiva to form and head a new ministry. In Bahia, the failure of Dantas’ endeavor had harsh consequences for the liberal ranks, one of which was Rui Barbosa’s defeat in the election for Deputy General by the conservative candidate Inocêncio Marques de Araújo Góis Júnior, who was strongly supported by the Liga da Lavoura e Comércio de Santo Amaro (The League of Farming and Commerce of Santo Amaro) created in 1884 by the Costa Pinto family. A survey of the abolition societies in Bahia undertaken by Jailton Brito shows that the slave owners’ protests against Dantas’ bill were more decisive in Santo Amaro, in the Recôncavo (Brito, 1997). For Walter Fraga, in 1884, the main reaction of the sugar aristocracy to the visible shock to the slavery institution was to declare themselves emancipationists but against “revolutionary agitation” and, principally, against the disrespect of property rights, which Dantas’ bill represented. The promotion and publicizing of manumissions without charge, group manumissions, and manumissions of slaves who had explicitly demonstrated obedience and gratitude were part of the strategy to control the emancipation process (Fraga, 2006, p.108-109). Thus, by manumitting Teodoro’s brother without charge on 28th September 1884, the Viscount generated a great deal of positive publicity for the “praiseworthy actions” of the slave owners, and reaffirmed the importance of the Law of 1871. Registering Matias’ letter of freedom exposed the slave owners’ trick of giving merit and acknowledging the good qualities that entitled the slaves to freedom. It was evident that manumission was understood as something that was granted by the slave master to a slave that, in his judgement, deserved it – to whom he could attribute and or recognize qualities that entitled the slave to freedom. Teodoro Sampaio and Domingas probably witnessed the handing of the manumission letter, written by the Viscount of Aramaré, to Matias. An occasion of pomp and circumstance when “the lord of the sugar mill [being] highly thought of, [expected] that his slave did not

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa pride himself on his master.” The Viscount of Aramaré, like many others in Brazil as the 1880s progressed, had to live with the risks this situation posed to his political and economic pretensions to control the manumission mechanisms. He died following a stroke a few days after the Proclamation of the Republic, leaving his family in financial trouble.16 The newspaper Diário da Bahia, which also supported the abolitionist movement when it was run by Rui Barbosa, lamented the death of the Viscount of Aramaré, extolling the virtues of his farming background and ties with the family of Counsellor Dantas, since his daughter had married the counsellor’s nephew João dos Reis de Sousa Dantas Filho.17 After the first months of the Republic, the heirs of the Viscount of Aramaré concerned themselves with reorganizing his businesses and the workers of the engenho Canabrava. In August 1890, the Decree Nº 623 was published at the palace of the provisional government of the republic, headed by Manoel Deodoro da Fonseca which granted “João dos Reis de Souza Dantas Filho and José Pacheco Pereira and to coronel Aristides Novais an interest guarantee of 6% per year to establish a central sugar mill in the State of Bahia.” 18 At the same time, Teodoro Sampaio was reorganizing his life in São Paulo where, between 1892 and 1903, he occupied the important post of director and chief engineer of sanitation of the State of São Paulo. His return to Bahia had to wait until 1904, when he oversaw the construction of the city’s sanitation system. In an unfinished text written in 1906, Teodoro Sampaio evaluated the effects of the abolition of slavery on Bahia’s society. In his own words:

Today Bahia is a decaying society; it is a society in transition, with the unhealthy look of a degenerate people. The times when Bahia was cultured are long gone. ... It must be said that the abolition of slavery squandered the fortunes of the old people, killing off sociability and the refinement that came with urbanity. The decay of society in Bahia dates from the abolition of slavery. The period that follows is one of remodeling, of reforming customs, reforming labor, of new life demands for the lords and for the ex-slaves; the inaptitude of those ...accustomed as they were with living off the work of others; and the latter, unprepared for a regime of freedom, who with their ignorance and the very nature of the race lead to a regime of idleness and inactivity...19

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Wlamyra Albuquerque

1919: the “side of the negro” and the “stigma of slavery”

As can be seen, Teodoro Sampaio saw the post-abolition period as a time of remodeling and change, even for the nature of the “race” that had just gained its freedom. For him, the economic and political changes caused by the abolition of slavery and the creation of the Republic decimated sociability and the refinement of old. However, the engineer also observes that all parties were implicated in the process which he interpreted as decay: the lords of the sugar mills, accustomed to living off others; and the freed slaves, unprepared and ignorant, idle and inactive. Thus, the responsibility of the supposed unwilling- ness to work, ignorance and lack of refinement was allotted to the main characters of the drama of slavery. Willing to help overcome this “lamentable” state of affairs, Teodoro Sampaio, as co-founder and speaker of the Instituto Geográfico e Histórico da Bahia (IGHBa), judged that one of our weaknesses was degeneration of race, since “although we have the ability to evolve, history is yet to show, in ages past, a great people that strived for human progress of mixed-blood from the races that comprise our ethnic makeup.” 20 Without doubt, neither Teodoro Sampaio, nor the IGHBa were alone in their digres- sions regarding the relation between the legacy of slavery, abolition and race in Brazilian society (Schwarcz, 1993). Sometime after, in 1919, this same issue would be exposed in a different form during the presidential election campaign disputed by Epitácio Pessoa and Rui Barbosa who, at the age of 70, finished a tumultuous campaign amid workers’ protests and even an attack on his party members in Salvador during a campaign rally in the center of the city. The newspaper A Tarde, that supported Counsellor Rui’s campaign, denounced that on the afternoon of 25th March 1919, secretas, dockers and boaters were “sent” to the rally by senator J. J. Seabra and the governor Antônio Muniz to support Rui Barbosa. According to the newspaper this was orchestrated by an undercover policeman known as Carestia de Vida, who commanded around 300 “Sicarii”. Describing the confrontation as a barbaric attack, the writer states: “after this Africa of yobs ... the gentlemen Lauro Lopes, Carlos Seabra and another two or three Sicarii went by automobile to the palácio da Aclamação to receive applause from the governor and toast with champagne.” 21 The arrival of Rui Barbosa was scheduled a few days after this incident. In order complete his campaign tour he needed to strengthen his delicate, though important, alliances with political leaders from Bahia. The trip was risky, given the attack; however, he faced the challenge as an act of bravery. He clarified his

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa plans in a letter to the deputy Pedro Lago: “the trip to Bahia was already in doubt due to steam difficulties and conferences in (the States of) Minas (Gerais), São Paulo and Rio (de Janeiro). Now, however, I shall go by any means, God willing, if necessary cancelling the conference in Rio” (Barbosa, [1946], p.66). As soon as Rui Barbosa’s trip was confirmed, his allies in Bahia began preparations. As a member of the Instituto Geográfico e Histórico da Bahia, Teodoro Sampaio was given the task of making the reception speech and was careful not to leave out one of the mottos of the campaign: taking the lead in the abolition of slavery:

Dear Counsellor, The redemption of slaves struggling for the freedom of those yet to be born against the piracy around the crib... Throughout the memorable abolitionist movement which ended in abolition, the right and respect for property never subdued your enthusiasm for freedom, because in your enlightened and capable mind the right to human dignity cried out louder. You wiped the stigma of man’s centuries old crime from the negro’s face and removed the burden of over three centuries of oppression from the slaves’ hunched shoulders...22

Teodoro Sampaio’s speech raises some interesting issues. One is the endorsement, in 1919, of the Law of 1871. Another is the mention of the stigma of slavery: removed from the tense context of 1888, the engineer seems to revise his opinions about the consequences of the abolition of slavery. Leaving aside the lord’s kindness, Sampaio adhered to the discourse that credited major social change at the end of the nineteenth century to the visionary nature of the abolition movement embodied by Rui Barbosa. This was not a trivial exercise given the circumstances, in which his presidential candidate was the target of “Sicarii”, “wrongdoers” and “an Africa of yobs.” In his own way, Teodoro Sampaio was helping to intertwine the heroic memory of the abolition movement with a political plan which sought, at least, to subdue the actions of the “Sicarii”, and “coloured men” who weaved, differently to him and with other powerful and prestigious lords, their own ties and political agreements. The test of fire of the tense presidential campaign was the reception in the port. Teodoro Sampaio was only one the members of the IGHBa. When Rui Barbosa disembarked in Bahia, he saw a “truly frenzied” crowd awaiting him; some saw “hysterical ladies squashed by the masses of people” touching Rui Barbosa’s hands (Gonçalves, 2000, p.157; Viana Filho, 1987, p.441). To protect

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Wlamyra Albuquerque him, a group of men from the local commerce organized a Guarda Branca (white guard) who used straw hats and white suites with a badge on the lapel with an image of Rui Barbosa. They had the task of policing the “the masses of people” that jostled in the port as can be seen in Figure 3.

Figure 3 – Rui Barbosa giving a speech in the port in Salvador. Source: Machado, 1999, p.82.

According to Rui Barbosa, the Guarda Branca “accompanied him after he disembarked, playing, at the same time, an important role in keeping public order among the masses that had gathered, always encouraged by the exemplary feelings of civic enthusiasm and affection for popular rights.”23 Some days after, in a banquet for 250 people, the engineer Teodoro Sampaio listened to the most important speech which Rui Barbosa made during the 1919 election campaign. The following are some of its most famous lines:

I had the honor of being the author of the Dantas bill, of writing, in its support, the opinion of the commissions, of being, in the House of Deputies, its body and flag, of being defeated in the subsequent elections due to the love I held for it, of fighting the Saraiva Law, of appealing to the conscience of the Brazilian nation with the merits of the act of redemption, of incurring the threats of the infamous guarda negra (black guard), of never being absent in the moments of most risk, with a devotion that never waned, and which never desired or received other

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa

interests or gains in return, other than danger, hate and revenge. (Barbosa, 1919, p.368)

Counsellor Rui Barbosa managed to bring together in a single paragraph the most crucial episodes of the emancipation process in Brazil and offer himself to the nation for a new cause; the Presidency of the Republic. In doing so, he thanked and complemented the great engineer Teodoro Sampaio, now an important ally who experienced the dismantling of slavery and the creation of the Republic attempting to extricate his family from slavery while confirming his ties with the large slave owners and his contact with the highest authorities of the court, including the emperor. These figures were treated at the time as two of Bahia’s most illustrious men. However, the political and historic tapes- try involving Rui Barbosa and Teodoro Sampaio in the post-abolition period was woven from the complex socioracial relationships and political strategies that formed the subjects in the dismantling of the main strongholds of slavery in the Americas: Bahia.

REFERENCES

ALBUQUERQUE, Wlamyra. O jogo da dissimulação: abolição e cidadania negra no Brasil. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2009. BARBOSA, Rui. Campanha presidencial. In: ______. Obras completas. Rio de Janeiro: s.n., 1919. v.46, p.368. BARBOSA, Rui. Correspondência de Rui. Seleção e notas de Affonso Ruy. 3.ed. Salva- dor: Livr. Progresso, [1946]. (Col. de Estudos Brasileiros, série 1ª, 4). BRITO, Jailton Lima. A Abolição na Bahia: uma história política. Salvador: Ed. UFBA, 1997. CHALHOUB, Sidney. Machado de Assis – historiador.São Paulo: Companhia das Le- tras, 2003. FRAGA, Walter. Encruzilhadas da liberdade. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2006. GONÇALVES, João Felipe. Rui Barbosa: pondo as ideias no lugar.Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV 2000. MACHADO, Mário (Org.) Rui Barbosa – fotobiografia. Rio de Janeiro: FCRB, 1999. MENDONÇA, Joseli. Entre as mãos e os anéis: a lei dos sexagenários e os caminhos da abolição no Brasil. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 1999. PANG, Eul-Soo. O Engenho Central de Bom Jardim na economia baiana (1875-1891). Rio de Janeiro: Ministério da Justiça; Arquivo Nacional; Instituto Histórico e Geo- gráfico Brasileiro, 1979.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Wlamyra Albuquerque

PEREIRA, Ademir.Teodoro Sampaio – nos sertões e na cidade. Salvador: Versal, 2012. PIERSON, Donald. Brancos e pretos na Bahia.São Paulo: Cia.Ed. Nacional, 1971. REIS, Isabel. Histórias da vida familiar e afetiva dos escravos na Bahia do século XIX. Salvador: Ed. UFBA, 1998. SANTOS, Ademir Pereira dos. Theodoro Sampaio: nos sertões e nas cidades.São Paulo: Versal, 2011. SCHWARCZ, Lilia Moritz. O espetáculo das Raças: cientistas, instituições e questões raciais no Brasil (1870-1930). São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1993. SLENES, Robert. Na Senzala, uma flor: esperanças e recordações na formação da fa- mília escrava.Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2011. SOUZA, Robério Santos. Tudo pelo trabalho livre! Salvador: Ed. UFBA, 2011. VIANA FILHO, Luís. A vida de rui Barbosa. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, 1987.

NOTES

1 Instituto Geográfico e Histórica da Bahia (IGHBa), Teodoro Sampaio Archive, box 9, document 75, Letter from Teodoro Sampaio to the Viscount of Aramaré on 13th March 1882. 2 According to Arnaldo Pimenta da Cunha, she lived with dementia for over 15 years in one of the rooms of Teodoro’s family home in Misericórdia Street in the centre of Salva- dor. Arnaldo Pimenta da Cunha, Revista IGHBa, n.69, p.132. 3 IGHBa, Teodoro Sampaio Archive, box 6, document 52. 4 The biographies of Teodoro Sampaio diverge on this point. Humberto de Campos in Sombras que sofrem states that he “drank slave milk from the slavery of his mother’s breast,” while Arnaldo Pimenta da Cunha points out that sufficient evidence does not exist to confirm whether he was manumitted, Revista IGHBa, n.79, p.103. 5 For Wanderley Pinho it was the intelligence of the young Teodoro that convinced the chaplain to invest in his education: “such manifestation of a lively intelligence must have captivated the priest who took it on himself to educate him. The chaplain soon saw that that child was destined to do great things.” Speech given by Jayme da Gama e Abreu, 17th December 1940, Revista IGHBa, n.67, 1941, p.170. 6 IGHBa, “Um engenho de cana de açúcar no Recôncavo de Santo Amaro”, manuscript, box 1, document 15. 7 IGHBa, Teodoro Sampaio Archive, 7-1-1942, box 9, letter from Tedoro Sampaio to the Viscount of Aramaré, 13the March 1882. 8 Idem, p.57. 9 IGHBa, Teodoro Sampaio Archive, box 9, document 58. 10 IGHBa. Teodoro Sampaio, letter to Donald Pierson, Teodoro Sampaio Archive, box 6, doc 52, Notes autobiography, 12th October 1936.

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The political realm of Teodoro Sampaio and Rui Barbosa

11 Idem. 12 Idem. 13 IGHBa, Arnaldo Pimenta da Cunha, “Teodoro íntimo”, Revista IGHBa, n.69, p.122. 14 Gazeta da Tarde, Salvador, 19th July 1884. 15 Fundação Casa Rui Barbosa, Letter from José do Patrocínio to Rodolfo Dantas, CR 1120/1 (3). 16 APEB, Colonial section, Inventory 08/3401/11, 1889. 17 Diário da Bahia, Salvador, 23th November 1889. 18 Internet site of the Brazilian Senate, available at: http://legis.senado.gov.br/legislacao/ ListaTextoIntegral; Accessed on 15th January 2015. 19 IGHBa, Box 5, document 13, speech “O aspecto da sociedade baiana em 1906”, 5th April 1906. 20 IGHBa, speech by Teodoro Sampaio, Revista IGHBa, n.39, 1913, p.124. 21 A Tarde, Salvador, 26th March 1919, emphasis added. 22 IGHBa, Teodoro Sampaio Archive, box 3, document 37, Reception speech for Rui Bar- bosa, 11the April 1919. 23 Rui Barbosa, Correspondence, 21th April 1919. Afonso Rui explains that the main task of the Guarda Branca was to avoid accidents and distance disturbances from the Senator.

Article received on January 30, 2015. Approved on February 23, 2015.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17

Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience among coffee workers in Rio de Janeiro (1931-1964) 1 Campos do pós-abolição: identidades laborais e experiência “negra” entre os trabalhadores do café no Rio de Janeiro (1931-1964)

André Cicalo*

Resumo Abstract Este artigo explora se e como sinais de This article explores whether and how uma experiência afro-brasileira vieram à signs of an Afro-Brazilian experience tona durante a existência do SCEC, um surfaced during the life of SCEC, a trade sindicato de carregadores e ensacadores union of coffee carriers and packers (car- de café que prosperou no porto do Rio de regadores e ensacadores de café) that Janeiro entre 1931 e 1964 Apesar da forte flourished in the port of Rio de Janeiro presença de trabalhadores afrodescenden- between 1931 and 1964. In spite of the tes no SCEC, o legado negro estava em large presence of Afro-descendant work- grande parte ausente do discurso oficial ers at SCEC, black legacy was largely ab- do sindicato, que, em vez disso, colocava a sent in the official discourse of the trade ênfase na classe, no nacionalismo e em union, which gave emphasis instead to outros valores não relacionados à cor. Es- class, nationalism and other color-blind se fato não está completamente desconec- values. This fact is not completely dis- tado do contexto sociopolítico do Brasil connected from the socio-political con- naquela época, dominado pelo sistema do text of Brazil in that epoch, dominated trabalhismo e pela ideologia da democra- by the system of labor politics (trabal- cia racial. No entanto, saliento que marca- hismo) and the ideology of racial democ- dores de um “campo negro” não eram racy. However, I point out that markers completamente estranhos ao SCEC. Eles of a ‘black field’ were not completely ainda sobrevivem nas memórias dos ensa- alien to SCEC. They still survive in the cadores e estão refletidos nos padrões ra- memories of ensacadores, and are reflect- ciais que tradicionalmente caracterizaram ed in the racial patterns that have tradi- o cais do porto do Rio de Janeiro. tionally characterized the docklands of Palavras-chave: pós-abolição; sindica- Rio de Janeiro. tos; identidade negra. Keywords: post-abolition; trade unions; black identity.

* Marie Curie IOF Fellow, King’s College of London. London, UK. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69006 André Cicalo

In March 1945, a reporter from the newspaper A Manhã asked dock- worker João Baptista Ribeiro Fragrante his opinion about the labor legislation promoted by Getúlio Vargas. The interviewee declared that: “before Getúlio Vargas, workers were nothing but economic slaves who achieved their ‘Free Birth Law’ (Lei do Ventre Livre) in 1930 and their ‘Slavery Abolition Law’ (Golden Law or Lei Áurea) … with the Constitution of 1937!” In this way, Fragrante praised the labor rights that had been granted since the beginning of Vargas’ rule, which started with the Revolution of 1930 and evolved into the authoritarian and corporatist regime of Estado Novo (New State) in 1937. Only with the system of protections established by Vargas, Fragrante clarified, would workers achieve “stability, holidays, justice, and a limit of working hours …”. With the previous legislation, in fact, “the proletariats did not even have the right to a Sunday recess, and enjoyed only some limited cover against work injuries” (“Em 1937…”, A Manhã, 1945, p.3). Fragrante was introduced as a member of the Trade Union of Coffee Carriers and Baggers2 of Rio de Janeiro, Sindicato dos Carregadores e Ensacadores de Café do Rio de Janeiro (SCEC), a labor organization that existed between 1931 and 1985 in the port area of Rio de Janeiro.3 The ensacadores, the great majority of whom were Afro-Brazilians, unloaded coffee cargo arriving from the Southeast inland areas, processed and mixed the raw product at the port warehouses, and stored coffee blends in big sacks for shipping and export. These workers were trabalhadores avulsos (casual laborers), that is, unskilled men who offered their manual work on a daily basis at the many warehouses on the docklands, without any contract of employment.4 The newspaper article added rich information about the interviewee’s background. Fragrante had been born thirty-eight years earlier in the inland state of Minas Gerais. He had arrived in Rio de Janeiro, illiterate, at the age of sixteen, “full of hope and ambitions” (“Em 1937…”, A Manhã, 1945, p.3). In 1927, at the age of twenty, he started working as an ensacador. In 1931 he was among the founding members of SCEC, of which he later also became secretary and president. Enthusiastic about Vargas’ labor legislation, Fragrante stated that the Estado Novo had provided him not only with basic labor rights, but also with the material conditions to study and become an accountant, improving his life prospects (“Em 1937…”, A Manhã, 1945, p.3). A black and white photo provides visual information about the interviewee: a very dark- skinned man who is sitting at an office desk, finely dressed in jacket and tie. The speaker’s reference to the Free Birth Law and the Golden Law, I admit,

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience particularly caught my attention due to Fragrante’s phenotypic appearance. Sanctioned in 1871, the Free Birth Law established freedom for the offspring of enslaved African and Afro-descendant people, while the Golden Law abolished slavery entirely in 1888. Despite this, Fragrante’s mention of slavery abolition laws was applied to the apparently color-blind field of labor. The question remains as to whether there is anything racial or ‘black’ beneath Fragrante’s testimony. My premise is that any racial reference would be a blatant exception in the framework of SCEC’s public discourse. My analysis of the historical archive of this trade union, in fact, shows that ensacadores limited their official discourse to concepts of labor and professional unity, the Catholic faith, family, and the nation, with no regard to any black ethno-racial and political references. Nothing at all in the union’s archive would suggest that the ensacadores were predominantly Afro-Brazilians, aside from the good amount of old photographs that I rescued from SCEC’s dusty cupboards.

Figure 1 – João Baptista Ribeiro Fragrante in A Manhã

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 André Cicalo

Figure 2 – SCEC’s dilapidated portrait of Getúlio Vargas

Starting from Fragrante’s newspaper interview, this article investigates whether and how a ‘black field’, or a ‘black experience’, emerged at SCEC under the veil of much institutional silence.5 In his study of maroon settlements (quilombos) in nineteenth century Rio de Janeiro, Flávio dos Santos Gomes points out the presence of a ‘campo negro’ (black field). He presents this concept as a complex and multifaceted social network that was deployed by African and Afro-descendant people, which produced social movements, conflicts and economic practices with different interests (1996, p.36; Cruz, 2000, p.277-278).6 I propose that, even though the presence of an Afro- Brazilian experience is largely downplayed within SCEC’s official documents, a black field still surfaces in multiple ways in the docklands in the mid-twentieth century. Firstly, a black field emerges through the demographic prevalence of black workers in the port of Rio de Janeiro and, even more consistently, within specific trade unions. Secondly, it survives in the memory of ensacadores, in some cases openly, and in some other cases filtered through the discourse of class identity. The black field of ensacadores, as Gomes (1996) suggests for quilombos, was certainly intersected by networks of solidarity and conflict. Having said that, it was also influenced by the set of exclusions that black dockworkers had to face in Brazilian society, and that were reflected in

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience the docklands somewhat automatically. Seen from this perspective, the presence of a black field in the docklands of Rio de Janeiro is also something that goes beyond the official intentions of SCEC and the reflexivity of its members. Exploring Afro-Brazilian discourses and silences in the specific context of ensacadores must take into account the socio-political situation of the era of labor politics in which SCEC was founded and developed, an era that has been labeled trabalhismo (Gomes, 2005). Inaugurated by the regime of Vargas in 1930 and continued under his successors until 1964, trabalhismo granted proletariats social advantages without precedent, but also overlapped with a phase of state corporatism (1937-1945) and overall restrictions to social and political actions. In addition, Vargas’ regime coincided with official attempts to downplay ethno-racial differences and inequalities. The mainstream discourse became a nationalist ideology of mestiçagem (racial mixture) and racial democracy (referred to today as ‘myths’), and the promise that industrial development would be the solution for Brazil’s social problems. The widespread silence on ethno-racial matters within Brazilian trade unions at the time of the SCEC is reproduced by the paucity of studies that deal with this subject at any stage and at any geographical scale in Brazil (Rogers, 2011, p.124). Only Cruz (2000; 2006a), McPhee (2006a; 2006b), and few other scholars have provided interesting insights on this subject, discussing the ‘black’ legacy among dockworkers in Rio de Janeiro in the first two decades of the twentieth century. The number of studies that explore racial matters in trade unions drops further in relation to the time of trabalhismo. This trend might be due to the assumption that labor organizations, belonging more obviously to the sphere of class, have little to say about ethno-racial questions, and even less at an historical moment when racial democracy was normatively championed as state ideology. The idea of trade unions as exclusively class-based, however, should be reconsid- ered, particularly for those labor unions in which race and ethnicity have left a significant mark for historical and social reasons (Rogers, 2011). I propose that, in my field of research, even silences represent a source of information, and the underground discourse of these silences can be explored and analyzed (Sheriff, 2001). This reasoning, however, does not suggest that the Afro- Brazilian legacy at SCEC was framed in terms of underground ethno-racial politics. The interest of these laborers, in fact, was to negotiate inclusion and citizenship through the idea of the laborers’ proletarian nature, and an apparently color-blind concept of ‘respectability’.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 André Cicalo

This article is partly based on archival sources and engages with the existing literature about race and labor on the docks of Rio de Janeiro. A large portion of the information used was found at SCEC’s premises, including minutes (atas) of the union’s meetings between 1931 and 1964, and 17 issues of SCEC’s mensário, the monthly journal of the ensacadores, released between 1960 and 1961. Other data were discovered in what remains of the record databases of members of SCEC, in addition to photographic material belonging to the organization. These sources were found in haphazard piles at SINTRAMAERJ, the Trade Union of General Carriers of Rio de Janeiro, which replaced SCEC in 1985 and occupies SCEC’s premises in the port area of Rio de Janeiro. Aside from these documents, I consulted over one hundred newspaper articles concerning dockworkers’ trade unions in Rio de Janeiro via the Online Database (Hemeroteca) of Brazil’s National Library. Further sources consulted were retrieved from the Public Archives of the State of Rio de Janeiro (Aperj), where the ‘Political Police’ section holds records of the institutional relations established between trade unions and authorities between 1927 and 1983. This pool of documents represent the basis of what I define as the official (or institutional) discourse of SCEC. They show how the union presented itself to authorities, and reveal the language that the ensacadores’ leaders deployed in their interactions with the state. The rest of the methodology used for this research was based on interviews, participant observation and oral history collected from elderly former SCEC members, some of whom are still linked to SINTRAMAERJ as pensioners (aposentados). The research was constrained due to the fact that, despite there being a number of surviving SCEC former members available for interview, most of these informants had joined the union towards the end of SCEC’s institutional life, with very few having experienced the early decades of the trade union This means that future attempts to reconstruct members’ experiences at SCEC will have to rely on the memory of younger cohorts, some of which are descendants of the trade union’s founders.

Race and ethnicity in Rio de Janeiro’s docklands: an overview of the literature

In colonial Rio de Janeiro, enslaved Africans were used to perform the heaviest and most low-status economic activities; among these, the transportation of goods and people. With the intensification of port activities in the

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience seventeenth century, the Governor of Rio de Janeiro, Rui Vaz Pinto, ruled that “the loading and unloading of ships should be performed by black enslaved people” (Lamarão, 2006, p.22). In the nineteenth century, the moving of the Portuguese royal family to Brazil, the development of the local economy and the boom in coffee exportation required a higher number of manual workers in the docklands. The bags of coffee arriving from the plantations were collected across the city center by “groups of half naked and shouting black men”, who carried the product on their heads to the warehouses (Santos in Lamarão, 2006, p.39-40).7 Farias et al. describe that many slaves-for-hire (escravos de ganho) managed to buy their freedom by offering this kind of casual work on the docks, and that the Mina ethnic group from West Africa enjoyed a sort of monopoly in this field (2005, p.111-118). Towards the end of the nineteenth century, due to the waves of European migration in Brazil and the abolition of slavery, a number of (white) migrants started looking for employment as dockworkers in Rio de Janeiro. As a consequence, the number of white workers in the docklands increased notably, even though this sector remained under the control of black workers (Cruz, 2006b, p.227; 2006a, p.225). In the first decades of the twentieth century, as a result of the industrialization process and the spread of socialist and anarchist ideas from Europe, Brazilian workers started to organize, reacting to their extremely vulnerable working conditions. Dockworkers, for example, had not seen their labor situation much improved since the time of slavery, and continued to be largely oppressed by their employers’ contractual power (Batalha, 2006, p.98-99; French, 2006). In 1903 groups of shippers founded the Union of Stevedores (estivadores),8 while in 1905 a group of carriers founded the Society of Resistance of Warehouse and Coffee Workers, historically and popularly known as Resistência. A number of scholars have emphasized the strong Afro- Brazilian composition of dockworkers’ trade unions (Cruz, 2000; 2006a; Galvão, 1997; Moura, 1995; Chalhoub, 2001), and Moura is quite specific in describing Resistência as a ‘black’ trade union (um sindicato negro) (1995, p.71), in spite of the presence of a white minority. Data presented by Cruz of 353 membership photos of Resistência members between 1910 and 1929 show, according to her own subjective interpretation, that 23.5 percent of members were brancos (white-skinned), 14.2 percent were pardos (brown-skinned and/ or mixed-race), and 62.3 percent were pretos (very dark-skinned) (Cruz, 2000, p.271). For this reason, as Galvão reminds us, the union was also known as the Companhia dos Pretos (Black People’s Company) (1997, p.22). Roberto Moura (1995) was probably the first scholar to insist on the Afro-Brazilian roots of

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 André Cicalo the dockworkers’ unions of Rio de Janeiro. For example, he pointed out the significant contribution that Afro-Brazilian port workers made to the cultural identity of the city, particularly through samba, capoeira, carnival, and the practice of Afro-Brazilian faiths.9 Furthermore, Cruz has shown that the structure of port carriers’ work was based on terminology and organization inherited from slavery, an historical reality that was broadly racialized due to the color and cultural specificities of the enslaved. For example, Cruz refers to the role that a ‘captain of the troop’ (capitão da tropa) played in the coordination of groups (troops or tropas) of casual port workers and for the negotiation of labor with potential employers, reproducing an organization typical of the slavery epoch (2010, p.118). Cruz also observes that the expression ‘troop of laborers’ (trabalhadores de tropa), already used during the slavery period, was semantically extended, and continued to be used for trade unionized cargo workers during the first half of the twentieth century.10 Roberto Moura (1995, p.71) and Sidney Chalhoub (2001, p.91-114) have interpreted recorded cases of conflicts between European migrants and Afro- Brazilian workers in ethno-racial terms. In fact, the growing number of European competitors between the 1870s and the 1920s seriously threatened the control that Afro-Brazilians exerted in the least prestigious niches of the job market (Cruz, 2006a; Farias et al., 2005, p.127). Cruz (2006a) and MacPhee (2006a, p.647-648), without discarding completely the presence of ethno-racial cleavages in the Resistência, have been more skeptical of this reading, while emphasizing the shared lower status of Afro-Brazilian and European laborers and their relatively harmonious cohabitation in port neighborhoods. Cruz’s research, in particular, shows that European immigrants were not only accepted as members of dockworkers’ unions but they also often occupied important administrative roles in those organizations (2006a, p.206). Cruz, in addition, reminds us that socialist and color-blind ideals were at the basis of the Resistência’s statute, approved in 1905, whose motto was “one for all and all for one”, promoting the union of all workers without “distinction of nationality, color and religion” (Cruz, 2006a, p.194). Consequently, Cruz and Albuquerque (1983, p.151) believe that conflicts in dockworkers’ trade unions in the early twentieth century were more typically due to political rather than ethno-racial reasons. Nonetheless, drawing on Gomes’ work (1996), Cruz defends the idea that Afro-Brazilian dockworkers established an underground ‘black field’ within the ethnically heterogeneous space of port neighborhoods. This social and material space, in Cruz’s view, constituted a frame within which a black identity could be preserved and developed (Cruz, 2000, p.277-278).

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

Expanding upon Cruz’s point, it seems that ‘black territories’ were not based exclusively on links of solidarity but also on the disconnections and discrimination that Afro-Brazilians suffered in a white-hegemonic society. In a newspaper article dating from 1907 and quoted by Cruz, for example, a worker complained that employers barely distinguished laborers from thieves and vagrants, because from the employers’ perspective everybody was a “scoundrel and nigger” (canalha e negrada). A newspaper article from 1918 also showed a similarly racialized portrait of dockworkers, when a worker from Resistência equated the achievements of the union’s class struggles to the abolition of slavery, which occurred on 13 May 1888.

Before [Resistência], it was common for carriers to be beaten with a multi-tailed whip. There was no appeal (apelação) … they hit the black [my italics] … and the police pretended not to know … This situation was natural for many, because their sad condition as coffee workers was a prolongation of what May 13 had abolished. (in Cruz 2010, p.117, my translation)

Although the literature on dockworkers I have mentioned refers exclusively to Resistência and concerns the pre-Vargas era, these references represent an extremely important background for a study of SCEC’s ensacadores. Archival material, in fact, shows that SCEC was formed, at least in part, by defectors from Resistência, which had traditionally controlled the transportation and storage of any goods, including coffee, in the port area of Rio de Janeiro. The same Fragrante with whom I opened this article must have been a member of Resistência. In fact, as Fragrante himself mentioned in his interview, he had started working as an ensacador de café in Rio de Janeiro in 1927, four years before the establishment of SCEC. The minutes of the union’s assembly also show that, at least in its initial phase, some SCEC workers kept their membership of Resistência, an option that the directive board of ensacadores decided to ban in 1932 (atas book 1932, p.9). The atas book of 1947 (p.71) shows that Resistência made repeated use of Labor Justice (Justiça do Trabalho) to invalidate the recognition of SCEC and to reincorporate it. Disputes between SCEC and Resistência characterized the docklands until the mid-1940s, primarily because Resistência could not accept losing control over coffee processing and transportation. Such data illustrate that SCEC and Resistência had a very similar constituency. My interpretation of 1249 photos of SCEC members between the 1930s and 1960s reveals that pretos and mula- tos, that is, dark- and brown-skinned people to whom I could subjectively

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 André Cicalo ascribe some black-African heritage, represented not less than 70 percent of SCEC’s total collective.11

Figure 3 – Health membership card of an ensacador

Figure 4 – An ensacador displaying his old work card (libreta)

Being a ‘respectful’ classe: unity, Catholicism and the nation in SCEC’s official discourse

Cruz suggests that the Afro-Brazilian heritage and constituency of the Resistência did not entail an ethno-racial politics of identity within the union. As she notes,

[Resistência’s] workers were investing precisely in the breaking of racial hierarchies that [Brazilian] society aimed to preserve. They emphasized equality, and championed the irrelevance of color, origin and religion. They created rules of

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

universal coexistence and praised solidarity. (in Cruz, 2006a, p.208, my translation)

The situation I found at SCEC was very similar. No written archival sources that concern SCEC explicitly reveal the presence of a black legacy in the trade union, and only from the set of historic and administrative photos of the institution can we learn that SCEC was predominantly composed of black workers. The rest of the archival sources I studied, by contrast, make reference to a number of interests and values that clearly occupied a more central space in the institutional identity of ensacadores. One of these values was the ideal of professional unity,

to overcome … individual hate … which can only bring misfortune to our class … Two people together are worthier than an individual, because both take advantage of their association … whereas people who have nobody to support them whenever they fall down will be miserable. (atas book 1940, p.19)

The call for unity among members is found consistently in SCEC’s assembly atas and in the mensário between 1931 and 1964. To some extent, this recalls considerations already made by Cruz about Resistência in the first two decades of the twentieth century. In the traditional class spirit of labor organizations, SCEC’s statute of 1940 aimed to promote class solidarity and work for the wellbeing of members and their families. This included the provision of legal and financial assistance for workers, in addition to creating and supporting literacy courses, schools, and hospitals, and offering support for funer- als and other social security needs, in conformity with law 1402/1939 (atas book 1940, p.6-7). The objective behind these provisions was to help raise the spiritual and material conditions of workers, who officially self-identified as a classe of “low-status laborers” (trabalhadores humildes) (atas book 1941, p.19). The statute of 1940, on the other hand, also established strict rules in relation to work ethics, against unprofessional conduct and unjustified absence from work (atas book, 1940, p.9). From the atas books, which include the 1940 statute, we also know that alcohol consumption before and during work was particularly condemned (atas book 1947, p.73; atas book 1948, p.109). Punishments for misbehavior could range from temporary to permanent exclusion from the trade union (atas book 1940, p.9). A further value that clearly emerges in the official discourse of SCEC is the celebration of ensacadores’ Catholic faith. On 22 April 1956, the newspaper A Cruz dedicated an article to the twenty-fifth anniversary mass of SCEC, held

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 André Cicalo at the Church of Candelaria: “Following his religious education, the president Waldemiro Nunes could not celebrate the silver anniversary of his institution without addressing his gratitude to God, Who has benefited Brazil’s workers so profoundly” (“O sindicato…”, A Cruz, 1956, p.8). Themensário and the photographic material, in the same vein, reveal that the trade union celebrated its foundation anniversary mass, every 20 April in the Church of Santo Antônio dos Pobres (Saint Anthony of the Poor), while other celebrations took place at the Church of São Jorge (Saint George), both in the center of the city. In a document published in the mensário in 1961, porters thanked the protection of “merciful Jesus” when the government with- drew an increase in coffee export taxation, which risked reducing the avail- ability of work for ensacadores and might have resulted in the union’s bankruptcy (mensário, n.6, p.2, 1961). Even more crucially, an ideal that constantly emerged in the institutional life of SCEC was loyalty to the nation. Most issues of the mensário, for example, opened with the following sentence:

WE INVITE OUR COMRADES (COMPANHEIROS) TO EMBRACE NOBLE CAMPAIGNS AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. ONLY IN THIS WAY WILL WE BE ABLE TO PRESENT OURSELVES NOBLY, CONSTITUTING A STRONG AND RESPECTFUL CLASSE, AND FULFILLING OUR HIGHEST GOAL OF SERVING THE BRAZILIAN NATION. (mensário, 1960 and 1961)

This emphasis on the nation is not surprising for the epoch, particularly considering that, according to its statute, SCEC aimed:

to promote the study, coordination, protection and legal representation of the professional category of coffee baggers … in order to collaborate with public authorities and other associations to establish professional solidarity and [the] professional category’s subordination to national interests. (statute, atas book 1940, p.6-7, my italics)

Not by chance, the Ministry of Labor and the Political Police put the trade unions’ meetings, elections, atas, and any other official aspects of laborers’ lives under strict surveillance. We know, for example, that the Ministry of Labor often exerted the prerogative of replacing union presidents in cases of internal conflict or suspicions of poor administration.12 In a worst-case scenario, authorities could dissolve labor organizations in the same way that they had allowed for their creation. In addition, any political activity whose ideals might

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience be at odds with the government was forbidden within the trade union (atas book 1940, p.6-7). As a result, the values of SCEC during trabalhismo responded to an institutional and operative need, more than reflecting the ensacadores’ identity. The union’s boards of directors had to constantly reassure the authorities that everything about the conduct and the philosophy of the organization was in line with national ideals. The records of the Political Police of Rio de Janeiro (1940-1964) are full of letters sent by trade-union administrations, in which the leaders of these organizations seemed to be trying reassuring the authorities about their patriotism, anti-communism, institutional unity and adherence to Catholic values. For these reasons, in order to explain the logic of SCEC’s official discourse and identity, it is necessary to understand what is meant by ‘nation’ during trabalhismo. Vargas gained power with the Revolution of 1930, in a moment characterized by strong social demands and agitation, after the First Republic had failed to modernize the country. The spread of socialism among European immigrants, in the meantime, had raised the spirits of the proletariats, who struggled for better labor conditions and whose strikes threatened the continuity of production and the country’s wealth. Within this context, Vargas’ plan had been to industrialize the country, control Brazil’s oligarchical groups, repress anarchist and communist movements, and curb immigration. Vargas’ regime addressed these objectives primarily with nationalist policies, regulating social inclusion and labor rights but also increasing state control over the labor sector. Such control became more effective with the Estado Novo, when Vargas’ government took on a dictatorial and corporatist character. The logic entailed in trabalhismo was that workers should receive respect and be protected, but also that they should learn discipline and work ethics in order to be considered ‘honest’ and to serve the nation (Gomes, 2005, p.239). The government saw the lower classes as soldiers of industrialization and used a logic of social politics that was largely inspired by Pope Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum Encyclical, which established the rights and duties of capital and labor, and where the concepts of religious observance and family were emphatically stated. The idea, as Gomes suggests, was that “if it was not possible to erase poverty completely, at least it was possible to provide the proletariats with a more human and Christian condition, as requested by the social doctrine of the [Catholic] Church…” (2005, p.198). In terms of race relations, Vargas is remembered for his nationalist support for the ideology of ‘racial democracy’ and ‘racial mixture’. These national values discursively downplayed the existence of racial inequalities in Brazil so to foster

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 André Cicalo national identity and pride, but also ended up disguising racial divides and championing a romantic view of Brazil’s racial ‘harmony’ (Hasenbalg, 1979). By the end of the nineteenth century, eugenic views had started to become popular in Brazil. This suggests a general pessimism at that time about the presence of a large Afro-descendant population and the idea that this could be problematic for Brazilian development. Reacting to such views, Vargas drew on Gilberto Freyre’s positive assessment of Brazil’s multiple racial and cultural roots as a feature of which Brazilians must be proud. At the same time as Vargas de-penalized Afro-Brazilian religions and valued Afro-Brazilian culture as part of national folklore, his regime constantly celebrated Brazilians as citizens of a mixed-race and culturally syncretic country. In so doing, the regime praised Brazil’s racial harmony and looked with skepticism at any politics that might contradict this idea. In 1937, within the framework of corporatism that banned all political and social organizations, Vargas dismantled Frente Negra Brasileira (FNB),13 the first expression of black politics that had achieved formal organization in Brazil. This happened just after FNB had reached the status of a political party in 1936. It also happened at the time when FNB had begun to proselytize among trade unions.14 This means that, although trabalhismo was characterized by moments of democratic opening and contextual re-articulation of black political action, the overall context did not encourage the development of a political black identity within dockworkers’ trade unions in Rio de Janeiro. As the philosophy of racial democracy was ubiquitous to all aspects of social life in Brazil, it was also enmeshed within Brazil’s labor politics. Vargas acknowledged that black workers should be given official attention as a consequence of their suffering under slavery (Castro Gomes, 2005, p.223). Some authors have particularly explored the racial layers of trabalhismo, interpreting Vargas’ labor politics for the lower classes as an attempt to redress the popular and black-racialized imagery of the malandro (trickster). The malandro, as often represented in samba lyrics, was widely portrayed as an antithesis to work ethics because of its association with bohemian life, petty crime and rejection of work (Matos, 1932; Lima, 2009). Vargas’ labor politics, in other words, would have the function of domesticating Afro-Brazilian tricksters and transforming them into “tie-wearing workers of capital” (homens de gravata e capital) (Lima, 2009, p.27) in the service of national progress. It is worth remembering that the Estado Novo supported the diffusion of a pedagogic samba (laborers’ samba or samba do trabalhador) that praised the values of work and encouraged the social redemption of the malandros from “idle” subjects into “new men” (homens novos) (Maia, 2011, p.212; Matos, 1982, p.108).

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

If trade unions were controlled by the state and relied on state support for social advantages and recognition, national ideals of ‘respectability’ must have been crucial for dockworkers. In other words, incorporating the logic of racial democracy and reproducing silences about race was also part of the game, and might have reinforced the paucity of ethno-racial references in SCEC’s official documents. Having said this, there is no doubt that submission to the state was convenient for dockworkers, who gained not only ‘respectability’ but also economic prosperity during trabalhismo, In 1960, SCEC’s mensário was still celebrating that Vargas had allowed “[all] workers to occupy a prestigious place in the economic, legal and political scenario [of Brazil]” (mensário, n.2, p.2, 1960). Due to the favorable conditions that Vargas provided for the coffee sector, ensacadores were able to purchase their own headquarters (sede própria) with an annexed clinic, gather “a financial patrimony of 30,000,000 Brazilian cruzeiros” and buy a number of estate properties. They were also able to guarantee broad social security and adequate medical services for union members and their families (mensário, n.2, p.2, 1960). SCEC’s photographic archive and newspaper articles offer visual evidence of this prosperous past, showing institutional moments of the trade union’s life; for example, expensive ceremonies and parties attended by personali- ties such as Brazil’s president Eurico Gaspar Dutra, the Governor of the State of Guanabara Carlos Lacerda, and Deputy Tenório Cavalcanti. It was during these celebrations that finely dressed ensacadores displayed much of their wealth and ‘respectability’ to state authorities. Living proof of this success was João Fragrante, the formerly illiterate ensacador who had ‘respectably’ turned into an accountant, while honestly earning a living through his hard job (a rude tarefa) on the docks (“Em 1937…”, A Manhã, 1945, p.3). Sitting at his desk and dressed in an elegant suit, this slave descendant was interviewed by a popular newspaper, displaying all the signs of his novel social status.

Figure 5 – A moment in SCEC’s administrative life (1960)

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 André Cicalo

Figure 6 – The Board of Directors at ‘St. Anthony of the Poor’ Church (1960)

Figure 7 – Ensacadores’ families welcoming Deputy Tenório Cavalcanti at SCEC (1960)

Figure 8 – Party celebrations with members’ families at SCEC (1960)

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

Race, memory of slavery and Afro-Brazilian legacy among dockworkers

The previous section of this article focused on the official discourse of SCEC, as contained in the institutional documents that cast light on the trade union’s past. The question, at this point, is whether any ‘black’ experience had significance beyond SCEC’s institutional language. The only way to explore this question, unfortunately, is to rely on the testimonies of the few living veterans of the labor organization. One of the matters that I explored with my informants was whether racial discrimination held any significance at SCEC.

[There was] nothing of that! The only thing that mattered for us was supporting the interests of the classe … ensuring respect from all workers and being well- behaved at work (portarmos bem no trabalho) … White, black, mulato (white and black mixed) … once you carried coffee, it did not matter who you were outside the docks (a sua pessoa não contava mais) … you were just a bagger (você era saqueiro e ponto)! Everybody did the same, just a very rough job (trabalho pesado pa’ cacete) … and we had to help each other to make the weight more bearable … White people were a minority anyway…they had to adapt, didn’t they? (Arlindo)

The interview with Arlindo, a ninety-year-old former ensacador, is quite typical of the interviews I carried out with other SCEC workers, independent of their color. All the interviewees pointed out the prevalence of Afro-Brazilian workers at SCEC as well as the presence of a white minority with whom, apparently, there was no racial conflict. The heavy pace of the job and its low social status, in addition to its collaborative nature, must have converted SCEC’s labor collective into a space of relative social harmony, free from ethno-racial tensions (Cruz, 2006a). Although these testimonies downplayed ethno-racial conflict among ensacadores, race should still be explored as an analytical concept in the study of dockworkers’ trade unions. Firstly, as Arlindo observes, white people were a minority at SCEC and white people might have had to ‘adapt’, making concessions to a predominantly non-white collective. In other words, racial issues among ensacadores might have been different if there had been a different racial distribution in the workforce, or if white people had dominated the boards of directors. This last possibility, however, was notably reduced by SCEC’s statute (atas book 1940, p.6), according to which presidents should be

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 André Cicalo born in Brazil and members of the boards of directors should be Brazilian or naturalized Brazilian (atas book 1940, p.9). Secondly, although internal relations between ensacadores were not clearly influenced by color and racial issues, this fact should not imply that workers considered racism as something alien to their everyday lives. Most black interviewees, for example, told of the racial discrimination they had suffered away from the docks. These cases included experiences of being banned from eleva- tors and swimming pools in middle-class buildings, being the only people searched by the police on public transport, and being mistaken for muggers on their way home. Although informants had a view of the docklands as a non-racist space, this fact did not spare most ensacadores from having a black- racialized experience in Rio de Janeiro. This occurred even during the ideological era dominated by trabalhismo and racial democracy, when the days of racism seemed numbered (Bastide; Fernandes, 1971). Thirdly, even assuming that ensacadores experienced the docklands as a racially democratic place, this fact does not necessarily imply that dockworkers’ trade unions were non-racialized. In fact, the high presence of Afro- Brazilians in some unions was not simply an effect of the triumphal resistance of black workers in defending their jobs from migrants. It was also a result of a general process of segregation, which disproportionally confined Afro- Brazilians to heavy and unskilled activities, even in the docklands. The book Um Porto para o Rio (A Port for Rio) (Turazzi, 2012), which illustrates images of the construction of the port in the early twentieth century, reveals that the laborers involved in the activities of landfilling the port and expanding the docks between 1903 and 1910 were predominantly white. Similarly, interviews with dockworkers have revealed that the numbers of black workers were traditionally lower in the Stevedores’ Union, and even lower among the Conferentes (shipment clerks). Data relating to this point can also be visually collected from the book Estivadores do Rio de Janeiro (Almeida, 2003). Almeida displays the photos of 66 union presidents, from which I deduced that 50 percent of the Estivadore presidents were white. The fact of their being a larger proportion of white dockworkers among estivadores (whose work was performed inside the ships’ holds) than among Resistência’s workers and coffee ensacadores (whose jobs were performed outside the ships) is also observed, but not explained, by Moura (1995, p.71). My informants from the docklands generally ascribe this situation to the higher clustering of Portuguese and, more marginally, Italian and Spanish dockworkers among estivadores and shipment clerks.15 But why should white Europeans cluster more typically in certain jobs

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience and trade unions in the docks? To answer this question, it is important to look at racial distribution patterns not simply as something typical of the docklands, but as an entrenched dynamic of Brazil’s social and economic life in general. Andrews (2004, p.143-144) defends the idea that links of solidarity based on nationality and color might have influenced the choice of the employers – most of them white and foreign.16 Specifically, the work of landfilling and expanding the port of Rio de Janeiro in the early twentieth century was sub-contracted to a private British company, C.H. Walker & Cia Ltda (Turazzi, 2012), which had total control of the recruitment process. According to Domingues (2003, p.103), the preference among employers for (white) European workers was based on the clear tendency to identify these workers as more skilled and familiar with tasks involving some level of technology.17 However, Domingues argues that the idea of European immigrants having better skills than Brazilians was a myth (2003, p.91-92). In a similar vein, Galvão (1997), who explores literacy rates among Resistência’s workers in the first decades of the twentieth century, finds that 26 percent of European members were declared illiterate, compared to 13 percent of Brazilian pretos, 13 percent of Brazilian pardos, and 9 percent of Brazilian brancos. As a consequence of this paradox, Domingues (2003, p.121) concludes that the comparative advantages of European migrants in the job market should primarily be explained by the persistence of eugenic and whitening ideals in Brazil. Since the scholarship available on dockworkers in Rio de Janeiro has not followed a comparative approach, what we lack is a reflection on pay and prestige hierarchies among different trade unions operating in the docklands. In this sense, the interview process with dockworkers highlighted that the tasks carried out by the shipment clerks’ and the estivadores’ collectives (where the number of Afro-Brazilians was lower) enjoyed higher prestige and remuneration than those performed by Resistência’s and SCEC’s workers, whose labor was considerably heavier and involved more physical power.18 Interviewees explained that the work of estivadores was made lighter by the use of mechanical cranes (guindastes), while the job of shipment clerks consisted of monitoring and administrative activities, a fact that required some literacy and mathematical skills. That said, higher pay and the type of work were not the only factors that produced uneven racial distributions among dockworkers’ unions. In fact, both SCEC’s statute and interviews with informants revealed that admission procedures for members traditionally favored the employment of workers’ relatives, and that potential candidates were often proposed from within circles of friends and acquaintances. Some levels of uneven racial

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 André Cicalo distribution, consequently, were probably maintained through the embedded racialization of workers’ social networks (among family, friends and neighbors), where specific ethno-racial groups might have been predominant. A parallel discourse can be made in relation to the social mobility of workers depending on their color. Galvão’s informants at Resistência, for example, claimed that while several Portuguese people had been union members, they tended to resign more easily as soon as better job opportunities opened up (1997, p.49); opportunities that, for one reason or another, seemed less available to black workers or less appealing to them. These considerations are useful to relativize my informants’ understandings of the docklands as a space where race did not really matter. Feelings about racial divides were probably reduced not only because some mixture was present in all the trade unions, but also because, in the case of work surpluses, laborers might be offered informal day labor through other unions. These exchanges, according to informants, were particularly frequent between ensacadores, Resistência’s carriers and estivadores, where workers could even ‘rent out’ their shifts to other people in exchange for a commission.19 Finally, racial divides within and between different trade unions were largely mystified as a result of the shared social and cultural space in the docklands. In fact, as an informant stated, “dockworkers played the same sambas, drank in the same botiquins (canteens), went to the same brothels, took the same train back to the suburbs [where most dockworkers lived]…” (Ivanil). The black racialization of some trade unions took on sharper contours when I asked SCEC informants why black laborers had traditionally prevailed in their unions. Interviewees responded by saying that coffee transportation was, originally, typically the work of enslaved people (isso vem do trabalho escravo). Others explained that it was because they executed manual labor (trabalho braçal), which required little or no schooling (baixa escolaridade). Informants made their points by implying a discourse of the racialization of poverty, the main explanation for which was embedded in the memory of slavery. This is the case not only because the slave trade exerted a racializing effect on Brazilian history, but also because, in the understandings of ensacadores, a black-racialized body represented the ‘ideal’ executor for heavy, physical jobs:

It might happen that a muscled white man was willing to work [as an ensacador] … well, the man could not even unload a truck of 150 sacks! [laughs] If he could barely take the sacks out of the truck, how could he ever transport them to the

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

warehouse? These [white] people did not even know how to hold the bag … so their hands turned very soon into raw flesh. In contrast, the pretos … the preto was very strong (era forte mesmo) … which is not a surprise since he came from slavery … When he started working [as an ensacador], the black man already knew the job … because he came from the plantations, from inland in the state [of Rio de Janeiro] or from [the states of] Minas Gerais and Espírito Santo. They all descended from slaves who lived on the plantations there. When he [the black worker] was lazy, not even the whip worked (nem dava o chicote pra isso) … but when he was keen on working, in that case he was an excellent laborer. (Arlindo)

Another worker reinforced similar connections between the heavy jobs of ensacadores and the black-racializing effects of slavery:

In my time, coffee baggers earned good money since pay was proportional to production … but the job … the job really killed you! [We] black folks (a negrada)20 had to unload trucks (carretas) of 200 or more sacks of coffee, 60 kilos each … 61, if you included the weight of the sack … Most workers were black because it was the job of the slaves! Because, in the end, what do we [goods carriers] do if not give continuity to what the black slave (o negro escravo) did before us? (Levy)

The presence of a ‘black field’ within dockworkers’ trade unions does not surface exclusively through the process of color distribution and the performance of black-racialized bodies as a legacy of slavery. Roberto Moura (1995), not by chance, has emphatically described dockworkers’ contributions to the shaping of Afro-Brazilian culture in Rio de Janeiro through samba, carnival and their involvement in Afro-Brazilian faiths, as has also been mentioned by the same dockworkers (see also Arantes, 2005). Members of the Resistência and other dockworkers’ organizations in Rio de Janeiro (including SCEC), for example, were founders of the samba school Império Serrano, one that traditionally put some emphasis on the memory of slavery and Afro-Brazilian cultural heritage such as jongo music, Afro-Brazilian popular Catholicism and African gods (orixás).21 In spite of this legacy, any connections between ensacadores and samba, capoeira, and carnival are strangely silenced in SCEC’s archives, and were carefully maintained outside of the union’s official life. In official discourse, ensacadores had also preferred to conceal any references to Afro-Brazilian faiths, while they emphasized their lives as observant Catholics. The data that I collected through archival research, however, show incoherence with a statement that I constantly heard in the port area of Rio de Janeiro: “dockworkers were all macumbeiros!” (followers of macumba, a term

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 André Cicalo widely used to refer to Afro-religious cults of candomblé and umbanda in Rio de Janeiro). Ivanil and other ensacadores spent some time remembering which candomblé and umbanda houses (casas de macumba) SCEC leaders frequented in the areas of Jacarezinho, Nova Iguaçu, Penha and Duque de Caxias. Some of them also mentioned how macumba played an important role during the election process of SCEC boards of directors, where opposite factions of ensacadores competed politically for power. These rituals, I was told, never took place at SCEC’s headquarters and remained confined to the semi-private space of its members’ lives. The manifestation of African spirits, on the other hand, was not totally separate from life in the docklands.

Kiko: …When the crane started lifting a cargo of stones into the ship, a worker went completely crazy. He screamed and panicked. He shouted out that those stones could not leave [the docks]…they should be put back where they came from [the land from where they had been extracted]. You had to see it to believe it... Me: But what happened? Kiko: He was possessed [by an orixá] (sei lá, o cara baixou alguma coisa)… Other worker: It’s because orixás (as entidades) relate to earth, water, fire … That one must have felt deprived of his element (sentiu que tiraram alguma coisa dele). Me: How did the story end? Kiko: He calmed down only when somebody called his mother, who had a ter- reiro (candomblé/umbanda house) somewhere…

But is it possible that nothing of the ensacadores’ macumba universe was present at SCEC’s premises? Interestingly, when I asked dockworkers whether any visible expression of an Afro-Brazilian religious universe had survived at the SCEC, Ivanil looked at me with some surprise: “Is there not a Saint George over there [pointing to the Saint George altar and statue on the third floor of SINTRAMAERJ’s headquarters]? Isn’t that black people’s stuff? (Não tem um São Jorge lá em cima? Aquilo não é coisa de preto?)”. Ivanil’s reference to the Saint George altar as “black people’s stuff” exemplifies the syncretic process by which enslaved people and their descendants have used images of white saints and rituals from Catholicism to venerate African gods (Saint Jorge is largely identified with African god Ogum in Rio de Janeiro). Whether this cultural syncretism is the result of the harsh repression that Afro-derived cults have suffered since colonial times, or whether it represents a ‘black’ cultural appropriation of Catholicism, or

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

Figure 9 – Saint George’s niche at SCEC’s/SINTRAMAERJ’s headquarters more simply Afro-Catholicism, this subject is widely explored in literature (Karasch, 2000, p.355-360; Soares, 2002) and goes far beyond the reach of this article. A point that is quite important to stress here, instead, is that Vargas formally removed the embargo against Afro-Brazilian faiths (law 1202/1939), basically admitting them as ingredients of national identity. In this context, nothing should have prevented ensacadores from making their devotion to orixás more explicit within SCEC’s spaces. It is worth mentioning, however, that such ritual freedom was not unconditional, and followers still had to obtain expensive permits to practice their cults from the Delegacy of Games and Costumes, at least until 1976. In addition, the granting of these permits was never automatic, and Afro-Brazilian faiths continued to face repression more or less implicitly. Both during and after Vargas’ rule, in fact, Afro-Brazilian cultural expressions were generally seen as antithetical to modernization and public morality, or as popular folklore. Consequently, an open display of Afro-Brazilian culture might have been counterproductive for the ‘respectable’ image that ensacadores aimed to project of themselves either as citizens or as state interlocutors. This trend certainly continued during the military regime (1964-1975), when, despite the end of trabalhismo, the ideology of racial democracy continued to thrive.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 23 André Cicalo

Conclusion: dockworkers’ post-abolition fields between citizenship and exclusion

The absence of Afro-Brazilian markers in SCEC’s institutional discourse and its general confinement to the semi-private sphere of workers’ lives does not simply reflect the irrelevance of ethno-racial matters in the docklands. It should also be interpreted either as a result of constraints set by the state ideology of racial democracy or as a strategy of social emancipation of black proletariats. This strategy made particular sense at a time when state ideologies claimed to be offering a valid solution for the full integration of the black masses into the formal job market, while Afro-descendants were trying to shake off the stigma of slavery. SCEC’s wealth and its illustrious relationships with authorities and politicians suggest that the dream of racial equality was affordable for ensacadores, and that displaying loyalty to the mainstream moral system of the nation was both compulsory and convenient. For all these reasons, SCEC’s official archive may not be the most appropriate field in which to research black experiences among coffee baggers. The archive, as I have suggested, represents a better space to explore how ensacadores concealed and negotiated their Afro-Brazilian heritage, in order to build and preserve an image of respectability. Seen from this angle, ensacadores’ silence on Afro- Brazilian heritage might represent “simultaneously a public form of accommodation and a private (if at the same time communal) form of resistance” (Sheriff, 2001, p.83). Having noted the set of institutional constraints and conscious choices that might have led ensacadores to officially downplay the Afro-Brazilian legacy, I have posited that the presence of a black field, or several black fields, at SCEC still surfaces through the intersection of different scenarios. The first scenario consists of the way that racial structures manifest in the docklands, although this might sound at odds with the feeling of racial harmony that some informants report having experienced there. However, the idea of a black field does not simply build onto the systems of inclusion and solidarity that Afro- Brazilian workers deployed within and outside the docklands. It also draws on processes of historical exclusion, which have generally prevented certain sectors of post-abolition society from full access to socio-economic resources, and have relegated them to lower-status jobs. The second scenario by which a black field emerges among dockworkers concerns the explicit reference that these workers make to the slavery past as an important framework for their jobs. I have observed that this legacy, which is already described in the

24 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience historiography, also tends to ‘speak’ through the black-racialized body of the ensacador, stigmatized and self-stigmatized as a ‘natural’ performer of heavy, unskilled labor. The third scenario that reveals a black field relies on links with Afro-Brazilian cultural heritage, in the ways that this has been preserved within the less official spheres of SCEC workers’ lives. At the institutional level, dockworkers’ links with slavery history and Afro-Brazilian legacy emerged in Fragrante’s newspaper interview, although any possible ethno-racial content there appears somewhat ambiguous and is reframed in class terms. Fragrante, as I have pointed out, de-racialized his testimony by arguing that Vargas’ labor legislation had abolished workers’ slavery.22 However, a number of features tend to racialize his testimony. Firstly, the interviewee made an extremely accurate reference to slavery mitigation and abolition laws (the Free of Birth Law and the Golden Law), something that white workers might not have cited with the same emphasis. Secondly, some ethno-racial content in the newspaper article was automatically displayed by the phenotype of the interviewee, independent of his elegant outfit and further evidence of his improved social status. Finally, Afro-Brazilian legacy emerges through the ethno-racial constituency of the overall labor collective that Fragrante represented: a constituency whose prevalent Afro-Brazilian character was presumably known to A Manhã’s readership in 1945. In general, the impression is that scars from a rather close and familiar slave past, as well as echoes of post-abolition struggles, still filter through Fragrante’s discourse, where class and race necessarily appear as superposed and entangled spheres. Fragrante, consequently, was more than just a lower-class worker who showed his gratitude to trabalhismo. He was also a voice of post-abolition society. This could be understood as an historical ground crossed by discourses, negotiated meanings and silences, through which black proletariats have strategically looked for citizenship and longed for effective inclusion.

REFERENCES

Albuquerque, Marli Brito. Trabalho e conflito no Porto do Rio de Janeiro: 1904- 1920). M.A. Dissertation – Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro, 1983. Almeida, Luiz. Estivadores do Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro: Topbooks, 2003. Andrews, George Reid. Afro-Latin America 1800-2000. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 25 André Cicalo

Arantes, Erika Bastos. O Porto Negro: trabalho, cultura e associativismo dos trabalhadores portuários no Rio de Janeiro na virada do XIX para o XX. Ph.D Disserta- tion – Unicamp. Campinas, SP, 2005. Bastide, Roger; FERNANDES, Florestan (eds.) Brancos e negros em São Paulo. 1.ed. 1959. São Paulo: Cia. Ed. Nacional, 1971. Batalha, Cláudio. Limites da liberdade, trabalhadores, relações de trabalho e cidana- nia durante a primeira república. In: Cole Libby Douglas; Ferreira Furtado, Júnia (eds.) Trabalho livre, trabalho escravo. São Paulo: Annablume. 2006. p.97-112. Chalhoub, Sidney. Trabalho, lar e botequim: o cotidiano dos trabalhadores no Rio de Janeiro da belle époque. 1.ed. 1986. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 2001. CRUZ, Maria Cecília Velasco. Cor, etnicidade e formação de classe no porto do Rio de Janeiro. Revista da USP, v.68, p.188-209, 2006a. Cruz, Maria Cecília Velasco. Da tutela ao contrato: “homens de cor” brasileiros e o movimento operário carioca no pós-abolição. Topoi, v.11, n.20, p.114-135, 2010. CRUZ, Maria Cecília Velasco. Puzzling Out Slave Origins in Rio de Janeiro Port Unio- nism. Hispanic American Historical Review, v.86, n.2, p.205-245, 2006b. CRUZ, Maria Cecília Velasco. Tradições negras na formação de um sindicato. Afro-Ásia, v.24, p.243-290, 2000. Domingues, Petronio. Uma história não contada. São Paulo: Ed. Senac, 2003. Farias, Juliana; Líbano Soares, Carlos Eugênio; Santos Gomes, Flávio dos (eds.) No Labirinto das Nações. Rio de Janeiro: Arquivo Nacional, 2005. French, John. As falsas dicotomias entre escravidão e liberdade: continuidades e rup- turas na formação política e social do Brasil mderno. In: Cole Libby, Douglas; Ferreira Furtado, Júnia (eds.) Trabalho livre, trabalho escravo. São Paulo: Annablume, 2006. p.75-96. Galvão, Olívia Maria. A Sociedade de Resistência ou Companhia dos Pretos. Master dissertation. –Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro, 1997. Gomes, Angela de Castro. A invenção do Trabalhismo. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 2005. Gomes, Angela de Castro; Mattos, Hebe. Sobre apropriações e circularidades: me- mória do cativeiro e política cultural na era Vargas. 1998. Available at: http://www. labhoi.uff.br/sites/default/files/sobre_apropriacoes_e_circularidades.pdf; Accessed on: 16 Oct. 2014. Gomes, Flávio dos Santos. Quilombos do Rio de Janeiro no século XIX. In: Reis, João José; Santos Gomes, Flávio dos (eds.) Liberdade por um fio: história dos quilombos no Brasil. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1996. p.263-290. Hasenbalg, Carlos. Discriminação e desigualdades raciais no Brasil. Rio de Janeiro: Graal, 1979. Karasch, Mary C. A vida dos escravos no Rio de Janeiro – 1808-1850. Sao Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2000.

26 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

Lamarao, Sergio. Dos trapiches ao porto: um estudo sobre a area portuaria do Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro: Secretaria Municipal das Culturas, 2006. Líbao, Carlos Eugenio Soares. A negregada instituiço: os capoeiras no Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro: Secretaria Municipal de Cultura, 1994. Lima, Marcos. Malandros de antanho e malandros de gravata e capital. Boitatá, v.7, p.15-34, 2009. MATOU o “capitão” da tropa. A Noite, Rio de Janeiro, Wednesday, 23 Dec. 1931. McPhee, Kit. Immigrants with Money Are No Use to Us. The Americas, v.62, n.4, p.623- 650, 2006a. McPHEE, Kit. A new 13th of May: Afro-Brazilian Port Workers in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 1905-18. Journal of Latin American Studies, v.38, n.1, p.149-177, 2006b. Maia, Andréa. Cultura e cotidiano nas minas de ouro: trabalhadores em tempos de experiências autoritárias e suas resistências plurais. Topoi, v.12, n.22, p.209-227, 2011. Matos, Claudia. Acertei no milhar. Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra, 1982. Moura, Roberto. Tia Ciata e a Pequena África no Rio de Janeiro. 1.ed. 1983. Rio de Janeiro: Funarte; Instituto Nacional de Música/ Divisão de Música Popular, 1995. O SINDICATO dos Ensacadores de Café do Rio de Janeiro comemora as suas bodas de prata. A Cruz, Sunday, 22 Apr. 1956. Rios, Ana Lugão; Mattos, Hebe. Memórias do cativeiro. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2005. Rogers, Thomas. Race, Respect, and Authority in Contemporary Brazil. Labor – Stu- dies in Working-Class History of the Americas, v.8, n.2, p.123-146, 2011. Sheriff, Robin. Dreaming Equality: Color, Race, and Racism in Urban Brazil. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2001. Soares, Mariza Carvalho de. O Imperio de Santo Elesbao na cidade do Rio de Janeiro, no seculo XVIII. Topoi, v.3, n.4, p.59-83, 2002. SOLIDARIEDADE com a Abyssinia ameaçada. A Manhã, Rio de Janeiro, Saturday, 3 Aug. 1935. Terra, Paulo Cruz. Cidadania e trabalhadores: cocheiros e carroceiros no Rio de Janeiro (1870-1906). Ph.D Dissertation – Universidade Federal Fluminense. Niterói, RJ, 2012. Turazzi, Maria Inez. Um porto para o Rio. Rio de Janeiro: Casa da Palavra, 2012. UMA ABSOLVIÇÃO que causa protestos em São Paulo. A Noite, Rio de Janeiro, Mon- day, 16 Jan. 1933.

NOTES

1 The work leading to this article has received funding from the People Program (Marie Curie Actions) of the European Union’s Seventh Framework Program (FP7/2007–2013) under REA grant agreement no. PIOF-GA-2012-327465.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 27 André Cicalo

2 I could not find a better translation of ensacador into the English language. This term in Portuguese refers to workers who stored food and other goods into bags/sacks for distribution on the market. 3 Sindicato dos Carregadores e Ensacadores de Café do Rio de Janeiro. In the text, I simplify the original ‘SCECRJ’ into ‘SCEC’. The trade union changed its name to Sindicato dos Carregadores e Ensacadores de Café da Guanabara in 1960, when the federal capital was transferred to Brasilia and Rio de Janeiro became the capital of the small state of Guanaba- ra (1960-1975). It finally changed into the Sindicato dos Carregadores e Ensacadores de Café do Estado do Rio de Janeiro in 1975. 4 Although coffee carrying was an important task of coffee dockworkers, SCEC workers used the term ensacador/es more often than carregador/es. 5 For similar considerations about silence on ethno-racial matters in official discourse see McPhee (2006b, 175) and Cruz (2006a). 6 Cruz, before me, found the concept of a ‘black field’ useful to analyze black ethno-racial legacy in Rio de Janeiro’s docklands in the first two decades of the twentieth century. 7 Cruz, citing a document of 1853, mentions that, before abolition, most of the transportation of coffee between warehouses was done by black slaves-for-hire, who walked in a queue (enfilarados) and were directed by a captain (2010, p.118). See also Farias et al. (2005, p.115). 8 Although this term is often used generically for dockworkers, the specialty of the estivadores was organizing cargos inside the ship’s hold. 9 See also Líbano (1994) and Arantes (2005, p.107-127). 10 An article on the first page of the newspaper A Noite (“Matou…”, 1931, p.1) comments on the murder of a capitão da tropa at SCEC. The work of the captain was carried out by the trade union ‘fiscal’ (superintendent), terminology still used today, while the tropas were transformed into professional categories of workers (classes or proletariado). 11 This percentage does not suggest that the rest of the workers were ‘white’. The remaining 30 percent includes a small percentage of non-white workers about whose black-African ancestry I felt unsure. There is no information about the year in which the membership forms were filled out. However, the date of workers’ admission in the trade union appears in some of the forms, ranging from 1931 to the early 1960s. 12 For an example, see the atas book 1941, p.18-19. 13 Brazilian Black Front. 14 During Italian military campaigns in Abyssinia, FNB exhorted “black stevedores of Rio de Janeiro, Santos and Bahia to boycott the export of any war resources that could be employed against their threatened [black] brothers” (A Manhã, 1935, p.7). 15 This impact of ‘nationality’, I observe, had the implicit effect of altering the ‘racial’ distribution in certain labor unions or job sectors. However, with the implementation of immigration restriction laws in the early 1930s, this impact probably tended to decrease.

28 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Fields of Post-Abolition: Labor and ‘black’ experience

16 In Sao Paulo, according to Domingues (2003, p.118), 75 percent of employers were Italian. 17 For a similar point away from the docklands see Terra (2012). The author explains how since the mid-nineteenth century, European immigrants tended to monopolize mechanized transport of people, while enslaved people and freemen remained disproportionally segregated in physical jobs of general transportation as carregadores. 18 See also Andrews (2004, p.143-144). 19 This system was called ‘cavalo’ (literally, horse). 20 The frequent use of this term among ensacadores is interesting, conserving the presence of about 20-25 percent of white people among this labor category. 21 For a sample of lyrics by Resistência and Império Serrano’s leader, Aniceto da Império, see http://letras.mus.br/aniceto-do-imperio/ (last accessed 17 Oct. 2014). 22 This testimony finds a parallel in relatively recent interviews carried out with slave descendants in Brazil’s rural Southeast (see Gomes; Mattos, 1998, p.7-12; and Rios; Mattos, 2005, p.248). These interviews show that slave descendants ascribe real abolition to Getú- lio Vargas, meaning that the law of 1888 had not done enough to convert enslaved and slave-descendant people into full citizens.

Article received on January 20, 2015. Approved on March 6, 2015.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 29

The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity in the post-abolition period, Laguna (SC) As heranças do Rosário: associativismo operário e o silêncio da identidade étnico-racial no pós-abolição, Laguna (SC)

Thiago Juliano Sayão*

Resumo Abstract Este artigo traz uma reflexão sobre a So- This article looks at Sociedade Recreati- ciedade Recreativa União Operária va União Operária (1903), an associa- (1903), uma associação fundada por tion founded by Afro-Descendants afrodescendentes vinculados à Irman- linked to the Brotherhood of Irmandade dade de Nossa Senhora do Rosário dos de Nossa Senhora do Rosário dos Pretos. Pretos. Consideramos a relação entre as We consider the relationship between associações, religiosa e leiga, o principal religious and lay associations, the prin- indicativo da ascendência africana dos cipal indicator of the African ancestry of sócios da Operária, uma vez que essa the members of Operária, since this as- agremiação não afirmou, na primeira sociation did not stipulate an ethnic-ra- metade do século XX, uma identificação cial identification during the first half of étnico-racial. O ocultamento da raça ou the twentieth century. Hiding race or cor em uma agremiação classista na ci- color in a class based group in the city of dade de Laguna, estado de Santa Catari- Laguna, in the Brazilian state of Santa na, apresenta-se como oportunidade de Catarina, is understood as an opportu- estudo sobre a associatividade afro-bra- nity for studying Afro-Brazilian associa- sileira no pós-abolição. tivity in the post-abolition period. Palavras-chave: associativismo; pós- Keywords: associativism; post-aboli- -abolição; Laguna. tion; Laguna.

Any outsider who comes to Laguna, whether by railway or by sea, soon has his observer’s spirit solicited by a construction, which due to the elevated topograph- ic position in which it is found, and by the religious symbolism which it reflects, must appear with another aspect and presence; and not like the ruin and true abandonment which it demonstrates.

* Pós-doutorando em História, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (UFSC). Florianópolis, SC, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69007 Thiago Juliano Sayão

We refer to the small church of Rosário [the Rosary] which is erected on a small hill to the extreme north of our city and with the same name. We know that the temple now in ruins belongs to the Brotherhood of the Rosary, which we think should congregate efforts and even ask for public support in order never to consent that a construction like that, which required so much work and dedication, would be found in the state it is currently exists; a condition of pure abandonment. Here we appeal to the religious spirit of the Brothers of the Rosary, who, in the majority, are workers, can be a part of the effort to restore a church, which by the attraction it exerts our visitors, as well as how it is found, has become not only a flagrant mirror of our religious decadence, but also the massive lack of love for the aesthetics of our city.1

The Church of Rosário was demolished in the 1930, around 12 years after the publication of this text. The dissolution of the Irmandade de Nossa Senhora do Rosário dos Pretos da Laguna (the Brotherhood of Our Lady of the Rosary of the Blacks of Laguna) in Santa Catarina should be understood in a relational form and not definitively, since it implied a process of the associative regroup- ing of Afro-Descendants in the Post-Abolition period. This article reflects on the creation of an association founded by blacks linked to Rosário, in a context marked by racial segregation and the struggle for citizenship. The brotherhood was the place of origin of four of the founders of Sociedade Recreativa União Operária (SRUO – the Workers’ Union Recreational Society): Bonifácio Jesuíno Alves, Lucidonio Sypriano, Pedro Jerônimo do Nascimento, and Antônio Felisberto da Rosa. Bonifácio and Lucidonio were bricklayers; Pedro, a carpenter, and Antônio, a merchant. We believe that the participation of the Rosário’s members in the creation and administration of the Workers’ Union is an important indication of the African ancestry of the members this society, since during the first half of the twentieth century SRUO did not affirm any ethnic or racial identification. The hiding of race2 or color3 is an opportunity to study the strategies of social ascension and conquest of new black territory through associativism. If the demolition of Rosário Church represented the elimination of an old Afro-Descendant space, the construction of the Workers’ Union served to legitimate the appropriation of another place for the sociability of an Afro-Lagunese group. Santo Antônio dos Anjos da Laguna (1682), along with São Francisco do Sul (1658) and Nossa Senhora do Desterro (1662), were among the oldest

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity settlements in Santa Catarina. The Vila of Laguna served as a water port for the supply of food and timber during the first decades of Portuguese colonization in South America. The Vicentines used indigenous and African labor since their foundation. In the second half of the eighteenth century, the colonization and settlement of the coastline of Santa Catarina counted on a great inflow of slaves and the arrival of approximately 6000 immigrants from the Azores and Madeira. The agricultural production of Santa Catarina in this period began to offer a diversity of foodstuffs to “help meet the demands of the South- Central and Northeastern areas” (Mamigonian; Cardoso, 2013, p.24). In the first decade of the twentieth century, the economy of Laguna was based on small scale agricultural production and fishing. Among the foodstuffs produced were: manioc flour, salted fish, corn, broad beans, and black beans. In addition the city also had a dozen factories which produced: beer, soap, can- dles, fireworks, bags, trunks, objects made from tin, vinegar, casks, and shoes. The urban landscape was composed of ports, warehouses, and around a thousand buildings, both public and private residences. In 1900, Laguna had 16,471 inhabitants; in 1920 this number had jumped to 27,573. In the 1940 Census, in which there appears the indication of the color of the population, there appear 30,728 whites and 2,489 blacks and mixed. Until the 1990s the history of Laguna did not consider the Africans and their descendants as historic agents. In the texts of local memorialists they appeared as slaves until abolition and afterwards were no longer cited. The invisibility of blacks in the South of Brazil is, according to Ilka Boaventura Leite (1996), one of the supports for the ideology of whitening which arose out of the discourse of the supposed insignificance of slavery for a Southern economic system based on polyculture on a reduced scale. However, current academic research shows that slaves, freemen, and freed slaves of an African origin had actively participated in the social life of Santa Catarina since the eighteenth century. In the first half of the nineteenth century they accounted for around 30% of the coastal population. Slave labor was used in agricultural production, notably for manioc flour, fishing, and the production of whale oil. Recent research also indicates that as well as serving as labor for their masters, slaves, freed, and free Africans and Creoles worked for themselves, associated in brotherhoods and societies of different natures, travelled between provinces, accumulated goods (including slaves) and created families with distinct de- grees of kinship.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Thiago Juliano Sayão

The roots of the Workers’ Brotherhood

Studies which have dealt with the Brotherhoods of Rosário in Brazil have concentrated on the period prior to abolition and are fundamentally based on commitments (compromissos), books, and statutes produced in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The authors situate them in spaces social controlled by the Catholic Church, but they were also territories of resistance for African and Afro-Brazilian culture. Black and mixed brotherhoods held both traditional Catholic rituals and festivities with a hybrid cultural character. Brotherhoods were potential spaces for the reinvention of African culture and the protection for the enslaved population, and as a place of congregation, allowing meetings between groups of African descent, slaves, freed, and free. According to João Reis, “The brotherhood represented a space of relative black autonomy, in which its members constructed significant social identities, within which its members constructed significant social identities, within a world that was at times suffocating and always uncertain” (1996, p.9). Russel- Wood agrees with Reis when he says that the brotherhoods were legally accepted communitarian forms of life, which stimulated associative feeling among Africans and Afro-Descendants and, at the same time, constituted a “direct relationship to a series of socio-economic factors” (2005, p.230). John Thornton raises the idea of an “African Christianity” (2004, p.334), in which the brotherhoods were spaces where many Brazilian slaves “expressed their identities” in “parades on holy days, doing the dances of their nation and singing in their own language” (ibid., p.417). The Republican period in Brazilian history was marked by the decline of black brotherhoods, which we can measure, for example, in the process of the destruction of the churches of the brotherhoods of Nossa Senhora do Rosário in different cities. In the 1920s the churches of Rosário in Uberaba (MG) and João Pessoa (PB) were destroyed. In the 1930s those in the cities of Curitiba (PR), Guarulhos (SP), in the neighborhood of Penha (São Paulo, SP), in Guaratinguetá (SP), Goiás and Campina Grande (PB) were demolished. The Church of Porto Alegre (RS) fell in the 1940s, and that of Campinas (SP), in 1956.4 We understand that the demolition of these churches signified a systematic deletion of collective forms of organization and the mobilization of Afro-Descendant groups. The destruction of black brotherhood churches are indications of the march of the Romanization of the Catholic Church, as well as part of the urban reform policy (Haussmannization) which took form in the first half of the last century.

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity

In turn, the decline of black and mixed brotherhoods was to some extent linked to the rise of other modern black associations. Studies point to the survival of the practices of the old brotherhoods in worker associations, created in the first half of the twentieth century. Cláudio Batalha identified the maintenance of determined rituals of brotherhoods, such as the organizational structure of assemblies and the celebration of the day of crafts in Afro- Descendant worker societies in Rio de Janeiro. According to Batalha, aspects of workers’ associative culture were inherited from mutualist societies in the nineteenth century, related, for example, “to the dignity of work, the valorization of manual labor, and above all, to class, and what constitutes more than the mere survival of traditions or an archaic vocabulary” (1999, p.47). Sidney Chalhoub explains the emergence of modern beneficent societies as the consequence of the “decadence of Catholic brotherhoods” (Chalhoub, 2007, p.228). These, due to the reduction of the importance of religion, came to assume the “functions of social protection of workers” (ibid.). Marcelo Mac Cord analyzed the transformation of the Brotherhood of São José do Ribamar to the Sociedade das Artes Mecânicas e Liberais (1850 – Society of the Mechanical and Liberal Arts). His relational perspective was related to the importance of the symbolic capital accumulated by the Brotherhood for the modeling of the professional and lay society. The master carpenters “used the Brotherhood as an institute which added to the practitioners of that trade” (Mac Cord, 2012, p.30), while Mac Cord also explains the emergence of the Society of Arts as a strategy for maintaining the prestige of the brothers of the Brotherhood of Ribamar. “The idea of constructing an association allowed them to reinforce old common ties and to rework a cultural repertoire consolidated and shared by them in Recife” (ibid., p.50). In the field of Afro-religiosity, Luis Páres linked the weakening of the brotherhoods to the creation of associativity in the Candomblé terreiros in Bahia, which “came to constitute one of the most important means of social aggregation, identity, and cultural resistance of the black and mixed population” (2007, p.138). These studies show, from different angles, the transformations of Afro- Descendant associativism, which stopped being organized around brotherhoods to organize in mutual assistance, educational, recreational, or Afro-Brazilian religious societies. Moreover, we still noted that modern black associations inherited some of the principal functions of brotherhoods: promotion of sociability, social integration, and the defense of racially discriminated groups.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Thiago Juliano Sayão

Nevertheless, we know that the appearance of a society, whether of a religious or secular nature, has to be understood in relation to the historic context in which it developed. It is in this sense that we understand the Brotherhood of the Rosary of Laguna, like the other homonymous confraterni- ties, as a place of solidarity and visibility for the African and Afro-Descendant population.

This brotherhood had its golden epoch at the time of slavery. It held the renowned Padroeira festival, in which could be felt the entire ritual, the taste of African things. In it appeared a king and a queen, with their respective vassals, all slaves, dressed in flashy clothes. The king, dressed in character, with a crown on his head, and the queen whose head was adorned with bright colors. With grotesque clothes, they came to church, heard mass, and went to the procession. When the religious part was over, they gave themselves over to dances brought from Africa, which went on until very late at night. The king of the first festival held in 1836 was the emancipated black Francisco Vaga, while the first queen was Josefa, slave of José Lourenço. This first festival was officiated by Vicar Francisco Vilela, who in 1839, was killed by the Farrapos. (Ulysséa, 1976, p.182)

This text is one of the rare reports about the practices of the Brotherhood of the Rosary of Laguna. The documents, minutes of meetings, and commitments made by this society have disappeared, therefore we have little information about it. We know, from reading the newspapers, that Rosário Church was the departure point, until 1885, of the important procession of the image of Senhor Bom Jesus dos Passos. We also discovered that it came to an end in the 1930s and the land on which it was located was sold by the brotherhood in 1941. No sign exists nowadays of that church, or of the rituals held there. Nevertheless, we can consider the ending of the Brotherhood of the Rosary, which resulted in the creation of black educational and recreational associations, a determining episode in the history of Africans and Afro-Descendants in Laguna in the post abolition period.

Status and black territory

The Workers’ Union Recreational Society (Sociedade Recreativa União Operária), founded in 1903, and the Cruz e Souza Literary Club (Clube Literário Cruz e Souza), created in 1906, are the two modern black societies in Laguna. They had a markedly recreational nature. Until the appearance of

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity these associations, soirées were only held in the clubs of whites: Clube Blondin (1887), Congresso Lagunense (1889), and Sociedade Recreativa Anita Garibaldi (1889). We can therefore say that União Operária opened, in the framework of Belle Époque culture, a private place, territory of nocturnal entertainment for blacks. Studies about black associativism in the South of Brazil, especially in Rio Grande do Sul, explain the creation of Afro-Descendant societies in the Post- Abolition period as the action of black communities against racial discrimination, since blacks and mixed persons were forbidden from frequenting the clubs of whites (Loner, 1999). Petrônio Domingues (2009) highlights the creation of Afro-diasporic networks composed of associations and newspapers, which had the purpose of fighting the segregation of blacks in southern Brazil – especially the cities of Porto Alegre, Pelotas, Santa Maria, and São Leopoldo. The black societies of Pelotas acted, according to Fernanda Oliveira (2011), with the purpose of manufacturing a positive image for the descendants of Africans. In a general form, in the process of positivation of black identity, recreational and cultural clubs followed a set of norms of civility and investing efforts in the school education of their members. The societies were places of sociability, but they also served as a means of social mobility for their members. In Rio Grande do Sul, according to Nara de Jesus, “black social associations or social clubs proliferated during the 1920s and 1930s, grouping a part of the black population who aspired to social status of the middle class” (2005, p.30). The desire for social distinction, through the acquisition of new status which occurred through the appropriation of determined cultural practices, is a common point in research about Afro-Gaucho associativism.5 In Laguna it was no different. SRUO workers also had the association as a place of visibility, integration, and social association. Despite its name, the Workers’ Union, was formed of a plurality of professionals, manual workers, merchants, traders, and civil servants. Of the 42 professions declared in the SRUO`s registration books between 1921 and 1938, 17% of contributing members said they were workers, 13% traders, 9% casual laborers, and 7% carpenters. The variety of professions tended to reduce over time tempo. Between 1941 and 1949, 27 professions were registered: 13% declared themselves maritime workers, another 13% workers, 11% bricklayers, 6% painters, and 6% carpenters. Between 1950 and 1956, of the 25 professions registered, it was demonstrated that the number of ‘maritime’ workers increased proportionally: 23% were sailors, 10% stevedores, 9% casual laborers, 8% civil servants, 6% bricklayers, around 5% were dockers, and the same

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Thiago Juliano Sayão proportion were carpenters and chauffeurs.6 The quantitative data indicates that the dynamics of the registration of members between the 1920s and 1950s, was directly related with the socio-economic movement in the coal and cargo port in the city. SRUO workers held dances on the association’s anniversary, in the festivities dedicated to the patron saint of Laguna, Santo Antônio, also organizing festivities in carnivals and meetings in which they danced, played billiards, and bingo. In addition to the recreational nature, we identified that the club had an educational function, offering night courses and a library to its members, friends, and relatives. The aims of the club were:

a) Provide dances or any other festivities in which the members and their families can meet; b) Create a varied and instructive reading section for its members, making acquisitions of good newspapers, books, and magazines; c) Intensify and develop by all means available to it social assistance services; d) Establish games permitted to societies for the recreation of its members.7

We understand that, as well as the objectives published in the statutes, there were ‘hidden objectives,’ those which were not made explicit in documents, but which could be identified in collective, daily, and continuous actions. Two non-specified objectives can be highlighted which also serve to understand the formation of Operária: create and maintain a group identified by color in a worker society, and acquire its own building in the central area of the city. These aims seem strategic to us for the constitution and maintenance of that association. Its financial resources were especially used to fulfill the second implicit objective: the acquisition of the building. SRUO was capitalized through the collection of monthly dues, recreational activities, and donations. According to the books of revenues and expenses, the money was collected in the following order of importance: the monthly dues from the members, the rental of the hall for billiards games, bingo, lottery, and buffets. The monthly dues were the principal source of income for the society, which explained the concern with the defaulting of its members that appeared in the minutes of the meetings. Moreover, the principal cause for the removal of a member was because of the accumulation of unpaid dues. The treasurer was responsible for collecting the dues and notifying the Board when members did not pay for three consecutive months. Sales of dances tickets were a secondary form of income.

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity

Dances had less financial importance, though a high symbolic value, since it was in these festivities that members gained greater visibility. The greatest expenditure of Operária were related to payments to suppli- ers of products for dances and festivities, as well as services related to the maintenance of the building (the cost of electric lighting, removal of litters, and other charges paid to the municipality). In second place were expenses with the purchase of the building, located on Rua Santo Antônio, on the corner with Rua Tenente Bessa, one block from Praça XV de Novembro, the principal urban space in Laguna. The purchase of this eclectic style building seems to us the group’s greatest achievement. It represented the conquest of a new black territory8 in the center of the city. The acquisition and maintenance of the building involved a series of linked efforts. Members and their families, especially the women, were responsible for the organization and the implementation of fundraising. Married and unmarried women, despite not having a seat on the board for the first decades the association existed, had a fundamental role in the organization of production of the ‘entertainment.’ Possibly the young people, relatives aged less than 18 of members, registered in the books as ‘guests,’ also assisted in the production of events. The registration books indicated the creation of an extensive associative network formed by members, their relatives, and guests, indicating that the club functioned as an aggregator of its worker members, and also their relatives and friends. Also through the analysis of the accounting books in which revenues and expenditures appear, it was possible, once again, to relate the Brotherhood of the Rosary to the Sociedade Operária. Part of the money used to amortize the debt from the acquisition of the property was withdraw from a fund adminis- tered by the brotherhood. The presence of individuals in the two spaces, the brotherhood and the club, allowed the transit not only of people, but also of experiences and resources, which served for the formation of an associative economy, indispensable in the exercise of autonomous collective practices. The conquest of autonomy also occurred though the connections of SRUO with important local persons. Visits by illustrious citizens were common during the commemorative events with a high symbolic value, such as the its foundation day, 9 February, and the First of May. According to Article 39 of its Statutes, the First of May represented the annual commencement of the new board. In the 1938 commemoration tributes were paid to the patron of the library, the abolitionist leaders and journalist, José Patrocínio, with the presence of Fr. Bernardo Philippi, the direct of the Lagunense Congress, Dib

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Thiago Juliano Sayão

Mussi, the Mayor of Laguna, Giocondo Tasso, and representatives of local trade unions, such as the Trade Union of Stevedores and the Trade Union of Metallurgical Workers. In addition to the public acts involving the community, the association also gained respectability by adopting a set of formal and solemn acts in its meetings and festivities. The use of formalized symbols and practices following the precepts of civility and good conduct. Ceremonials consisted of a series of rituals, including: speeches given by persons (illustrious guests and members of the board), reading of the foundation act, singing of the anthem, saluting the flag, the dance, and ‘taps.’ The manipulation of republican symbols, such as the flag and anthem, had, amongst other functions, a pedagogical nature from the Comtean perspective of positivism. Emblems were used in public rituals in order to reach everyone, including “women and the proletariat, less affected, at least in Brazil, to the written word” (Carvalho, 1990, p.140). Ritualized meetings reproduced the language of public symbolic discourse, through both form and the content of what was said. The ritualization of festivities was one of the principal ceremonial practices invented in recreational societies. Public ceremonies of societies conferred on them respectability, at the same time that it reaffirmed their identity.9 According to statements collected by Júlio da Rosa (2011), SRUO was a club formed by blacks of social importance. Paulo Sérgio da Silva, great-grandson of Sizino Antônio Machado, a merchant who joined the club in 1919, referred to the members as “blacks of the elite” (Rosa, 2011, p.78). Antônio Paulo Bento, a former president of Operária, identified the members of the Operária as “morenos,” (ibid., p.67), i.e., mixed or ‘brown’. Marina Viana da Silva, daughter of Eugênio Viana, a merchant who exercised the functions of treasurer and president of the Society, declared that União Operária belonged to the “mulattos” (ibid., p.86-87). In Antônio and Marina statements, a social superior position of members was identified by a clearer skin color. In these memories – which we identified as collective (Halbwachs, 1990), the name of mulatto or moreno, for the Operária’s members, served to affirm a social superior status and, thereby, mark a difference in relation to other blacks, members of Clube Cruz e Souza, said by the same interviewees to be ‘blacks.’ In the memories of Nerina Viana Mendes, also a daughter of Eugênio Viana, in comparison with that of Cruz e Souza, the club’s dance “was more social. It was full of something. Black ‘nega’ did not get in. I was black and got in, because I was family.”10 Nerina’s memories accentuate the differentiation of status. We can perceive here that the link of an Afro-descendant with the

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity club was based on connections which involved identifications of color and prestige. Changes in social position of a person could even imply a new ethnic- racial identification. Becoming a member of theOperária could signify ‘whitening.’11 Becoming mulatto/moreno represented a mark of social ascension. Although the statements of people linked to the club, former members and relatives, present a collective memory of the identity of the group (Pollak, 1992, p.204), we have to be attentive to the fact that memories produced in the present time mix with the life memories of the interviewee. Moreover, social memory also suffered modifications over time. Memory, according to Pierre Nora (1993, p.9), “is life, always carried by living groups, and in this sense, it is in permanent evolution, open to the dialectic of remembering and forgetting.” For this reason data from memory has to be treated skeptically, memories questioned, and absences problematized. Memory, as a history vestige, needs to be confronted and related to other contemporary documents related to theme studied. We believe that the identification of the mulatto or moreno by collective memory serves, at the same time, as a reaffirmation of the social importance of the antecedents of the group and a way of distancing it from its African ancestrality. Having said this, we will analyze an image 1921 which shows the board of the Operária.

Figure 1 – Board of Sociedade Recreativa União Operária, Laguna, 1921.

This photograph was produced to record the awarding of the club’s lottery prize.12 In the center of the image is Lucas Bainha, responsible for the action,

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Thiago Juliano Sayão surrounded by the members: Pedro do Nascimento, the then president, João Augusto de Carvalho, Luiz Natividade, Euclides Santiago, João Marcolino de Souza, and Bonifácio Alves. The clothing, like the distribution of men around the table, suggests that the scene was mounted. The photograph is, in this sense, evidence that creates an idealized13 visibility of the group. Furthermore, it can be argued that the way of dressing, as ‘white’ as possible, is visual proof of whitening. However, we can understand that those members of the Operária reproduced practices and ceremonies accepted in a specific social and cultural context, did not signify they were whitening, in the sense of abandoning Afro-Descendant inheritances, but rather acting strategically “to suffer less discrimination and perhaps be more accepted” (Hofbauer, 2005, p.408). After all, whitening is an ideal that “opens the specter of negotiation, in the way that any definition of color/race reflects, to an extent, the context of the relations of power in which they occur” (ibid., p.409). In turn, the photographic presentation of the directors of the society in formal clothes contributes to the fabrication of an image of “blacks of the elite,” and is related to what differentiates them, according to the already mentioned statements, from the members of Cruz e Souza. In this case, the difference between the members of the two clubs is in status and not in color. It is important to highlight that the term “black elite” is used to reference those who are prestigious whilst part of a discriminated collectivity (Giacomini, 2006). In other words, it is an expression which serves to distinguish some Afro- Descendants from all the others, through the accumulation of economic, cultural, social, or symbolic capital.14 Similarly, the ethnic-racial identification of SRUO based on the moreno/mulatto skin color of its members of greatest prestige seems to us to be a generalization of collective memory. After all, not all members of Operária were blacks with clear skin and belonged to an ‘elite’ group. We will now look at two Afro-Descendants, Olavo Alano and Pedro do Nascimento, who were of importance in the association. Olavo Alano (1893-1965), a merchant, was one of the most important members of Operária. In his death certificate he appeared as ‘white.’ Olavo was the son of Miguel Alano Bittencourt (1861-1939), ‘mixed,’15 whose parents were Eva Sypriana de Jesus (1820-1890) and Luciano Alano de Bittencourt. Olavo was the nephew of Manoel Alano Fernandes Lima (1845-1923), ‘mixed,’ the oldest son of Eva Sypriana, also ‘mixed.’ Both, Eva and Manoel, from what it seems, were slaves on a plantation in Aratingaúba, which was part of the parish of Imaruí. Manoel’s father appears in his baptism record as ‘unknown,’ common among the children of slaves. According to Saul Ulysséa, Manoel

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity

Alano was “the only man of color who managed to overcome the prejudice of the time against the descendants of the black race, due to his character, insinu- ation and delicacy” (1943, p.43). It is important to highlight that Manoel was treasurer of the Brotherhood of Our Lady of the Rosary and the owner, with his relatives, of the plantation shop and haberdashery Manoel Alano & Irmãos. Pedro Jerônimo do Nascimento (1882-1967), godson of Manoel Alano, was another prestigious member of the society. Pedro was the secretary of the Brotherhood of the Rosary and had different function in Operária: president, secretary, and caretaker. He was recognized as an able carpenter and was a part of the founders’ group: “Perseverant souls who have the wisdom to valorize in the vanguard of this social line this group of workers, sons of this Lagunense land.”16 At the age of 65 he received the title of President of Honor of SRUO, due to the “brilliant actions he always demonstrated for the Society.”17 It is probable that his brilliance was related to the associative experience he acquired in Brotherhood of the Rosary, as well as the assiduous participation he had in the assemblies of Operária. Nevertheless, while his professional skill and commitment to the society were worthy of being noted in the minutes of meetings and assemblies, his connection with the black brotherhood remained silenced. We do not intend to look in greater depth at the trajectories of either Pedro or Olavo, but rather call attention to the African descent of both, even in the case of the second being declared ‘white,’ and point to the probable ties of kinship they had with Manoel Alano for success in the intra-group relationship. Both also help us understand the meaning that this society gave to worker members: a responsible, disciplined, and orderly worker. The ‘true worker,’ according to Olavo Alano, was the one who paid their dues on time and respected the norms agreed in the statutes. Worker members, irrespective of the nature of their profession, had the obligation to produce ‘from their sweat’ the money to support the society. Olavo, as stated in the minutes, warned that if it were not for the efforts of the ‘real workers’ the building would have been a ruin.18 Pedro and Olavo were, thus, the exemplary workers in an ethical association which aimed at preserving the territory conquered by the group.

Silence of ethnic and racial identity

The affirmation of a racial identity for Operária could not be perceived in the documents produced by the group in the first half of the twentieth century. It is, therefore, not possible to affirm, based on these sources, an identification of color/race for the members of that club. This identification, as we have seen,

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Thiago Juliano Sayão was obtained through oral statements in 2010 (Rosa, 2011). How then can an Afro-Descendant identity be considered in a recreational club which publically presented itself in the same clothes as the clubs of whites? To answer this question, we started with the nominal list of the members of Operária who were also part of the Brotherhood of the Rosary,19 to imagine a dual identification for the members of SRUO: blacks and workers. We perceived that determined subjects moved in the interstitial space between the brotherhood and the club, witnessing both the process of decadence of their church and the construction of a club for them, their relatives, and friends. The end of Rosário, looked at through the prism of associative transfiguration, resists the version of the disappearance of the community of men of color and strengthens an interpretation based on the strategies for the conquest of citizenship in a modern urban world permeated by racism. The politics of transfiguration, emphasized by Paul Gilroy, allows us think about the performances of the Laguna Afro-Descendants in a worker association.20 Even though SRUO did not make any claim in its documents to an ethnical-racial identification, we understand that the associative spirit of the black brotherhood gained a new form in that society – an institution more suitable to the positive republican ideal of civility and progress. How then to understand the hiding of the identity of race, or color, in an association that is bears the name workers? To understand the factors that can explain the silence about an African identity, it is necessary to consider the general and local historic and geographic context of the birth and development of the association. In the field of ideas in the 1900s there circulated a discursive production about the construction of a national identity which sought to nul- lify the ethnical and cultural differences at the same time that it reinforced, under the ideology of whitening in the South of Brazil, the valorization of the race and culture of Portuguese colonists and European immigrants. Another important question in the context posterior to abolition is related to the disci- plinarization and discrimination of black workers, which mobilized newspapers and police in a wide-ranging fight against ‘vagrancy.’ It is in this context, in fact, that recreational and sporting societies presented themselves as a solution to the problem of indiscipline and vagrancy in the urban space. As the newspaper O Albor stated: “The spirit of sociability” of the Laguna associations was an “expression of civilization,” which “reflects the requirement for an educational advances of a collectivity.”21 SRUO also corroborates this to encourage sociability and education of workers of African descent.

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity

In the context of the positivation of labor, worker associativism demanded the participation of blacks in the public life of the city. The connection of the identification of the black with labor,22 in turn, could act in the fight against the stigma of African descent related to slavery. It is in this sense that the posi- tivization of the Afro-Descendant group does not occur through the sustenta- tion of an ethical-racial identity, but rather an affirmation of values accepted in the shared behavior of a local community, which to a certain extent explains the non-existence of a discourse of positivation of black identity in Operária. The discourse published in Operária’s minutes and statutes reaffirmed this: the hierarchy of command; the exercise of voting in elections for the board; bureaucratic organization; financial and administrative rigor; and the zeal for the ‘decency’ of its members. Among the duties of members was, according to Article 7, Sub-item C of the statutes: “Remain decent and ensure this decency in all part of the society’s premises, treating politely those present, as well as not using indecent or irritating gestures or words.” The defense of the values of civility appeared in the sanctions of ‘disorderly’ behavior, such as in the reprehension of Fernando dos Santos for “disrespecting the principal hall with immoral words and gestures.”23 It appears that this type of action served to deny any relation of the club’s members with uncivilized habits, generally associated with poor Afro-Descendants. Antônio Ramos was removed from Operária “for causing disorder in the inaugural soirée of Grêmio Corbeille de Flores, thereby becoming unworthy of continuing to belong to the society.”24 Antônio, according to the member Aragão, carried out “disrespect- ful conduct to families and board,” therefore the “loss of all his membership rights” was just.25 The punishment of loutish members had to be exemplary. Almiro and Luiz Pacheco were also expelled from the society for fighting within Operária’s building, with “the two being prevented from frequenting the club, and can no longer be proposed again (as members) in accordance with Article 18, Sub-Item C of the statutes.”26 Punishment in these cases, rather than signifying a distension of the group, seemed to strengthen the ties of solidarity, since the norms of conduct, by exercising control over the ways of acting, reinforced the image of civility among Operária’s members. The public discourse27 of the members of União Operária seems to us to be the result of a process of negotiation of power between the different social groups in the city. To understand the public performances and the silence of black identity in Operária, we should consider the soil on which it was formed: an urban space in which political power was concentrated in the hands of a few families associated with the Catholic Church (Serpa, 1993). Perhaps, for

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Thiago Juliano Sayão this reason, the social ascension or importance of an individual in SRUO involved the hiding of racial identification. To think about this silence we should also consider the ethnic distribution of the population of Laguna. We saw at the beginning of this text that Afro-Descendants (blacks and mixed) represented, according to the 1940 census, 7.5% of the population. Possibly an identity affirmation based on color would have resulted, in the first half of the twentieth century, in negative reactions, directly or indirectly, prejudicing the social projects of a minority group. Hiding racial identity in public discourse was not the deletion of the African inheritance, but the tactical positioning of the social insertion of Afro- Descendants in the Post-Abolition period, given that: “Especially during the first decades after the end of slavery, references to the condition of former slaves, or the mention of the color of a person continued to cause suspicion or to disqualify an individual” (Rio; Mattos, 2005, p.33). The example of Operária highlights that the silence of color/race was not only an individual strategy, but also of a group. This silence could be explained by the victory, even if only provisionally, of the ideology of whitening. According to Hebe Mattos: “Equality between Brazilian citizens was fundamentally perceived by the loss of the mark of slavery,” which implied “stopping being recognized not only as freed (a necessarily provisional category), but also as ‘black’ or ‘negro,’ until then synonyms of slaves and former slaves and, therefore, referring to their character of non-citizen” (2013, p.289-290). It is precisely for this that the hiding of identification was also presented as a strategy of resistance, integration, and social ascension. The act of not declaring an associative connection of color/race has to be understood in segregationist contexts. Since the Empire, according to Sidney Chalhoub, State Councilors used different subterfuges, such as the lack of signatures, or the illiteracy of one of the directors of an association, to disapprove statutes with racial cleavages: “The opinions of State Councilors about the beneficent societies of blacks show the determination of councilors to prevent the creation of collective social subjects based on racial self-identification and/ or of an African origin” (Chalhoub, 2007, p.237). Analyzing the public discourse of SRUO – characterized by the authorized and documented discourse in minutes and in statutes –, we can perceive that the affirmation of difference, especially Afro-Descendant, continued to suffer from self-control, whether declared or hidden, after Abolition and the proclamation of the Republic. Actually in Operária culture there was an intention to silence determined actions and words, probably with the purpose of preserving an image of integrity

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity for its members. We can read in the statutes that among the duties of members was: “Remaining reserved and not divulging any disagreeable occurrence or in- cidence, or any other facts which might happen within the premises of the society.”28 In only one episode can we find an evident sign of racial identification for the members of SRUO. In the assembly held on 6 May 1967, it was registered in the minutes: “it was decided that the Fiscais [literally inspectors, but meaning bouncers] should prohibit all and any entrances on to the dance floor of members of the white race.”29 Apart from this limited episode, which affirmed identity through the contrast and negation of the other, Operária did not leave explicit, in the statues or working documents, an ethnic-racial affiliation. Although Law 173, from 10 September 1893, and the 1916 Civil Code30 did not prohibit the formation of racially based groups, in practice the disapproval existed, even in a veiled form, of the values which underlined the history of Africans and their descendants in sociocultural formation of Laguna. The silence around the identity of race could be interpreted as a sociocultural mark of slavery, as well as a strategy for the exercise of citizenship.

Final considerations

We have seen that the collective memory did not identify the ‘mulatto’ or ‘moreno’ members of Sociedade Recreativa União Operária as the descendants of the ‘blacks’ of the Brotherhood of Nossa Senhora do Rosário. This data is forgotten or hidden. We can only establish the intimate relationship between these societies in the comparative research among the names of their members. And it was exactly the presence of the Brothers of the Rosary in the foundation and running of Operária which led us to think about the dual identity of this society: black and worker, with the black identity, hidden, being one of the inheritances of Rosário. Based on what we read, we can suspect that the accumulated experiences and prestige of those who moved from the brotherhood to the club were factors which influenced the choice of leaders and the development of the association. We also showed that being a member of Operária demanded its own associative ethics. The good worker was the worker dedicated to the club and who complied with its regulations. Being an Afro-descendant member signified a real form of self-valorization through work, especially for those whose exercised manual trades. Finally, studies about black associativism shows us that the act of meeting in associations was a practice of sociability, but was also a possibility of affirming

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Thiago Juliano Sayão or altering the social position of the subject who, through the group, could negotiate a positive insertion in Lagunense society. This research, in turn, indicated that the process of hiding ethnic-racial identification was part of the daily strategies of the social and political actions of a worker and Afro-Descendant association in the city of Laguna, in the Post-Abolition period. The silence of black identity was read here not as a victory of the ideology of whitening, but as a local- ized tactic which by avoiding direct confrontation with the discriminator, allowed the conquest and maintenance of a new black territory.

REFERENCES

BARTH, Fredrich. Grupos étnicos e suas fronteiras. In: POUTIGNAT, Philippe. Teo- rias da etnicidade. 2.ed. São Paulo: Ed. Unesp, 2011. BATALHA, Cláudio H. de M. Sociedades de trabalhadores no Rio de Janeiro do século XIX: algumas reflexões em torno da formação da classe operária. Cadernos AEL, v.6, n.10/11, p.42-68, 1999. BOURDIEU, Pierre. A distinção. Crítica social do julgamento. São Paulo: Edusp; Porto Alegre: Zouk, 2007. CARVALHO, José M. de. A formação das almas: o imaginário da República no Brasil. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1990. CERTEAU, Michel. A invenção do cotidiano: 1. Artes de fazer. Petrópolis, RJ: Vozes, 1994. CHALHOUB, Sidney. Solidariedade e liberdade: sociedades beneficentes de negros e negras no Rio de Janeiro na segunda metade do século XIX. In: CUNHA, Olívia M. G. da; GOMES, Flávio dos S. (Org.) Quase-cidadão: histórias e antropologias da pós-emancipação no Brasil. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 2007. DANTAS, Sandra M. Entre sete colinas. História e memória na configuração do patri- mônio de Uberaba. Revista de História Regional, v.18, n.1, p.224-238, 2013. DIAS, Roberto B. “Deus a pátria”: Igreja e Estado no processo de romanização na Pa- raíba (1894-1930). Masters’ Thesis in History – PPGH, Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB). João Pessoa, 2008. DOMINGUES, Petrônio. Fios de Ariadne: o protagonismo negro no pós-abolição. Anos 90, Porto Alegre, v.16, n.30, 2009. ELIAS, Norbert. O processo civilizador. vol. 1. Uma história dos costumes. Rio de Ja- neiro: Jorge Zahar, 1994. ESCOBAR, Giane V. Clubes sociais negros: lugares de memória, resistência negra, pa- trimônio e potencial. Dissertação (Mestrado Profissionalizante em Patrimônio Cultural) – PPGPPC, Universidade Federal de Santa Maria (UFSM). Santa Maria, 2010.

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity

GIACOMINI, Sonia Maria. A alma da festa: família, etnicidade e projetos num clube social da Zona Norte do Rio de Janeiro – o Renascença Clube. Belo Horizonte: Ed. UFMG; Rio de Janeiro: Iuperj, 2006. GILROY, Paul. Entre campos: nações, cultura e o fascínio da raça. São Paulo: Annablu- me, 2007. GILROY, Paul. O Atlântico negro: modernidade e dupla consciência. 2.ed. São Paulo: Ed. 34; Rio de Janeiro: Universidade Cândido Mendes/Centro de Estudos Afro- -Asiáticos, 2012. GUIMARÃES, Antonio S. A. Racismo e anti-racismo no Brasil. São Paulo: Ed. 34, 2005. HALBWACHS, Maurice. A memória coletiva. São Paulo: Vértice, 1990. HALL, Stuart. Da diáspora. Identidades e mediações culturais. 2.ed. Belo Horizonte: Ed. UFMG, 2013. HOFBAUER, Andreas. Uma história de branqueamento ou o negro em questão. São Paulo: Ed. Unesp, 2006. JESUS, Nara R. D. de. Clubes sociais negros em Porto Alegre – RS: a análise do processo de recrutamento para a direção das associações Satélite Prontidão e Floresta Au- rora, trajetórias e a questão da identidade racial. Masters’ Thesis in Sociology – PPGS, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). Porto Alegre, 2005. LEITE, Ilka B. Território negro em área rural e urbana – algumas questões. Textos e debates. Terra e territórios de negros no Brasil. Florianópolis: Nuer/UFSC, ano 1, n.2, 1990. LEITE, Ilka B. (Org.) Negros no sul do Brasil: invisibilidade e territorialidade. Ilha de Santa Catarina: Letras Contemporâneas, 1996. LONER, Beatriz Ana. Classe operária: mobilização e organização em Pelotas (1888- 1937). Tese (Doutorado em Sociologia) – PPGS, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). Porto Alegre, 1999. MAC CORD, Marcelo. Artífices da cidadania: mutualismo, educação e trabalho no Recife oitocentista. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2012. MAGALHÃES, Magna L. Entre a presteza e a brancura brilha o Cruzeiro do Sul: associativismo e identidade negra em uma localidade teuto-brasileira (Novo Hambur- go/RS). Tese (Doutorado em História) – PPGHIST, Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos (Unisinos). São Leopoldo, RS, 2010. MAMIGONIAN, Beatriz G.; CARDOSO, Vitor H. B. Tráfico de escravos e a presença africana na Ilha de Santa Catarina. In: MAMIGONIAN, Beatriz G.; VIDAL, Joseane Z. (Org.) História diversa: africanos e afrodescendentes na Ilha de Santa Catarina. Florianópolis: Ed. UFSC, 2013. MATTOS, Hebe. Das cores do silêncio: os significados da liberdade no sudeste escravista. 3.ed. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2013. PARÉS, Luis N. A formação do candomblé. História e ritual da nação jeje na Bahia. 2.ed. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2007.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Thiago Juliano Sayão

PASCHOALIN, Thais H.; BODSTEIN, Celso L. F. Pirâmide invertida. O cotidiano no centro de Campinas. In: XXXI CONGRESSO BRASILEIRO DE CIÊNCIAS DA COMUNICAÇÃO, 2008, UFRN. Available at: www.intercom.org.br/papers/na- cionais/2008/expocom/EXP-3-0298-1.pdf; Accessed on: 11 April 2015. PELEGRINI, Sandra C. A.; VILANOVA, Welington. As dificuldades de salvaguarda do patrimônio cultural da população negra em Guaratinguetá. In: II CONGRESSO INTERNACIONAL DE MUSEOLOGIA, 2012, UEM. Anais II Congresso Interna- cional de Museologia: patrimônios e acervos. Maringá, Ed. do PGE, 2012. POLLAK, Michael. Memória e identidade social. Estudos Históricos, Rio de Janeiro, v.5, n.10, p.200-212, 1992 REIS, João J. Identidade e diversidade étnica nas irmandades negras no tempo da es- cravidão. Revista Tempo, Rio de Janeiro, v.2, n.3, 1996. RIOS, Ana L.; MATTOS, Hebe. Memórias do cativeiro: família, trabalho e cidadania no pós-abolição. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2005. ROLNIK, Raquel. Territórios negros nas cidades brasileiras: etnicidade e cidade em São Paulo e Rio de Janeiro. Revista de Estudos Afro-Asiáticos, Centro de Estudos Afro-Asiáticos, n.17, 1989. Available at: https://raquelrolnik.files.wordpress. com/2013/04/territc3b3rios-negros.pdf; Accessed on: 11 April 2015. ROLNIK, Raquel. A cidade e a lei. Legislação, política urbana e território na cidade de São Paulo. São Paulo: Nobel; Fapesp, 1997. ROSA, Júlio C. da. Sociabilidade e territorialidade: a construção de sociedades de afrodescendentes no sul de Santa Catarina (1903-1950). Master’s Thesis in History – PPGH, Universidade do Estado de Santa Catarina (Udesc). Florianópolis, 2011. ROUILLÉ, André. A fotografia: entre documento e arte moderna. São Paulo: Ed. Senac, 2009. RUSSELL-WOOD, A. J. R. Escravos e libertos no Brasil colonial. Rio de Janeiro: Civi- lização Brasileira, 2005. SCOTT, James. Los dominados y el arte de la resistencia: discursos ocultos. Ciudad de México: Ed. Era, 2000. SERPA, Élio C. Igreja, elites dirigentes e catolicismo popular em Desterro/Florianópolis, Laguna e Lages. 1889-1920. Tese (Doutorado em História) – PPGHIST, Universi- dade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo, 1993. SILVA, Fernanda O. da. Os negros, a constituição de espaços para os seus e o entrelaça- mento desses espaços: associações e identidades negras em Pelotas (1820-1943). Master’s Thesis in History – PPGHIST, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS). Porto Alegre, 2011. SOUSA, Fábio G. R. B. de. Campina Grande: cartografias de uma reforma urbana no nordeste do Brasil (1930-1945). Revista Brasileira de História, São Paulo, v.23, n.46, p.61-92, 2003.

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity

TANCCINI, Thaís. Igreja de Nossa Senhora do Rosário de Porto Alegre: entre a destrui- ção e a preservação patrimonial. TCC (Graduação em História) – IFCH, Univer- sidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). Porto Alegre, 2008. THORNTON, John. A África e os africanos na formação do mundo Atlântico. 1400- 1800. Rio de Janeiro: Elsevier, 2004. TOLEDO, Benedito Lima de. São Paulo: três cidades em um século. São Paulo: Duas Cidades, 1983. ULYSSÉA, Nail. Três séculos na Matriz de Santo Antônio dos Anjos da Laguna. In: SANTO ANTÔNIO dos Anjos da Laguna: seus valores históricos e humanos. Flo- rianópolis: Ioesc, 1976. ULYSSÉA, Saul. A Laguna de 1880. Florianópolis: Ioesc, 1943.

NOTES

1 O Albor, ano 21, n.923, 25 set. 1921. Emphasis added. 2 We understand race as a social and culturally constructed concept (GUIMARÃES, 2005). The idea of race adopted here is one with emerges in social interactions and conflicts, in which the social functioning or triggering of race (racialization) can both initiate racism through hierarchical differentiations based on phenotypical or cultural characteristics, as well as serving as a “resource for self-defense which should help the recovery of ethnic sentiment, the sentiment of dignity, self-esteem, and self-confidence” (HOFBAUER, 2006, p.24). It is precisely in the analysis of the processes of racialization that the concept of race is presented as an important category of academic analysis, since it serves us to comprehend the dynamic of the manufacture of identity and difference. 3 According to GUIMARÃES (2005, p.33): “‘Color’ in Brazil functions as a figured image of ‘race’.” 4 Unlike what occurred in Laguna, the majority of the churches cited were reconstructed and afterwards preserved as historical and cultural heritage. See: DANTAS, 2013; DIAS, 2008; PASCHOALIN; BODSTEIN, 2015; PELEGRINI, VILANOVA, 2012; ROLNIK, 1997; SOUSA, 2003; TANCCINI, 2008; TOLEDO, 1983. 5 Civility is understood as a set of norms and cultural practices adopted by individuals or groups. According to Norbert Elias, the values of civility (civilité) – control over speech, posture, gestures, clothing, and facial expressions – were used socially to differentiate social classes and groups (ELIAS, 1994). 6 In addition to the professions mentioned, in the registration books there appear the following trades: agent, tailor, artist, clerk, canoeist, carter, confectioner, lecturer, butler, cook, agent, plumber, shoeshine boy, blacksmith, operator fireworks, stoker, civil servant, wai- ter, hotel worker, machinist, carpenter, mechanic, soldier, goldsmith, baker, fisherman, teacher, shoemaker, servant, telegraphist, and printer.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Thiago Juliano Sayão

7 Estatutos da Sociedade Recreativa União Operária. Diário Oficial, p.7, 5 out. 1965. 8 We understand territory as a practiced place, a space “produced by operations which orientate it, give details about it, temporize it, and lead it to function in a polyvalent unit of conflictual programs, or contractual proximities” (CERTEAU, 1994, p.202). The black territory is, by extension of the concept, the space of experiences of Afro-Descendant groups, the place where singular constructions and preparations of common knowledge occurs (ROLNIK, 1989). It is in this sense that the office of the Sociedade Operária is perceived here as a territory of “international occupation” (LEITE, 1990), since this was used for meetings and exchanges. 9 We understand that the discursive practice of identity takes place in the process of negotiation and conflict with otherness. “The distinctive language of identity appears again when people seek to calculate how tacit belonging to a group or a community can be transformed into more active styles of solidarity, when they debate the place in which they constitute frontiers around a group and how they should be imposed” (GILROY, 2007, p.125). The identity is a historic question and, therefore, should be thought of in the dynamic of daily relations, to the contrary, in turn, of the essentialism of primordialist theories (HALL, 2013). Generally, ethnic-racial identity emerges from the negation of discourses and practices which involve an identity of collectivity (BARTH, 2011). According to Ana Rios and Hebe Mattos: “the historicity of identities and racial classifications becomes a central question for the understanding of processes of slave emancipation and the how Afro-descendant populations and post-emancipation societies culturally deal with the meanings of slavery” (RIOS; MATTOS, 2005, p.29) 10 Author’s personal archive. MENDES, Nerina V. Interview with Marilise L. M. dos R. Sayão, 16 jun. 2013. 11 The ideology of whitening disseminated the idea that the mixing of races would eliminate over time African biological and cultural traces, which would be absorbed and eliminated by a supposed racial superiority of the white element. Whitening, through intermixing, aimed at ethnic purity. According to the logical of this racist ideology, defended in Brazil by intellectuals such as Silvio Romero and Oliveira Viana, the paler the skin color the more distant the subject was from the racially inferior black element. The ideology of whitening, by fusing race and social status, affirms and naturalizes difference by means of color. According to Andreas Hofbauer, whitening is a “historically constructed ideal (an ‘ideology’, a ‘myth’) which fuses elevated social status with the ‘white color and/or white race’ and also projects the possibility of the transformation of skin color, of the ‘metamorphosis’ of color” (HOFBAUER, 2006, p.177). 12 Revista Ideal: mensário independente de artes, letras, sociologia e ciências, ano 1, n.1, jun. 1921. 13 Visibility, according to André Rouillé, corresponds to “a clarification of things: a manner of seeing and showing, a certain distribution of the opaque and the transparent, of the seen and not seen” (ROUILLÉ, 2009, p.39). 14 Economic capital is what is constructed by the sum of income and of goods and proper-

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of Rosário: worker associativism and the silence of ethnic-racial identity ty; social capital involves the network of social relations; while the level of education cha- racterizes cultural capital, it is “inherited or acquired in school” (BOURDIEU, 2007, p.19); and finally, symbolic capital characterized by prestige. “The purchase of works of arts, ob- jectified witness of ‘personal taste,’ and the closest form of the most irreproachable and most inimitable of accumulation, in other words, the incorporation of the distinctive signs and symbols of power under the modality of natural ‘distinction’, personal ‘authority’ or ‘culture’” (ibid., p.263). 15 The identification of color/race of determined individuals were obtained in death or baptismal registers. 16 Ata de sessão da diretoria. Livro de atas da SRUO, 11 jun. 1926. 17 Ata de assembleia geral extraordinária. Livro de atas da SRUO, 28 abr. 1947. 18 Ata da sessão da assembleia geral. Livro de atas da SRUO, 21 abr. 1933. 19 We found the following names amongst the brothers of the Brotherhood of Our Lady of the Rosary who playing a leading role among the members of the Workers’ Union Recrea- tional Society (Sociedade Recreativa União Operária): Adolpho Campos, Antão Veríssimo, Antônio Felisberto da Rosa, Bonifácio Deoclesio Gil, Bonifácio Jesuíno Alves, João Augus- to de Carvalho, José Alano de Bittencourt, José Antônio de Oliveira, Lucidonio Cypriano, and Pedro Jerônimo do Nascimento. 20 The policy of transfiguration “emphasized the emergence of desires, social relations, and modes of associations that were qualitatively new in the ambit of the racial community of interpretation and resistance and also among this group and its oppressors in the past. It specifically points to the formation of a community of needs and solidarity” (GILROY, 2012, p.96). 21 O Albor, ano 23, n.1037, 30 dez. 1923. 22 According to Beatriz Loner: “Blacks had practically to develop their own associative network as means of the survival and organization of the group. For this they had leaders whose concern with the integration of the ethnicity in society led them to develop various associations and activities in the search for the social and economic elevation of the black man. This integration corresponded to their affirmation as workers, especially working class ones, in the most various and diverse forms that this could concretize. The search for fixed employment as a guarantee of survival and a certain endorsement by society and the public authorities is part of the dreams of all those who fought for the valorization of the black in discriminatory society of the First Republic” (LONER, 1999, p.270). In the relationship between associativism, the positivation of identity, and the social ascension of the black through labor, see : ESCOBAR, 2010. 23 Ata da sessão da assembleia geral. Livro de atas da SRUO, 12 set. 1921. 24 Ibid., 1 jul. 1930. 25 Ibid., 30 nov. 1931. 26 Ibid., 28 abr. 1942.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 23 Thiago Juliano Sayão

27 Public discourse is understood here as publicized discourse, generally formed by norms of etiquette and courtesy. It represents or reproduces the discourse of the elite and the dominant ideology in a determined time and space. Public discourse is imbued with the power of authority, and for this reason escapes from moral censures. Despite being a discourse of the dominators, as James Scott affirms, public discourse can also be used and appropriated by the subordinate, thereby functioning as an effective strategy for social inclusion and cultural resistance (SCOTT, 2000). 28 Artigo 7º, letra F, dos estatutos da SRUO. 29 Ata da assembleia ordinária geral. Livro de atas da SRUO, 6 maio 1967. 30 It regulated the associations for “religious, moral, scientific, artistic, political purposes, or for simple leisure, in the terms of art. 72, § 3, of the [1891] Constitution.”

Article received on January 30, 2015. Approved on February 15, 2015.

24 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks: mulatto culture, class, and eugenic beauty in the post-emancipation (USA, 1900-1920)1 Os perigos dos Negros Brancos: cultura mulata, classe e beleza eugênica no pós-emancipação (EUA, 1900-1920)

Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento*

Resumo Abstract Por meio da articulação entre história so- By linking the social history of culture cial da cultura e do trabalho, o artigo dis- and labor, this article discusses the pro- cute o processo de fortalecimento da cess of strengthening the ‘mulatto cul- “cultura mulata” promovido por intelec- ture’ promoted by upper and middle tuais afro-americanos das classes alta e class African-American intellectuals in média no período pós-emancipação. Ao the post-emancipation period. In analyz- analisar o “problema da liberdade” com ing the ‘problem of freedom’ based on base nos referenciais de beleza construí- references to beauty constructed by these dos por esses “novos negros”, trago à ce- ‘New Blacks,’ texts and photographs col- na textos e fotografias coletados das re- lected from The Half Century Magazine, vistas The Half Century Magazine, de from Boston and The Crisis: a Record of Boston, e The Crisis: a record of the da- the Darker Races, from New York, are rker races, de New York. Os magazines e looked at. The magazines and other evi- outros títulos evidenciam que, entre 1900 dence show that between 1900 and 1930, e 1930, o sistema de segregação intrarra- the intra-racial segregation system based cial baseado na tonalidade da pele (“colo- on skin tone (colorism) caused as a con- rismo”) trouxe como consequência a sequence ‘pigmentocracy,’ in other “pigmentocracia”. Ou seja, o privilégio words, the privilege of having light skin da pele clara (light skin) em relação à es- rather than dark skin in relation to op- cura (dark skin) no tocante às oportuni- portunities for social mobility. dades de mobilidade social. Keywords: race; respectability; post- Palavras-chave: raça, respeitabilidade; emancipation. pós-emancipação.

* Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Faculdade de Educação, Núcleo de Pesquisa Intelectuais Negras. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69008 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

In 1907, an “obvious colored woman” was forced to get off a “bus for whites.” Despite “protests” and “visible proofs,” the young woman, member of an “influential Southern family,” was obliged to sit in the “Jim Crow” transport. “Honed” to always “detect African blood,” the people of the South could do this even when “hair straightening” or “clear skin” disguised descent. Even in the North, where the “lines” (of color) were not so “rigidly defined,” the question of “mistaken identity” concerned the population. There, both men and women, “close to the age of marriage,” were counselled to deeply investigate the pedigree of their loves to remove any possibility of their lives being linked to “disguised Africans.” Notwithstanding “social and family complications” in the post-emancipation North and South, cases of “men and women of color” who “passed for whites” when they could became a “growing tendency.”

Figure 1 – “Jim Crow carriage [train]” Source: Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, General Research and Reference Division. Printed with the permission of the Board of Directors, The Good Life Center. (Nearing, 1929).

Presented by The Colored American Magazine, the text “Dangers of the White Black” (Williams, 1907, p.423) presents us with a complex plot concerning the uses and meanings which Afro-Americans attributed to their bodies in

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks the first decades of the twentieth century, when the manipulation of hair and skin in search of good appearance became a routine practice in the Negro community. A little known universe in Brazil, the case – of panic and rejection for some and hope and relief for others –, helps us to narrate part of the historic process of the construction of new images intermediated by black people in the free world. This process was directly influenced by eugenic policies and by the values of white supremacy, which stimulated black colorism,2 a system of ranking subjects based on lighter or darker skin (Du Bois, 1903). To understand this system, it is worth emphasizing that during the years of Reconstruction, many mulattos became figures of great prestige and political influence in the US. Known as the ‘new blacks,’ they were part of a segment that called itself the ‘aristocracy of color.’ A society of classes apart from the United States, a “parallel social structure” (Kronus, 1971, p.4) which Du Bois called the “talented tenth” of the black race (Du Bois, 1903). Restricted in size, but large in terms of cultural and economic capital, the aristocratic ranks were filled by new blacks such as Booker T. Washington, a former slave, son of an unknown white father, who founded Tuskegee Institute in Alabama at the end of the nineteenth century; the sociologist and historian William E. B. Du Bois, the first Afro-American to do a doctorate in Harvard University and also one of the first blacks to become a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP);3 Fannie Williams, the distinct orator who in one of her biographies stated that she had never experienced “discrimination due to color” (Williams, 1904), and the writer Paulina Hopkins, who we will meet again further below, amongst other characters. To continue narrating our history, a history which refers to the Afro-American saga of the search for respectability4 in the free world, I will work with images published between 1900 and 1920 selected from two magazines: The Colored American Magazine (TCAM), published in Boston, and The Crisis, from New York and still published today. Both periodicals are part of the vast Afro-American press, which first emerged at the beginning of the nineteenth century. TCAM is a magazine created in 1900 which circulated until 1909, first in Boston, afterwards moving to New York in 1904. Subsidized by the Colored Co-operative Publishing Company, it was one of the first black publications at the beginning of the twentieth century. Circulating nationally with a print run of 15,000 copies, the monthly magazine published articles which celebrated the ‘highest culture’ in the areas of religion, science, culture, and literature of the lettered Afro- American world. One of its principal editors was the notable Afro-American

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento writer Paulina Hopkins, author of the novel Contending Forces: A Romance Illustrative of Negro Life, North and South. The Crisis dates from 1910 and was a magazine created an subsidized by the NAACP. With the prominent Afro- American intellectual Du Bois as editor, in addition to publicizing names, photographs, books and articles about history, culture, literature, and politics produced by intellectuals from the darker races, the magazine was notable for both raising discussions about the struggle for civil rights and denouncing the problems of the ‘American Negro,’ amongst which was the constant threat of lynching. In addition, it differentiated itself from many others by publishing the reflections of white intellectuals about the “problem of the Black Race.” It also circulated nationally. In 1918, for example, The Crisis had a print run of 100,000 copies.5

Figure 2 – The Social Life of America Colored: a meeting in Winter in Baltimore, MD. Source: The Crisis: a record of the darker races, Feb. 1912, v.4, n.2, s.p.

Figure 2 and those following are composed of mulattos with impeccable clothing and serious penetrating faces. Owners of intense social lives expressed in soirees, recitals, lunches, and beneficent dinners, but above all due to policies of racial isolation, the aristocracy of color guaranteed their maintenance as a group with privileges since the seventeenth century, as suggested by Du Bois’ observations:

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks

The mulattos we see on the streets are invariably descendants of one, two, or three generations of mulattos, [in whom] the infusion of white blood comes from the seventeenth century, [since in New York] in only 3% of weddings of people was color was one of the parties ‘white.’ (in Green, 1978, p.151)

Table 1 – Total population of Whites and Negroes, USA, 1850-1920 6

Total Number of Percentage Number of Percentage of Year Population Whites of Whites Negroes Negroes

1850 23,191,876 19,553,068 84.3% 3,638,808 15.7% 1860 31,443,321 26,922,537 85.6% 4,441,830 14.1% 1870 38,558,371 33,589,377 87.1% 4,880,009 12.7% 1880 50,155,783 43,402,970 86.5% 6,580,793 13.1% 1890 62,947,714 55,101,258 87.8% 7,488,676 11.9% 1900 75,994,575 66,809,196 87.9% 8,833,994 11.6% 1910 91,972,266 81,731,957 88.9% 9,827,763 10.7% 1920 105,710,620 94,820,915 89.7% 10,463,131 9.9% Source: Table adapted from “Color, or Race...”, 1910, Table 3, Vol.1, p.127, 129.7

Table 2 – Total Negro population, divided into Black and Mulatto, USA, 1850-1920

Year Negro Black Mulatto

1850 3,638,808 3,233,057 405,751 1860 4,441,830 3,853,467 588,363 1870 4,880,009 4,295,960 584,049 1880 6,580,793 – – 1890 7,488,676 6,337,980 1,132,060 1900 8,833,994 – – 1910 9,827,763 7,777,077 2,050,686 1920 10,463,131 8,802,557 1,660,554 Source: Table adapted from “Color, or Race...”, 1910, Table 6, Vol.1, p.129.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

Table 3 – Negro and Mulatto population in relation to the total population of the USA

Total Negro Percentage of Mulatto Percentage of Year population of Population Negroes Population Mulattos the USA 1850 23,191,876 3,638,808 15.69% 405,751 1.75%

1860 31,433,321 4,441,830 14.13% 588,363 1.87%

1870 38,558,371 4,880,009 12.66% 584,049 1.51%

1880 50,155,783 6,580,793 13.12% – –

1890 62,947,714 7,488,676 11.9% 1,132,060 1.8%

1900 75,994,575 8,883,994 11.62% – –

1910 91,972,266 9,827,763 10.69% 2,050,686 2.23% 1920 105,710,620 10,463,131 9.9% 1,660,554 1.57% Source: Table adapted from “Color, or Race...”, 1910, Table 6, Vol. 1, p.129.

Tables 2 and 3 show that Mulattoes represented a minority of the Afro- American population, a situation unaltered since the times of English colonization due to a series of policies encouraging racial endogamy started by slaves with light skin and perpetuated by their descendants in the post-emancipation period. Owners of elevated cultural and economic capital, blacks with clear skin were a group apart, as the data in the following tables suggest. During the 70 years covered, this segment reached its peak of growth in 1910, when it represented 2,050,686 people (2.23%). Meanwhile, Negroes totaled 9,827,763 or 97.77% of the Black population. Figure 1 allows a better comprehension of the history of racial categories by which the Negro group was classified in the Census. With Figure 1 in mind, it can be seen that whilst Jim Crow laws were in force, the images shown here, carefully orchestrated by photographers in the cities of Boston and New York, indicate that sectors of the mulatto elite constructed a eugenic model of beauty to represent the new negritude. Fed by pigmentocracy10 – the valorization of pale skin to the detriment of darkness within the interior of the Afro-American community, this model assumed the superiority of mulattos in relation to their darker ‘brothers.’ This was material- ized in texts and distinctive expressions such as ‘black mass,’ used by light-skin blacks to differentiate themselves from those with dark-skin.

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks

Figure 1 – Evolution of color categories to Negroes in the US Census, 1850-1960

Year Categories 1850 Black and Mulatto 1860 Black and Mulatto 1870 Black and Mulatto 1880 Black and Mulatto 1890 Black, Mulatto, Quadroon, Octoroon 1900 Black 1910 Black and Mulatto 1920 Black and Mulatto 1930-1960 Negro Source: United States Bureau of the Census, 1790-1990.8 9

Figure 3 – Miss M. A. Winnar, Lestern A. Walton, Capt W. Il. Butler, Miss Anna K. Russele, Saint Louis, Missouri. Source: The Colored American Magazine, Vol. 2, no.?, Mar. 1901, p.381.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

In relation to the production of photographs, similar to what happened with white people, representations of Afro-Americans also involved prior preparation before facing the cameras.11 Rather than a simple concern with appearance, this investment in poses and lights demarcated a printed black culture, with the pedagogical purpose of educating male and female readers from their race about the publication of images of people connected to success stories of “progressive businessmen,” such as the “politician” William P. Moore, “Professor” B. H. Hawkins, “owner of the New National Hotel and Restaurant” and William Pope, “president of Square Cafe” (Moore, 1904, p.305-307), amongst other aristocrats of color. In The Colored American, for example, this political and pedagogical project of ‘improving the race’ was illustrated by photos, achievements, and aristocratic fortunes, added to the publication of stories, poetry, novels, the announcement of events such as soirees held by women’s clubs and, no less important, the construction of myths and heroes in specific spaces. This was the case of ‘Famous Women of the Race,’ a column dedicated to paying tribute with small biographies to prestigious black women, such as the former slaves Harriet Tubmann and Soujorner Truth. Both were described as “educators responsible for the struggle for independence and for respect for the masculin- ity of their race” (Hopkins, 1902, p.42). Despite the summonsing of the war- riors of the color of the night, anyone who thought that the battle for the valorization of black women was won was wrong. After all, modern times demanded other feminine representations which could definitely challenge the memory of slavery. In the present pasts, the representation of dark-skinned women had to be excluded. They were incongruent with the project of respectable femininity (where eugenic beauty was included) that the colored elite was building with its hundreds of portraits of new women. Refined, educated, and sophisticated mulatto women, such as the representatives of the “specimen of Amtour Work,” recorded by the camera of W. W. Holland in a text where “teachers” and “leaders” can learn to choose “good photographs” and to disseminate the same practice amongst the rest of their race (Holland, 1902, p.6). To observe the mediation of the image conflicts between the old and new black woman, we used one of the editions of the The Colored American Magazine. Covering the months of January and February 1902, the publication narrated the saga of Harriet Tubman in the Famous Women of the Negro Race column. Looking attentively, we can note during the text the

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks presence of three mulatto women, including the Haitian Miss Theodora Holly, “author of the book Haytian Girl” (Holland, 1902, p.214-215). Since the order of images and texts in a publication is not chosen by chance, there can be noted in the Thursday edition 13 pages reserved for the narration of the deeds of the former slave, where we are presented to Frances Wells and Olivia Hasaalum. Pretty and well-dressed, the girls from Oregon contrasted with the subsequent image. Probably a representation of Tubman, who was known as Moses, the image portrayed a black woman using a cloth on her head, wearing simple clothes, and holding a musket in one of her hands (Holland, 1902, p.212).

Figure 4 – On the left, “Mrs. Frances Wells and Miss Olivia B. Hassalum,” two pro- totypes of the new black woman; on the right, a representation of Harriet Tubman.

The position of the images in question induces a ‘natural’ comparison between the lightness and darkness of the contrasted characters. Based on this comparison, the public would automatically conclude that the stage of primitivism of blacks had been surpassed by racial intermixing and the refinement of mulattos. Although the text exalts the “courage,” “strength,” and “heroism of a nature rarely encountered” (Holland, 1902, p.212) of the totally

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento dark-skinned Tubman, its iconographic representation in comparison with the two previous images highlights the abyss between modernity and primitivism, an abyss symbolized by color. The periodical thus invested in images consistent with a young black woman who, in the condition of “sex of the house” (Holland, 1902, p.7), was awarded with various texts and notes with indications of how to decorate an environment or which new clothes to use in weekend strolls. If we consider the authorship of the text that pays tribute to Harriet Tubman, in the hands of Paulina Hopkins we can see that this counterpoint acquires even more meaning. Extremely engaged in the anti-racist struggle, this writer and editor of the magazine is considered as a pioneer of Afro- American literature and in this position became an arduous fighter against the “stigma which degraded [her] Race” (Hopkins, 1988, p.13). Hopkins, who needs to be understood in the context of her time, used a series of eugenics conceptions in her writings. In her fourth novel, Contending Forces, published in 1900, for example, she emphasized how blacks had progressed in terms of clothing, appearance, and manners. Echoing other Afro-American intellectuals that education was the principal solution for fighting the marginalization of descendants of slaves, she sought remedies for the ailments that afflicted them. Adapting the eugenic premises of racial improvement to the black world, she preached that the improvement of blacks would principally occur through inter-racial marriages with whites. This is announced by the character Dora Smith, a woman of mixed race, considered by her mother as someone of “superior intelligence” thanks to her white ancestry. Not by chance Mrs. Smith is the same mother who pages earlier stated that in the United States “the black race had become a race of Mulattos” (Hopkins, 1988, p.152). With the defense of a specific eugenics for blacks, Hopkins determined that the progress of ‘Race’ was not only cultural, but rather, and above all, biological. Her perception is a fortunate example which elucidates the interactions between gender, class, and color in the black community – inter-sectional interactions that gave birth to a reference to eugenics beauty which, also reflected in cosmetics advertisements and internalized by many subjects of color, fed the climate of panic of whites faced with the spread of “disguised Africans” 12 as Misses Lila Morse and Carrie Oliver, from Virginia, and Madame Elizabeth Williams, from New York could well have been.

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks

As we have seen, the research in The Colored American Magazine leads to the conclusion that, from the behavioral point of view, good manners, religious devotion, and prestige were indispensable pre-requisites for a black to be considered ‘new,’ in other words a persona grata, someone respectable. Nevertheless, elegant clothes, well-looked after hair, serious faces, and penetrating poses had a much less important meaning, if analyzed in isolation. The reading of images together with texts suggests that to appear well in the photo it was necessary, above all, to study, qualify oneself – prepare oneself – for the new world, the universe of liberty, the urban, the industrial. And in this way

Figure 5 – Miss Lila Morse and Miss Carrie M. Oliver, students of the class of the Boydton Institute, Virginia, 1901. Source: The Colored American Magazine, Nov. 1900, p.37.13

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

Figure 6 – Mme. Elizabeth R. Williams, New York, “professional tutor for many years in various parts of the South.” Source: The Colored American Magazine, Vol. 2, no. 2, Dec. 1900, p.135. constructing a community of color, recognized for their talent, intelligence, and versatility was as primordial as having money. In economics, to be middle class it was necessary to have fixed employment, goods such as real estate and cars, small businesses such as beauty salons, boarding houses, barbers, and print-shops. In the case of those who were richer, it was expected that they would have land or businesses such as banks, supermarkets, funeral homes, jewelers, insurance agencies, medical consultan- cies, dental practices, lawyers’ officers, schools or universities, and that they would hold directors’ positions or positions which demanded higher education. To construct an analysis which can compare the homogenization of the black population in the post-emancipation period as one of a multitude of degraded poor, with a restricted insertion in the domestic services sector and small trades,14 it is important to connect the social history of work and of

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks

Figure 7 – Colored head surgeon, interns, and nurses, General City Hospital, Kansas City, Missouri. Source: The Crisis: a record of the darker races, Sept. 1914, Vol. 8, no.5, p.231. culture. Also necessary is observing how specific groups of descendants of slaves won for themselves social mobility, becoming small, mid-sized, and large entrepreneurs in the face of racism and segregation. Here it is important to prioritize the study of the formation of the black middle class, a pioneering study carried out by Franklin Frazier in the 1950. To historicize the process of social mobility of the group in question, the Afro-American anthropologist highlighted the founding of 134 black banks between 1888 and 1934 (Frazier, 1997, p.39). Financial institutions arising out of the Freedmen’s Savings Bank, they were fundamental for this social ascension by offering “racial support” (Frazier, 1997, p.41). A racial support in the form of consigned credit and start-up capital to allow blacks buy land and build hotels, shops, churches, barber shops, cabarets, theaters, beauty salons, funeral homes, pool halls, and other commercial establishments until then monopolized by whites. Another no less important factor for the rise of black businessmen15 was the great migration to the north of the country from the 1890s onwards. While until 1900, 90% of this population lived in the South, in subsequent years the picture changed significantly. Their en masse arrival in cities such as Chicago and New York was translated into the entry of individuals into the large urban

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento labor market which stimulated the formation of a professional elite. Although in the middle of the transformations a large part of the occupations available were concerned with unskilled labor, it is estimated that 3% of blacks were employed in clerical positions, such as typists, secretaries, clerks, administrative assistants, etc. (Frazier, 1997, p.44).

Figure 8 – Two Afro-American dentists and a female hygienist in the New York Tuberculosis and Health Association, Inc., 1926. Source: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Divisions, Washington, D.C.

In the case of the North, where educational opportunities were greater,16 this occurred above all in the public sector. In the South, it occurred basically in schools and companies owned by Black Business. Table 4 shows various professions held by black people at the turn of the century. Although the majority of the black population presented in the table were concentrated in rural activities (agricultural workers, 1,344,125, and farmers, planters, and foremen, 757,822), more daring conclusions can be drawn from the data, which are more in line with historiographic perspectives which highlight the diverse experiences of free labor in the Americas (Cooper et al., 2005). In fact, not by chance, the nomenclature worker was one of the obstacles mentioned by Willcox, who prepared the tables, that the enumerators had in quan- tifying the occupations held by blacks (Willcox, 1904, p.57).

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks

Table 4 – Negro population with an minimum engagement of 10 years in specific occupations: 1900

Negro population with a minimum engagement of 10 years in paid occupations: 1900 OCCUPATION People with Negro specific Population occupations (in numbers) (percentage) Continental US: all occupations 3,992,337 – Occupations in which a minimum 3,807,008 – of 10,000 Negroes were employed in 1900 Agricultural workers 1,344,125 33.7 Farmers, planters, and foremen 757,822 52.7 Workers (unspecified) 545,935 66.4 Servants and waiters 465,734 78.1 Ironing ladies and washerwomen 220,104 83.6 Coachmen, lumbermen, truckers, etc. 67,585 85.3 Steam train railway employees 55,327 86.7 Miners and bricklayers 36,561 87.6 Sawyers and woodworkers 33,266 88.4 Porters and assistants (in shops etc.) 28,977 89.1 Teachers and professionals in faculties, etc. 21,267 89.6 Carpenters 21,113 90.1 Farmers and turpentine production workers 20,744 90.6 Barbers and hairdressers 19,942 91.1 Nurses and midwives 19,431 91.6 Clerks 15,528 92.0 Tabaco and cigarette factory workers 15,349 92.4 Workers in hostel 14,496 92.8 Bricklayers (stone and tile) 14,386 93.2 Seamstresses 12,569 93.5 Iron and steel workers 12,327 93.8 Professional seamstresses 11,537 94.1 Janitors and sextons 11,536 94.4 Governesses and butlers 10,590 94.7 Fishermen and oyster collectors 10,427 95.0 Engineer officers and stokers 10,224 95.2 (do not work in locomotives) Blacksmiths 10,100 95.4 Other occupations 185,329 Source: Table adapted from Willcox, 1904, Table LXII, p.57.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

Willcox says that usually the Census worked with five “professional classes”: “agriculture, personal and domestic services, commerce and transport, manufacturing and mechanics.” However, the indices of male and female Afro- Americans in “unqualified positions” and who declared themselves to be only “workers” was very high, forcing those administering the census to advise the enumerators, in this specific case, to ask in a more direct manner what was the “livelihood” of each of the interviewees (Willcox, 1904). Considering this context, it should be highlighted that the debates about the ‘problem of liberty’ in post-emancipation societies underline the persistence of descendants of slaves of calling themselves workers, an affirmation which shows the construction of a new language of work related to the struggle to obtain full citizenship. To explore further the information contained in the table published in the 1904 Census table, I will take as a parameter the 3,807,008 workers quantified in “occupations which employ a minimum of 10,000 negroes in 1900”. Based on these absolute numbers, I calculated the percentages referring to determined groups of negro workers. The percentages show even more clearly that only a select monitory of the workers in question were in professions which required any prior specialization or education, namely “teachers and professionals in universities” (21,267, 0.55% of negroes) and clergy (15,528, 0.4% of negroes), two of the principal occupations of these aristocrats. Also in relation to the division of labor and continuing the conversion of absolute numbers into percentages, although in numerical terms the middle class was much more representative than the upper class, becoming part of the former was an exception. The percentages of blacksmiths (0.26%), carpenters (0.55%), hairdressers and barbers (0.52%), and nurses and midwives (0.51%) highlight this exceptionality. The low indices of professional seamstresses (0.3%), engineer officers and stokers (0.26%) invite us to make similar conclusions. In terms of connections between race and image, the above figure also shows the tiny amount of Afro-Americans employed in professions historically related to “good appearance,”17 such as doormen and janitors (0.76%), or governesses and butlers (0.27%). Another factor which reinforced the rarity of social mobility, an aspect vehemently denounced by Frazier, was supported by the persistence of its members in exercising occupations linked to the history of domestic work: servants, waiters (12.2%) and washerwomen (5.78%), as well as the 14.3% gathered together under the label of ‘non-specified workers.’ In the turmoil of class structure, respectability, education, refinement, fair skin, white descent, and material goods perpetuated themselves as some of the

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks principal marks which distinguished mulattos, with all their success, money, and education, from blacks. This context, present in cities such as Philadelphia, Savana, Atlanta, New York, Saint Louis, Boston and New Orleans, was fed by a ‘colorist’ logic. An “economy of color” (Harris, 2009, p.1-5) which reallocated subjects in a new and ever more racialized reality, with the reference being the contrast between being light and dark-skinned. Considering the photographs in line with the spread of eugenic education practice, it can be seen that the ideal of whitening was simultaneously, but differently, fed by white racism and black colorism, the latter valorizing being a mulatto as “social capital” (Glenn, 2009). Used by Afro-Americans to construct their internal class relations, this fair-skinned social capital which saw this as the best, most beautiful, and modern was present in most periodicals until the 1920s at least, when Garvey’s conceptions began to question the colorism and pigmentocracry of the black press. Also contributing to the re-signification of dark complexion was the acceptance of tanning for white women. The obtaining of an “exotic” color (ibid., p.183) came to be associated with the better economic condition expressed, for example, by the possibility of spending holidays in tropical countries.18 Notwithstanding this scenario of changes, the history recounted here refers to a process of the racialization of blacks themselves. Through differentiated experiences and perceptions of color, these subjects constituted a racialized notion of beauty emphasized by the valorization of the mulatto appearance (visually white), young, urban, modern, successful. Nevertheless, before incurring simplifications, value judgements, or deceptions fed by the romantic illusion of a genetic inter-racial solidarity,19 or what Bayard Rustin calls “the sentimental notion of black solidarity,”20 it is pertinent to bear in mind that the practice of colorism derived from values created and reinforced by white supremacy. Having shown the range of affirmations and understandings that the existence of mulattoes help to generate, no one better to bring the conversation to a close than the following characters. Rigorously chosen, the models who posed for The Colored American Magazine were the owners of their own projects for the reconstruction of femininity (Wolcott, 2001, p.3). A reconstruction which recognized them as educated women. Icons of reinvigorated negritude, as well as concern with elegance, our black madams, ‘posing,’ troubled with the future of their people of color, but this is another story...

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

Figure 10 – Cover, The Colored American Magazine, Aug. 1901.

REFERENCES

BARICKMAN, Bert. Passarão por mestiços: o bronzeamento nas praias cariocas, no- ções de cor e raça e ideologia racial, 1920-1950. Afro-Ásia, Salvador, no. 40, p.173- 221, 2009. CALIVER, Ambrose. A Background Study of Negro College Students. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1933. COLOR, or Race, Nativity and Parentage. Thirteenth Census of the United States Taken in the Year 1910, Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Washington Government Print Office, Population, General Report and Analysis. Table 3, vol.1, p.127, 129. COOPER, F.; HOLT, T.; SCOTT, R. Além da escravidão: investigações sobre raça, trabalho e cidadania em sociedades pós-emancipação. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2005.

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks

CRAIG, Maxine Leeds. Ain’t I a Beauty Queen: Black Women, Beauty and the Politics of Race. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. DAMASCENO, Caetana Maria. Segredos da Boa Aparência: Da “cor” à “boa aparência” no mundo do trabalho carioca, 1930-1950. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRRJ, 2011. DANKY, James P.; WIEGAND, Wayne A. (Ed.) Print Culture in a Diverse America. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1998. DU BOIS, W. E. B. The Talented Tenth (Excerts). In: ______. The Negro Problem: A Series of Articles by Representative Negroes of To-day. New York, 1903. Available at: www.yale.edu/glc/archive/1148.htm; Accessed on: 30 Jan. 2015. FRAZIER, Franklin. Black Bourgeoisie. [1.ed. 1957]. New York: Free Press Paperbacks, 1997. GATEWOOD, Willard B. Aristocrats of Color: The Black Elite, 1880-1920. Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 2000. GLENN, Evelyn Nakano (Ed.) Shades of Difference: Why Skin Color Matters. Califor- nia: Stanford University Press, 2009. GLENN, Evelyn Nakano. Consuming Lightness: Segmented Markets Global Capital in the Skin-Whitening Trade. In: GLENN, Evelyn Nakano (Ed.) Shades of Diffe- rence: Why Skin Color Matters. California: Stanford University Press, 2009. p.166-187. GREEN, Dan S. (Ed.) W. E. B. Du Bois On Sociology and the Black Community. [1911]. Illinois: The University of Chicago Press, 1978. GROOMS, Robert M. Dixie Censored subject: black slave owners. Available at: http:// americancivilwar.com/authors/black_slaveowners.htm; Accessed 3 Oc. 2011. HARRIS, Angela. Introduction: Economies of Color. In: GLENN, Evelyn Nakano (Ed.) Shades of Difference: Why Skin Color Matters. California: Stanford University Press, 2009. p.1-5. HOLLAND, W. W. Photography for Our Young People. The Colored American Ma- gazine, p.5-9, May 1902. HOPKINS, Paulina. Contending Forces: A Romance Illustrative of Negro Life North and South. [1.ed. 1900]. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988. HOPKINS, Paulina. Famous Women of the Negro Race, III – Harriet Tubman. The Colored American Magazine, v.4, n.3, p.210-223, Jan.-Feb. 1902. HOPKINS, Paulina. Famous Women of the Negro Race. The Colored American Ma- gazine, v.4, n.6, p.41-46, May 1902. JAMES, Winston; HARRIS, Clive. Inside Babylon: The Caribbean Diaspora in Britain. London; New York: Verso, 1993. JOYCE, Donald Franklin. Black Book Publishers in the United States: A Historical Dictionary of the Presses, 1817-1990. s.l.: Greenwood Press, 1991. KOUTSOUKOS, Sandra. Negros no estúdio do fotógrafo: Brasil, segunda metade do século XIX. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2010.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

KRONUS, Sidney. The Black Middle Class. Ohio: Charles E. Merill Publ Co, 1971. MOORE, William. Progressive Business Men of Brooklyn. The Voice of the Negro: an illustrated monthly magazine, jul. 1904, vol. 1, no. 7, p.304-308, jul. 1904. NEARING, Scott. Black America. New York: The Vanguard Press, 1929. NICKEL, John. Eugenics and the fictions of Paulina Hopkins. In: CUDDY, Louis A.; ROCHE, Clarie M. (Ed.) Evolution and Eugenics in American Literature and Cul- ture, 1880-1940: Essays on Ideological Conflict and Complicity. Lewisburg: Buck- nell University Press, 2003. p.133-147. OPPORTUNITIES for New Business. The Great Migration – Migration Resources. Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Available at: www.inmotionaa- me.org/gallery/detail.cfm?migration=8&topic=99&id=465288&type=image&pa ge=10; Accessed on 28 Nov. 2011. REUTER, Edward Byron.The Mulatto in the United States. Boston: R. G. Badger, 1918. THE COLORED AMERICAN MAGAZINE: an illustrated monthly devoted to Lite- rature, Science, Music, Art, Religion, Facts, Fiction and Traditions of the Negro Race. Boston, Mass. WALKER, Juliet. The History of Black Business in America: Capitalism, Race, Entre- preneurship. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009. WILLCOX, Walter. Distribution by Occupation. In: ______. Negroes in the United States. Department of Commerce and Labor Bureau of the Census S. N. D. North Director, Bulletin 8, General Tables, Washington Government Printing Office, 1904. WILLIAMS, Fannie Barrier. Perils of the White Negro. The Colored American Maga- zine, v.12-13, p.421-423, 1907. WILLIAMS, Fannie Barrier. A Northern Negro’s Autobiography. Independent, LVII, 14 jul. 1904. WOLCOTT, Victoria W. Remaking Respectability: African American Women in In- terwar Detroit. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2001. WOODSON, Carter Goodwin. The Negro Professional Man and the Community. Was- hington, D.C.: Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, Inc., 1934. XAVIER, Giovana. Brancas de almas negras? Beleza, racialização e cosmética na imprensa negra pós-emancipação (EUA, 1890-1930). Doctoral Thesis in History – IFCH, Unicamp. Campinas, SP, 2012.

NOTES

1 This research received funding from the National Council of Scientific and Technological Development (Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico - CNPq) in the form of a doctoral grant and a doctoral sandwich in New York University in 2009. I

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The Dangers of White Blacks would like to thank Barbara Weinstein, Sidney Chalhoub, and the participants of the Black Culture in the Atlantic Research (Cultna/UFF) and the Black Intellectuals Study and Resear- ch Groups for the discussions, fundamental for writing this text. 2 In relation to colorism, see: GLENN, 2009. 3 The NAACP was founded on 12 February 1909 by white liberals, such Mary White Oving- ton and Oswald Garrison Villard (both descendants of abolitionists) during a meeting to discuss ‘racial justice,’ given the harsh reality of daily lynchings of blacks in the United States. Of the sixty participants, only seven were Afro-Americans, amongst them the historian and sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois and Ida B. Wells-Barnett, journalist, teacher, and civil rights activist. The initial objective of the organization was to have the rights of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Constitutional Amendments enforced, which were about the end of slavery, equal protection before the law, and universal male suffrage, respectively. In 1910, the Association established its national head office in New York City, having nominated Moorfield Storey, a white lawyer, as its president and chosen a team of directors. At that time the only Afro- -American member who participated in the executive of the NAACP was W. E. B. Du Bois. In his position of Director of Publications and Research, he founded in 1910 The Crisis, the organization’s official publication which is still in circulation today. In 1913 the organization created local offices in Boston, Massachusetts; Baltimore, Maryland; Kansas City, Missouri; Washington, D.C.; Detroit, Michigan, and St. Louis, Missouri. Between 1917 and 1919 it membership grew from 9000 to 90,000. In 1919, the organization published an important report, Thirty Years of Lynching in the US. In 1920, James Weldon Johnson became its first black secretary. Even today, the principal objective of the NAACP is to “assure the political, educational, social, and economic equity of citizens from minority groups in the United Sta- tes and to eliminate racial prejudice.” Available at: www.naacp.org/pages/naacp-history; Ac- cessed on 1 Aug. 2011. 4 A primordial discussion about the reconstruction of black feminity in the post-emancipation period can be found in: WOLCOTT, 2001. 5 For greater information about the history of the black press in the United States, see, amongst others: JOYCE, 1991. 6 For all the tables, the numbers referring to other groups (indigenous, Asiatic, foreigners) were ignored. 7 Due to difficulties of access, the information referring to the 1920 Census presented in the tables is based on “United States – Race and Hispanic Origin: 1790 to 1990”. Available at: www. census.gov/population/www/documentation/twps0056/tab01.pdf; Accessed on 11 Oct. 2011. 8 Although mulatto had been used to classify negroes, the results of the quantification were not made available for the 1880 Census. In the cells referring to this group, the initials NA (Not Available) appear. “Population by color”, in Tenth United States Census Taken in the Year 1880, Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Washington Government Print Office, Population, General Report and Analysis.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Giovana Xavier da Conceição Nascimento

9 For greater information about the construction of racial endogamy policies among the mulatto population in slavery, see, amongst others: GATEWOOD, 2000, and XAVIER, 2012. 10 It is worth noting that Afro-American intellectuals maintained a long tradition of studies about pigmentocracy, in which there stand out pioneering works such as: CALIVER, 1933; WOODSON, 1934; REUTER, 1918. A more recent analysis, concerned with the connections between gender, racial policies, and pigmentocracy, can be seen in CRAIG, 2002. On the impacts of pigmentocracy on the Caribbean, what stands out is the work by: JAMES; HARRIS, 1993. 11 From the second half of the nineteen century onwards, prior preparation for the taking of photographs became a very common practice, present in all social classes. In relation to this, see: KOUTSOUKOS, 2010. 12 In relation to the role of eugenics in the work of Paulina Hopkins see: NICKEL, 2003. 13 Although the magazine is the November 1900 issue, the text mentions the 1901 student class, probably the next one in the institute. 14 For problematization of this idea, see: WALKER, 2009. 15 It is estimated that in the 1920s there were approximately 75,000 black businessmen in the United States. Cf. “Opportunities...”, s.d. 16 In the North of the country, children, for example, had more educational opportunities, since the local legislation prohibited child labor. 17 For relations between color, gender, and good appearance in the first half of the twentieth century, see: DAMASCENO, 2011. 18 In relation to the meanings of tanning, see: BARICKMAN, 2009. 19 Using distinct cases, Grooms desconstructs this romanticism demonstrating that, when liberated, blacks, in most cases, became slave owners in the south of the country. Based on the 1860 Census Data, of the 4.5 million Afro-Americans, approximately four million were slaves there, while 261,988 were free. Taking as a reference the case of New Orleans, in which 10,689 of this population of former slaves lived (in which there was an important contingent of people with fair skin, descendants of Creoles) three thousand free black slave owners were registered. This meant that around 28% of the local free colored population had slaves. See: GROOMS, s.d. 20 For the activist this ‘idea’ was responsible for perpetuating the idea that before emancipation black culture was illiterate and the experiences of its subjects homogenous, since slavery homogenized all blacks, preventing any other type of privilege or distinction based on class, behavior, or strength be shown amongst them. See: DANKY; WIEGAND, 1998, p.151.

Article received on February 1, 2015. Approved on February 23, 2015.

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil: musical dialogues in the post-emancipation period O legado das canções escravas nos Estados Unidos e no Brasil: diálogos musicais no pós-abolição

Martha Abreu*

Resumo Abstract O objetivo maior do artigo é trazer para The objective of this article is to bring to o campo dos estudos históricos do pós- the field of post-abolition historical -abolição uma recente reflexão sobre o studies some reflections about the lega- legado da canção escrava – ou do “som cy of slave songs – or the “sounds of do cativeiro” – nos Estados Unidos e no slavery” – in the United States and in Brasil. A estratégia, mais do que eviden- Brazil. Rather than focus on the well- ciar as conhecidas diferenças entre os known differences between the two dois países, é destacar os possíveis diálo- countries, the intention here is to call gos e aproximações em torno das dispu- the attention of the reader to possible dialogues and contacts based around tas e significados desse legado. Como the disputes and meanings attached to recurso, além da historiografia especia- this legacy. As well as the specialized lizada, utilizo as avaliações de dois bibliography on this issue, I concentrate exemplares intelectuais, do final do sé- on the assessments of two intellectuals culo XIX, que tiveram contato com as at the end of the nineteenth century, canções dos descendentes de escravos who both had contact with the songs of nas Américas e refletiram sobre os seus the descendants of slaves in the Ameri- sentidos políticos: Du Bois e Coelho cas and who both reflected on the politi- Netto. Suas avaliações inseriam-se num cal meanings of those songs: Du Bois contexto mais amplo de internacionali- and Coelho Netto. Their assessments zação da música negra e de projeção dos are part of a broader context of the in- músicos negros no pós-abolição. ternationalization of black music and Palavras-chave: canções escravas; músi- the rise to prominence of black musi- ca negra; pós-abolição; Brasil; Estados cians in the post-abolition period. Unidos. Keywords: slave songs; black music; post-emancipation; Brazil; United Sta- tes of America.

* Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF). Niterói, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69009 Martha Abreu

The world of music has always offered a wide field of possibilities for the study of African and slave experiences in the Americas.1 In the words of Shane and Graham White, slave songs, which are understood as music, verse and dance, can be defined as “the sound of slavery” (White; White, 2005). In fact, slave songs were a structural component of the slave-owning American societies; they were an integral part of the policies of control and repression of the slave-owners and the authorities, as well as the strategies of resistance and negotiation of the slaves. The “sound of slavery” was constant in slave quarters, workplaces, cities and farms, in meeting places and parties, both in Brazil and the United States.2 However, these songs also had far-reaching implications, which went beyond the world of slaves and their celebrations. The songs of slaves become spectacles at social and religious events organized by the slave-owners, and throughout the nineteenth century they came to be sung and represented, in a stereotyped and derogatory manner, by Blackface performers in the United States and Cuba, and in theatrical reviews in Brazil. Slave songs, in the form of cakewalks or lundus often appeared in the potentially lucrative market of musical scores, in music halls, in theaters and even in the nascent music industry - but not necessarily the black protagonists that those songs depicted. The world of entertainment and that of Atlantic music entrepreneurs produced attractive dance crazes based on genres and rhythms that were identified with the black population of the Americas.3 From the late nineteenth century, the political framework of abolition in the Americas did not greatly change the commercial paths already trodden by slave songs, but it did extend their reach and also discussions about their meanings and interpretations. I intend to show how the musical field started to express, perhaps as nowhere else, the impasses and the social and political conflicts experienced in the post-abolition period between the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. After abolition, intellectual discussions about the formation of modern nations, in cultural terms, put the musical contribution of Africans and their descendants as an important item on the agenda. Even in the United States, spirituals emerged as something of immense value after being “discovered” at the end of the Civil War (1861-1865) by progressive northern folklorists.4 Through music, and the musical skills of the black population, racial and even national differences were constructed and reinforced; the future possibilities for integrating ex-slaves into new societies and free nations were evaluated.5 In a direct relation to the rise of racist social theories at the end of the nineteenth century, slave songs took on more modern and obviously racialized

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil versions, which were known and published academically and commercially as black music.6 Centered around this legacy and these memories, which were associated with the sounds of Africa, slavery and miscegenation, musicians, intellectuals linked to music, and folklorists assessed their future and inaugurated the study and writing of the history of black music in the Americas. The main objective of this article is to bring to the field of post-abolition historical studies some aspects and moments of this long debate about the legacy of slave songs – or the “sound of slavery” – in the United States and Brazil. Rather than reinforce the obvious differences between the two countries, my intention is to highlight dialogues and approaches in the formulations of black music and the experiences of black musicians in the Americas between the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The evaluations of the meanings attached to the songs of the descendants of slaves, which were written by two outstanding intellectuals of the early twentieth century, the North American W. E. B. Du Bois and the Brazilian Coelho Netto, serve as the motivation and resources for the development of the central questions of this article.7 The impressions and evaluations of these intellectuals, who both had direct experiences of the “sounds of slavery,” demonstrate in an exemplary manner the importance of, and the new meanings attached to, the discussions and representations about the legacy of slave songs in the post-abolition era within the wider context of the internationalization of black music and the projection of black musicians in the nascent music recording industry.

Potential dialogues

Sometime between 1886 and 1887, W. E. B Du Bois (1868-1963), who was then aged nearly twenty and was attending Fisk University, must have seen for the first time a Negro Revival among the humble black population in the southern United States, more precisely Tennessee. Based on what he wrote some years later in a chapter entitled “Of the Faith of the Fathers” in The Souls of Black Folk (1903) it is clear that this experience had a great effect on his subsequent intellectual and political life.8 Du Bois became one of the greatest leaders of black American political thought and pan-Africanism.9 Black religious music, also expressed in so-called “sorrow songs” occupied an important space in his later reflections about the contributions in economic, demographic and cultural terms of black people in the United States.10 Du Bois’s encounter with this Negro Revival was in the countryside, away from his home, “it was out in the country, far from home, far from my foster

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Martha Abreu home, on a dark Sunday night.” After passing through wheat fields and corn- fields, he wrote that “we could hear dimly across the fields a rhythmic cadence of song, – soft, thrilling, powerful, that swelled and died sorrowfully in our ears” (Du Bois, 1999; p.240; 1997, p.148). Du Bois had probably already been awarded his Ph.D. at Harvard, a title that he obtained in 1895, when he wrote the short chapter “Of the Faith of the Fathers”, which was published in The Souls of Black Folk in 1903 (Du Bois, 1999, p.239-256). More than once in that chapter he mentions that he was very impressed by what he had witnessed, especially the atmosphere of intense ex- citement that had taken over those “black folk.” Du Bois associated the Negro Revival with a “Sabbath” and he came to recognize that it was not easy to describe what he had seen. The exaltation of a Negro Revival “in the untouched backwoods of the South” produced in Du Bois a strong desire to reveal “the religious feeling of the slave”. In his opinion, when simply described, “such scenes seem grotesque and funny, but as seen they are awful” (Du Bois, 1997, p.149; 1999, p.241). In his description of this special religious feeling of the slave, Du Bois did not mince words or adjectives:

A sort of suppressed terror hung in the air and seemed to seize us, – a pythian madness, a demoniac possession, that lent terrible reality to song and word. The black and massive form of the preacher swayed and quivered as the words crowded to his lips and flew at us in singular eloquence. The people moaned and fluttered, and then the gaunt-cheeked brown woman beside me suddenly leaped straight into the air and shrieked like a lost soul, while round about came wail and groan and outcry, and a scene of human passion such as I had never conceived before. (Du Bois, 1999, p.241)

Amid this madness, demonic possession, terrible reality, groans, shakes, and banshee screams, Du Bois recognized that “the music of Negro religion” was still “the most original and beautiful expression of human life and longing yet born on American soil. Sprung from the African forests, where its counterpart can still be heard, it was adapted, changed, and intensified by the tragic soul-life of the slave, until, under the stress of law and whip, it became the one true expression of a people’s sorrow, despair, and hope” (Du Bois, 1999, p.241-242). In another chapter, “The Sorrow Songs”, Du Bois broadened the perspective of slave songs and included, along with “the Music of Negro religion,” love

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil songs and work songs in the category of “Sorrow Songs”. He gave them a special role and in his words “the Negro folk-song – the rhythmic cry of the slave – stands to-day not simply as the sole American music, but as the most beautiful expression of human experience born this side the seas” (Du Bois, 1999, p.298). This assessment of the “one true” and “beautiful and unique” role of the “songs of black people,” was not exactly new in the United States (see Hamilton, 2007). But from the writings of Du Bois, who was recognized as the most influential black political leader in the first half of the twentieth century, and who most explicitly revealed to the world the impact of racial oppression among black communities,11 this view came to be widely accepted in studies of the musical expressions of African descent in the United States. As Paul Gilroy has argued, it was even transformed into a sort of paradigm for future, positive judgements regarding the role of slave descendants in the cultural and musical context of the North Atlantic.12 The legacy of slavery undoubtedly continued to define the content of the debates about the future of former slaves for a long period. In the musical field, that legacy, sometimes defined as slave music, sometimes as black or African- American music, occupied a prominent place in the history of Afro-descendants, and consequently in the evaluations that emphasized their positive contributions to the building of the American nation, in terms of culture and identity, after the end of slavery. It was a very similar situation in Brazil. Far away from the United States, but at the same time, and with obvious similarities, the equally young and promising intellectual Coelho Netto (1864- 1934) also felt the desire – or need – to explain what he had seen on the night of New Year’s Day 1892, after a dinner at a farm in Vassouras (RJ), a town which was central to the slave economy of the coffee industry in south-eastern Brazil in the nineteenth century. In March of that year, recognizing the strong impression that the event had had on him, he published an article entitled “The Caxambu” (in other words “the dance of the freed slaves”) in the newspaper O Paiz in the city of Rio de Janeiro, which he defined in these words:

This is the dance of Africa. They danced no other; sad in its brutality and its monotony, wild and barbaric as the land of their origin. It is the dance that blacks brought from exile as a nostalgic representation of their distant homeland – it was this dance that reminded them of their captive souls, a life lived in forests with the noise of trees, the leap of the tiger jump among clumps of thistles, the roar of the desert storm and cannibal wars...13

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Martha Abreu

For Coelho Netto, the caxambu was a heated performance of dancing and drumming; a longing for homeland and “the climate of their country.” 14 Coelho Netto described the caxambu in a forceful manner; within the post- abolition environment he defined it in similar terms to those used by Du Bois when he described the religious and spiritual meetings he had attended as the “Sabbath of slavery.” According to Leonardo Pereira, this article about the caxambu was part of a set of chronicles, written and published by Coelho Netto during 1892 in the newspaper O Paiz, under the general title “Through Hills and Valleys.” In 1892 Coelho Netto had spent a few months on a coffee farm in the Paraíba Valley, during the crises and persecutions of the Floriano Peixoto government, which typified the difficult period of the First Republic. Pereira has analyzed this set of writings in depth and he considers that Coelho Netto used “Through Hills and Valleys” as a kind of prologue for the literary treatment that he subsequently used in novels that he wrote which were based around the theme of the backlands. Like other intellectuals of his generation, he used literature as a way to think about and discuss the effects of the abolition of slavery, especially concerning the difficulties of the integration of former slaves and African descendants in Brazilian society. In Pereira’s view, because Coelho Netto did not believe in the potential contribution of former slaves in the formation of a promising republican nation, as an alternative he defended the backlands, the strength of the rural environment and the soul of its people, which were the result of the miscegenation of African descendants and indigenous people, as a positive way forward for the construction of national, modern and Republican originality (Pereira, 2012, p.95, 99-103). This position adopted by Coelho Netto, which was praised by his contemporaries, can easily be identified in his article “The Caxambu”, but in this case, in the field of musical discussion. The article uses expressions that are negative towards Africa and Africans, as well as descriptions of the way in which music was used to overcome the burden of slavery, through the music of former slaves and the sounds of slavery.15 In the final sentence Coelho Netto writes that it was becoming less and less common to hear the caxambu, “only faraway could you hear its roar, deep in some valley”. It was no longer prioritized and “sorrow had its end.” Coelho Netto writes that the “guttural screams” of the caxambu were being overlooked because Africans had embraced the God of Christianity and rejected the instruments of Africa, now preferring the trombone and flute; “and so the painful tradition of exile will be erased.”

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil

In the field of music and folklore, Coelho Netto also represented a kind of intellectual who, although he understood the value of slave songs, believed that the memories of the sounds of Africa, and their “guttural screams” and primitive instruments, would fade into oblivion with the establishment of the Brazilian Republican nation after the abolition of slavery. After all, for him, the descendants of Africans (and he saw this as something that was positive) had already adopted “our God” and “dignified” musical instruments, such as the trombone and flute, which were worthy of civilization. African customs would be forgotten once the “painful tradition of exile” had disappeared. With the passing of slavery, the cultural expression of exile (Coelho Netto mentions dance more explicitly than music) would disappear or be diluted and mixed into the large mixed race cultural melting pot of the nation, and more specifically, that of Brazilian popular music (Abreu; Dantas, 2011). In January 1892, Coelho Netto wrote in O Paiz that dance, like oral poetry, was a “valuable ethnographic subsidy for the comparative study of different primitive races.” Nothing was more characteristic of the trends, instinct and the soul of a people than their national dance; it was possible to derive the “moral and intellectual culture” of a people from their national dance. Coelho Netto wrote “There are characteristic dances that may go down in the history of the world, determining an era time and evolution, defining a period or symbolizing a fact.” The caxambu was part of a “historical time” – that of the slaves – and therefore it no longer had a reason to exist. Coelho Netto’s notion that African traditions would be forgotten in Brazil became powerful and long-standing in the writings of folklorists and musicolo- gists in the late nineteenth and early decades of the twentieth century that were concerned to construct a history of Brazilian popular music. As I have written elsewhere, along with policies to whiten the population and theories of the degeneration and the inferiority of mixed-race populations, which were very common in the writings of authors, doctors, lawyers and immigration-centered politicians, Brazilian folklore, poetry, and especially popular music, became vehicles for intellectuals who were positively interested in the discovery and dissemination of mixed-race musical and cultural phenomena. Even though they occasionally repeated a few maxims about the “black race,” in the early years of the Republic intellectuals such as Coelho Netto, Silvio Romero, Mello Morais Filho, Afonso Arinos and Olavo Bilac celebrated the contributions of African descendants and the enslaved to what they were defining as the original features of popular Brazilian music (Abreu; Dantas, 2011).

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Martha Abreu

Du Bois and Coelho Netto did not meet each other. They lived in very different worlds and it is highly unlikely that they even heard about each other. Their opinions about the music of the descendants of slaves or about the legacy of slave songs (expressed in The Souls of Black Folk or “The Caxambu”) undoubtedly had different prognoses and political forecasts for the future. However, they reveal commonalities that need to be valued in the search for a deeper understanding of the musical disputes in the post-abolition era.16 Du Bois and Coelho Netto were both aware that in the period between the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, writing or expressing opinions about the music of slaves entailed evaluating - in their cases, positively - the cultural heritage of Africans and their descendants in the imagination of modern, national and post-slavery societies. They were also aware that evaluating black music, or the legacy of slave songs, involved participating in the debate about the hierarchy of races and the possibilities of the integration of people of African descent into society. Their words and assessments are striking and useful examples to highlight the power of music at this time of the (re)definition of social and national racial identities, – and vice versa: social and racial identities cloaked themselves in musical expressions (see Radano, 2003). The writings of Du Bois and Coelho Netto are responses by representatives of their generation to the problems and issues related to cultural and musical order that faced those living in the post-abolition period. Each in its own way fought for the cultural and social integration of former slaves in the world that was being constructed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Du Bois was black and he faced poverty and discrimination – which was probably the main difference in the trajectories of the two. But Coelho Netto was also well aware of the problems facing the black population. He was active in the republican and abolitionist campaigns in Rio de Janeiro; he was a close friend of important black leaders like José do Patrocínio; he was familiar with life on the coffee farms; and he produced texts which, despite the fact that they contained racist maxims and defended miscegenation, discussed forms of integration for former slaves in the new republican nation. Coelho Netto was part of a literary group that believed in the power of literature and intellectuals to effect social change and politics in Brazil.17 Both men were scholars, writers, poets, essayists, teachers and activists – Du Bois was closer to the field of history, and Coelho Netto to that of literature. Although Du Bois was a novelist and journalist, he also had a strong academic background. Amidst the prejudices that existed in the intellectual world of the period (including among black thinkers in the United States), which

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil were shaped by positive and negative opinions of aspects of civilization in Africa, both men were able to recognize the importance of music and dance for Africans and their descendants. At the same time, both men they gave them new meanings. Regarding the slavery period, they realized how much slave songs – the “sound of slavery” – fuelled the survival and cultural struggle of those who were in “exile”, an expression used by both authors. They associated meetings of black people with “Sabbaths” and valued the pain of exile – the memory of a distant homeland, to which there could be no return, but at the same something that black people did not wish to forget. For Coelho Netto, who was far less enthusiastic about the future of this music, the caxambu was “the tradition of exile.” For Du Bois, black music was “the voice of exile” (Du Bois, 1997, p.188). Concerning the post-abolition period, and this is most evident in the case of Du Bois, both authors recorded how meetings, songs, bodily tremors, music and dance, could be important channels of communication and organization for former slaves. Outstanding intellectuals and activists in their countries, the two writers, in a very similar manner, were concerned about the weight of the legacy of slavery and the possibility of African cultural and musical continuity in their own countries. Both also recognized that the music of black people, either as a heritage of Africa or as a legacy of slavery, had become a broad field of discussion and disputes over the future of former slaves and their culture. Even considering the differences and distances between the two writers, uncertainties and arguments regarding the presence and continuity of Africa in the cultural field were part of the concerns of Du Bois and Coelho Netto – and for a long time these factors would influence academic controversies in the United States and Brazil.18 Both authors were well aware of the transformation that exile and slavery had foisted on Africans, and also how these experiences had established links of continuity between Africa and the Americas. Both men realized how disputes over memories (or the forgetting) of Africa in the fields of culture and music would be fundamental for the integration of former slaves in post-slavery societies and in the construction of the imagination of their nations. Although the “historical time” of slavery had actually passed, Coelho Netto was quite wrong in his assessments and predictions. The caxambu – or jongo, as it became known – went from strength to strength during the twentieth century and in 2005 it was formally recognized as part of the cultural heritage of Brazil. Even today it is practiced by the descendants of slaves who worked on the coffee plantations in southeast Brazil. Even though it is sung in

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Martha Abreu

Portuguese and its lyrics pay homage to Catholic saints, jongo was elected as part of Brazil’s cultural heritage precisely because of its historical continuity and its representative role in African-Brazilian resistance in the southeast region, as well as the fact that it forms part of the remaining legacy of the African people speaking the Bantu language who were enslaved in Brazil (see Abreu; Mattos, 2007). In addition to jongos and caxambus there are many examples today, in several regions of Brazil, of musical expressions that identify themselves as black and which are based upon the heritage of slavery and/or Africa, such as congados, maracatu and samba de roda, and the fight against racism and in favor of the cultural heritage that was constructed in captivity and identified as black (see Abreu; Mattos, 2011). Even though he was far more sensitive to the role of music in the affirmation of black identity and culture in the United States, perhaps even Du Bois would have been unable to imagine or predict how powerful black music would become in the United States, from jazz to funk to gospel and blues. As a banner of struggle against racism, or as a commercial product of the music industry, the role of black music is undeniable in the intense contemporary cultural interchanges of the Black Atlantic, as defined by Paul Gilroy (2001, Chap. 1). A few words remain to be said about Du Bois and his relationship with African heritage in black religious music. Du Bois, in a very similar manner to Coelho Netto, was sure that “after the lapse of many generations the Negro church became Christian” Du Bois, 1999 p.246, 1997, p.152), and in that sense American as well, under the pressure of slavery.19 As much as the African dimension of the “black church” was recalled by Du Bois (Patterson, 2010, p.150; Du Bois, 1999, p.243), and in this respect he differed from Coelho Netto, he also defended the “dramatic insertion of Africans and their descendants in the historical trajectory of the United States.” 20 The United States was the common homeland of blacks and whites, inextri- cably linked by history, although separated by everyday racism. Metaphorically defined as a veil, racism seemed to cover up one of those worlds, which Du Bois would reveal.21 In fact, Du Bois would not give up on the recognition of the existence of a “double life that every American Negro must live, as a Negro and as an American” (Du Bois, 1999, p.251; 1997, p.155). The religious frenzy of “shouting”, understood as the moment when “when the Spirit of the Lord passed by,

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil and, seizing the devotee, made him mad with supernatural joy,” was to Du Bois, the “last essential of Negro religion...” (Du Bois, 1997, p.149; 1999, p.242). Especially in the chapter entitled “Of the Sorrow Songs”, Du Bois showed that the “songs of black people” persisted: they were “the articulated message of the slave to the world” (Du Bois, 1997, p.189; 1999, p.301). Even if such music was despised, “it still remains as the singular spiritual heritage of the nation and the greatest gift of the Negro people” (Du Bois, 1997 p.186; 1999, p.298). In his words, as highlighted previously, it was the “only American music ... the most beautiful expression of human experience born this side of the seas” (Du Bois, 1999, p.298). Du Bois identified “black religious music,” a mode of Sorrow Songs, as a central symbol of values, moral rectitude, integrity and autonomy, which used vocabulary that was deeply influenced by Christian religious themes, but not exclusively. Du Bois concluded that these Sorrow Songs, and also songs about work and love, contained “explosions of a wonderful melody” and “voices of the past” (Du Bois, 1999, p.298; 1997, p.185) and also brought “hope – a faith in the ultimate justice of things.” These songs contained sentiments linked with strength and the hope of ultimate victory, when men “will judge men by their souls and not by their skins” (Du Bois, 1999, p.308; 1997, p.192). Although Du Bois eventually acknowledges the existence of cultural exchanges and musical mixtures, he does not lose the dimension of something that is distinctly black. For him, in attempting to divide the history of black music into periods, it was possible to think of a first stage (African music) and a second stage (African-American), while the third stage would be “a blending of Negro music with the music heard in the Foster land.” The result was still distinctly black, “but the elements are both Negro and Caucasian.” 22 Du Bois wrote in the last words of The Souls of Black Folk that the contribution of black people in the United States (and once again this echoes similar concerns held by Coelho Netto) needed to be publicized and recognized as a form of struggle, protection and appreciation: “Our song, our toil, our cheer, and warning have been given to this nation in blood-brotherhood. Are not these gifts worth the giving? Is not this work and striving? Would America have been America without her Negro people?” (Du Bois, 1999, p.310). If in Brazil the association between music and social and/or racial identity, as expressed by Coelho Netto, was mainly orientated towards the construction of a mixed form of Brazilian popular music (the unique mixture of a cultural mix of black, indigenous and white), Du Bois’s position of defending the continuity of the “songs of black people” was also found south of the equator.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Martha Abreu

André Rebouças (1838-1898), who was an important black leader in the struggle for abolition in Brazil, just before Du Bois and Coelho Netto, also sought political and identity-centered explanations for the presence of song, dance and laughter among “black Africans.” From his exile in Africa, after the abolition of slavery and the proclamation of the Republic, Rebouças seems to have been better able to observe the directions of the African cultural legacy in the Americas and the relationship of black music with the reconstruction of identities after the end of slavery. On February 4, 1893, in the Cidade do Rio newspaper, which was edited by José do Patrocínio in Rio de Janeiro, his response was similar to that of Du Bois in that “black religious music” brought “hope – a faith in the ultimate justice of things.” 23 Rebouças sought explanations for the laughter, song and dance of “black Africans” in the martyrdoms and the humiliations that they had undergone, which were reminiscent of the experiences of the early Christians who were sacrificed in the Roman circuses. In Rebouças’s The Negro was African, pain and suffering are related to slavery in Brazil and to the form of Christianity that was appropriated by Africans in the Americas. Close to Du Bois in terms of origin and academic background, Rebouças also valued pain and religion, along with laughter, singing and dancing, to maintain the hope of those who have the “thirst for righteousness” and of those who felt the pain of subordination and humiliation. In the words of Rebouças, “That is why black Africans are always laughing, singing and dancing: looking towards the sky, always looking for Jesus; the faith and hope of the miserable and wretched, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, as he [Christ] said in his statement of superhuman eloquence.” 24 By attributing a political direction to slave songs, as vehicles for hope and the struggle for justice of black people, Rebouças valued cultural expressions that would much later be considered by academic experts in the late twentieth century as landmarks in the construction of black identity in the Americas, such as laughter, singing and dancing (see Caponi, 1999). Once again in the post-abolition period, impressions and intellectual assessments of slave songs in the United States and Brazil were similar – this time between two black intellectuals, Rebouças and Du Bois. Ironically, if laughter, singing and dancing were seen as weapons of struggle, and the expressions of the African cultural and political heritage, they were also used with completely opposite meanings in entertainment shows. As we shall see, laughter, song and dances (the “sounds of slavery”) were used as the main representations to deprecate black people on stage, in the circus, in the

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil arts and, by extension, in society throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Even for Du Bois and Rebouças, who were both learned men of their time, the African cultural legacy was not easily understood or valued.

Necessary approaches

Du Bois and Coelho Netto’s evaluations of the “greatest gift of black people” or the “painful tradition of exile” were part of post-abolition discussions about how to incorporate former slaves into society in political and cultural terms, and they also dialogued with other interests and other people who were interested in the legacy of the slave songs. Du Bois and Coelho Netto were not alone. Slave songs – and their heirs, black music – drew the attention of many other intellectuals, such as European modernist classical composers,25 as well as entrepreneurs (Brazilian and international) and urban groups hungry for cultural novelties. Slave songs were renewed through the diversity of the cakewalk and ragtime in the United States, the lundu and maxixe in Brazil, the rumba and son in Cuba, and the calypso in the English Caribbean. Slave songs invaded the modern American and European Atlantic cultural circuits and were successful on the stage and in the nascent music industry; they also opened up job opportunities for black musicians.26 However, the post-abolition musical field in the United States and Brazil was also a space in which those of African descent were represented through reconstructions of old racial stereotypes and through the creation of obstacles, both large and small, to thwart the upward mobility of black people in the artistic world. The meanings attributed to black characters and to black musical genres, in theaters, in sound recordings, and on the covers of sheet music27 often represented allegories of racial inequalities that continued to be reproduced after the end of slavery. Indeed, while music and dance of African descent were successful on the main stages of the contemporary world, at the same time there was a belief circulating across the whole Atlantic that non-whites were inferior and that limits had to be set regarding the access of former slaves to citizenship. Music and dance could also serve to naturalize, prioritize and ridicule cultural and racial differences and identities. Du Bois and Coelho Netto knew very well what was at stake after abolition. In the “Sorrow Songs” chapter of The Souls of Black Folk Du Bois mentions the cartoons and ridicule that were directed towards black people and

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Martha Abreu slave songs in the vulgar and debased imitations of popular music contained in minstrel shows and coon songs.28 Coelho Netto had watched batuques, “black fados” and jongos represented very successfully in costumed operettas and theatrical reviews in Rio de Janeiro since the 1870s. Incidentally, according to Silvia Cristina Martins de Souza, in Coelho Netto’s novel The Conquest (1890) the character Rui Vaz – who was based on the playwright Arthur Azevedo – claims that the director of the Fênix Dramática Theatre, Mr. Jacinto Heller (one of the most successful theatrical empresarios of the 1880s) required “some couplets and a jongo for a comedy ... The man wants, at whatever cost, that blacks come on stage with maracas and drums, and that they dance and sing.” It seemed that the public were demanding shows that contained “chiri- nola and saracoteios.” 29 Writing about the “caxambu” for the O Paiz newspaper in 1892, Coelho Netto was well aware of the comic and artistic potential of slave songs. Throughout the nineteenth century the popularity of minstrel shows was consolidated in the United States; these shows aimed to please audiences with the humor of minstrels, who were often represented by Blackfaces and black characters such as Jim Crow, Uncle Tom and Sambo (Boskin, 1986). Painted with black grease and exaggerated lips, the Blackfaces ridiculed the alleged ingenuity and musical joy of slaves in old southern plantations through their clothing (gloves and tails, for example) and by the performance of certain gestures and speech, They took to the stage “studied imitations of the ways in which slaves sang, danced and celebrated” (Abrahams, 1992, p.133). In the eyes of whites, especially before the Civil War, blacks were naturally funny, always laughing and susceptible to music, which helped to prove their alleged child- ishness and inferiority.30 The specialized literature on this subject in the United States is vast, and this issue was undoubtedly linked with the advances and defeats of the anti- racist struggles in that country throughout the twentieth century. In general, the most recent publications hold to the view that minstrel shows were significant in that they spread ideas about race, class and gender throughout the United States, and at the same time they made blackness a North American cultural commodity.31 However, it was impossible to control all the meanings contained in these shows because even if they made visible the idea of race and recreated racist imagery, they also carnivalized these certainties and opened up spaces for critical answers that were much more plural than might have been anticipated (Lott, 1996, p.9). As Abrahams (1992, p.134), has observed, minstrels shows, with their slaves and black characters, were also able to act as

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil vehicles that were critical of slavery, southern slave-owning attitudes, and the dehumanization of slaves. The presence in Brazil of Blackface characters representing slaves and black people is still little known or investigated. Although there may be very few references to such behavior, it is not possible to simplify matters and deny that there were similar occurrences in the various musical shows, parties, circuses, and carnivals in Brazil. Some studies have identified Blackface scenes on stage and in entertainment in Brazil. For example, Beatriz Loner, found evidence of masked members of the Nagô club imitating “the customs and attitudes of blacks” in carnival celebrations in Pelotas, Rio Grande do Sul, in February 1884. Besides the element of fun, Loner highlights the ambiguity of this presentation, because it was also linked to the solemnities of the abolitionist campaign, with its “meritorious character and social criticism,” even contributing to the freedom of slaves (Loner, n.d). As Abrahams highlighted in relation to the United States, criticisms of slavery also seems to have accompanied musical representations of black people south of the equator.32 Carolina Dantas has identified the presence of a character referred to as “an old Black John,” played by an Italian actor in a company of Italian artists in The Endowment, a play written by Arthur Azevedo and staged in Rio de Janeiro in the early twentieth century. Commenting on this play in the O Correio Paulistano newspaper of June 23, 1908, Olavo Bilac wrote that the “Black John played by an Italian actor would have been an admirable black” (Dantas, 2010, p.258). The fact that a white Italian actor interpreted the role of “Black John,” does not seem to have aroused comments from this illustrious Brazilian academic.33 Certainly, whites and mixed race actors playing the roles of black characters and slaves on stage, with childish, submissive and funny stereotypes, cannot have been unusual because there were many theatrical and literary texts, such as The Endowment that included such representations throughout the nineteenth century (see Gomes, 1994, part 3; and Mendes, 1982). Herculano Lopes has pointed out that even in the theaters of comedy and theatrical reviews, spaces for black actors were denied, and they were also very limited for mixed race actors. Lopes writes that even in 1912, the São José theater company in Rio de Janeiro put on a successful play written by Luís Peixoto and Carlos Bittencourt called Forrobodó, “with a (supposedly) white cast representing characters who were almost all blacks and mulattos.” 34 I managed to locate photographic records from the late 1920s of a theatrical review entitled The

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Martha Abreu

War of the Mosquitos showing the presence of Blackface characters and dancers representing blacks in scenes of urban life.35 In the light of this evidence, circus clowns may have been the nearest equivalent to North American Blackfaces in the context of Brazil. Although it is still far from a conclusive argument, I have records of clowns, either black or painted as black, who achieved recognition in the world of the circus, playing the fool for white audiences with famous lundus such as “Black Tongue” about the lives of slaves.36 The circus-theater was a very important popular artistic space between the late nineteenth and early twentieth century across the entire Atlantic world.37 Some clowns, like the black musician Eduardo das Neves, worked in Rio de Janeiro in circuses owned by North American businessmen and they almost certainly facilitated the circulation of new music between North and South America.38 Dudu, as he liked to be called, when he was hired by the modern recording studio Casa Edison, recorded lundus that celebrated, in a humorous way, his repertoire of black characters, such as Father John, Father Francisco and Happy Black Forro. All these characters had strong similarities with North American characters, such as Uncle Tom and Uncle Remus, who were portrayed and sung about in “black language” in nineteenth-century literature and theater.39 Another important similarity with the minstrel shows in the United States can be identified in the presence, with more information available from the 1870s onwards, of the use of slave songs, such as jongos and lundus, to end operettas and theatrical reviews. These musical moments provided much fun, laughter and humor in a similar manner to cakewalks, the North American musical genre associated with the dance numbers by Blackface characters.40 Even before the 1870s, the songs and dances of slaves, such as cateretês, umbigadas, fados, lundus, jongos and batuques could be found in writings by Martins Pena and Antônio Manoel de Almeida, as well as in shows associated with parties in honor of the Holy Spirit, in the Campo de Santana in the city of Rio de Janeiro (Abreu, 2009, Chap. 1). In these festivals, at the end of theatrical attractions “a jongo of black automata” was presented in the famous Teles tent, a kind of popular open-air venue starring artists who identified themselves as “mestizo”. The famous actor Francisco Correa Vasques, who is recognized as the first artist to explore Afro-Brazilian dance at the end of theatrical performances, would have started his artistic life in this tent in the Campo de Santana (Abreu, 2009, p.76-100; Marzano, 2008; Magaldi, 2011, p.393). Although they indicated the incorporation of Afro-Brazilian musical expressions, the use of lundus and jongos at the end of these shows (genres that

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil were identified with the slave and black populations, especially in southeast Brazil) infantilized and deprecated the black population in grotesque and comic scenes, many of which were set in coffee plantations. However, by also conferring a critical and ironic character to slavery and imperial values, they revealed many representations of slaves and blacks on stage (Magaldi 2011, p.391-393). It should not be forgotten that the lundu was considered to be a comic and satirical genre par excellence, “which censored or ridiculed people, events, classes and other aspects of society” (Lima, 1953, p.7). In 1886, in the city of Rio de Janeiro, shows such as The Man-Woman and The Crook included jongos. A tune with the title “Jongo of the Sixty-Year Olds” – an obvious reference to the Law of the Sixty-Year Olds that had been passed the previous year – was a great success. The lyrics to “Jongo of the Sixty-Year Olds”, which were analyzed by Silvia Cristina Martins de Souza, reproduced the images of submissive slaves, singing work songs and lauding their masters.41 Despite the difficulties underlying these types of stereotypical racial representations, black musicians were increasingly visible in the growing world of commercial entertainment, which incorporated circuses, bands, theaters and the nascent recording industry (from the 1890s in the United States and from the start of the twentieth century in Brazil). Blackface musical shows started to gain new meanings when black artists in the United States and Brazil began to interpret the art of minstrels in new ways, inverting meanings and gaining for themselves the popularity of the cultural market and increased earnings. Black musicians increasingly occupied spaces, seeking laughter from their audiences, and reversing the stereotypes that were assigned to them. Excellent examples of this were the musicians Eduardo das Neves (1874- 1919) and Bert Williams (1874-1922), the subjects of a comparative study that I am currently developing.42 They were recognized respectively for their lundus and cakewalks and they were protagonists in the birth of the music industry in both countries. Both men can be credited with giving other meanings to the representations of black musicians and the legacy of slave songs. Despite the strong presence of musical and intellectual entrepreneurs, the musical field also expressed the struggles concerning equality and the appreciation of the cultural expressions of the descendants of slaves and Africans. It was also an important channel for communication and the expression of the identity and politics of black people and black artistic leaders in various parts of the Americas, as Du Bois referred to in his chapter “The Sorrow Songs”. Slave songs, and their musical legacy, became a key way to combat racial

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Martha Abreu oppression and domination, and to act in favor of social inclusion and citizenship in the post-abolition era in different regions of the diaspora. In this article I hope to have opened up a wider discussion about the post- abolition musical field in the United States and in Brazil. Avoiding a formal and systematic commitment to a comparative history, I wish to draw attention to the dialogues and similarities between the experiences of black musicians, as well as the discussions involving the assessments of the legacy of slave songs – and the construction of the history of black music – before the 1920s. In addition to the similarities between the depictions of Blackfaces in the United States and Brazil, it is also worth highlighting other dialogues. Cakewalks and ragtimes were played at dance venues in Rio de Janeiro and other cities in Brazil, and maxixes were mentioned in publications about dance in the United States in the early twentieth century.43 In Brazil, black musicians were inspired by black North American artists such as George W. Johnson, a former slave from Virginia who worked in the music industry and who recorded “laughing songs,” a genre also recorded in Brazil by Eduardo das Neves (Palombini, 2011). Entrepreneurs linked to the United States were involved with circuses and the music industry throughout Brazil and in the major cities of Latin America (see Franceschi, 2002). From the 1920s, the international commercial circuits of jazz and the more formal organization of black movements in Brazil created close and explicit ties between culture and politics in the Black Atlantic, both north and south (Pereira, 2013, Chap. 3; Butler 2011; Alberto, 2011). In a transnational phenomenon, African and Afro-American art and music took hold of intellectuals who were considered to be modern in the United States, France and Brazil, in the same way that the idea of the “New Negro” mobilized black intellectuals and musicians in the Americas. The modernist movement in Brazil was a tributary of international fashion, which valorized black and African art, especially in the field of music (Archer-Straw, 2000; Shack, 2001; Guimarães, n.d.). In the 1920s, so-called jazz-bands, playing maxixes, sambas and cakewalks began to impose themselves on the music scene in Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo in both erudite and popular environments (Labre, 2013). Black groups of musicians also started to look more and more for novelties arising from the Black Atlantic, which circulated via New York and Paris. The renowned group of black musicians known as the Oito Batutas would have probably encountered jazz during the time they spent in Paris (Martins, 2009).

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil

The transnational perspective in relation to the legacy of slave songs can make important contributions to the history of black music in Brazil, which, until recently, was constructed within the limits set by the nationalist landmarks of the 1920s and 1930s or the cultural policy of the Vargas governments.44 It can also contribute to providing a different perspective on the rather comfortable existing version of race relations in Brazil and the United States.45 The classic racial polarities between the two countries – appreciation of miscegenation in Brazil versus segregation in the United States – seem to be insuf- ficient when evaluating the legacy of slave songs and the experiences of black musicians in the North and South Atlantics. Following the ideas contained in research by Radano regarding the United States, it is possible to propose that in Brazil music also assumed an important significance in its ability to influence and to reflect the legacy of race relations (Radano, 2003 p.XIII). In the South Atlantic the field of music also represented a key space in the cultural policies of exclusion and incorporation, as well as in the game of the representation of African descendants in the new post- emancipation societies, as evidenced in the exemplary assessments of Du Bois, Coelho Netto and Rebouças, and the world of theatrical performances. Furthermore, even considering the weight imposed by the Jim Crow laws in the United States, the options and the problems faced by black musicians in both countries were not that dissimilar. In the midst of constant novelties within the world of entertainment, they had to deal with the daily reproduction of racist maxims in the musical field, in addition to the powerful pronouncements of intellectual such as Du Bois and Coelho Netto. Certainly, these musicians moved in very different worlds, represented by the modernity of the United States and Brazil in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, but they ended up imposing their own rhythms and tastes, as recent studies of the history of black music in the United States and of samba in Brazil seem to indicate.46 On several occasions they even managed to demonstrate the desire for the continuation of the legacy of slave songs and Africa itself, through spirituals and sambas, batuques and ring shouts. Despite national specificities, maxixes and samba, blues and jazz emerged at about the same time and are genres associated with black people and the legacy of slavery and Africa. The “sounds of slavery” do not seem to have disappeared, long after the end of slavery itself.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Martha Abreu

REFERENCES

ABRAHAMS, Roger D. Singing the Master: The emergence of African-American culture in the Plantation South. New York: Penguin Group, 1992. ABREU, Martha. Conexões atlânticas da música negra no pós-abolição: Brasil e Estados Unidos, 1890-1920. In: MATTOS, Hebe; COTTIAS, Myriam. Escravidão e Subje- tividades no Atlântico Luso-brasileiro e francês, séculos XVII a XX. (no prelo). ABREU, Martha. Histórias Musicais da Primeira República. ArtCultura, Uberlândia, v.13, n.22, p.71-83, jan.-jun. 2011. ABREU, Martha. O Império do Divino: Festas religiosas e cultura popular no Rio de Janeiro, 1830-1900. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, 2009. ABREU, Martha. Outras Histórias de Pai João: conflitos raciais, protesto escravo e irreverência sexual na poesia popular, 1880-1950. Afro-Ásia, v.31, p.235-276, 2004. ABREU, Martha; DANTAS, Carolina Vianna. Música Popular e História, 1890-1920. In: LOPES et al. (Org.), 2011, p.37-68. ABREU, Martha; MATTOS, Hebe. Jongo, registro de uma história. In: LARA, Silvia H.; PACHECO, Gustavo. Memória do jongo, as gravações históricas de Stanley J. Stein, Vassouras, 1949. Rio de Janeiro: Folha Seca; Campinas, SP: Cecult, 2007. ABREU, Martha; MATTOS, Hebe. Remanescentes das Comunidades dos Quilombos: memória do cativeiro, patrimônio cultural e direito à reparação. IberoAmericana, ano XI, n.42, p.145-160, jun. 2011. ABREU, Martha; VIANA, Larissa. Festas religiosas, cultura e política no Império do Brasil. In: GRINBERG, Keila; SALLES, Ricardo. O Brasil Imperial. vol. III, 1870- 1889. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2009. ALBERTO, Paulina. Terms of Inclusions: Black intellectuals in twentieth-century Brazil. Chapel Hill: University of North Caroline Press, 2011. ALLEN, William F.; WARE, Charles P.; GARRISON, Lucy McKim. Slave Songs of the United States: The Classic 1867 Anthology. New York: Dove Publications, 1995. ANDRADE, Mário de. O Romance de Veludo. Revista de Antropofagia, ano 1, n.4, p.5-6, 1928. ARCHER-STRAW, P. Negrophilia: Avant-garde Paris and black culture in the 1920. New York: Thames & Hudson, 2000. BARROS, Orlando de. Corações de Chocolat: a história da Companhia Negra de Re- vistas (1926-27). Rio de Janeiro: Livre Expressão, 2005. BEAN, Annemarie; HATCH, James V.; McNAMARA, Brooks (Ed.) Inside The Mins- trel Mask: Readings in nineteenth-century Blackface Minstrelsy. Middletown: Wes- leyan University Press, 1996. BOSKIN, Joseph. Sambo: The rise and demise of an American jester. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986.

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil

BRASIL, Eric. Carnavais da Abolição: diabos e cucumbis no Rio de Janeiro (1879- 1888). Dissertação (Mestrado) – Universidade Federal Fluminense. Niterói, 2011. BROOKS, Tim; GIOVANNONI, David (Prod.) The Lost Sound: Blacks and the Birth of the recording industry, 1891-1922. Archeophone Records, 2005. BRUNDAGE, W. Fitzhugh. Working in the ‘Kingdom of Culture’, African Americans and American Popular Culture, 1890-1930. In: ______. (Ed.) Beyond Blackface: African Americans and the creation of American popular culture, 1890-1930. Cha- pel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2003. BUTLER, Kim D. A nova negritude no Brasil: movimentos pós-abolição no contexto da diáspora africana. In: GOMES; DOMINGUES (Org.), 2011, p.137-156. CAPONI, Gena. A reader in African American expressive culture. Massachusetts: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1999. CHASTEEN, John Charles. National Rhythms, African Roots: The deep History of Latin American popular dance. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2004. CHUDE-SOKEI, Louis. The Last “Darky”: Bert Williams, Black-on-Black Minstrelsy, and The Africa Diaspora. Durham, London: Duke University Press, 2006. COHEN, Ronald D. (Ed.) Alan Lomax, Selected Writings, 1934-1997. New York: Rou- tledge, 2005. COWLEY, John. Carnival, Canboulay and Calypso, Traditions in the Mamaking. Cam- bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. DANTAS, Carolina V. O Brasil café com leite: mestiçagem e identidade nacional. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. Casa de Rui Barbosa, 2010. DENIS-CONSTANT, Martin. A Herança Musical da Escravidão. Tempo, Niterói, v.15, n.29, 2011. DU BOIS, W. E. B. As almas da gente negra. Trad. Heloisa Toller Gomes. Rio de Janei- ro: Lacerda Ed., 1999. DU BOIS, W. E. B. The Souls of Black Folk. Boston, New York: Bedford Books, 1997. FLOYD JR., Samuel. The Power of Black Music. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. FRANCESCHI, Humberto. A Casa Edison e seu tempo. Rio de Janeiro: Sarapuí, 2002. GILROY, Paul. O Atlântico Negro, modernidade e dupla consciência. Rio de Janeiro: Ucam; Ed. 34, 2001. GOMES, Flavio; DOMINGUES, Petrônio (Org.) Experiências da emancipação. São Paulo: Selo Negro, 2011. GOMES, Heloisa Toller. As marcas da escravidão. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRJ, 1994. GOMES, Tiago de Melo. Um espelho no palco: identidades sociais e massificação da cultura no teatro de revista dos anos 1920. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2004. GUIMARÃES, Antonio Sergio. Intelectuais negros e modernidade no Brasil. Disponí- vel em: www.fflch.usp.br/sociologia/asag/Intelectuais%20negros%20e%20moder- nidade%20no%20Brasil.pdf; Acesso em: 4 jan. 2014.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Martha Abreu

HAMILTON, Marybeth. In Search of the Blues: Black voices, white visions. London: Jonathan Cape, 2007. HERTZMAN, Marc. Making Samba: A new History of race and samba in Brazil. Durham: Duke University Press, 2013. KREHBIEL, Henry Edward. Afro-American Folksongs: A study in racial and national music. 1.ed. 1913. New York: Frederick Ungar, 1971. LABRES, Jair. Em torno das Jazz Bands do Rio de Janeiro, nos anos 20. Dissertação (Mestrado) – PPGH, Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF). Niterói, 2013. LARA, Silvia; PACHECO, Gustavo (Org.) Memória do jongo: as gravações históricas de Stanley Stein, Vassouras, 1949. Rio de Janeiro: Folha Seca; Campinas, SP: Cecult, 2007. LEME, Monica Neves. E Saíram à Luz, As novas coleções de polcas, modinhas, lundus etc.: música popular e impressão musical no Rio de Janeiro, 1820-1920. Tese (Dou- torado) – Universidade Federal Fluminense. Niterói, 2006. LEVINE, Laurence W. Black Culture and Black Conciousness. New York: Oxford Uni- versity Press, 1977. LIMA, Rossini Tavares de. Da conceituação do lundu. São Paulo: s.n., 1953. LONER, Beatriz Loner. Pelotas se diverte: clubes recreativos e culturais no século XIX. Disponível em: www2.ufpel.edu.br/ich/ndh/downloads/historia_em_revista_08_ Beatriz_Ana_Loner.pdf; Acesso em: 21 nov. 2014. LOPES, A. Herculano; ABREU, Martha; ULHOA, Martha; VELLOSO, Mônica (Org.) Música e História no longo século XIX. Rio de Janeiro: Fundação Casa de Rui Bar- bosa, 2011. LOPES, Herculano. Vem cá, mulata! Tempo, Niterói, n.26, jan.-jun. 2009. LOTT, Eric. Blackface and Blackness: The Minstrel Show in American Culture. In: BEAN; HATCH; McNAMARA (Ed.), 1996. MAGALDI, Cristina. Música, sátira e política no Rio de Janeiro Imperial. In: LOPES et al. (Org.), 2011, p.415. MAKUMA, Kasadi wa. Ethnomusicology and the African oral tradition in Brasil. In: LOPES et al. (Org.), 2011, p.97-116. MARTINS, Luiza Mara Braga. Os Oito Batutas: uma orquestra melhor que a encomen- da. Tese (Doutorado) – PPGH, Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF). Niterói, 2009. MARZANO, Andrea Barbosa. Cidade em cena: o ator Vasques, o teatro e o Rio de Janeiro, 1839-1892. Rio de Janeiro: Folha Seca; Faperj, 2008. MATTOS, Hebe. André Rebouças e o Pós-Abolição, Entre a África e o Brasil, (1888- 1898). In: ABREU, Martha; DANTAS, Carolina; MATTOS, Hebe; MONSMA, Karl; LONER, Beatriz (Org.) Histórias do Pós-Abolição no Mundo Atlântico: identidades e projetos políticos. vol. 1. Niterói, RJ: Eduff, 2014.

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil

MATTOS, Hebe; RIOS, Ana Lugão. Memórias do Cativeiro: família, trabalho e cidadania no pós-Abolição. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira, 2005. p.17-29. MEER, Sarah. Uncle Tom Mania: Slavery, minstrelsy and transatlantic culture in the 1850s. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2005. MENDES, Miriam Garcia. A personagem negra no teatro brasileiro (1838-1888). São Paulo: Ática, 1982. MOORE, Robin. Nationalizing Blackness: Afrocubanismo and Artistic Revolution in Havana, 1920-1940. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1997. MOORE, Robin. O teatro bufo: teatro blackface cubano. In: LOPES et al. (Org.), 2011. p.357-382. MORGAN, Thomas L.; BARLOW, William. From Cakewalks to Concert Halls: An illustrated History of African American popular music, from 1895 to 1930. Was- hington, DC: Elliott Clark, 1992. NEWMAN, Albert. Dances of Today. Philadelphia: The Penn Publishing Company, 1914. NOIRIEL, Gérard. Chocolat clown nègre: l’histoire oubliée du premier artiste noir de la scène française. Montrouge: Bayard, 2012. PALOMBINI, Carlos. Fonograma 108.077: o lundu de George W. Johnson. Per Musi, Belo Horizonte, n.23, p.58-70, 2011. PATTERSON, Michelle Wick; BURLIN, Natalie Curtis. A Life in Native and African American Music. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010. PEREIRA, Amilcar Araujo. O Mundo Negro: relações raciais e a constituição do Mo- vimento Negro contemporâneo no Brasil. Rio de Janeiro: Pallas; Faperj, 2013. PEREIRA, Leonardo Affonso de M. Cousas do Sertão: Coelho Netto e o tipo nacional nos primeiros anos da República. História Social, n.22-23, 2012. PEREIRA, Maria Clementina. Não me ponha no xadrez com esse malandrão: conflitos e identidades entre sambistas no Rio de Janeiro do início do século XX. Afro-Ásia, n.38, p.179-210, 2008. PRICE, Richard. O Milagre da Crioulização. Estudos Afro-Asiáticos, ano 25, n.3, p.383- 419, 2003. RADANO, Ronald. Lying up a Nation, Race and Black Music. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2003. REIS, João José. Tambores e temores, a festa negra na Bahia na primeira metade do século XIX. In: CUNHA, Maria Clementina Pereira. Carnavais e outras frestas. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2002. RIOS, Ana Lugão; MATTOS, Hebe. A Pós-Abolição como problema histórico: balan- ços e perspectivas. Topoi, v.5, n.8, 2004. SANDERS, Lynn Moss. Howard W. Odum’s Folklore Odyssey. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2003.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 23 Martha Abreu

SEIGEL, Micol. Uneven Encounters: Making race and nation in Brasil and the United States. Durham: Duke University Press, 2009. SHACK, William A. Harlem in Montmartre: A Paris jazz story between the Great Wars. Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2001. SILVA, Ana Carolina Feracin da. Introdução. In: ______. (Org.) Bilhetes Postais – Coe- lho Netto. Campinas, SP: Mercado das Letras; Cecult; São Paulo: Fapesp, 2002. p.7-15. SLENES, Robert. Na senzala, uma flor: esperanças e recordações na formação da família escrava. Brasil. Sudeste, século XIX. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, 1999. SOUZA, Silvia Cristina Martins de. Que venham negros à cena com maracas e tambores: jongo, política e teatro musicado no Rio de Janeiro nas últimas décadas do século XIX. Afro-Asia, Salvador, v.40, 2010. VIANA, Larissa; ABREU, Martha. Lutas políticas, relações raciais e afirmações culturais no pós-abolição: os Estados Unidos em foco. In: AZEVEDO; Cecilia; RAMI- NELLI, Ronald. História das Américas, novas perspectivas. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 2011. WADE, Peter Wade. Music, Race & Nation: Música Tropical in Colombia. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000. WAGNER, Bryan. Disturbing the Peace: Black Culture and the police power after slavery. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009. WHITE, Shane; WHITE; Graham. The Sounds of Slavery: Discovering African Ame- rican History through songs, sermons and speech. Boston: Beacon Press, 2005.

NOTES

1 Among others, see the classic study by LEVINE (1977). 2 For Brazil, see REIS, 2002, and ABREU; VIANA, 2009. For the United States, see ABRAHAMS, 1992. It is important to point out that studies on slave songs are far more numerous in the United States than in Brazil. 3 MOORE, 2011; CHASTEEN, 2004; WAGNER, 2009, Chaps.3 and 4; BROOKS; GIO- VANNONI, 2005; SOUZA, 2010. 4 On the “discovery” of spirituals, see ALLEN; WARE; GARRISON, 1995. 5 On the construction of the relationship between music and black identity see GILROY, 2001, Chap. 3; and RADANO, 2003, p.1-48. Regarding the relationship between the process of abolition and racialization, see RIOS; MATTOS, 2004. 6 There are far more studies in the United States about black music in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century than in Brazil. See KREHBIEL, 1971; SANDERS, 2003, Chap.1; COHEN (ed.), 2005. For Brazil, see ABREU; DANTAS, 2011, p.37-68.

24 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil

7 It is worth emphasizing that it is not my intention to conduct a thorough analysis of the work and careers of these two authors but to note that their observations, in that context, expressed significant contributions to the debate about the legacy of slave songs. 8 DU BOIS, 1997, p.148. Portuguese translation by Heloisa Toller Gomes (DU BOIS, 1999). Heloisa Toller Gomes provided an excellent translation into Portuguese and in her introduction she includes a chronology and notes, including biographical and bibliographical references about Du Bois. 9 Du Bois was the first black person to be awarded a Ph.D. at Harvard in 1895. His thesis, “The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America, 1638-1870” was published in 1896. Du Bois collaborated in the organization of associations fighting for the defense of the black population, such as the Niagara Movement in 1905 and the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) in 1910. In 1919 he organized the first Pan-African Congress in Paris and he participated in the organization of several other Pan African Congresses throughout the twentieth century. In 1935, he published his major work, The Black Reconstruction. See VIANA; ABREU, 2011. 10 The Souls of Black Folk, which was published in 1903, was a literary and essay-type book and it made Du Bois well-known in the United States. This book, with additions and changes, brought together articles that had been previously published elsewhere. In Chapter X, “Of the Faith of the Fathers”, Du Bois discussed the importance of “black religious music” and the “black church” in the southern United States. “The Sorrow Songs” is the title of the final chapter (XVI). The other chapters are dedicated to the plurality of the souls of black people, situating black North Americans in their interconnections with Africa, Europe and the Americas. See Heloisa Toller Gomes, “Introduction,” in DU BOIS, 1999, p.19-23. 11 Heloisa Toller Gomes, “Introdução”, in DU BOIS, 1999, p.7. 12 On the importance of Du Bois for the construction of black music, see GILROY, 2001, Chap. 4. In other periods of his career, Du Bois produced work on black art, but it is not my intention in this article to assess his possible changes of opinion, nor his criticism of black popular culture. About Du Bois, see also BRUNDAGE, 2003. 13 Coelho Netto, “O Caxambu”. O Paiz, Rio de Janeiro, 6 Mar. 1892, p.1. 14 Caxambu, better known as jongo, is a circle dance accompanied by drums and clapping. A couple in the center of the circle take the lead. Impromptu verses are sung by old jon- gueiros and accompanied in chorus by the participants. See LARA; PACHECO (ed.) 2007, and the website: “Jongos, Calangos e Folias”, www.historia.uff.br/jongos/?page_id=76; Ac- cessed 4 Jan. 2014. 15 According to Pereira, this was not the first time that Coelho Netto made reference to batuques and slave songs in his writings. PEREIRA, 2012, p.89-90. 16 The specifics of the political struggles of former slaves in the post-abolition era are discussed in MATTOS; RIOS, 2005, p.17-29, and GOMES; DOMINGUES (ed.), 2011, p.7-10. 17 On Coelho Netto’s links with abolition and Republican reformism, see PEREIRA, 2012, p.94, and SILVA, 2002, p.7-15.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 25 Martha Abreu

18 The debate between those who defend the presence of Africanism or evidence of creoliza- tion is rich in the literature on black culture in the Americas, from the early twentieth century. About this debate, see PRICE, 2003; MAKUMA, 2011; SLENES, 1999, Chaps. 1 and 3. 19 The discussion about the defense of forgetting the sounds of Africa between slaves and their descendants were present in Du Bois’s time. See, for example, PATTERSON, 2010, Chap. 6. 20 Heloisa Toller Gomes, “Introdução”, in DU BOIS, 1999, p.11. 21 DU BOIS, 1999, p.49-50; “Reflexão Prévia”, 1 Feb. 1903. 22 “While the third is a blending of Negro music with the music heard in the Foster land. The result is still distinctively Negro and the method of blending original, but the elements are both Negro and Caucasian” (DU BOIS, 1997, p.189). “One might go further and find a fourth step in this development, where the songs of white America have been distinctively influenced by the slave songs or have incorporated whole phrases of Negro melody... Side by side, too, with the growth has gone the debasements and imitations...” (DU BOIS, 1999, p. 303-304). 23 DU BOIS, 1999, p.308 (Chapter on the “Sorrow Songs”). 24 Written in Barbeton, South Africa, on May 30, 1892, this text was part of his African Idylls. It was published in the A Cidade do Rio newspaper on February 4, 1893. The writings of Rebouças on Africa have been analyzed in MATTOS, 2014. 25 The specialized literature often cites the influence of black spirituals and Negro folk- -songs on North American and European modernist composers such as Dvořák, Debussy, Darius Milhaud and Stravinsky. See Radano, 2003, p.74. 26 DENIS-CONSTANT, 2011. For more about these Atlantic circuits, see MOORE, 1997; COWLEY, 1998; and WADE, 2000. 27 The covers of cakewalks scores contain numerous examples of stereotypes created around slave songs. See MORGAN; BARLOW, 1992. The covers to scores and songs in nineteenth-century Brazil, one with a drumming scene, are discussed in LEME, 2006, v.2, p.310. 28 DU BOIS, 1999, p.299-301, 304. The slave songs sung by white performers and Blackfa- ces also represented challenges and concerns for several US black leaders such as Frederick Douglass and James Weldon Johnson. See LOTT, 1996. 29 Coelho Netto, apud SOUZA, 2010, p.147. See also MAGALDI, 2011, p.415. The novel The Conquest recreated the literary coexistence of young intellectuals who fought for abolition and the Republic, such as Coelho Netto, Olavo Bilac, Arthur Azevedo and Paula Nei, etc. SILVA, 2911, “Introdução”, p.9. 30 Writing about the United States, Robin Moore highlights two phases of Blackfaces shows. Before the Civil War, blacks appeared as happy, servile and docile when working in the plantations. Through the use of antics and incorrect speech, they were portrayed as stupid and inferior, thereby providing a justification for slavery. After abolition, they were portrayed “in

26 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 The legacy of slave songs in the United States and Brazil such a way as to emphasize their promiscuous, unscrupulous and potentially dangerous nature,” reinforcing justifications for segregationist policies. MOORE, 2011, p.358. 31 BEAN; HATCH; McNAMARA (ed.), 1996. See also BRUNDAGE (ed.), 2003. 32 Concerning laughter and social criticism connected with musical genres, and costumes identified with black people at parties and carnivals, there are interesting suggestions in BRASIL, 2011. 33 “Father John” (Pai João) was a very common literary figure in the theater and popular song between the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. On the representations of “Father John” in popular poetry and the work of folklorists, see ABREU, 2004. 34 LOPES, 2009, p.102. In the opinion of Lopes, it was only from the first decades of the twentieth century that the character of the mulatto came to be represented by mestizo actors. 35 Photos of the play War of the Mosquitoes, directed by Olavo de Barros, 1928-29, Rio de Janeiro. Brício de Abreu archive, Funarte. A few years earlier, in 1926, the Black Magazines Company, led by João Cândido Ferreira (the famous De Chocolat) was organized for the performance of actors and black musicians. About this company, see GOMES, 2004, Chap. 4; and BARROS, 2005. 36 See ANDRADE, 1928, p.5-6. The black actor Benjamin de Oliveira also enjoyed success in the circus-theater and painted his face white to act in The Merry Widow in Rio de Janei- ro, a clear reversal of Blackface, “which caused a stir in the city” (LOPES, 2009, p.97). 37 On the success of circus and the black clown “Chocolat” in Paris at the end of nineteenth century, see NOIRIEL, 2012, Chap. 3 38 On the success of circus and the black clown “Chocolat” in Paris at the end of nineteenth century, see NOIRIEL, 2012, Chap. 3. 39 The grammatically incorrect speech of people of African descent (called Negro dialect in the US) was also used in minstrel shows in the US. The play Uncle Tom was successful in musical theaters in England and the United States; Uncle Tom was the central figure of the abolitionist novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe, 1852. See MEER, 2005. 40 The cakewalk was the great musical genre of the minstrel shows. It is considered to be a dance and music genre that originated from parodies by slaves of the dances of southern slave-owners in the United States. See MEER, 2005, p.11. 41 SOUZA, 2010, p.155-160. For Souza, even if one takes into account the participation of many writers, actors and musicians working in the theater in the struggle for abolition, such as Chiquinha Gonzaga, Arthur Azevedo, Francisco Correa Vasques, Cavalier Darbilly and Henrique Mesquita, they were still working in the shadow of prejudice or paternalistic views that sought to direct the actions of slaves and former slaves (ibidem, p.161). 42 On Bert Williams, see CHUDE-SOKEI, 2006, p.61-68. For a comparison between Bert Williams and Eduardo das Neves, see ABREU, (forthcoming). 43 Researching at the Library of the US Congress, I located some dance manuals from the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 27 Martha Abreu early twentieth century aimed at teaching people to dance the maxixe. For example, NEW- MAN, 1914. On the cakewalk in Brazil, see CAMPOS, 1904. 44 For a critique of these nationalist landmarks, see ABREU, 2011. 45 The proposal, as set out by Micol Seigel, that a transnational history can be understood as the search for connections that connect people and projects. These connections operate from local to global, and vice versa, without expressing any totality or representing any typical national profile (SEIGEL, 2009, Chap. 2). 46 For the United States, see FLOYD JR., 1995. For Brazil, see HERTZMAN, 2013; PEREI- RA, 2008.

Article received on January 30, 2015. Approved on February 23, 2015.

28 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69

Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship1 Relações Igreja-Estado em uma cidade operária durante a ditadura militar

Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez*

Resumo Abstract O artigo propõe a discussão das relações The paper discusses the relations be- entre Igreja e Estado nos anos iniciais da tween Church and State in the early years ditadura militar brasileira, momento es- of the Brazilian military dictatorship, a te de consolidação de um novo bloco time of consolidation of a new historical histórico no interior da Igreja e de forte bloc within the Church and of great he- disputa hegemônica nas Forças Arma- gemonic dispute within the Armed Forc- das. A partir de um caso ocorrido na cies. A case which occurred in the steel dade siderúrgica de Volta Redonda (RJ), town of Volta Redonda (RJ) in 1967, in no ano de 1967, no qual quatro jovens which four young men connected to the ligados a um movimento católico local local Catholic movement had been im- foram presos pelo Exército após distri- prisoned by the Army for distributing buírem panfletos críticos ao governo pamphlets critical of the government, vigente, tem início uma série de confli- gave rise to a series of conflicts between tos entre o bispo local e as autoridades the local bishop and the military authori- militares. Uma reconstrução pragmáti- ties. A pragmatic reconstruction of the ca dos fatos decorrentes desse caso será facts resulting from this case is given pri- aqui privilegiada a fim de discutir as dis- ority here in order to discuss the disputes putas de poder estabelecidas entre seto- of power that took place between pro- res progressistas da Igreja e o Estado gressive sectors of the Church and the autoritário e suas respectivas estratégias authoritarian State, as well as their re- de conquista de hegemonia. spective strategies for gaining hegemony. Palavras-chave: Ditadura militar; Igreja Keywords: Military dictatorship; Catho- católica; Volta Redonda (RJ). lic Church; Volta Redonda (RJ).

* Doutoranda, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Sociologia e Antropologia (PPGSA/UFRJ). Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69010 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez

The central role which Catholicism has played since the historic action of religious orders in the colonization process, at the origin of the articulation of a national identity, reflected in a popular imagination which is not only religious, but also political, social and cultural within Brazil, is well-known. As Gustavo Oliveira highlights, “the conception of ‘religion’ in Brazil is profoundly associated with a Christian and above all Catholic model of the organization of beliefs, rituals and sacred institutions” (Oliveira, 2010, p.4). Having survived the changes imposed by the secularization of the state, with the advent of the Brazilian republic and its new constitution of 1891, the Church underwent a process of re-formulating its strategies for hegemony. In this sense, Ação Católica [Catholic Action] arose as the organization responsible for updating Catholic discourse in a way which not only prevented the uprooting of Catholic culture, which suffered from competition with other denominations within its own religious field, but above all, as a way of extending its influence within society. In order to do this, the layperson was called on to take a more active role, even within the limits of the hierarchical framework, in the same way that the worker was transformed into an “agent” in the popu- list discourse elaborated by Getúlio Vargas. With the aim of accompanying the ideological transformation of political society, as Gramsci (1981) noted, the Catholic institution tended to opt for a progressive movement, in order to maintain its own “official” ideological unity and to adjust to the transformations in other fields. At the same time, this updating would have to be carried out at a slow and methodical pace, so as to ensure that its transformations were not felt by the majority, thereby conserving a certain homogeneity in its ideological bloc. The “ideological homogeneity” of which the Sardinian philosopher spoke, had, throughout history, guaranteed its institutional unity through various mechanisms of internal organization and dissemination of a more or less mal- leable vision of the world, which guaranteed its social capillarity. Notwithstanding an attempt at permanent reification, in which the Catholic Church is presented as fixed in time, since it is of the order of the atemporal, there are various cases in which the dynamism intrinsic to social relations appeared in all of its complexity and inconsistency. In this way, stimulated by this challenge of exposing the inconsistencies of the Church and revealing the discursive and ideological nexuses between the religious and political fields, I propose an analysis of the relationship between Church and State, during the turbulent and polarized period of the

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship

Brazilian military dictatorship, more specifically, during its first years of de- ployment (between 1964 and 1967). Within the Church, the 1960s were characterized by a profound polarization, both between ecclesiastical agents and between lay movements, incubated within Ação Católica and the hierarchy. Specialized historiography has highlighted a “shift to the left” of Catholic sectors, principally among workers and students.2 In general, the interpretation adopted by these scholars places too great an emphasis on analyzing the political role of the Church in society. In methodological terms, however, I have chosen an interpretation based equally on the analysis of symbolic goods, which are elements par excellence from the field of culture, understood here as structuring structures (Bourdieu, 1989). This concept, forged by Bourdieu, equips the institution with dynamism, by default of the vision of many of its interpreters, insofar as it would find itself in a constant structuring process, with each social agent, consciously or unconsciously transforming the structured structure into a structuring structure. With this, I do not wish to deny its effective intervention in political life, both locally and nationally. The confrontation between authorities, ecclesiastical and military, as well as the discourse of defending human rights and social justice, are examples of direct political interventions made by various religious and lay figures, but which do not find a more complete explanation merely in an analysis of political elements. Religious, political, cultural, ideological, social and economic life forge social reality in its multiple interrelations. I have those chosen a specific event which occurred in the city of Volta Redonda (State of Rio de Janeiro) in 1967, involving a local Catholic movement, Juventude Diocesana Católica (Judica) [Catholic Diocesan Youth], with the aim of qualifying the composition of actors and ideological perspectives within the Catholic institution and the military institution, as well as to go over the arguments deployed by both parties. One year previously, the Diocese of Volta Redonda, received the new bishop, D. Waldyr Calheiros de Novaes, who remains etched in local memory as a great defender of workers’ rights and a fierce opponent of the military regime. The chosen episode was the first time that the ecclesiastical authority publicly presented itself as opposed to the policy of persecution deployed by the military regime and which gave rise to an intense and complex game of force between the religious and political authorities. The imprisonment of four youths linked to the cited Church movement leads us to an intriguing analysis of the forces involved in the process and their differing views of the world. It even allows us to reflect on the participation of the Judiciary in the conduct of trials, in the first year of effect of

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez the Lei de Segurança Nacional [National Security Law] and the enactment of the new Republican Constitution, in 1967.

The relationship between Church and State in the Brazilian republic

Before immersing ourselves in the analysis of the case proposed here, I shall make a brief presentation regarding the historical construction of the relationship between Church and State in Brazil, so as to locate the reader within the social and political dynamics implemented by political society and by this institution, which Gramsci defines as “civil society within civil society”. Revisiting this historical period has the objective of providing more elements for the purpose of punctuating the transformations and continuities experienced in the initial years of consolidation of a new historical bloc, the military and its civilian allies, at national level by the progressive wing of the Catholic Church. From the First Republic [1889-1930] onwards, a continual dispute between forces for hegemony within society was witnessed. Despite its separation from the State, the Church maintained itself as the controller of a broad network of institutions which then provided it with a capillarity and educating power for both the dominant and the dominated classes. The institution continued to draw on powerful ideological material, formed by literature and by the press, even including parish bulletins, and by the school and university organization which it retained. It also maintained the clergy (an organic body of intellectuals), religious orders and institutions entrusted to lay people with political or union aims (parties and Catholic unions) or ideological ones (Ação Católica). Portelli comments on this point:

In reality, the Church actually represents all of the aspects which Gramsci analyses in civil society; on the one hand, ideology disseminated and adapted to the entire social body; on the other hand, the organizations and channels for dissemination of this ideology. Gramsci opposes to this vast and complex sphere of the superstructure that of political society. (Portelli, 1977, p.30)

This new condition obliged the Church to re-formulate strategies, thereby creating the Project for so-called “neocristandade” [neochristianity], capable of forging a new social organization in which Catholicism would come to provide the moral and cultural unity of the nation, despite the relative formal

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship independence of the State and the political sphere. In addition to demanding a bureaucratic approximation with the bourgeoisie and the new urban elites, this model also proposed an investment in the training of lay intellectuals and in the education of the masses, as well as more participation by the laity in a number of decisions of the practical life of the Church. The action of Catholic intellectuals, during the first decades of the twentieth century, created a new symbolic universe for the institution, in which it affirmed itself as the intermediary between the State and society. An example of the re-establishment of this Catholic hegemony is the founding of the Centro D. Vital, in Rio de Janeiro, in 1922, which would take on the production of the magazine A Ordem [The Order] an important source for the dissemination of ecclesiastical ideas. The Centro D. Vital hence had as its principal objective of the dissemination of Catholic ideas and would be at the forefront of the important changes which occurred during the following decade: it launched the bases for Ação Católica in Brazil, in 1933; it created the Confederação Nacional da Imprensa Católica [National Confederation of the Catholic press]; it encouraged the emergence of Catholic universities and of the Liga Eleitoral Católica [Catholic Electoral League] (LEC). In this way, the dynamics of the field of Catholicism, through Ação Católica and other movements derived from it, such as the Círculos Operários Católicos [Catholic Workers’ Circles] and Juventudes especializadas [Specialized youth movements],3 was updated as a “strategy for articulation, training and mobilization of the laity around the public affirmation of Catholic identity and the defense of its moral and social positions” (Oliveira, 2010). From 1930 onwards, the social question would take up a central position in government speeches. In particular, the working class received the attention of the public policies of Getúlio Vargas, since this contributed to limiting the oligarchical power of the historical bloc, recently replaced by the urban-industrial bourgeoisie. In this way, Vargas’ state designed a project for “collaboration between classes”, transforming the working class into a “partner” of the government, with a discourse of harmony between classes. The anti-Communist ideal also presented itself as a further axis between the interests of the State and of the Church. After 1945, with the political crisis of the Estado Novo and the emergence of a democratic discourse, the State would attempt to disassociate itself from the dictatorial State and from then on, project its self-image as an opponent of the government. “What had been positive and the guarantor of harmony and

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez order became paternalism, which was illegal and anti-democratic. A new discourse was invented, more appropriate to a new age” (Sousa, 2002, p.242). From this period onwards, until the eve of the civil-military coup d’état in 1964, the formation of a new historical bloc was incubated within the Catholic Church. The “social question”, disseminated as a strategy of hegemony during the 1930s, developed spectacularly throughout the 1950s and 60s, conquering important sections of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. Many priests and bishops committed to projects such as the Ligas Camponesas [Peasant Leagues] or the Movimento de Educação de Base [Basic Education Movement] (MEB) and operated with the Juventude Operária Católica [Young Catholic Workers] (JOC) and the Juventude Universitária Católica [Young Catholic Students] (JUC). This generation of lay and ecclesiastical militants forged a discourse critical of the institutional framework represented by the hierarchy and developed a body of ideas which defined the Church’s mission as social transformation through commitment in the field of politics. This discourse had as its characteristic, the overestimation of the autonomy of militants, seeking to strengthen the idea of the ecclesiastical agent as a mere auxiliary in the process of collective organization, seeking to emphasize a “basic” character for its movements. At the same time, taking the interpretation of Bourdieu (1989) as a reference, we cannot lose sight of the unequal relationship experienced between priests/bishops and lay people, since they found themselves inserted into a division of labor which was hierarchical par excellence. The proximity of relations between priests and lay people, the choice not to use the cassock and the use of simple and direct language are factors which undoubtedly contributed to reformulate a symbolic universe which previously sought to strengthen this distance and disparity of conditions. At the same time, the sacredness of the condition of clergyman inscribed in the popular imagination would be felt in the manner of relating to a member of the hierarchical body, not to mention the difference in the use of oratory and the power of conviction which this religious condition presupposed. Even in the face of this observation, sectors of the Catholic Church took the expansion of the role of lay people within it to its ultimate consequences and with this, provided the grass roots with greater power of intervention. At this point, identities gained new meanings, despite continuing to orient themselves, to a greater or lesser degree, by the codes determined by the structure. In this way, the polarization experienced by political society during the 1950s and start of the 1960s was also felt inside the Catholic Church within Brazil. Beside the Catholic movements identified as progressive, we may also

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship cite the existence of the “rosário em família” [Rosary in the family] and of the “marchas da família, com Deus, pela liberdade” [Marches of the family with God for freedom] campaigns. A struggle for hegemony within the field of Catholicism itself thus becomes evident. Soon after the establishment of the military regime, the Church officially offered support to the new historic bloc, demonstrating the hegemony of the Conservative bloc within the Catholic Church. During these initial years, coop- eration took place between the military and ecclesiastical hierarchies. We may thus speak of the proximity of objectives, maintenance of order and discipline and defense of authority and capitalism, and of ideology in the rejection of any socialist or communist experiment and of collaboration between classes. This same balance of forces would be overturned during the 1970s and 1980s, when a body of organic intellectuals, committed to the project of combating “social injustices” would formulate an anti-capitalist discourse of grassroots empowerment, grounded in a very solid ideology, that of Liberation Theology. Many of its ideas were disseminated by the Catholic ranks and at times, a more aggressive discourse was adopted by the Conferência Nacional dos Bispos do Brasil [National Conference of Bishops of Brazil] (CNBB) itself, an organization which, par excellence, represented the thinking of Brazilian bishops. During the 1960s, these progressive sectors were already more or less developed, although the official discourse of the institution was still very closely linked to the military government. Since this was a highly pluralistic institution in terms of its ideological colors, in 1967, the moment on which this study focuses, it was already possible to perceive a well-organized network of priests and bishops, who incorporated the idea of a “committed faith” and who mobilized elements of the Church itself (communication network, physical space, political influence, etc.), available to it to regiment and support actions of its basic movements and even of organizations on the political left. It was this interplay of forces between the progressive clergy and the military government, which we shall analyses more carefully, on the basis of the imprisonment of the young people of Judica.

The case of Judica: confrontations and concessions between military and ecclesiastical authorities

In November 1967, four young men belonging to the Judica4 Catholic movement were arrested by soldiers after having been detained for distributing

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez pamphlets regarded as subversive. Two members of this movement, Natanael José da Silva (Chairman) and Jorge Gonzaga (Sports and cultural director), accompanied by the Deacon Guy Michel Thibault and the Seminarist Carlos Rosa, decided, following mass, to go for a drive around the dioceses in order to distribute a number of pamphlets to show their indignation at the social situation in Volta Redonda.5 The pamphlet denounced the terrible living conditions to which the majority of the Brazilian population were subjected, above all the working class, and its content criticized the imperialist policy of the United States within Brazil. It concluded by calling for the mobilization of “workers in the city or in the field, employees, students and intellectuals”6 to take part in the fight against the dictatorship. According to the report by the Municipal Truth Commission of Volta Redonda (CVVR), the group was followed by a patrol of the Military Police of the 1st Armored Infantry Battalion (AIB) and taken to the Battalion headquarters to give evidence. Already in the Army vehicle, Jorge Gonzaga reported that they had been physically attacked, receiving slaps, punches and verbal threats. The detained young men were kept in solitary confinement, remaining incommunicado for a month. They were then accused of crimes of subversion, in accordance with the National Security Law. This episode occurred during the morning of 6 November. On the 10th and 11th of the same month, a search was carried out of the rooms of Guy Thibault and Carlos Rosa, who lived at the Bishop’s residents, in order to “search and apprehend portraits, books and subversive material”.7 The incident caused a malaise with the Bishop of Volta Redonda, insofar as he considered the attempt at an “invasion” of his house without prior authorization to be abusive, in addition to criticizing the repressive attitude of the military, with regard to the imprisonment of the young men, who had already been unreach- able for several days. Despite holding a search and apprehension mandate, the officials were persuaded by the priest Bernardo Thus to await the arrival of the Bishop, who was in a neighboring city, to search the rooms of the imprisoned residents. This fact broadly demonstrated the effort by the Church to maintain its autonomy with regard to the local state authority and at the same time, the mutual respect between the authorities, giving priority to the approach of negotiation, as shall become clear below. On the occasion, D. Waldyr also expressed his displeasure with regard to the “ostentatious character of the force” at the door of his residence, causing a climate of fear and suspicion among his apostolate. It is interesting to note how

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship the public dimension of his figure was deployed not only as a mechanism for affirming his local influence to the military but also as a factor of responsibility before his congregation, when faced with a suspicion of subversion of ecclesiastical authority itself and a concern to see his figure disconnected from any connotation of a political order. Colonel Armênio Pereira, the commander of the barracks and Colonel of the Infantry of the Army, would henceforth remain in the local memory as the principal agent of the military forces responsible for the persecution and imprisonment of all of those considered as subversive, until 1969, the period during which he commanded the Battalion. In particular, the commander of the 1st AIB undertook a defamatory and hostile campaign against the so-called “progressive clergy”. As is proven by the documents of the SNI, the 1st AIB systematically monitored all of the activities associated with the Diocese of Barra do Piraí/Volta Redonda, registered in many monitoring reports and in the three IPMs [Military Police Investigation] brought against the Bishop D. Waldyr in subsequent years. In addition to Colonel Armênio, the Lieutenant-Colonel Gladstone Pernasetti Teixeira, rapporteur of the IPM of the Judica case, was indicated by the prisoners as the most violent in carrying out the interrogations. Carlos Rosa, testifying to the CVVR, reported: “He threatened me the entire time, threatened to send me to the DOI-Codi, threatened to send me to various torture centers, didn’t he? But didn’t go further than threats. And it’s evident that when they wanted to know something and I didn’t speak, they hit me”.8 Jorge Gonzaga, also testifying to the CVVR, made clear the level of threats which had occurred during the interrogations: “Gladstone put a pistol on the table like this at 3 o’clock in the morning. ‘Hey man, why don’t you confess that you’re a communist son of a bitch so I can shoot you in the head right now’. They couldn’t stand it any more, so it was psychological pressure”.9 The collected testimonies demonstrate that one of the objectives of Colonel Armênio and his subordinates consisted of exploiting the incident to prove the involvement of the Bishop D. Waldyr in distributing the pamphlets, and this because since his arrival in Volta Redonda, the Bishop had made clear his proximity to the working classes and his criticism of the military dictatorship. As a member of the progressive sectors of the Catholic Church, D. Waldyr had displeased the military for the first time when he refused to celebrate mass to commemorate the anniversary of the “1964 Revolution”, in April 1967. In reply to the order by Colonel Armênio to search the rooms of the seminarists, on 14 November, the local bishop published a declaration in the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez newspaper Jornal do Brasil which became known as the “seven deadly sins”, using the “weapons” available to him as the religious authority in the city and making use of his influence in the political arena. Despite being long, this document deserves to be transcribed, insofar as it represents the intervention of priests and bishops and political issues, understood by them as the social question. The letter states the following:

While Colonel Armênio is concerned with discovering subversive individuals, I am concerned: 1) about a wage agreement which has been dragging on for five months, in the meantime with various workers deprived of even ‘the crumbs falling from the table of their Lord’; 2) I am concerned about the fact that for some, this increase adds NCr$ 160.00 to their salary, while for others, the increase represents more or less NCr$ 21.00 which, added to their current salary, reaches more or less NCr$ 150.00, a quantity less than the simple increase in the former. The bread that they eat is the same price. The meat that they don’t eat is the same price as it is for those who eat it; 3) I am concerned that this increase will not cover the outstanding balance of the workers, which is already a concern for CSN, and which hundreds of workers, on payment day, will take home, causing sadness in some households, arguments and others and despair for many, putting the stability of the family at stake; 4) I am concerned about the high level of mental illness among workers, not only new ones, but old ones. We are also alarmed by the number of alcoholics; 5) I am concerned about the maintenance of social castes: Laranjal is for... Vila is for... Flats are for... This creates rivalries between classes. These are islands which are created; 6) I am concerned about the community life of residents in houses which do not belong to them. I know that CSN itself has been concerned about this for several years. Since the houses do not belong to them and they cannot buy them, nobody feels stable and safe, whence the apathy for anything in the city. This indifference between humans is pernicious to human relationships; 7) I am concerned about the excess supply of labor and the exploitation of it by a number of companies taking advantage of the situation, imposing arbitrary payments, disrespecting current legislation. ...

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship

All of these are pastoral concerns which, together with the others of our ministry, oblige me to see, outside of my residence, the causes which may lead to the despair of subversion.10

In addition to the strong tone of denunciation, this declaration firstly demonstrates a pastoral position which stands behind the grassroots and is more alert to class problems. In drawing up a discourse closer to the typical union and labor claims, D. Waldyr ultimately expands the field of action and the legitimacy of the Church. At the same time, we must piece together a grammar of the discourses drawn up by these progressive sectors in order not to reduce his vision of the world to strictly political aspects. All criticism of a political coin is preceded by the affirmation of typically Catholic moral values, the family, private property, at the same time highlighting a doctrinal continuity, a basis and ideological justification of the order of the transcendental. On the same day, D. Waldyr wrote another letter, this time addressed to Colonel Armênio Pereira, responsible for the establishment of this IPM, containing a copy of his declaration in the JB, stating: “This is what I said. With regard to the interpretation and comments which they may wish to make regarding my note, this is not my responsibility”.11 The route of dialogue reveals itself to be the most recommended, as it appears in the discourse in the JB, notwithstanding disagreements with the regime and the confrontation of forces. On the 18th, D. Waldyr sent another letter, addressed to various priests in his dioceses and neighboring dioceses, requesting the dissemination of his declaration published on the 14th. One of the letters, sent to Frei Marcos, of Angra dos Reis, stated the following:

Please find attached these brochures which repeat the report in the Jornal do Brasil of 14/11. This report is authentic. Not everyone found out about the report. The Fathers thought that wider dissemination would be necessary. Tomorrow in all of the masses, it may be read in the place of the sermon and distributed at the door of the Church to those adults who wish to take it home. It may be read by a lay person, after the person celebrating Mass gives notice that it is a clarification by the Bishop.12

This is an excellent example of the highly organized Solidarity network created between priests and bishops, mobilized in the clash of forces against the military regime, in affirming a position of power by these clergymen in civil

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez society. During this period, the Church presented itself as an important alternative means of communication. Having a very broad internal structure, internal mechanisms for the dissemination of news and a capillarity which transcended the plane of the press, both national and local, many members of the clergy and lay people succeeded in bypassing censorship and mobilizing efforts on various occasions, specifically by virtue of the constitution of a network of this type. Masses and sermons took on a new social function, thereby presenting themselves as a space for communication and criticism, within a censorious and repressive regime. The Bishop’s attitude evidently caused another case of malaise with the regime. For example, on the day of celebration of the dominical mass, the priest Natanael de Moraes Campos, of the Church of Santa Cecília, received a search and apprehension warrant, due to the distribution of the pamphlet disseminated at D. Waldyr’s request for the clarification of the episode of the imprisonment of the young people of Judica at the Sunday mass. On the other hand, this reveals the military’s highly effective monitoring system, which deployed various officers in monitoring the movements of those considered suspect or of the so-called “enemies” of the nation, a situation which would intensify, as the structuring of the military regime progressed. We observe here that even during the initial years of the civil-military dictatorship, when the relations between Church and State were satisfactory, members of the Catholic Church already had their activities monitored by local military agents, being, as a minimum, considered suspect and susceptible to provide explanations of their actions. The suspicion of subversion did not spare these progressive sectors, despite the Catholic institution claiming its autonomy to deal with “deviant cases” within its ecclesiastical body. On analyzing the documentation, we may verify a constant disputing of authority: military versus ecclesiastical. D. Waldyr received a letter from the Bishop D. José Castro Pinto, who had interceded with the military authorities in this case, with the objective of ensuring that the bishop’s authority was respected by the military leaders and at the same time, but this episode did not have more serious consequences for the relations between Church and State. The appeal of the Bishop is in this direction:

The General [General Commander of the 1st Army] is willing to instruct his troops in the sense of what was proposed by the President Castelo Branco to consult the Ecclesiastical Authority first, whenever a case arises. If I may entreat

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship

your Excellency to do something, it is that you talk with General Ramiro, who will visit you where you wish, at the Episcopal residence or anywhere else.13

On the one hand, the ecclesiastical authorities demanded respect for the internal autonomy of the institution, which had to have the right to resolve its problems with its hierarchical or lay subordinates before the interference of any other body of the State. On the other hand, a concern was observed on the part of the Catholic hierarchy to intercede in this case in the direction of maintaining good relations with the military. The interplay of forces was continuous and complex, insofar as it entailed a diversified range of thinking. It nevertheless had the capacity to adjust and pacified the internal and political divergences, maintaining the unity of the historic bloc.

The constitution of a plan for military hegemony and clashes with the Church

This case also produced two very interesting documents from the perspective of the mechanisms for control created by the military after 1964 and their respective institutional bodies: the defense material for the four young men, drawn up by the attorney Lino Machado Filho, and the declaration of a dissenting vote by the Minister Pery Bevilaqua. Both documents allow us to discuss the transformations in the legislation of the military regime and the establishment of acts of prison and judgement, by the Military Courts. They also provide us with the elements to reflect on the defense mechanisms which were accessible prior to 1968 and the uses made of Justice in general. According to the analysis by Dreifuss (1981), the civil-military coup d’état of 1964 was based on the articulation of three political forces which had been acting in a more or less coordinated manner since the 1950s: multinational capital associated with national capital, State capital and the military. The forces behind the coup which had planned the overthrow of the Goulart government were the result of a competent political-ideological articulation driven by the ideology of the Doutrina de Segurança Nacional e Desenvolvimento [Doctrine of National Security and Development], incubated within the context of the Escola Superior de Guerra [Higher School of War] (ESG). The principal objective was the establishment of a geopolitics capable of guaranteeing the security of the whole of the Southern Cone, in the sense of preventing the expansionist danger of international communism. Added to this goal was an attempt to strengthen the State in such a way as to permit the entry of foreign

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez capital, with the aim of establishing an infrastructure capable of transforming the country into an economic power. It was for this reason that a greater control of social movements was necessary, with an entire structure being established to combat the left and eliminate so-called “internal enemies”. Over the following period of more than a decade, institutional acts and repressive laws would be enacted, with the aim of providing legitimacy to the regime and information entities would be created to monitor, identify and eliminate the internal “enemy”. In a short period of time, different sectors of society would be included within the concept of “enemy” of the regime. The episode of the imprisonment of the Judica militants is interesting in this sense, since it allows a verification of how the information system of the military operated in practice and how the development of its repressive actions occurred, which, only one year later, culminated in the passing of the Ato Institucional no 5 [Institutional Act No. 5](AI-5). The generalized climate of suspicion provoked by the supposedly right of Communist revolution in the country, added to the identification of subversive acts in the actions of the widest range of social groups, provided the political tone for the context of the time. Already in 1964, the Serviço Nacional de Informações [National Information Service] (SNI) was created, devised by General Golbery do Couto e Silva, under the Castelo Branco government. This body was responsible for the creation of a network of information which prepared files on some 400,000 individuals, relying on the aid of North American consultants. The six-page document of the defense attorney, Dr. Lino Machado Filho, regarding the Judica case, is a rich example for discussing the disputes between the military and ecclesiastical authorities, as well as for identifying the way in which the military circumvented or disrespected the current law and conversely, the arguments for the defense based on legitimacy of the legal system inherited from the fragile preceding democratic period. In this way, the relationship between the Executive and the Judiciary developed in a tense and complex manner. From the first days of the military regime, the persecution and imprisonment of citizens falling under Law No. 1802 of 5 January 1953, which defined crimes against the political and social order. Until October 1965, the two powers entered into constant attrition, since the judgement of crimes considered as political fell to the ordinary courts, with the Supremo Tribunal Federal [Supreme Federal Court] (STF), in general acquitting those accused due to lack of evidence.

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship

Angélica Coitinho (2010) sees in the drafting of AI-2 a strengthening of the more hardline sectors of the Armed Forces, in so far as it increased the number of ministers of the Supreme Federal Court from 11 to 16 as the solution found to the amp hour’s existing between the more extreme wing of the regime and those considered more moderate. Another measure in the same direction consisted of the transfer of responsibility for the judgement of civilians who committed crimes against the internal security of the country, i.e. those falling under Law No. 1802, to the Superior Tribunal Militar [Higher Military Court] (STM), a decision which was maintained with the enactment of the Lei de Segurança Nacional [National Security Law] of 1967. In this way, the Military Courts became the guarantor of the internal unity of the military Corporation, with the ideological body provided by the National Security Doctrine. The first stage of the judgment of cases consisted of the establishment of the IPM, in which the determination of the crime and its authors were determined. At the same time, as was highlighted in the book Brasil: Nunca Mais [Brazil: Never Again], the so-called “preliminary interrogations” were characterized by inaccessibility and physical and mental mistreatment, as we shall see in the Judica case. On many occasions, not even the Military Courts were noti- fied of the detentions and the procedural deadlines established by the National Security Law itself were often disregarded. Following this, the case passed into the sphere of the Auditoria Militar [Military Audit], the first instance of the military courts. An appeal to the second body was still possible, the STM, consisting of 15 life ministers appointed by the President of the Republic. This body was highlighted by lawyers at the time as the most important one in the legal game, since it was the only one which maintained a certain neutrality and independence. Anthony Pereira (2010) nevertheless believes that in reality, it was a strategy to oblige these magistrates to judge on the basis of the law and not on their personal convic- tions. This is proven by the statistics compiled by the Brasil: Nunca Mais group, which concluded that the majority of the decisions issued in the first instance were upheld by the STM, with rare exceptions in which the penalties were reduced. In the case analyzed here, the arguments imposed by the attorney, contracted by the diocese of Volta Redonda itself, demonstrate confidence in the law on the part of the Church and the activation of legal mechanisms to prove the unconstitutionality of the imprisonment of the young people and of their inaccessibility to date after 5 days in prison. Above all, this was a dispute in the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez legal field. There was hence a credibility in the law, among those subject to political persecution, the most common being the recourse to habeas corpus, until the decreeing of the AI-5. As such, on 16 November, the defending counsel filed a request for habeas corpus in favor of the four young men, on establishment of the IPM. In this case, No. 1407, Lino Machado Filho requested that the inaccessibility of the imprisoned young men cease, so that they could defend themselves freely and that “due to the manifest incompetence of the military authorities in trying and judging them, the investigation should be attributed to the civil authority”.14 In recounting the facts, the attorney listed a series of elements intended to demonstrate the illegality of this ruling by the military authorities and at the same time, to state the disrespect for the authority of the Bishop of Volta Redonda:

Nor is the unchallenged violence unknown, practiced against the law and against order; against the law and against justice; against the inviolability of the home, of the domicile of the bishopric, by the party responsible for the Investigation, in carrying out initiatives aiming to obtain evidence against the detainees. On the other hand, not even the enforcing authorities denied the seizure of the minivan belonging to the bishopric, after having been rammed by the military vehicle, on the night of the 5th 6th of this month. Finally, the certainty that the detainees are imprisoned and without any communication with the world, with their family members, with their protector, with the bishopric cannot be denied, after Colonel Armênio Pereira, Commander of the First Armored Infantry Battalion denied that a representative of His Eminence, the Bishop of Volta Redonda had been imprisoned, that is to say, he had failed to tell the truth. The military apparatus for investigations, from which comments emerged of suspected imprisonment or conduct against that Prince of the Church, compromising ecclesiastical authority, its incommunicado detention, its authority, its condition of Pastor, cannot deny the precepts which grant to public men as such, to the Universal Church, treatment of respect, consideration and dignity that the very Christian conscience of the Brazilian people obliges and imposes.15

What is at play here is a legal question and another moral one: the illegality of the judgement by the Military Court and the disrespect for Episcopal authority. Its arguments are hence formulated in the sense of demonstrating

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship the abuses committed by the military in legal terms and calling on the conflict between authorities. This case represents a series of excesses by the authority committed on various other occasions, leaving clear the increase in the power of the bodies of repression and the “backwardness” of the legislation, in accordance with the more radical conception of the Armed Forces, which ob- structed the authoritarian actions of the regime. It should be remembered that the event occurred at the end of 1967 and that the more hardline sectors of the Armed Forces had already begun to argue for a central information body and a well-structured political police, which would result in 1969 in the creation of the Departamento de Operações Internas e Centro de Operações de Defesa Interna [Department of Internal Operations and Centre for Internal Defense Operations] (DOI-Codi). The request for habeas corpus, as was practice, was denied. At the same time, it is interesting to analyses the declaration of the dissenting vote by the Minister General Pery Bevilaqua. The STM judge between 1965 and 1969 was well-known for his impartiality and respect for the law. Renato Lemos highlights that in general, Bevilaqua gave a favorable opinion to the accused, which was possible due to the large number of badly constructed cases, but frequently dissented in the decisions issued by the STM (Lemos, 2004). This fact demonstrates the divergences existing within the military, whether of an ideological or of a strategic nature, as noted by Fico. It is clear here that the Armed Forces did not constitute a monolithic bloc and for the entire military period, we may identify internal disputes for power. At the same time, the fact that Bevilaqua’s vote was discordant is indicative of the empowerment of “hardline” sectors within the Armed Forces, with these sectors intending to establish their hegemony and contemptuous of civilian bodies. The dissenting minister stated:

I grant the order for the immediate release, so that they may be free to reply to the I.P.M., given that the military authority does not have functional competence to establish an investigation in the civil area, to determine crimes provided in the L.S.N., or even to arrest a civilian, except in the cases of art. 146 of the C.J.M., when “any civilian may and the military must imprison any person found committing a crime, or after the perpetration of the same, attempting to flee, pursued by public outcry. Only in these two latter cases shall imprisonment be considered to have been made in flagrante delicto”. The individual, civilian or military, who imprisons a criminal under the conditions described in art. 146 of the C.J.M., shall have exhausted his legal action, delivering the prisoner to the competent legal authority for the drafting of the instrument of imprisonment for in

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez

flagrante delicto offences, which he shall sign as the driver of the prisoner or even as witness and nothing else. The case shall then take its normal course. Members of the Army who found the civilians, detainees of this H.C., distributing suspect bulletins on a public highway, could at most have arrested them by the order of the Local Police Delegate, apprehend the bulletins and present them to the police authority, to which they should also deliver the seized bulletins. I said “the most that they could do”, since the procedure of the Cont. Plus of the Patrol could also confine itself to noting the number plate of the vehicle, collect the bulletins thrown into the street and next them to the “service report” which they would give to the duty officer, on returning to the Barracks. And then, the Head of the Unit, would proceed according to the law, in such a way that the competent civil authority would act in accordance with the relevant legal provisions. In this way, there would be no impunity, or collision of authority or discredit for anyone. There would be no illegal coercion by the civil authorities, for the ecclesiastical authorities or for the accused .16

According to the minister, in this case, there was a “denaturing of the functions of the elements included in the ‘glorious Armed Forces’ attributed to the exercise of police missions not within their remit”. In disagreeing with this stance, he stated that:

It is becoming necessary and urgent for the higher military authorities to act on the troops under their command in the sense of providing a suitable orientation for them, in order to ensure the cessation of the distortions of the military function which have been found to be multiplying in various regions, with serious inconveniences for the Armed Forces and for the Civil Power.17

In this statement by the Minister Bevilaqua, we may identify the thesis, which circulated among the military sectors, of the excessive “autonomy” of certain bodies linked to the more radical sectors, which intended to operate independently of the will of the President of the Republic and even of the current legislation. The third point of the document of the defense lawyer also questions the legality of the imprisonment and incommunicado detention:

What the unchallenged facts reveal is that the detainees were arrested by military patrol, arrested because they were distributing pamphlets. Which pamphlets? Were the soldiers who were members of the patrol in a position to judge the content, the text, to then immediately arrest the detainees? Where is the legal

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship

definition for “this crime”? A crime not defined by law is not a crime. Which military authority would have ordered their arrest on this occasion? What is the legal capacity for seizing the vehicle of the bishopric? What is the evidence or who witnessed the crime allegedly practiced by the detainees? How and why was this prison violent?18

Following the arguments in defense of the four young prisoners, the attorney Lino Machado Filho asks the question “Who are the detainees?”, to then evoke the individual trajectories of the accused. As a principal argument, he presents the Catholic faith of the young people as the principal ground for attesting to their innocence. The defense document alleges:

they are young people integrated into the local religious community, perhaps concerned with the world of today, even with misfortune; with the problems of yesterday, with their own future and that of this country, which they intend to serve and because they intend to serve, it is better and good that they study. ... These are young people endowed with a profound Christian feeling, since they sought an environment for their dialogues within the Catholic youth movements; for their discussions; for the relief of their own souls, for the theatre of their aspirations, for the communion of their tendencies, with others, with more and more numerous young people; with priests, tutors, educators. ... The detainees would not be and cannot be agitators, since these latter act on the masses or hide themselves under a cloak. They would not seek shelter in the Apostolic Church of Rome, which teaches, above all and first of all, that we are all brothers.19

In this way, the fact of being Catholic appears as an alibi and of being young is presented as a mixture of ingenuousness and eagerness for transformation, specific to use. Evoking a discourse based on nationalism and Catholic sentiment and hence in accordance with military doctrine, the defense builds its argument, after listing the unconstitutional grounds for this imprisonment. It then draws up a request for release:

The coercion which the detainees have been suffering, is manifestly illegal, since they were not caught in flagrante delicto, this flagrante delicto was not recorded in accordance with the law. They were not arrested by decision of a previously

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez

existing investigation. Since they have been imprisoned for more than three days and kept incommunicado, they are not subject to military authority, since the crime, if perpetrated, is not the competence of the Military Court. Requesting that the coercing authority be called on, in terms of the petition, with the requirements of an instrument of qualification of imprisonment for flagrante delicto crimes; of search and apprehension of the instrument determining the opening of the investigation, we request the granting of the order so that the detainees be released from incommunicado detention and from the trial .20

At the same time, in the report of the IPM brought against the four young men and in the suggestion of a IPM against the bishop D. Waldyr, arising from the action of the bishop in this case, the judges concluded as follows: that it was Carlos Rosa de Azevedo “who conceived and planned the printing and distribution of the pamphlets which were characteristically subversive, encouraging class struggle”; that Guy Thibault was aware of the content of the pamphlets and assisted Carlos with their dissemination, influencing Natanael and Jorge Gonzaga. These latter men were also guilty, on becoming aware of the content of the pamphlets, of agreeing to their dissemination. And referring to the local ecclesiastical authority, they issued a rebuke:

Since this was the attitude of Bishop Dom Waldyr Calheiros de Novaes, who arranged for the distribution of his interview through the manifesto, the printing of which he ordered, as has been seen ... certainly translated his intention of creating animosity between his Diocese ... and the Army, in particular the local Military Garrison, i.e., the 1st AIB.21

The four young men were then considered to be guilty of a crime against the National Security Law, demonstrating the power that the military body, located in the 1st AIB, had in the region and with the judiciary. The judgement of the young men of Judica highlighted the deterioration in relations between Church and State, already in the first years of establishment of the military regime. Beyond March 1968, highlighted as a catalyst of conflicts between Church and State, I intend to demonstrate a procedural trajectory, marked more by continuities than abrupt changes. With a decision unfavorable to the young people, they then had to appeal to the second instance, the 2nd Audit of the Air Force. In the new requests, written by Lino Machado Filho and dated 10 May and 30 September 1968, the reference to the legality of the imprisonment appears once again, since there was no “recording of any flagrante delicto”. The lawyer also questioned the fact

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship that the witnesses for the accusation were all soldiers of the 1st Armored Infantry Battalion of Barra Mansa, the same ones who arrested the young people and took them to the barracks on the morning of 5-6 November.22 As may be observed on the basis of the testimonies provided by the soldiers who testified against the young people in the proceedings, it may be perceived that they were subject to psychological coercion by Colonel Armênio, which may be demonstrated by the manner of inducing an answer in the form of a question, as in the following example: “Isn’t it true that you saw the accused throw this document out of the window of the minivan?”.23 At the same time, the principal witness for the defense, the Bishop D. Waldyr, was prevented from testifying in the proceedings, on the allegation that he was a friend of the defendants, above all of Guy Thibault. With the objective of validating the Bishop’s testimony, already collected in the IPM, and characterizing it as a legal testimony, the attorney drew up an argument on the basis of the idea of illegal coercion, anchored in the suitability of the ecclesiastical authority, and the guarantee to all citizens of the right of defense, based on paragraph 15, article 150 of the Federal Constitution. The reporting judge of the proceedings in this case, Ernesto Geisel, upheld the arguments of the defense lawyer, expressing “that there was no illegal con- straint on the testimony of the ecclesiastical authority”,24 but with the qualification that his testimony would be heard as a “compromised testimony”, in view of his “link with the case”. Despite the testimony of D. Waldyr, the deportation of the principal party indicted in the proceedings, Guy Thibault, of French nationality was unanimously decreed, despite the question of order raised by the lawyer Lino Machado Filho. We have here a demonstration of the deterioration in relations between the local bishop and the Armed Forces. The Regional Labor Delegate of Barra Mansa, Mr. Palmir Silva, was dismissed by the “hardline military”, at the request of Colonel Sá Campelo, since he had the headquarters of the body blessed by D. Waldyr Calheiros, as was stated in an article in the Jornal do Brasil of 22 March 1968. The case also involved international organizations, such as Amnesty International, and the local population in the sense of paying the fees of the contracted attorney through voluntary contributions, since they could not use the last tithe of the Diocese, since there was no consensus among the apostolate. Finally, on 6 November 1968, the judgement of the young men of Judica took place, resulting in a sentence of 8 months of imprisonment for the French

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez deacon, who was already in Toulouse (France), and for Carlos Rosa. The other two boys were acquitted. At the same time, after the release of the young men, there was a new judgement resulting in the imprisonment of Jorge Gonzaga (9 months) and Natanael José da Silva (10 months). Once again, the intervention of D. Waldyr would be necessary, who once again demonstrated the forced to negotiate with the military unit which received the young men. According to Jorge Gonzaga, D. Waldyr, beside the attorney Lino Machado Filho, had established an agreement that the young men would not be sent to the prison of Ilha Grande. Ultimately, they served their sentences at the Air Force Base of Galeão, being then sent to a depot of the Air Force in Rio de Janeiro (DARJ). Cases such as these would be even more frequent in the following years, involving imprisonment and even deaths.

Final considerations

This case of imprisonment of the members of Judica helps us to reflect on the advances of the repressive structure defended by the more authoritarian sectors of the Armed Forces and on the execution of these actions beyond the judicial regulations. Moreover, even before the clash of authorities, the principle of respect for the Catholic Church and its representatives is notable, which even the more radical military figures had to admit at that point. During the 1970s, the disagreements and clashes between Church and State became more frequent, even if everything indicates that they sought to resolve tense situations through negotiation and dialogue. In this sense, it is important to understand both the Armed Forces and the Catholic institution as spaces with multiple ideological colors and political stances, as the case presented here seeks to demonstrate. While certain Catholic sectors aligned with the military policies, providing them with full support in favor of restoring or preserving order, on the other hand, there was a network of clergy cited here, of which D. Waldyr is an example, which opposed the stances of persecution and repression which proliferated throughout the country, swelling the group of clergymen who directed the struggle for human rights. In addition, as historians, we must abandon the pretension of a logical and consistent narrative and deal with the contradiction of social, individual or collective actions audaciously and methodically. As Serbin demonstrates in his revealing analysis of the Bipartite Commission, established during the 1970s, in which an effort was made at an understanding between Church and

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship

State, Catholic figures recorded in the memory of the struggle against the military dictatorship, such as the influential layman Cândido Mendes or the progressive D. Paulo Evaristo Arns, kept up many dialogues with military sectors known to be responsible for the repressive structure installed within the country, such as the Army Chief of Staff, Antônio Carlos da Silva Muricy. This took place during the years highlighted as the “most severe” of the military regime. D. Waldyr Calheiros was evidently no exception to this rule. The Bishop of Volta Redonda, like D. Adriano Hipólito and many others, were included in the list of subversive Catholics against whom various threats were made, and even imprisonment and acts of torture, especially during the 1970s. These same players nevertheless never ceased acting through the approach of dialogue with the military forces, nor did they fail to submit on one or other occasion to the appeals and possibly orders of their peers or hierarchical superiors. In dealing with actions of ecclesiastical agents, we cannot lose sight of the structure which trained them, which prescribed a set of moral and political actions and standards for action which ultimately oriented the discourse and worldview of these clergymen. I have sought here to demonstrate the tools used to constitute the “deviant” attitude of the bishop D. Waldyr, i.e. to reconstruct on the basis of a small case the range of actions which these actors manipulated in the play of local forces, as well as the tools available and deployed by both authorities, religious and political, in the legal field, in a clear dispute for hegemony within society.

REFERENCES

BOURDIEU, Pierre. O poder simbólico. Rio de Janeiro: Bertrand Brasil, 1989. COITINHO, Angelica do Carmo. O Superior Tribunal Militar durante a ditadura brasileira: a atuação do Ministro General de Exército Rodrigo Otávio Jordão Ramos (1973-1979). In: ENCONTRO REGIONAL DA ANPUH-RIO, 14. Memória e Pa- trimônio. Anais... Rio de Janeiro, jul. 2010. DREIFUSS, René Armand. 1964: a conquista do Estado. Petrópolis, RJ: Vozes, 1981. GRAMSCI, Antonio. Os intelectuais e a organização da cultura. Rio de Janeiro: Civi- lização Brasileira, 1981. KONDER, Leandro. Marxismo e Cristianismo. Encontros com a civilização Brasileira, Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileiro, n.6, 1978. LEMOS, Renato. Justiça fardada: o general Peri Bevilaqua no Superior Tribunal Militar (1965-1969). Rio de Janeiro: Bom Texto, 2004.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 23 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez

MAINWARING, Scott. Igreja Católica e Política no Brasil-1916-1985. São Paulo: Bra- siliense, 1989. OLIVEIRA, Gustavo G. S. de. A globalização e a (des/re)articulação das identidades e práticas religiosas no cristianismo brasileiro. In: ENCONTRO ANUAL DA AN- POCS, 34. (ST 29: Religião e Globalização). Caxambu, MG, 2010. PEREIRA, Anthony. Ditadura e repressão. São Paulo: Paz e Terra, 2010. PORTELLI, Hugues. Gramsci e o Bloco Histórico. Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra, 1977. SEMERARO, Giovanni. A Primavera dos anos 60: a Geração Betinho. São Paulo: Loyo- la, 1994. SOUSA, Jessie Jane Vieira de. Círculos Operários: a Igreja Católica e o mundo do trabalho no Brasil. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRJ, 2002.

NOTES

1 This study received a grant from the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico [National Council for Scientific and Technological Development] (CNPq). 2 To cite the most notable actors: MAINWARING, 1989; KONDER, 1978; SEMERARO, 1994; e SOUSA, 2002. 3 These were the Juventude Agrária Católica (JAC), Juventude Estudantil Católica (JEC), Juventude Independente Católica (JIC), Juventude Operária Católica (JOC) and the Juven- tude Universitária Católica (JUC). 4 The Juventude Diocesana Católica [Catholic Diocesan Youth] was organised in 1966, under the orientation of father Barreto and with the support of Bishop D. Waldyr Calhei- ros, with the aim of bringing together various Catholic youth movements which were scattered throughout the neighbourhood of Volta Redonda, such as Juventude Operária Cató- lica (JOC), Associação Católica Juvenil (ACAJ), Comunidade de Jovens Cristãos (CJC), GFJ, FJEC and RJC, etc. 5 In a testimony to the Comissão Municipal da Verdade [Municipal Truth Committee] of Volta Redonda, Carlos Rosa stated that this pamphlet was previously written and reproduced by him on a mimeograph machine in a church in Barra Mansa and also revealed that this was not the first pamphlet with a tone critical of the dictatorship distributed by him in the city. On previous occasions, he and a group of young Catholics had distributed similar pamphlets at the gate of CSN, when the nightshift workers left. These were very rapid actions, aiming to circumvent the repression. 6 Judica Pamphlet. Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 5 Nov. 1967, Doc001. 7 It is interesting to think of the list of materials seized from their rooms and to perceive the type of reading of these young religious people at the time: > Documents seized from the room of Carlos Rosa de Azevedo – 11 Nov. 1967: Books: Cuba, estopim do mundo [Cuba, the world’s fuse], by Athos Vieira de Andrade; Além das torres

24 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Church-State relations in a working-class town during the military dictatorship do Kremlin [Beyond the towers of the Kremlin], by Flávio Costa; Síntese de doutrina social [Synthesis of Social Doctrine] by Gabriel Galache; Uma escola social [A social school], by D. Aranzadi and C. Giner; Iniciação ao comunismo [Introduction to communism], de George Cronin; Cadernos Brasileiros [Brazilian notebooks], No. 42; Estatutos do Círculo de Estudo e Orientação da Juventude Friburguense [Statutes of the Circle of Study and Orien- tation of the Youth of Friburgo]; 8 notebooks; 7 handouts; 5 pamphlets; 3 cuttings from newspapers and magazines; 14 loose notebook sheets. > Documents seized from Guy Michel Camille Thibault: Books: A Revolução Brasileira [The Brazilian revolution], by Caio Prado Jr.; Apostila da Juventude Diocesana Católica [Han- dout of Catholic Diocesan Youth] (Judica); Relação de movimentos filiados à Judica [Re- port on movements affiliated with Judica]. This report helps us to perceive, firstly, a concern with the sociopolitical reality of the country and an approximation to left-wing thinking and the revolutionary experiences of the Soviet Union and Cuba. In this way, it is interesting to perceive the very trajectory of the construction of this progressive thought incubated during these years within the Church. 8 Testimony by Carlos Rosa, collected by the Comissão Municipal da Verdade de Volta Redonda, 30 April 2014. 9 Testimony by Jorge Gonzaga collected by the Comissão Municipal da Verdade de Volta Redonda, 24 March 2014. 10 Declaration by Dom Waldyr Calheiros to the press – “Os sete pecados capitais” [The seven deadly sins]. Volta Redonda, Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 14 Nov. 1967, Doc006-008. 11 Letter from Dom Waldyr to Col. Armênio Pereira. Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 14 Nov. 1967, Doc005. 12 Letter from Dom Waldyr Calheiros to Frei Marcos. Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 18 Nov. 1967, Doc022. 13 Letter from Dom José Castro Pinto to Dom Waldyr Calheiros. Volta Redonda, Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 21 Nov. 1967, Doc028. 14 Request for Habeas Corpus of the attorney Lino Machado Filho. Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 16 Nov. 1967, Docs. 012 a 019. 15 Idem. Doc013. 16 Declaration of the vote by Min. Gen. Ex. Pery Constant Bevilaqua in Habeas Corpus No. 29.141. Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, Doc. 032. 17 Idem. Doc033. 18 Idem. Doc016. 19 Request for Habeas Corpus by the attorney Lino Machado Filho. Volta Redonda, Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 16 Nov. 1967, Doc015.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 25 Alejandra Luisa Magalhães Estevez

20 Idem. Doc017. 21 Suggested IPM against Dom Waldyr Calheiros. Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 5 dez. 1967, Doc043. 22 The minivan was intercepted and detained by the Second Army Sergeant, José de Olivei- ra Sampaio (Commander of the patrol), by the soldier Argeu Alves da Costa (driver) and by the soldier Alécio Ribeiro Neves (chauffeur). 23 Request for Habeas Corpus by Lino Machado Filho. Archive of the Diocesan Curia of Volta Redonda, 30 Sep. 1968, Doc081. 24 Article “D. Valdir pode depor” [D. Valdir may testify], Última Hora, 30 May 1968.

Article received on March 30, 2012. Approved on December 12, 2014.

26 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security: the case of sugar and the struggle of workers for better living conditions1 Uma greve que pôs em risco a segurança nacional: o caso do açúcar e a luta dos trabalhadores por melhores condições de vida

Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro*

Resumo Abstract Com base no estudo da “Greve do Açú- This study focuses on the “Sugar Strike” car”, ocorrida em março de 1964, às vés- of March 1964, which occurred on the peras do movimento civil-militar que eve of the civil-military movement that destituiu o presidente João Goulart, o deposed the Brazilian president João artigo busca identificar as reivindica- Goulart. The article aims to identify the ções dos grevistas e analisar suas princi- grievances of the strikers and to analyze pais formas de ação política em prol the main forms of political action used in dessas demandas. A greve foi organiza- support of these demands. The strike was da no interior do estado do Rio de Ja- organized within the state of Rio de Ja- neiro por um sindicato de trabalhadores neiro by a union of textile workers after a têxteis, após a denúncia de que arma- denunciation that warehouses in the zéns da vila operária estavam estocando workers’ village were stockpiling sugar o produto em benefício de alguns con- for the benefit of some “wealthier” cus- sumidores “ilustres” e recusando a ven- tomers and refusing to sell the product to da aos tecelões. Outros sindicatos decla- raram greve de solidariedade, e a greve weavers. Other unions took industrial serviu de argumento para se enquadrar action in solidarity and the strike served o presidente do sindicato na Lei de Se- as a pretext to charge the union president gurança Nacional, após os militares to- under the National Security Act after the marem o poder. Ancorados no conceito military took power. Based on the con- de economia moral, buscaremos com- cept of moral economy, this paper will preender o quanto as questões cotidia- try to understand how everyday issues nas influenciaram na adesão dos traba- influenced the adherence of workers to lhadores às mobilizações populares. popular mobilizations. Palavras-chave: greve; trabalhadores Keywords: strike; textile workers; moral têxteis; economia moral. economy.

* Doutorando em História, Política e Bens Culturais, Centro de Pesquisa e Documentação de História Contemporânea do Brasil, Fundação Getulio Vargas (CPDOC/FGV). Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. felipe_ [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69011 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

It is five o’clock in the morning of Thursday, 26 March 1964 and a young weaver wakes up to another day of work at the factory. She gets up quickly so as to get to work on time; she has only been in the job for a few months, which she got after numerous requests from family members who already worked in the company. There was great competition for the job, but because she was the daughter of weavers and she lived in a house within the workers’ village she was successful. Before leaving home for another day of toil, the weaver has her breakfast. However, there is a problem; the lack of sugar in the workers’ house due to supply problems and the consequently high price of the product in the local market. As a solution, the weaver (like many of her neighbors) uses a technique that was very common in periods of shortage during World War II – her morning drink is prepared with sugarcane juice instead of water. Thus, the coffee has a slightly sweetened flavor and it is usually accompanied by some day-old bread smeared with butter. Arriving at the textile factory – always about fifteen minutes before the start of work because she is responsible for switching on the machines in her sector – the young weaver is surprised by the large number of workers outside the entrance to the factory, forming a picket. The union had decreed a strike and the order is no one is to touch the machines. She is soon approached by an older worker, a union leader, who informs her that she is to enter the factory and to go to her sector, but that she is to remain motionless beside the machin- ery until she receives further instructions. The weaver is very disturbed, fearful of being noticed by the manager, who had arranged this job for her at the request of her family, and scared of being accused of being a “traitor” or “scab” by her fellow workers. With every strange movement near the machines, the union leader who oversees the maintenance sector frowns, with a disapproving look, and pounds his fist into the palm of the other hand, in order to dissuade any workers who are trying to return to work. As another worker later recalled, “anyone who did not strike was in for it!”2 Later, everyone would know the reason for the strike; the misappropria- tion of sugar by a local merchant. However, contrary to all expectations, this apparently unassuming episode took on an extremely unexpected significance, or as is often said in Brazil “deu pano pra manga”.3

I remember well that there was a time when there was a lack of rice, beans, sugar. I don’t know if there was a real shortage or whether people were hiding these things to sell for higher prices. Someone was in the warehouse ... and they wanted

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

to only pay the legitimate price ... Then a big mess started ... It finished with everyone going to the police station at Magé.4

The “Sugar Strike” is often mentioned in interviews with workers but it has not always been analyzed with academic rigor. For example, the recollec- tions of the young weaver described above came to light through an informal “off-limits” conversation with the author, which most likely would not have been possible in a recorded interview because, for many workers, there is still a taboo about publicly talking about their memories related to the civil-military movement of 1964. In the city of Magé, which is situated in the state of Rio de Janeiro and is the geographical area of study of this article, police raids on unions, indiscriminate arrests of workers, and the sharp repression that has been in force since that time has meant that these memories have remained submerged5 for many years. Numerous military police investigations (inquéritos policiais militares, IPM) were opened by the Military Police in Brazil from April 1964 onwards in order to frame “communists and subversives” by using the National Security Law (LSN). The “Sugar Strike” was used in this manner by the authorities in Magé, who argued that union leaders had urged the textile workers to promote an attack against the public prosecutor of the city when he visited the scene of the conflict. This particular IPM was forwarded in 1965 to the Superior Military Court (Superior Tribunal Militar), as indicated by the Second Institutional Act (Ato Institucional 2) and was included as number BNM 211in the list of legal cases compiled by the “Brazil: Never Again” project (Projeto Brasil Nunca Mais).6 This article is based on the concept of moral economy7 and aims to identify the main demands presented by these strikers, to analyze their main forms of political action, and to understand how the most everyday issues outside the workplace environment influenced the workers in their decision-making. Therefore, our approach will not concentrate on the struggles for better wages and labor rights, but mainly the issues of everyday life of these workers, who also lived in the city.8 Among these everyday issues were the lack of food supply in the city; the constant oscillation of inflation and its impact on prices and the budget of working families; problems connected with public transport in the city; the lack of housing for workers and the high price of rents; and the occurrence of outbreaks of disease in the region. In short, all these elements characterized the structural framework of insecurity experienced by workers during the period.9

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

Consequently, this article will use as its main sources the legal proceedings brought against the textile workers of Magé by the STM, police documents, the annals of the city council, the records of popular demands and reports in major newspapers, as well as the records of the views of workers concerning these issues.

Against shortages and in favor of better living conditions

Ever since the first strikes that were recorded in the city of Magé, the theme of shortages was evident. In the “Cloth Strike”, which occurred in 1918 and is still celebrated in the memories of local workers, one of the main targets of the striking workers was the warehouse of a trader known as Emygdio Fernandes. One of his descendants even published a memoir in the 1960s, which mentioned the incident:

They uttered the greatest infamies against Crespi, Matarazzo and other capital- ists, and inflamed the workers against the local traders, mistaking them for large trusts and consortia ... The name of Emygdio Fernandes topped the list of the agitators and he was the first to have his business looted and his home blown up ... At dusk, hundreds of people armed with rifles, machetes and anything they could lay their hands on stood before his store and screamed: “Die, Emygdio Fernandes” and the mob responded: “Die!”...10

The rise of communist agitation during World War II resulted in workers in Magé intensifying their protests against shortages. The stance taken by the Communist Party of Brazil (PCB) in coordination with the Magé weavers was notable because the PCB did not disregard the previous experiences of industrial unrest in the city, but legitimized them as part of the learning process of these workers. In this context, the “Cloth Strike” undoubtedly figured as an icon of these past struggles. Also during this post-war period, the local textile industries began to increase their social policies, using the pattern of the “working factory-village” (Lopes, 1988). One of the actions taken by the management of the companies was the creation of cooperatives, which provided for the sale of foodstuffs to the workers, offered them credit and deducted it from workers’ salaries. Although the intention was to provide necessities at affordable prices, many workers did not view the cooperatives in a favorable light.

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

The cooperative sold everything, but I never bought there because we would have just ended up in debt. The things they sold were a bit expensive. I saw people who when they got paid received nothing because it all went to pay the bill of the cooperative.11 My father used to do the shopping, which wouldn’t last for the whole month. You couldn’t buy more because they held your pay ... This was the struggle of the workers; they earned little and were held hostage by the cooperative. The pay check was already empty when it arrived.12

Aware of the dissatisfaction of the workers, especially regarding the issue of access to foodstuffs, the PCB used an important tactic to establish direct contact with the workers; the newspaper Tribuna Popular, which repeatedly published reports on the situation of the weavers in the city. Founded on May 22, 1945 by the PCB, this newspaper served as an important source of industrial agitation and also spread the ideas of the PCB. For example, at the inauguration of the PCB headquarters in Santo Aleixo in 1945 the newspaper highlighted the role of local party leaders in dealing with the problems experienced by workers, such as the lack of milk (which prejudiced the fight against infant mortality and children’s diseases); the limited number of schools; the absence of a cafeteria in the textile factories, which forced many workers to feed themselves “sitting on the sidewalk”; poor electri- cal and sanitary facilities; and the need to construct bridges in the district.13 It is noteworthy that the PCB had an intense profile in the city between the 1940s and 1960s and had several representatives elected to the Magé city council, although this became more difficult after the banning of the party in 1947. Most of these councilors were textile workers.14 Even when they had to operate in a clandestine manner, local communists organized a series of campaigns and associations in order to mobilize workers around the party. One of them, the Women’s League of Santo Aleixo, which was founded in 1946, was directed at working women or the wives of workers. Among other things, the Tribuna Popular highlighted the struggle for more bread, milk and meat, and argued against the extortionate prices of basic foodstuffs; “against queues, the black market, hunger and shortages”.15 The communist councilors who were elected in 1947, and banned the following year, proposed the free distribution of vacant land and the organization of food markets to reduce the prices of foodstuffs.16 They even organized polling stations near the workers’ villages in order to establish direct contact between councilors and the population. At the opening of one these stations,

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro councilors highlighted the issue of the high cost of foodstuffs in relation to the wages of workers in the textile factories mills of Magé, where “salaries for a fortnight ... are not even sufficient for a week”.17 TheTribuna Popular was closed down at the end of the 1940s. The editors of the defunct newspaper subsequently tried to revive it under the name of the Imprensa Popular; it remained the main organ for divulging the ideas of the PCB and also published several articles about the labor movement in Magé. The cooperative attached to the textile factories and the recently-elected mayor soon found themselves targets of the communists. In 1951 the Imprensa Popular reported that the management of the factory in Santo Aleixo had given the building that had been intended for the use of the cooperative to Mayor Waldemar Lima Teixeira, who was a member of the Social Democratic Party (Partido Social Democrático, PSD). He was also a trader and, according to the Imprensa Popular, he wanted to “get rich overnight”. The newspaper added, “he does harm to workers, stealing in both the weight and price of goods”.18 Two days later, the Imprensa Popular published another complaint about this cooperative, complaining about the lack of milk. The newspaper reported that without milk, “there is no point in the company’s nursery because the weavers cannot feed their children in their breaks from work”.19 In another textile factory, located in the city center, the workers went on strike demanding back pay, and the company’s management decided to close its supply warehouse, known as a cooperative, “in an attempt to break the spirit of struggle of the workers through hunger”.20 It is interesting to note that many of the workers’ demands were published in PCB newspapers, but they were also brought to the city council by PCB representatives. On one occasion, the communist councilor José Aquino de Santana protested against the attitude of the police, who had “mistreated people engaged in gathering signatures”. This concerned a petition for the return of a bread and milk wagon in Santo Aleixo. However, Councilor Aníbal Magalhães supported the police stance “because the two women [who were collecting signatures] are unfortunately under suspicion, one of whom is the wife of a blacklisted communist”.21 This matter was raised in a letter published in the Imprensa Popular, in which a worker complained that a trader in Petrópolis, who had been providing bread and milk to the population at affordable prices, had been prevented from doing so by the city council through the imposition of fines and demands for tax payments. According to the newspaper, one of the largest producers of milk in the city was the uncle of the mayor and therefore the municipal

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security government had used tax demands to put the trader in Petrópolis out of business. In response, the Women’s League of Santo Aleixo waged a vigorous campaign for the return of the trader, and organized a petition signed by workers. During the campaign, police assaulted two women who were collecting signatures.22 TheImprensa Popular also criticized the Pau Grande factory and its “cooperative just for show”, with prices that were “incredibly, higher than in Rio [de Janeiro]”. 23 The newspaper also criticized the Andorinhas factory, particularly the firm’s doctor José Borrajo, who, during a Children’s Festival spoke about the problem of a healthy diet for children and recommended that all children should eat fruit, cheese, milk, eggs and meat. In the opinion of the Imprensa Popular this statement was “demagogy, instead of measures against food shortages”, a position which was reinforced by the testimony of a worker who said that she had fed her son before the party, with a “dish just of beans” because the cost of living was so high and wages were so low.24 In the following elections in 1954 a communist councillor, Manoel Ferreira de Lima, was elected and he devoted himself to combating the high cost of foodstuffs, even suggesting the installation of social security food stations in the municipality, especially in working class neighborhoods. He also asked the city government to assess the balances of trade and criticized the performance of the Price Commission, which was “allowing a real debacle to occur regarding the prices of basic foodstuffs”.25 Since the creation of the Federal Commission on Supplies and Prices (Comissão Federal de Abastecimentos e Preços, Cofap) in 1951, demands for better living conditions, especially in relation to food, acquired greater force throughout the country. Indeed, the government’s decision to create such a commission was an attempt to solve the serious problems related to the cost of living, which had been growing since the end of World War II.26 The Cofap was directly subordinate to the then Ministry of Labor, Industry and Commerce and was composed of government representatives (mainly ministries), as well as representatives of the media, industry and workers. Auxiliary bodies of Cofap were established at state level in the form of the Commissions on Supply and Prices (Comissões de Abastecimento e Preços, Coap) and at the municipal level the Municipal Commissions on Supply and Prices (Comissões Municipais de Abastecimento e Preços, Comap).27 Recent studies have shown the strong attempts by labor unions to control the Cofap and Coaps, even proposing tables of indices of “fair prices” for basic items of necessity (Pereira Neto, 2006, p.201-202). In an attempt to question

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro the indices announced by the government, unions in São Paulo founded the Inter-Union Department of Statistics and Socioeconomic Studies (Departamento Intersindical de Estatísticas e Estudos Socioeconômicos, Dieese) in 1955. This organization also performed studies about the economic problems faced by working families and included collaborations with university students. These surveys largely served to substantiate the claims of the working class (Corrêa, 2011, p.96). Within this wider context, the communists managed to win the elections in the textile trade unions in the city of Magé and organize an association of farm workers (later transformed into a union). Simultaneously, textile workers directly linked to these new directors also elected councilors in the 1958 and 1962 elections, showing the influence of the PCB in the city, which lasted until 1964.28 The terms of office of Councilors Astério dos Santos (president of the textile union of Santo Aleixo) and Darcy Câmara (a central character in a strike at the Pau Grande factory) were characterized by intense and victorious struggles to protect workers’ rights. In the Magé council chamber, the question of food supplies for workers was championed by the aforementioned duo of communist councilors with the decisive support of councillors from other parties. In 1959, in his very first year in office, Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra of the Social Progressive Party (Partido Social Progressista, PSP) presented a bill to grant aid to the value of 200,000 cruzeiros in foodstuffs for factory workers in Santo Aleixo who were on strike. The communist councilor Darcy Câmara even included an amendment increasing the value of this aid 320,000 cruzeiros in order that each worker should receive at least 1,000 cruzeiros in basic foodstuffs, considering that there were 320 workers at the factory. However, the amendment did not receive the support of the majority of councilors and the initial proposal was approved. During a meeting in the council chamber, Councilor Astério dos Santos received as much criticism as he received support from his fellow councillors.

On behalf of the workers, Councilor Astério dos Santos expressed his thanks for the approval of the project. Councilors Paulo Leitão Junior and Mário Fernandes Maia suggested a committee of councilors to be appointed by the President because they thought that the presidency of the union was at odds with the management of the factory. Councilor Paulo Leitão Junior said that he had heard from a worker that the management of the factory was at odds with the president

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

of the union and that it was for the union to look after the interests of workers. Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra stated that there really was a struggle between the union and the company. Councilor Mário Fernandes Maia suggested a committee of councilors to make arrangements with the factory, alerting everyone that there was a campaign against Communism and that many people were trying to take advantage of opportunities to make workers make sacrifices. Councilor Mário Fernandes Maia stated that he was not a communist, but that his wife would continue to be on strike in solidarity with the other workers. Councilor Emigdio Dutra de Farias said that what was happening would happen for any union president...29

The impasse that existed between the management of the Santo Aleixo factory and the workers deteriorated to such an extent that the city council called a special meeting just to deal with this issue. Once again, Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra took the floor to present applications to various authorities, including the President and Vice President of the Republic, Congress, the Minister of Labor, the State Governor, the Rio de Janeiro State Legislative Assembly (Alerj), the regional delegate of the Ministry of Labor, the Federation of the Trade Unions of Textile Workers, the State Secretary for Public Security, the Municipal Delegate and the O Fluminense newspaper. He spoke about the conflicts that were occurring in Santo Aleixo between the Bezerra de Mello Company (the owner of the factory) and the workers of the weaving section, as well as denouncing “the antisocial measures that this firm has been adopting and blamed it for any abnormalities that might eventually come to pass”.30 Although this issue was resolved, with the weavers returning to work and the factory committing to better assist its workers, confrontations between the communist councilors and the factory owners and the mayor continued. From time to time these clashes became explicit in the council chamber and sometimes they included contributions from Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra, who changed political parties in early 1960, leaving the PSP to join the Brazilian Labor Party (Partido Trabalhista Brasileiro, PTB):

Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra informed the House of the persecution by the Mayor, who had judicially ordered Mrs. Luiza Reis, the owner of the Luiza guesthouse, to pay her debt to this municipality ... He received an aside from Councilor Mário Fernandes Maia, who advised him that the mayor was only following the advice of Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra, who had requested

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

that all debts owed to the city should be honored. Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra responded that that there had been much protectionism in favor of the powerful. Councilor Astério dos Santos informed the House that he had been in the office of Bezerra de Mello in Santo Aleixo when a municipal tax officer entered and that there had been amicable discussions between the two regarding the payment of tax owed by the factory to the city. Councilor Domingos José Dias Guerra intervened to state that this proved once again that the city council was not acting impartially and was only chasing poor debtors. Meanwhile, Councilor Mário Fernandes Maia came to the defense of the Mayor. As matters were coming to a head, the President warned the three councilors repeatedly in the gallery, but to no avail. At this point, because of the heat of the discussion, the session was suspended indefinitely...31

In fact, not all of these confrontations had the desired effect, but that did not stop the speeches of the communist councilors finding an audience outside the council chamber. This observation is echoed by other academic studies that have researched other regions of Brazil, and which have reached similar conclusions.

Analyzing the performances of the workers’ representatives in the local parliament, whether communist or socialist, we can notice the presence of many of the issues that characterize working class experiences and the construction of their citizenship during the period. In many instances these debates went beyond the specific duties of the city council and they turned into a much broader ideological political debate. However, there was a simultaneous effort to define a form of legislative intervention that was capable of ensuring the rights of workers within the framework of urban issues (living conditions, transport, culture and leisure, etc.). (Fortes, 2004, p.441)

Strengthened by moral views about the dignity of workers, justice and the liberation of the working class, as well as the difficulties experienced by workers (as evidenced in the speeches in the council chamber concerning “protectionism in favor of the powerful” and “only chasing poor debtors”), and above all by the support of the majority of workers to their proposals, the communist councilors joined forces with the PTB in an attempt to end the hegemony of the PSD in the local council, which had been in power since the first post-Es- tado Novo municipal election in 1947. Meanwhile, the support of the Ultima Hora newspaper, which was linked with the PTB, was crucial. Several articles were published regarding the

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security activities of the Magé unions and their elected representatives in the city council. Initially, they were published in the section entitled “Labor Column”, which was written by the journalist and union activist Jairo Mendes. Subsequently, these types of articles were published in the “UH in the Municipalities” column, which was written by Waldir Cardoso, who was based in Magé. Regarding the cost of living, in 1961 Ultima Hora covered two matters raised by Astério dos Santos in the city council: one questioned the high prices of rents, especially those charged by factories in the workers’ villages;32 and the other was against extortionate food prices, suggesting the restructuring of Comap to improve the fiscal control of greedy traders.33 The O Globo newspaper also published a denunciation made by Astério dos Santos in the council chamber, regarding the fact that local SAPS office had been “appropriating merchandise for a long time and selling it to local traders”.34 Another initiative that resulted in intense popular mobilization was the preparation of a petition containing 464 names calling for a 50% reduction in bus fares on some municipal lines. It was subsequently argued that a new bus company should operate in the city because the population was dissatisfied with the service provided by the current operator.35 The issue of the right to strike was also discussed several times by Councilors Astério dos Santos and Darcy Câmara. They protested against the arrest of union leaders, supported strike movements undertaken by other groups of workers, and criticized all those who acted against the interests of the working class. For example, in 1961, when it was proposed to grant the title of “Citizen of Magé” to Georgino Ferreira Mosque, the communists were the only councilors to vote against this proposal, arguing that they would not honor somebody who “beat up workers when he was sub-deputy in the Second Police District.” 36 The duo’s political stance provoked much reaction from opposing councilors in the council chamber.

It was difficult for councilors ... to contain their radical, systematic and vehement pronouncements, dictated by their party leaders. I remember well that the President had to ring the bell many times in order to calm tempers and bring order to several debates, many of which were initiated by the duo of Astério and Darcy; the “Left Wing” of the Magé council chamber.37

Councilor Pedro Botelho reproached Councilor Astério dos Santos for his attitude, claiming that instead of dealing with issues related to the city, which would

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

really benefit the community of Magé, he had systematically filed motions to the President of the Republic, the Vice-President of the Republic, federal deputies and senators, appealing to them to urgently address the issue of right to take strike action and other matters, which do not have anything to do with the city, or bring it any benefit ...38

Sugar and the fight against the “exploiters of the people”

The irregular distribution of sugar in the Saps office resulted in violence. The deputy chief of the office, Américo Thomás, attacked Joaquim dos Santos in the street, days after the latter had complaining in front of a committee about the disorganized manner in which sugar was being sold. Eight hundred kilos of sugar had arrived at the Saps office to be sold to the public. Because the sale was being made in a disorderly manner without any quota limits for buyers, a commission approached Américo Thomás, who refused to meet their requests, claiming that he had been authorized to sell any amount of sugar. Meanwhile, the deputy police chief, Jair Arruda, arrived and forced the Saps office to sell sugar in a more rational manner. In the police district to which he was taken, Américo Thomás received protection from officers after intervention on his behalf by Councilor Waldemar Lima Teixeira, who arranged for him to be released.39 In an article entitled “Magé: sugar distribution leads to violence”, Última Hora reported on this episode, which became a sort of test for the “Sugar Strike”. Coincidentally, the article was published on March 25, 1964; in the afternoon of the same day the strike movement began that would end up with a case lodged in the Superior Military Court. Considering the characters mentioned in this newspaper article, as well as the ongoing political situation in Brazil (the military took power on March 31, 1964) it is understandable how the issue of food shortages became acute. In 1961, under the administration of President Jânio Quadros, a plan was established to liquidate Cofap. However, when Quadros resigned and his vice- president João Goulart took over it was decided to create a new organization dedicated to addressing the high cost of living in Brazil, and in 1962 the National Supervision of Supply (Superintendência Nacional de Abastecimento, Sunab) was formed. Henceforth, the Brazilian government began to supervise traders in a more rigorous fashion. The following year, the Popular Economy Defense Commission (Comissariado de Defesa da Economia Popular, Codep) was also created, which had specific responsibility to supervise food prices.

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

With inflation rising, and a looming supply crisis in the country, Sunab sought to mitigate the impact of these problems, especially among poorer workers. For example, in 1963 Sunab developed campaigns for the sale of basic foodstuffs directly to consumers, thus avoiding intermediaries (who were considered to be mainly responsible for price increases). This was the case of “Operation Rice”, which occurred in Niterói, then capital of the state of Rio de Janeiro, where more than thirty tons of rice were sold to the population at lower prices. This operation was supported by the military because of the large numbers of people who gathered in the area.40 However, it was sugar that generated the biggest problems for Sunab during this period. From the end of 1963, newspapers reported studies that had been conducted in relation to basic foodstuffs, which indicated sugar shortages of about 50%, and Sunab was severely criticized “for considering that sugar shortages were normal”.41 Perhaps in response to these criticisms, in February 1964 Sunab distributed about 72 tons of sugar that had been withheld in the city of Campos dos Goytacazes (Rio de Janeiro state), which was one of the largest producers of cane sugar in the country at the time.42 To complicate the situation of sugar shortages even further, about 4,000 workers in the sugar refining industry in the state of Rio de Janeiro began a general strike that month; they demanded salary increases and a bonus, precisely because of the high cost of living. In addition, more than 20,000 workers in the fields and factories of Campos dos Goytacazes, Macaé and Resende supported the strike of the refinery staff.43 Consequently, Sunab had to authorize an increase in the price of sugar, which increased to 140 cruzeiros per kilo in São Paulo, Niterói, Nova Iguaçu, Duque de Caxias, Rio de Janeiro and Nilópolis (then in the state of Guanabara). In Brasília, the price of sugar rose to 155 cruzeiros per kilo, a record for price increases at the time, according to newspapers. 44 In the light of these price increases, it was decided to implement a plan to distribute sugar among the regions of the country in order to avoid shortages and civil unrest from a population that criticized the sugar trade for its “extreme greed”.45 Meanwhile, the Brazilian government, through the auspices of the Ministry of Justice, began to use part of the immigrant hostels on the Ilha das Flores with a view to installing a prison for those who were misappropriating merchandise and hiking up prices.46 Popularly known as “sharks” and “exploiters of the people”, traders who were convicted under the so-called “Popular Economy Law” 47 were arrested

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro and transferred to the Ilha das Flores, while those of foreign origin who were similarly convicted were liable for deportation. In order to ensure the security of the island, which was being used as a prison, a police headquarters was set up, which was linked to the Federal Department of Public Safety, an organ of the Ministry of Justice.48 The garrison of that headquarters consisted of officers who, after the transfer of the capital of Brazil from Rio de Janeiro to the new capital Brasília, opted for federal public service, the so-called “opting police”.49 The Correio da Manhã newspaper reported that the police force on the island comprised ten lieutenants, one warrant officer, 18 sergeants and 188 non-commissioned officers and soldiers, all “opting” from the military police of Guanabara. The article also pointed out that among those detained on the Ilha das Flores, were three traders who were newly arrived immigrants to Brazil.50 It is worth noting that these measures taken by the Brazilian government were widely reported in the press and were issues that the public were concerned about. During a rally organized in support of grassroots reform, held in front of the Central do Brasil railway station in Rio de Janeiro, on March 13, 1964, there were several banners and posters in the crowd with slogans such as: “We want jail for the exploiters of the people”, “Out with the sharks” and “Jango, Ilha das Flores is a paradise. Send the sharks to Ilha Grande”.51 In the newspapers, many columnists wrote opinion pieces or humorous notes about the campaign headed by the Justice Minister Abelardo Jurema, against the price speculators. For example, the “Snapshots (Flagrantes)” column written in the Correio da Manhã by “J., J. & J” (a pseudonym attributed to the journalist José Álvaro), contained two comments on the subject. In one of them, entitled “Offending Infratora( )” the columnist addressed the unhap- piness of a citizen with the “greed of a copacabanense butterfly” (probably a greedy trader) who threatened to report him to the “commandos” of the Ministry of Justice: “Either you conform or you will end up in the Ilha das Flores”.52 In the other comment, entitled “Squeeze (Aperto)”, the columnist was sarcastic:

Militia from the Ministry of Justice, after questioning a misfortunate Portuguese about his pastries and empadinhas, wanted to send him off for a summer on the Ilha das Flores, because the pastries had too much air in them and the empadinhas not enough olives. Only after much begging and promising did the pas- try negotiator managed to escape from the fierce group... 53

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

In the Ultima Hora newspaper, the famous columnist Stanislaw Ponte Preta (a pseudonym of the writer Sergio Porto) also published an article that addressed the issue of price controls. Entitled “Snitching is the best way to return to Portugal,” the author described the dilemma of Manuel 1, a Portuguese who was sad because he did not have enough money to return to his homeland. Seeing his friend so sad, Manuel 2 sought to help him. “Yes! Two Manuels” wrote Ponte Preta, “the other was not Joaquim, as so often happens in Portuguese stories that only have one Manuel”. So Manuel 2, who owns a warehouse, made an “unrefusable” offer to the depressed Manuel 1:

You can work for a few days in my store! ... You stay there and sell onions at a much higher price than the official one, OK? ... I’ll call Codep and I’ll tell Mr. Jurema that you have been cheating on prices ... So Manuel 2 called Codep and made the complaint. The agents went there, arrested Manuel 1 and took him to the Ilha das Flores, from where he was deported and he is now happy and back in Lisbon. 54

In Magé, the impact of all these measures against food shortages was also intense, and it was emphasized by several workers’ leaders. Workers arrived from all over the country for a big rally outside the Central do Brasil railway station in Rio de Janeiro. Ten buses and two special trains left from the cities of Duque de Caxias and Magé, carrying urban and rural workers in support of the movement for grassroots reform.55 The communist councilors Astério dos Santos and Darcy Câmara also attended the event. Five days after the rally, at a meeting in the council chamber in Magé, Councilor David Pinto d’Almeida of the PTB submitted a request, to be sent on an emergency basis to the presidency of Sunab, protesting at the lack of basic necessities in the city: the request was unanimously approved.56 In the same week, the Federation of Trade Unions of Textile Workers of the State of Rio de Janeiro, of which Astério dos Santos was a director, started a widespread campaign in support of an emergency allowance (an adjustment in salary until the end of the union agreements that were then in force) for about 30,000 textile workers in the state of Rio de Janeiro. The campaign was justified by the Federation because of the high cost of living in several municipalities, which had been calculated towards the end of the previous year. Among these municipalities, Magé had suffered an increase of about 70.73%.57 Shortly afterwards, Councilor Astério dos Santos also filed an application for consideration by the plenary of the city council, which was to be sent

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro directly to the President of the Republic, demanding measures to prevent ir- regularities in the delivery of foodstuffs; this was also approved. 58 It is noteworthy that the latter application was filed on the same day as the assault case at the Saps office, which was triggered by allegations about methods of distribution of sugar. The person who was assaulted, Joaquim dos Santos, was Astério dos Santos’s brother and the deputy chief of the post was “protected” by Councilor Waldemar Lima Teixeira. The following day, March 25, these two political leaders were again involved in a conflict – the so-called “Sugar Strike”. A demonstration was called after a military police officer, Gilberto Lopes da Silva, discovered that a local trader named “Aristides” (Waldemar Lima Teixeira’s brother-in-law) was withholding sugar from poorer customers, which amounted to a crime against the popular economy. Instead of taking him to the police station, the police officer forced the trader to sell sugar without restrictions. On 26 March, the union declared a strike and a group of workers gathered in front of the property to protest. Police reinforcements were sent, and even the public prosecutor went to the scene in a vehicle that was stoned by protesters. Finally, some workers and the president of the union were detained and subsequently released. A rumor arose that Astério dos Santos had been arrested and was being held at the police station; the other textile factories in the city, and part of the rail of the Leopoldina Railway declared a solidarity strike. 59 Once the strike was over, tempers apparently calmed and workers returned to work in their factories as usual. However, the civil-military movement that ousted President João Goulart on April 1, 1964 had overwhelming consequences in Magé, resulting in the invasion of the union headquarters by the police and the persecution of many workers, even within factories. Many workers, and also residents, were arrested and/or taken to Magé police station for questioning in investigations that related to “acts of subversion”; all were considered to be communists many of them incorrectly.60

In [19]64, it was crazy there, you know? Communist business, right ... They invented communist business! Those were some very sad days ... Many household- ers were picked up unnecessarily. People would say: “Oh, so and so is a communist!” The guy was working, he went to work, and the police went there ... they got him! They began hitting him right there ... There were many complaints ... They caught many, many people, who they said were communists. Many who they caught were innocent. Even today, if you call someone a communist, in truth we

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

don’t even know what a communist is ... They talked like that as a way to catch people, you know?... 61

The state of Rio de Janeiro, which like the state of Pernambuco was considered to be one of the great centers of communist activity in the country, contained the headquarters of the major unions and numerous communist cells ... The actions of Colonel Campelo [the new State Secretary for Public Security] rapidly extended to the entire state of Rio, with numerous communists being imprisoned ... Many offices, headquarters of trade unions, and residences of communist agents were raided by the Police, helped by the Army. The type and volume of the seized subversive material was impressive.... 62

At the time of the Revolution ... they fell over themselves to arrest people, guilty and innocent, people who had never even been in a union. ... My uncle... was already retired, sitting on the couch; they came and arrested him too. They also arrested Nelson, my brother-in-law, my sister and another uncle of mine. None of them had anything to do with the union! ... 63

During the night of April 3 [1964], Councilors Astério dos Santos and Darcy Câmara of the Brazilian Socialist Party (PSB) had their political rights suspended by their peers. The distinguished guest in the council chamber, the state deputy Waldemar Lima Teixeira, praised the attitude of the House for “helping to clean up the political situation of the city by rightly stripping the two communist elements of their political rights”.64 The headquarters of the unions were raided by the police and the Regional Labor Office intervened in the running of the unions. For example, in the unions in Santo Aleixo and Magé, where Councilor Astério dos Santos was president, a governing board was established with Alexandre Magalhaes Neto as president and Adalberto Pinheiro de Souza and Rolien Dias Castilho as assistants.65 In early April 1964, several newspapers reported police searches within the union, where “a large quantity of sailors’ uniforms”66 was found. This information came to be used at the beginning of investigations to prove the formation of a “Group of 11” in Magé, headed by the president of the union Astério dos Santos. In the investigation initiated by the Magé police station on May 29, eleven people (mostly workers) were called to testify as defendants. However, it was later found that the “sailors’ uniforms” were actually caps, which were souvenirs donated by the Association of Sailors and Marines of Brazil (Associação dos Marinheiros e Fuzileiros Navais do Brasil, AMFNB) in

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro thanks to the union for the support and solidarity they had provided. The caps featured the following inscription: “To witness the popular victory of the sailors, marines and the Brazilian people”. 67 The delegate of Magé then proposed the investigation of the suspicious activity of the accused, but did not actually define what that activity amounted to. The scenario chosen for the investigation was the so-called “Sugar Strike”, which had taken place months earlier. The prosecution argued that the defendants had used “the pretext of being concerned about the inflated price of domestic goods to raise the population against the authorities, almost causing a real social catastrophe”, and they also continued to denounce them for forming a “Group of 11”. 68 Because the evidence was not shown in court, the accusations went through various changes, even reaching the stage that three of the “Group of 11” were accused under the National Security Law (Lei de Segurança Nacional) of an attempt on the life of a magistrate (the public prosecutor who had his car stoned). At the end of the process, in 1966, when it had reached the STM, all the accused were acquitted for lack of evidence.

Final considerations

Considering this whole scenario, which involved a strike that allegedly endangered national security, we believe that this episode contains elements that have been hitherto little studied, given that it relates to the working class, and particularly the values that the working class constructs, which are built on the experiences of past struggles. By analyzing the legal case referred to as BNM 211 in the “Brazil Never Again” project more closely, as well as various other sources of information about the lives of the workers of Magé, it is possible to observe that the mobilization of workers regarding food shortages became more intense, not only because of increases in the price of basic necessities, but mainly because of the cases related to the inadequate distribution and withholding of foods. In a sense, it was as if the increase in prices, although they were considered to be unfair by the workers, was part of a game, given the understanding that the supply crisis affected everyone and the fact that, to some extent, traders would have to pass higher prices on to consumers (as long as price rises were not over-exaggerated). It is worth pointing out that, in many cases, the relationships between workers and traders were well-established and involved family members and/or emotional ties, which were supported by credit being

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security extended to workers in the factories and negotiated terms of payment, elements that undoubtedly contributed to alleviate conflicts between the parties. For the union leaders, the price increases were part of a dispute; the employers’ associations producing research on the cost of living to contradict government rates (the employers’ rates were usually lower) during wage negotiations. However, price increases were ultimately used as one of the main arguments in the debate for wage increases for workers. However, bad faith in the distribution of foodstuffs, and the selective with- olding of the same were considered unforgivable by workers, the latter being much worse from a moral point of view. When these cases were discovered the crisis regarding supplies of foodstuffs explicitly ceased to be something that affected the whole of society, and became something that clearly only affected the “lower” classes, thereby wounding working class dignity. These observations are quite complex to demonstrate empirically and, at the same time, they have also been largely neglected in much of the discussion about the world of work. However, we believe that the analysis provided in this paper provides a valuable contribution by avoiding the trend of studying workers merely as the driving force of political parties, unions, associations, clubs and factories, in short, often failing to recognize workers as key actors, and as the subject of their own histories, defending their rights and fighting for new social advances and better living conditions. Regarding the legislation, undoubtedly all the practices listed in this article (price increases, withholding foodstuffs and unequal treatment of customers) were crimes against the popular economy. Social relations are established through other matrices and are forged from experience. Thus, a more compre- hensive analysis is necessary. There are references in the BNM 211 legal case that can strengthen this argument. In his first testimony, collected at the police station after spending 53 days on the run, Astério dos Santos stressed that “the confusion because of the sugar originated because of the conduct of the trader who held up a can of ant killer and said: ‘Someone who cannot live, should die!’” 69 When Waldemar Lima Teixeira, testified he confirmed that the facts described in the case occurred in his brother-in-law’s store because of sugar:

The incident occurred with a military police officer ... who sent a girl to return the sugar because the price was higher than the official price ... then people started gathering at the door of the store, which numbered a crowd of more than

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

eight hundred people. The witness was inside along with another friend of his brother-in-law.70

Thus, we can infer how the phrase used by the trader (put in other words: “If you can’t afford it, die!”) was linked with the “immorality of profiting from people’s needs” (Thompson, 1998, p.257) and rapidly inflamed the feelings of eight hundred people outside the store. Both the actions of the trader (who was a relative of the deputy, and was protected by him) and the attitudes of the deputy chief of the Saps (who was accused of inappropriate distribution of foodstuffs, favoritism to customers, and hoarding for resale to local shops) pointedly disregarded the “sacrifices” of those textile workers in the face of sugar shortages, such as the young weaver mentioned at the start of this article (and so many other workers) who had to use sugarcane juice instead of sugar to prepare breakfast. The Brazilian Communist Party (PCB) was undoubtedly an important actor in the context of the “Sugar Strike”, especially in terms of maintaining close links with the workers for a long period. However, unlike the official government analysis that permeated almost all of the BNM 211 case, the strike was not simply a “simulation of just demands” aimed at the “implementation of a mazorca vermelha [red turmoil]”; it was the manifestation of the defense of rights, both legally constituted and symbolic, which were forged from the values and customs of that group of workers throughout their trajectory. Therefore, rather than jeopardizing national security, the “Sugar Strike” actually emerged from the interpretation by workers that some of their moral premises were being threatened, which encouraging them to resort to political action in support of their demands.

REFERENCES

CORRÊA, Larissa Rosa. A tessitura dos direitos: patrões e empregados na justiça do trabalho, 1953-1964. São Paulo: LTr, 2011. FERNANDES, Antônio de Paiva. Magé durante o Segundo Império e os primeiros tempos da República: a história de uma abnegada mulher. Rio de Janeiro: s.n., 1962. FORTES, Alexandre. Nós do Quarto Distrito: a classe trabalhadora porto-alegrense e a Era Vargas. Caxias do Sul, RS: Garamond, 2004. p.441. LOPES, José Sérgio Leite. A Tecelagem dos Conflitos de Classe na Cidade das Chaminés. Brasília, DF: Ed. UnB; Marco Zero, 1988.

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

MUNHOZ, Sidnei J. Ecos da emergência da Guerra Fria no Brasil (1947-1953). Diálo- gos, Maringá, PR: Universidade Estadual de Maringá, v.2, n.6, p.45-50, 2002. PEREIRA NETO, Murilo Leal. A Reinvenção do Trabalhismo no “Vulcão do Inferno”: um estudo sobre metalúrgicos e têxteis de São Paulo. A fábrica, o bairro, o sindicato e a política (1950-1964). Tese (Doutorado em História) – FFLCH, USP. São Paulo, 2006. POLLAK, Michael. Memória, esquecimento, silêncio. Estudos Históricos, Rio de Janei- ro: CPDOC, v.2, n.3, p.3-15, 1989. RIBEIRO, Felipe Augusto dos Santos. Operários à tribuna: vereadores comunistas e trabalhadores têxteis de Magé (1951-1964). Dissertação (Mestrado em História Social) – FFP, Uerj. São Gonçalo, RJ, 2009. SANTOS, Renato Peixoto dos. Magé: terra do Dedo de Deus. Rio de Janeiro: IBGE, 1957. SAVAGE, Mike. Classe e história do trabalho. In: BATALHA, Cláudio Henrique de Moraes; SILVA, Fernando Teixeira da; FORTES, Alexandre (Org.) Culturas de classe: identidades e diversidade na formação do operariado. Campinas, SP: Ed. Unicamp, 2004. p.25-48. SAVAGE, Mike. Espaço, redes e formação de classe. Revista Mundos do Trabalho, v.3, n.5, p.6-33, jan.-jun. 2011. THOMPSON, E. P. Costumes em comum: estudos sobre a cultura popular tradicional. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1998.

NOTES

1 This article is the result of a paper presented at the XXXII International Congress of the Latin American Studies Association (LASA), held in Chicago, USA, in 2014. 2 Interview with Maria Oneida Péclat, which was included in the documentary Loom produced by Taiane Linhares (2013). Available at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc917aJdfjo; accessed: 31 Mar. 2014. 3 The expression “deu pano pra manga” (literally, “provided enough material to make a sleeve”) is very popular in Brazil. It arose from an analogy about the estimate of how much material was necessary for making a shirt. When the amount of cloth is lower than expected, but it is still possible to finish the piece, this expression is used because a small amount of material can still be used to make a sleeve, for example. Figuratively, “deu pano pra manga” means something surprising, unexpected, which results in something that is far more than was expected. 4 Interview with Nito Lima Teixeira conducted by Juçara da Silva Barbosa de Mello, 5 Jan. 2005. Researcher’s archive.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

5 Regarding submerged memories, this article is supported by the work of sociologist Michael Pollak. See, Pollak, 1989. 6 The Brasil Nunca Mais (BNM), “Brazil: Never Again”, project was developed by the World Council of Churches and the Archdiocese of São Paulo during the 1980s. The initiative had three main goals: to prevent lawsuits for political crimes being destroyed at the end of the military dictatorship, as occurred at the end of the Estado Novo; to obtain information about torture practiced on behalf of political repression; and that the disclosure of the project would fulfil an educational role within Brazilian society. Available at: http:// bnmdigital.mpf.mp.br; accessed: 12 Dec. 2013. 7 The concept of moral economy was used in this article based on the reflections of the historian E. P. Thompson. See, THOMPSON, 1998, especially Ch. 4 (p.150-202) and 5 (p.203-266). 8 In 1956, the city of Magé had five textile industries running simultaneously: the Santo Aleixo and the Andorinhas factories in the Second District; the Pau Grande and Santana factories, both in the América Fabril Company in the Sixth District; and the Mageense factory in the city center (First District); not counting the Cometa factory in Meio da Serra, which paid taxes to the city of Petrópolis, but was a cause of permanent dispute between the two cities. See, SANTOS, 1957, p.187. 9 These implications about the structural safety of the working class refer to comments made by Mike Savage. See, SAVAGE, 2004, p.25-48; 2011, p.6-33. 10 FERNANDES, 1962, p.54-58. The “Cloth Strike” was so named by older workers in a reference to the action agreed during the strike, which recommended that the weavers take pieces of fabric from the factory to their homes. This was recounted in interviews with Waldomiro Pinto Carneiro and Benedito Queiroz Vieira, now deceased, conducted by the Grupo Centenário on the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of the creation of the Santo Aleixo district in 1992. Archive of Ademir Calixto Oliveira. This strike in Magé, which occurred in the context of the so-called “Anarchist Insurrection” in Rio de Janeiro, was also reported by newspapers in Rio de Janeiro. Cf. A Noite: 22 Nov. 1918, p.3. 11 Interview with Almir de Castilho conducted by Juçara da Silva Barbosa de Mello, 10 March, 2005. Researcher’s archive. 12 Interview with Evonete de Araújo Souza and Luiz Porfírio de Souza conducted by Taiane Linhares during the production of the documentary Tear (2013). Producer’s archive. 13 Tribuna Popular, 4 Jul. 1945, p.8. 14 In 1947, the following were elected to the Brazilian Labor Party (PTB): Irun Sant’Anna (a doctor); José Muniz de Melo (a trader and former textile worker who was licensed during the mandate), Feliciano Costa and Agenor dos Santos (weavers); and Argemiro da Cruz Araújo (a former worker in a gunpowder factory who was sworn in as a substitute during the mandate). These councilors had their mandates arbitrarily annulled in 1948 and the weavers who were militant in the party were harshly persecuted, including the presence of police inside factories. In 1950, the following were elected to the National Labour Party

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

(PTN): José Aquino de Santana (an electrician); Petronilho Alves (a weaver who was sworn in as a substitute only at the end of the mandate); and Ilza Gouvea (a weaver who was sworn in as a substitute at the start of the mandate). In 1954, the peasant leader and former textile worker Manoel Ferreira de Lima was elected to the Brazilian Socialist Party (PSB). In 1958 and 1962, the workers Astério dos Santos and Darcy Câmara were elected and re-elected to the PSB. 15 Tribuna Popular, 17 Nov. 1946, p.4. 16 Tribuna Popular, 19 Sept. 1947, p.8. 17 Public archive of the State of Rio de Janeiro (Aperj). Relatório do investigador Edson Braga Machado ao Comissário Geral Heráclito da Silva Araújo. Niterói: 26 Apr. 1948. p.1. 18 Imprensa Popular, 27 Mar. 1951, p.5. 19 Imprensa Popular, 29 Mar. 1951, p.5. 20 Imprensa Popular, 23 May 1951, p.4. 21 Câmara Municipal de Magé (CMM). Livro de Atas n.17 (1/31/1951 to 11/3/1954). fl.104. 22 Imprensa Popular, 22 Nov. 1952, p.4. Reports about the lack of wheat and bread in Magé were also published in other newspapers but the latter stressed that Mayor Waldemar Li- ma Teixeira was making every effort to solve the problem. Cf. A Noite, 28 Dec. 1952, p.2. 23 Imprensa Popular, 4 Mar. 1953, p.6. 24 Imprensa Popular, 22 Oct. 1953, p.2. 25 CMM. Livro de Atas n.19 (7/15/1955 to 7/15/1958). fl.76v. 26 From the end of World War II there was a considerable shortage of grain in the country and evidence of serious urban problems, including food shortages, triggered a series of strikes at the end of the 1940s, which extended into the 1950s. See, MUNHOZ, 2002, p.45- 50. 27 Law no. 1522, 26 Dec. 1951. 28 I researched the political performance of these communist councilors and their relationship to the working class in my Master’s thesis. See, RIBEIRO, 2009. 29 CMM. Livro de Atas n.20 (7/18/1958 to 11/6/1959). fl.51v. 30 Ibidem, fl.53v. 31 CMM. Livro de Atas n.22 (11/30/1960 to 2/13/1962). fls.4v-5. 32 Última Hora, 6 Jan. 1961, p.6. 33 Última Hora, 7 Jan. 1961, p.6. 34 O Globo, 14 Mar. 1963, p.3. 35 Última Hora, 8 Jan. 1964, p.5. 36 CMM. Livro de Atas n.22 (11/30/1960 to 2/13/1962). fl.55.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 23 Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro

37 Statement written by Plácido Agra Neto to Felipe Augusto dos Santos Ribeiro, Oct. 1999. Author’s archive. 38 CMM. Livro de Atas n.21 (11/10/1959 to 11/29/1960). fl.12. 39 Última Hora, 25 Mar. 1964, p.7. 40 Última Hora, 18 Dec. 1962, p.1. 41 Correio da Manhã, 10 Jan. 1964, 1st supplement, p.5. 42 Última Hora, 1 Feb. 1964, p.3. 43 Última Hora, 26 Feb. 1964, p.3. 44 Correio da Manhã, 28 Feb. 1964, 1st supplement, p.2. 45 A Noite, 28 Feb. 1964, p.2. 46 The immigrant hostels on the Ilha das Flores, which is located in the municipality of São Gonçalo, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, were inaugurated in 1883 and were the first of their kind to be created by the imperial government of Brazil. This important center for the reception and distribution of migrants and immigrants was in operation until 1966. Curren- tly, the old hostel facilities house military units of the Brazilian Navy, which, in partnership with the State University of Rio de Janeiro (Uerj), maintains a visitor’s center that is open to the public by appointment. Available at: www.hospedariailhadasflores.com.br; accessed: 12 Dec. 2013. 47 Law 1.521, 26 Dec. 1951. 48 Decree 53.844, 25 Mar. 1964. 49 Law 4.242, 17 Jul. 1963. 50 Correio da Manhã, 18 Mar 1964, p.9. Interestingly, this same report noted that at that time the immigrant hostels on the Ilha das Flores housed about six hundred farm workers who had been evicted from farms located in the city of Magé, and who were awaiting pla- cement by the of the Superintendency of Agrarian Reform (Superintendência de Reforma Agrária, Supra), which intended to expropriate those farms. 51 Correio da Manhã, 14 March 1964, 1st supplement, p.8. The wording of the last poster alluded to the prison on Ilha Grande, which is located in the municipality of Angra dos Reis in the state of Rio de Janeiro. This notoriously harsh prison was built in the early 1930s during the government of Getúlio Vargas. 52 Correio da Manhã, 20 Mar. 1964, 2nd supplement, p.1. 53 Última Hora, 25 Mar. 1964, p.7. 54 Correio da Manhã, 12 Mar. 1964, p.1. 55 CMM. Livro de Atas n.25 (12/30/1963 to 4/28/1964). fl.43. 56 CMM. Livro de Atas n.25 (12/30/1963 to 4/28/1964). fl.53. 57 BNM 211. fls.26v; 66v and 67v.

24 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A strike which endangered national security

58 In Santo Aleixo, Joaquim dos Santos and Valdemar de Souza were arrested as agitators; the brother of Astério dos Santos was accused of inciting agitation against local traders. See, O Globo, 6 Apr. 1964, p.10. 59 Interview with Hermínio Santos conducted by Joana Lima Figueiredo on 6 Apr. 2008. Researcher’s archive. 60 O Brasil Despertou a Tempo. Newspaper supplement published by the new government in collaboration with the National Agency. Apr. 1964, p.5. Author’s archive. 61 Interview with Lúcia de Souza Lima conducted by Juçara da Silva Barbosa de Mello on 10 Oct. 2007. Researcher’s archive. 62 CMM. Livro de Atas n.25 (12/30/1963 to 4/28/1964). fl.70. 63 Delegacia Regional do Trabalho (RJ). Decree 55/40, 11 May, 1964. 64 See,. Jornal do Brasil, 8 Apr. 1964, p.1; and Última Hora, 9 Apr. 1964, p.7. 65 O Estado de S. Paulo, 7 Apr. 1964, p.9. 66 BNM 211. fl.3. 67 BNM 211. fl.85. 68 BNM 211. fl.120. 69 BNM 211. fl.85. 70 BNM 211. fl.120.

Article received on August 17, 2012. Approved on December 12, 2014.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 25

Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s Os ativos intelectuais católicos no Brasil dos anos 1930

Helena Isabel Mueller*

Resumo Abstract A Igreja Católica no Brasil, no período The Catholic Church in Brazil between de 1930-1940, vinha se organizando no 1930 and 1940 was in the process of re- sentido de reivindicar a ampliação de organization with the aim of reaffirm- seu espaço na sociedade brasileira – não ing its position in Brazilian society. The como fé ou devoção, que era forte –, es- aim was not only to promote the expan- timulando a organização de católicos sion of the Catholic faith, but also to ativos para intervir na sociedade fortale- stimulate the organization of active cendo as demandas políticas da Igreja Catholics to strengthen the political in- diante do Estado. Em resposta, uma sig- fluence of the Church. The response nificativa parcela militante do laicato was the organization of militant lay católico se organizou e desempenhou Catholics that played an important role papel importante no período: os intelec- during the above period: the so-called tuais católicos que são o objeto de estu- Catholic Intellectuals who are the object do do presente artigo. of this paper. Palavras-chave: história intelectual; in- Keywords: intellectual history; Catholic telectuais católicos; história política; intellectuals; political history; Church Igreja e Estado. and state.

I wish to begin this article with a quote by Cornelius Castoriadis1 which expresses the common thread of my reflections on Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s:

In this respect [the extension of heteronomy] religion plays a central role. It supplies a representation of this source and of its attributes; it ensures that that all significations — those pertaining to the world, as well as those pertaining to human affairs – spring from the same origin, it cements the whole by means of a belief that musters the support of essential tendencies of the psyche. (p.77)

* Universidade Estadual de Ponta Grossa (UEPG), Departamento de História. Ponta Grossa, PR, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69012 Helena Isabel Mueller

In this attempt, “the political” is presented as that which generates the relations of humans among themselves and with the world, the representation of nature and time, the mutual positions of religion and power. (p.73)

Castoriadis highlights the institutional role of religion in maintaining heteronomy, as opposed to autonomy, an activity which involves questioning and reflecting on society and the interrogation of its laws and their foundation: for example, who makes the laws and who are they made for; what laws do we want? According to Castoriadis, it is the discussion of these questions by society that marks the exercise of political power, putting into question the state of heteronomy, an essential constituent of which is the transfer of decision-making power from society as a whole to an instance which is separated from the collectivity. In this state, the exercise of political power as the locus of discussion of questions pertaining to everyday social life – the division of social concerns between those who have the right to a part of the whole – is nullified. Political power is exercised to explain and control social tensions and strengthen the instances of power in the articulation and organization of society’s demands, putting them “in their place”. Religion, or rather its institutional arm, the Church, plays a significant role in the disciplinization of social tensions. Thus, power and politics – two sides of the same coin – are central to my reflections on the relationship between the Church and the state in Brazil during the 1930s. First, I propose a brief discussion of the notion of intellectual.2 Referring to the term intellectual in his work “Intellectuals and History”, Castoriadis (2002, p.112) states the following: “I have never liked it or accepted it. For reasons that are at once aesthetic: the miserable and defensive arrogance implied therein – and at the same time logical – who is not intellectual?”. He highlights the relationship between the “philosopher” and the “political community” in Ancient Greece, and particularly the difference between Socrates, the ‘philosopher from the city-state’, and Plato, the philosopher who places himself outside the city-state. When Castoriadis thinks of polis he thinks of the city-state, the citizen. It is therefore easy to understand the emphasis that he gives to Socrates and other thinkers that discussed questions related to polis, that is to say, those that exercised power. According to Castoriadis, Socrates widely exercised his citizenship and was judged and condemned for the exercise of political power in the most profound sense: constructing autonomy in the creation of the laws that govern the city. Conversely, Castoriadis emphasizes, Plato was withdrawn from the city- state and therefore viewed it from outside, thus instituting heteronomy in

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s philosophy and leading to what he calls the “deplorable activity of intellectuals when confronted with history: the rationalization of the powers”. Castoriadis suggests that the intellectuals of our time should restore, restitute and reinstate their authentic activity in history, that is to say, their essential function:

[the intellectual] can abide in this space [history], only by recognizing the limits of that which his supposed objectivity and universality permit of him; he should recognize, and not just through lip service, that what he is trying to get people to listen to is still a doxa, an opinion, not an episteme, a science. Above all, he should recognize that history is the domain in which there unfolds the creativity of all people, both men and women, the learned and the illiterate, a humanity in which he is only one atom. (Castoriadis, 2002, p.119)

In light of the above, the discussion about intellectuals and, more specifically, about the history of the intellectuals, is intimately linked to political history. For Sirinelli (2003, p.234), a discussion “undertaken along the indirect passage of the history of individual engagements, it [the history of the intellectuals] stood – double effect – at the crossroads of the biography and the political”. Within historiography, political history was ostracized for a certain period of time, and its concerns were relegated to a “lower” plane. The intellectuals belonged to a social space that did not attract the attention of historians because, for various reasons, including their posture towards society, they “belonged” to a superior plane, to the “elites”. In this way, following the thinking of Sirinelli, intellectuals were in a “blind spot”, invisible to historiography during some time and often considered part of the history of ideas, without raising the important question: how do intellectuals construct their ideas and how do they relate to the society to which they belong? Without doubt, a large part of the responsibility for this attitude belongs to the intellectuals. By putting themselves on a pedestal above and apart from society they set themselves in a sacrosanct space; and it was only after their ‘desacralization’ that they would capture the attention of historiography. In this sense, the twentieth century saw the emergence of the humanized intellectual who started to live and participate in society, contemplating and influencing various issues. They gave opinions, and asked and answered questions: they were no longer above society, but rather on an even ground with it, and could therefore be questioned by it. Sirinelli (2003, p.240) states that “desacral- ized, intellectuals were able to become an object of history over which historians would no longer hesitate to cast their net”. In the same vein, Altamirano

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Helena Isabel Mueller

(2005) emphasizes that the renaissance of political history instigated other ways of interrogating the past, including the history of the elites and intellectual history. In this sense, the intellectuals are viewed based on their engagement in society, as critically conscious protagonists and witnesses, in short, as people who places their knowledge and experience in the daily life of society. Their intervention in society was not neutral, but rather related to the individual options and political postures that guided each one’s intellectual activity. This was particularly the case from the early Twentieth Century onwards when the humanism inherited from the previous century set the tone of an intellectual discourse which had two essential characteristics: the defense of universal causes, detached from personal interests; and transgression of existing order. It is evident from the above that the notion of intellectual has not evolved along a linear trajectory, which makes it difficult to come up with a single definition. Various meanings have been attached to this term along the paths of history and each epoch expressed new ideas. Sartre once said that “the intellectual is someone who meddles in what is not his business and claims to question both received truths and the accepted behavior inspired by them, in the name of a global conception of man and of society”.3 In this sense, by med- dling in what is not his business and through his claims, the intellectual constructs other truths and behavior which he fights for. His posture is therefore not one of passivity and observation in the face of events, but rather of action, opening a space not just for his ideas but also for their realization. This was the type of attitude that the so-called Dreyfus-affair demanded of the “thinkers” or philosophers of the time in order to surpass the moment of reflection and move into political action by supporting or condemning those accused by the instituted power. Zola became the spokesperson for this type of attitude when he publicized a letter showing his position regarding the events, defending Dreyfus and publically calling for critical thinking, whose protagonists he called intellectuals. After the Second World War, this term gained an adjective which gave the term a rather stronger connotation. Fascism – especially Nazism and Stalinism – did not permit neutrality, or even a passive view of events, and thus the notion of engaged intellectual emerged. Running the risk of overextending the term, given its specificity, I consider the Catholic intellectuals engaged intellectuals, as they went beyond passive Christian reflection and widened the realms of their religiosity to include political action. They responded to the appeals - which they affirmed were from the entire Catholic population - to strengthen Catholicism, not only as a

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s religious exercise, but also as an intervention in society. As intellectuals belonging to what they considered a weakened society, they proposed to do this through political action and interventions to put society on a path based on their ideals, that is, those of the Roman Catholic Church. The beginning of the 1930s in Brazil was marked by growing support for the idea of a national project reinforced by the notion of a break with the old model symbolized by the revolution: the abandonment of a past seen as back- ward and representing the old, and the (re)birth of a new country founded on the idea of “national renewal”. Intellectuals from diverse cultural and political backgrounds engaged directly or indirectly in a wide-scale and multiple project to build the Brazilian nation. The construction of the notion of nation at that moment was very complex, especially due to the weaknesses in the social instances: a defined class structure and political organization that showed signs of a clearly representative democracy – still a vague notion at that time – were unheard of. This political vacuum “saw the swelling of the state machine as the historical subject par excellence in the power game” (Lenharo, 1986, p.20). The intellectuals filled this vacuum by exercising functions in the state to make up for the country’s lack of qualified personnel, especially in the newly-created ministries. It is interesting to note that the idea of “national reconstruction” that permeated a large part of the state’s discourse during the period 1920 to 1930 embraced the obliteration of the collective memory of a past of oppression and submission. In this sense, the real meaning of the discourse of change was permanence. Maria Helena Capelato emphasizes that this control “attempts to suppress all representations of the collective past, present and future in the social imaginary which are distinct from those which establish its legitimacy and secures its control over collective life” (Capelato, 1999, p.169). The 1920s and 1930s were marked by interference in the national construction/renewal discourse with the founding of the Communist Party of Brazil (PCB) in 1922, which brought with it the alarming idea of revolution, and the Modern Art Week, which subverted the aesthetics of language, arts and culture. Both had inherent insecurities and a lack of firm ground in relation to the future. The creation of the Dom Vital center in 1922 and its social order project which exemplified Catholicism, together with the magazine A Ordem, which was the spokesperson for its ideology, acted as a counterpoint to these movements. In this way, the longstanding concerns of Brazilian intellectuality relating to the formulation, coordination and construction of a

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Helena Isabel Mueller national ideology and the search for a birthstone to make up its identity, began to take shape. For some of Brazil’s intellectuals, modernity was the path to the future – whatever the goal. For Foucault (quoted in Ternes, 2005) modernity marked a way of thinking and feeling as a voluntary choice and belonging to a task, an attitude towards the world of a subject that is constantly established and rees- tablished by history: a subject that, apart from exercising freedom, builds it on a daily basis towards emancipation. Referring to Kant, Foucault purports that, more than just a period of history, modernity is an attitude: “a mode of relating to contemporary reality; a voluntary choice made by certain people; in the end, a way of thinking and feeling; a way, too, of acting and behaving that at one and the same time marks a relation to belonging and presents itself as a task”. Without doubt close to the Greek term ethos. Consequently, rather than distinguish the “modern period” from the “pre” or “post-modern” epochs, I believe it would be better to analyze how the attitude of modernity conflicts with attitudes of “contramodernity”.4 This attitude was consubstantial with artistic and cultural renewal through an attack against the veneration of the past that acquired positive emphasis with the elaboration of a “national” culture, a “rediscovery” of Brazil by the Brazilians. This plot also included a conception of identity which expressed critical awareness and openness to diversity and to a territory where there was dialogue among different cultures and where culture could assert itself through relationship rather than exclusion. Against this backdrop, a wide-reaching debate arose in Brazil which proposed new cohesive bonds through which identities could be viewed within a national/international context, fleeing from exasperated nationalism. In the backwash of this modernizing drive and on the other end of the debate, groups were organized to combat whatever kind of positive attitude towards modernity, demanding permanence of the traditions of Brazilian society. The debate heated up with the mobilization of the working class which was institutionalized by the creation of the Communist Party. Ever since the end of the Nineteenth Century, the struggle of the workers, most of which were European immigrants, had been guided by a strongly rooted anarchist movement, as shown by the strikes of 1917 and 1919. Despite intense mobilization, the visibility of the anarchist movement was easily concealed by official discourse that dismissed the movement disfranchising it from Brazilian society, since it was made up of immigrants and therefore ran counter to the interests

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s of the nation. The creation of the Communist Party in 1922 institutionalized the workers’ struggle, seducing a large part of the unions that actively participated in the construction of the party as a legitimate spokesman for their interests. The mobilization behind the Communist Party had an impact on society and divided opinions – the mere mention of the word “revolution” was threatening to the conservatives and their projects based on the maintenance of Brazilian society’s “true traditions”. Traditional and conservative groups, especially those related to the Catholic Church, organized themselves against any proposal that revealed an inkling of revolution. The fact that Brazil, by definition, had always been a Catholic country – Dominican Catholic in fact – did not mean that the Church had a strong political influence. The church had a predominant influence on culture during the colonial period since education was under its guise and it ran schools and seminaries, not to mention the Jesuits who dominated the intellectual landscape in Brazil for two centuries until they were expelled in the middle of the eighteenth century. However, in political terms, the Church was subordinate to the colonial government. Catholicism was declared the official religion of the country by the 1824 Constitution and at the same time the empire determined that the Church would remain aligned with the temporal power; the newly instated Royal Patronage regime gave the emperor supreme authority over the state and the Church and even gave him the power to “arbitrate over papal laws and decrees to ensure their validity in the country (the foresaid consent)” (Cancian, 2011, p.16). The Vatican reacted to this situation and sought to establish a new relationship with the Brazilian state. The pope’s position also provoked a strong response from influential sectors within the national clergy with or without links to the monarchy, who wanted to maintain the Church under their control without losing their relative autonomy in relation to Rome. However, the monarchy feared that any expression of autonomy by the Church would open the way for interference in the internal affairs of the country, obeying orders from Rome. The Western world at the turn of the twentieth century was subject to a constant process of profound change. The Industrial Revolution in Europe imposed relations of production and labor that would mold a new society full of tensions and conflicts where masters and workers clashed over the ways and rules of working at the time. New construction techniques had transformed cities which began to take on another appearance: “skyscrapers”, noise and crowds became part of everyday life. New means of transport and

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Helena Isabel Mueller communication reduced distances and speeded the pace of life. Modernity imposed itself. Far from being oblivious to these issues, the Church, through the Supreme Pontiff, was attentive to these transformations, in the political sphere – with the rise in the number of workers’ struggles and the idea of revolution and tensions between nations – and in technology and the economy, in relation to the pattern of capital accumulation. The relationships between people were transformed and broke with traditional patterns, and religiosity became diluted. As a reaction to this social “disorder”, the Catholic institution organized itself on various fronts seeking to (re)construct its internal affairs to strengthen papal powers. One of the manifestations of this search was the encyclical Rerum Novarum of Pope Leo XIII, which addressed the relationships between capital and labor and private property and aimed to orient bishops and church congregations to be attentive with regard to the tensions which emerged together with the development of capitalism and working class movements. It urged Catholics to take watch of the world around them in order to intervene to (re) conduct it to the true path of Christian faith, under the aegis of the Vatican. In its introduction it alerts:

The momentous gravity of the state of things now obtaining fills every mind with painful apprehension; wise men are discussing it; practical men are proposing schemes; popular meetings, legislatures, and rulers of nations are all busied with it – actually there is no question which has taken deeper hold on the public mind. (Rerum Novarum)

The events of the early twentieth century confirmed the Vatican’s fears: the First World War (1914 to 1918) and Russian Revolution (1917) radically transformed the world and led to the fragmentation of man’s vision of himself and of the world in which he lived. Cubism was a particular manifestation of this fragmentation. The Catholic Church was not content with being a spectator in the face of the worldly lay issues of the material world – and, it might be said, has never really accepted this role. Rather, it intended to intervene and, in order to do so, centralized decision making in Rome under the Pope – thus clearly not accepting the interference of nation states in its domain. A wide range of initiatives followed which resulted in the strengthening of the organization of the Church, enabling it to achieve hegemony in the

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s heated ideological, cultural and religious struggle of the contemporary world. Sergio Miceli (2009, p.18), quoting Stephen Neil, emphasizes that “when it comes to the formation of new orders and congregations, especially those directed at missionary work, the nineteenth century was more fertile than any other century” to promote the expansion not only of the Catholic faith, but also, and perhaps mainly, the material and ideological basis of the institution. In Brazil, the revitalization of the Church would take some time to take hold. The republic would create a secular state, separating the church and the state, which was made official by the 1891 Constitution. As Cancian (2011) writes, this separation and the end of the patronage distanced the Catholic Church from the public sphere. This situation was aggravated by freedom of religion which officially placed Catholicism on an even footing with other religions which were equally recognized by the state. However, two other issues deeply affected the Church: religious marriage lost its status with the introduction of civil marriage; and secular education, affecting a field which had up until that point been monopolized by the Church, not to mention the emergence of various protestant schools. The loss of this monopoly was one of the central issues of the disputes that followed between those that fought to maintain Catholic schools, which educated pupils according to the precepts of Christian – that is Catholic – tradition and religiosity, and those that fought for secular and democratic education. The “intrusion” of the state into affairs which had previously been the unquestionable domain of the Church minimized its control and demanded that it took steps to strengthen the institution and its grassroots. In other words, it was time to respond to the passivity of Catholics – or at least a group of them – and stimulate their active participation in the country’s social and political issues. The Church therefore reorganized itself by innovating and adopting new strategies aimed at expanding Catholicism, now free from all bonds of the State, and started to follow central guidelines established by the Vatican promoting the strengthening ties with the Roman Catholic Church, receiving in return resources and orientation. This strengthening of ties, denominated Romanization, was the start of a promising phase for the Church. According to Sergio Miceli (2009):

it achieved considerable success on multiple major fronts: it stabilized its income sources and recuperated its property assets, reconstructed and modernized its

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Helena Isabel Mueller

training facilities and seminaries, created a considerably more dynamic territorial presence, moralized, professionalized and widened its professional staff base...

The expansionist movement in the Catholic Church in Brazil and the rest of Latin America manifested itself in many different ways. Without abandoning the goals of Romanization and building up its asset base, the church sought to build a solid political and doctrinal alliance with sectors of the ruling classes that supported Catholic pretensions and were aware of their importance for the consolidation of social and political order in the republic. This “alliance” with certain sectors of Brazilian society deepened after 1930 with the organization of a group of laymen who played a significant role in the Catholic resistance: the so-called Catholic intellectuals. In this way, the Church strengthened its position in society and reinforced its role as organizer, disciplinarian and guide of the meaning of history. It also strengthened its relationship with the Vargas administration which confronted workers’ struggles and social demands. The Catholic intellectuals acted on both fronts, mediating between the two powers and society. In this context, according to Villaça (1975), the Pastoral Letter5 of 1916 was a first warning cry with regard to the stagnation of Catholicism in Brasil. Its author, Don Leme6, considered it a facade, mediocre and stagnated. His letter questions whether the intellectuals had received religious instruction and what programs, propaganda and resistance they had to offer. It also calls Christian intellectuality into action in response to the apathy of the Church, proposes a reaction to secular education, which he considers unacceptable, and launches the idea of a Catholic university. In short, Don Leme’s inaugural address to the diocese of Recife appeals for union and efficacy among Catholics in relation to Brazilian society which, in his view, needs intervention: “Instead of a fading chorus, we must form a legion ready for combat; who knows how to speak then speak, who knows how to write then write” (Villaça, 1975, p.139). Don Leme’s appeal did not fall on deaf ears. An uncontestable answer came from Jackson de Figueiredo, an intellectual from Rio de Janeiro who was attracted to militant Catholicism by Don Leme’s Pastoral Letter and became the organizer and founder of the Catholic movement which gained visibility through the Centro Dom Vital, the periodical A Ordem and a group of thinkers called the intelectuais católicos. According to Villaça (1975, p.163), the themes addressed by Jackson were Catholicism, authority, an order constituted against the revolution, nationalism and restoration of morality. He was rigid in his conceptions and authoritarian in his actions. He died in 1928 leaving behind

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s an organized Catholic militancy with a strong political influence on the Vargas government, which saw Catholic intellectuals as an opportunity for dialogue and support, especially during the structuring of the new state. It could be said that this relationship constituted a two-way street between church and state, where ideas, projects and actions which strengthened both parties could flow. During this process, the Catholic intellectuals had the prerogative to me- diate its political actions. There was for a moment a discussion between Catholic leaders over the formation a political party in the same mold as the Christian Democracy party in Italy. According to Schwartzman (Schwartzman; Bomeny; Costa, 2000) the lack of such a party led to the creation of the organization of intellectuals. Dom Leme created the Catholic Electoral League (LEC, acronym in Portuguese) in 1932 to provide guidance to Catholics with respect to the electoral process. The upper echelons of the Church however showed caution in relation to the possible political exposure that a clear position could bring and the negative effects of a defeat in the elections which could weaken relations between the church and political classes. Achieve positive results that met the demands of the church and strive for political development without exposing the institution was the main role of the Catholic intellectuals under the leadership of Alceu Amoroso Lima – or Tristão de Ataíde7– who replaced Jackson Figueiredo after his death, initially as president of the Centro Dom Vital and director of the periodical A Ordem. For Alceu Amoroso Lima, the LEC should be closely linked to the Catholic Action which in turn should “obey the general principles that govern the activities of the laity in the work of ‘Christianizing society under the guidance of the Catholic Church’” (Rodrigues, 2005). In this sense, it should not be made up only of practicing Catholics, but also open to all those that accept its program. Thus, the subordination of theLE C to the church hierarchy would not be the same as a political party. It would act as an agency responsible for the dissemination and expansion of Catholic ideology: the explicitly political arm of Catholicism. The name of the periodical A Ordem says a lot about its ideology: organize society, bring society back from the brink caused by modernity. In contrast to the motto of the Brazilian flag –ordem e progresso – the Church sought order, as defined by its precepts, but discarded progress. Not that the intellectuals were against material progress, which would bring Brazil closer to the image of civilized countries. The problem was in the changes which accompanied it, such as a rupture with Christian traditions and the good customs of Brazilian society, as well as liberalism, the other face of capitalism. Not to mention

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Helena Isabel Mueller communism and the Communist Party, which were gradually becoming the greatest of all evils. In this way, the Church conducted a movement in parallel to state action and addressed the Brazilian population with its most conservative and ultramontanist thinking:

the defense of order, of the hierarchy of religious authority, of education, guided by religious principles and controlled by ecclesiastical principles and the attack of the deleterious ideals of liberalism, individualism, freedom of information and thought, and also of the state when deprived of supervision of the Church. (Schwartzman; Bomeny; Costa, 2000, p.5)

From the state’s perspective, the Vargas government had to deal with the ambiguities of modernizing the country, building the bases for the growth of capitalism, and widening horizons so that new ideas could stimulate Brazilian culture, without however, abandoning conservatism: excess of any sort was to be contained. It comprised a hegemonic project which covered up dissent and disguised conflict. In this respect, it is worth remembering that in the first decades of the twentieth century, particularly from 1920 to the middle of the 1930s, the working classes systematically created and recreated the political space. The anarchistic, communist, Trotskyite and other sides of the workers’ movement made their voices heard loud and clear and gained significant visibility. The state therefore proposed to drown out these voices through an educational project which would “teach” these social actors their “real” place in society and therefore the “true” discourse: that which impeded the particular- istic interests of the oppressed classes from exceeding dominant interests which would ensure the success of the project of a “caring nation” without conflicts. During this period there was a tendency to “naturalize” the power of the state, which influenced the construction of a particular type of intellectual that saw himself, his place, function and relationship with society as being permeated by the state. In this context, it was up to the state to make history: individuals, especially the intellectuals, became historical as they participated in the state, as employees, or in some state project. However, intellectuals sometimes became entangled in this web, compromising their autonomy as historical subjects. The Vargas government called on a wide range of intellectuals who saw an open opportunity for putting their projects into practice: Villa Lobos developed choir singing in schools; Mário de Andrade foresaw the possibility of

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s building an archive of Brazilian culture in the National Historical and Artistic Heritage Service (Sphan, acronym in Portuguese), but was disappointed by bureaucracy; Lúcio Costa developed architectural projects, including the impressive headquarters of the Ministry of Education and Health (the current Palace of Culture) in Rio de Janeiro8. Maybe the most famous “employee” was Carlos Drummond de Andrade who worked in the Ministry of Education and Health for a number of years, including during the long lasting administration of the minister Gustavo Capanema. Education received particular attention from the Vargas government, especially the construction of universities in Brazil. It must not be forgotten that Capanema was one of the intellectual builders of the new state, and his idea of university envisaged the elaboration of a single project to format Brazilian universities as a whole. The ministry worked on this project for a long time based on the experiences with the universities that already existed in Rio de Janeiro. However, Catholic intellectuals had created a proposal to build a university connected to the Catholic Church, imitating the hegemony of existing congregations in various states of the federation of which the Jesuits and the Marist Brothers were the most important. These two projects were not exclusive, but rather complementary, particularly due to the relationship weaved by Alceu Amoroso Lima, who was a virile exponent of Catholic intellectuality. The state would be left to run public universities, while the Church would run the Catholic university, thus reoccupying its space in the Brazilian education project. Two projects however escaped the control of the federal government. The first was the University of São Paulo (USP), founded in 1934 by the government of São Paulo with the support of Júlio de Mesquita, then director of the newspaper O Estado de São Paulo, which was a centre of resistance to the Vargas government directed at forming political leaders based on the ideas of the 1932 revolution. The second was the University of the Federal District (UDF, acronym in Portuguese) proposed by Anísio Teixeira which began to take shape on the back of the success of the USP, and was founded in 1935 with five schools: Sciences, Education, Economics, Law, Philosophy, and Arts. Although it had a short life due to political reasons it was “a decisive instrument which breathed culture and sought new forms of elaboration, being the last straw for more conservative groups, including the Catholics” (Nunes, 2000, p.135). Anísio Teixeira envisaged that the university would implode the petty and individualistic struggles that spilled over into political and mental

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Helena Isabel Mueller anthropophagy which antagonized solidarity and the country’s scientific, literary and philosophical capacity. Clarice Nunes proposed the following:

Not only the production of knowledge, but also intellectual coordination and the formation of regular frameworks. The regulation of culture would be prohibited. The audacity to allow anything which is indeterminate and unpredictable! What good fairies dancing around the crib. (Nunes, 2000, p.315)

It is apparent that for Anísio Teixeira the university had a unique and exclusive function which went beyond spreading knowledge, the human experience and the education and training of professionals and researchers:

It is about maintaining an atmosphere of knowledge for knowledge to prepare the man that serves and develops it. It is about conserving live knowledge and not dead knowledge, in books or in empiricism of non-intellectualized practices. It is about intellectually formulating the human experience, always renewed, such that it can become conscious and progressive. It is about spreading human culture, but doing so using inspiration, enriching and vitalizing the knowledge of the past with the seduction, attraction and impe- tus of the present. (Teixeira, 1968)

The UDF’s academic proposal differentiated it from other universities. In contrast to the official project which proposed a Brazilian university to train elites, Anísio wanted to, “intellectually formulate the human experience... such that it can become conscious” through stimulating research. A significant number of Brazilian intellectuals were seduced by the idea of being a professor at the UDF. UDF professors formed a veritable ‘who’s who’ of Brazilian science and culture including Villa Lobos, Candido Portinari, Lucio Costa, Sérgio Buarque de Holanda, Josué de Castro, Mário de Andrade, Cecília Meireles, Álvaro Pinto and José Oiticica. For the students, the fact of not having to stick to a strict predefined curriculum based on the course chosen and the visceral nature of the relationship between professors and students was extremely seductive. The course content was impregnated with a desire for novelty, which was characteristic of the generation of intellectuals to which a large part of the professors belonged to, many of whom participated in the Brazilian modernist movement. The

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s relationship built between the students and knowledge was something rather visceral. In a conservative society such as Brazil which had only recently abolished slavery, traditional par excellence, the proposal of a university that cultivated liberty as a founding principle and not just as a possibility for an uncertain future caused fear. This cultural effervescence provoked reaction from the conservative ranks of politics and society, including Catholic intellectuals. This reaction had been announced from the beginning, since the UDF was born under the symbol of politics. Not because the majority of its professors were from “the left” – not necessarily due to party affiliation but more to life commitment – but also because the act of its foundation reflected its autonomy in the face of policies defined by a centralizing government. It was 1935, a year marked by growing tensions on both the home and international front and the ascension of specter of Communism. The conservatives were therefore predisposed to react to innovative projects seen as a threat to their hegemony. Anísio Teixeira was conscious of the tensions surrounding his project and in his inaugural address, reaffirming the political and educational ideals behind the university, he seemed to foresee what was to come:

Many judge that universities should exist in Brazil not to liberate, but to enslave. Not to march forward, but to hold back life. We know all too well this reactionary talk. It is as old as Methuselah. “This deep modern crisis is above all a moral crisis”. “Absence of discipline”. “Of stability”. “We are marching towards chaos”. “Towards revolution”. “Communism is out there”. That is what they are saying today. And that is what they have been saying for the last five hundred years. Because liberty, ladies and gentlemen, is always something that remains to be done.9

Later on, reinforcing the importance of the struggle for freedom, he states:

The university community celebrated today with the formal inauguration of our courses is made up of all those who have disappeared during this struggle and all those who continue to fight. Dedicated to culture and freedom, the University of the Federal District is born under a sacred sign by which it will struggle for the Brazil of tomorrow, faithful to the great liberal and human traditions of the Brazil of yesterday. (ibid.)

Groups which were against these ideals of freedom were quick to respond. Even before the official inauguration of the UDF, Alceu Amoroso Lima wrote to the then minister Capanema:

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Helena Isabel Mueller

The recent foundation of a Municipal University, with the appointment of certain heads of faculty who do not hide their communist ideals and preaching, was the last straw for the unease of the Catholics. Where does this path lead to? Will the government give its consent, against its will but under its protection, to prepare a new generation entirely impregnated with feelings which are totally contrary to the true Brazilian tradition and the true ideals of a healthy society?10

In this letter, Amoroso Lima continues by suggesting serious measures to combat communism. It should not be forgotten that Catholic discourse defended order, the hierarchy of authority, education guided by religious principles, an attack against liberal ideals, individualism, and freedom of information and thought. It was up to the state, according to the guidelines emanating from the authority bestowed on the Church, to close the UDF, thus eliminating the danger it represented for Brazilian society, which was conceived based on the ideals of tradition and Catholicism. In the same vein, for the federal government, the existence of the UDF represented indiscipline and disorder, since it was the Ministry of Education that should maintain order and discipline in the field of education. As can be seen, its actions were supported and inspired by the Catholic intellectuals. Alceu Amoroso Lima, at the time a fierce anticommunist and discretely enchanted by integralism, could be said to have been the main orchestrator of this battle against the UDF – principally against Anísio Teixeira. The university was closed and Anísio Teixeira, accused of being a communist, distanced himself from the public sphere for a time. Alceu became president of what was left of the UDF for a short period of time and incorporated its courses into the recently founded University of Brazil. The intellectuals that participated in the UDF experience were quick to respond as Mário de Andrade’s letter to Capanema shows:

I refuse to bow to the reasons given by you for this: I deeply regret that the only freer, more modern, more investigative place of teaching left in Brazil, after what you did to the Faculty of Philosophy and Literature of São Paulo, has been extin- guished. Even maintaining the current professors, the same spirit cannot be re- kindled in the University of Brazil. Liberty is fragile. It flees from pomp and the pompous and from top-heavy bureaucracy.11

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s

With this ultraconservative and excluding stance reflected in public policies strongly influenced by the Church, one of the most significant university projects in Brazil in the first half of the twentieth century was summarily ter- minated. Almost 30 years later, the University of Brasília (UnB) emerged leading to the return of Anísio Teixeira to the political scene in the company of Darcy Ribeiro. Once again the project faced the opposition of the Catholic Church, which again defended the construction of a Catholic university. However, those were different times. The UnB was just one of the projects of Juscelino Kubitschek’s cherished utopia– the construction of the Brazilian capital Brasília – and could not be replaced by another project. At the same time, the Catholic intellectuals had become diffuse and had therefore lost their political influence. Anísio Teixeira’s efforts to create autonomy were suffocated by the Vargas government with the precious collaboration of the Catholic intellectuals backed by the notion that everything emanates from the same root, which, without doubt, stems from Catholic religious activity. Heteronomy was necessary for the proper functioning of society. The Catholic Church would end up transforming its internal postulates: new times require new attitudes. However, its actions alongside the state did not wane, but rather continued through its constant, albeit passive, support for state policy, and its manifestations against specific policies in crucial moments, such as in the fight for the redemocratisation of Brazil after the 1964 coup.

REFERENCES

ALTAMIRANO, C. De la historia política a la historia intelectual: reactivaciones y renovaciones. Prismas, Revista de historia intelectual, Quilmes: Universidad de Quilmes, n.9, 2005. CANCIAN, R. Igreja Católica e ditadura militar no Brasil. São Paulo: Claridade, 2011. CAPELATO, M. H. Propaganda política e controle dos meios de comunicação. In: PANDOLFI, D. (Org.) Repensando o Estado Novo. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 1999. CASTORIADIS, C. Os intelectuais e a história. In: ______. As encruzilhadas do La- birinto. 3. A ascensão da insignificância. São Paulo: Paz e Terra, 2002. CASTORIADIS, C. Potere, política, autonomia. Volontà, Rivista Anarchica Trimes- trale, Milano, n.4, p.59-89, 1989. LENHARO, A. Sacralização da política. 2.ed. Campinas, SP: Papirus, 1986. MICELI, S. A elite eclesiástica brasileira: 1890-1930. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2009.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Helena Isabel Mueller

NUNES, C. Anísio Teixeira: a poesia em ação. Bragança Paulista, SP: Edusf, 2000. RODRIGUES, C. M. A Ordem: uma revista de intelectuais católicos (1934-1945). Belo Horizonte: Autêntica; São Paulo: Fapesp, 2005. RODRIGUES, H. O intelectual no campo cultural francês. Do Caso Dreyfus aos tempos atuais. Varia Historia, Belo Horizonte, v.21, n.34, p.395-413, jul. 2005. SCHWARTZMAN, S.; BOMENY, H.; COSTA, V. M. R. (Org.) Tempos de Capanema. São Paulo: Paz e Terra; Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 2000. SIRINELLI, J.-F.Os intelectuais. In: RÉMOND, R. Por uma história política. Trad. Dora Rocha. 2.ed. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. FGV, 2003. TEIXEIRA, A. Notas sobre a universidade. Coletânea de artigos publicados pelo jornal Folha de S. Paulo, jul.-ago. 1968. TERNES, J. Foucault, a escola, a imprudência de ensinar. In: KOHAN, W. O.; GON- DRA, J. (Org.) Foucault 80 anos. Belo Horizonte: Autêntica, 2006. p.93-104. VILLAÇA, A. C. O pensamento católico no Brasil. Rio de Janeiro: Zahar, 1975.

NOTES

1 CASTORIADIS, 1989: Il ruolo della religione è, in questo senso [a extensão da heterono- mia] centrale: fornisce la rappresentazione di questa sorgente e dei sui attributi, assicura che tutte le significazioni del mondo e delle cose umane scaturiscano dalla stessa origine, cemen- ta questa sicurezza attraverso la credenza, che gioca su delle componenti essenziali dello psichismo umano (p.77) ... Sarebbe cosi il político ad avere l’incarico di generare i rapporti degli umani tra loro e con il mondo, la rappresentazione della natura e del tempo, o il rap- porto tra potere e religione (p.73, author’s translation). 2 Here I seek to make a brief comment on the intellectual in historiography, without dwelling on theoretical-methodological discussions of different historiographical approaches, such as those adopted by Pocock, Skinner, La Capra and others. 3 This statement made by Sartre was taken from RODRIGUES, 2005. 4 Foucault, Dits et écrits, quoted in TERNES, 2006, p.95. 5 A Pastoral Letter is a letter which defines the actions of the Church and coordinates a series of activities which enable it to achieve its mission of announcing the word of God. The 1916 Pastoral Letter is Don Leme’s inaugural address to the Archdiocese of Olinda. 6 Apart from being an important clergyman in the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, Don Sebastião Leme was actively involved in politics. His inaugural address to the Archdiocese of Olinda provided the basis of the Pastoral Letter of 1916. In 1921, he returned to Rio de Janeiro, where he dedicated his time to organizing the lay movement in an attempt to intervene in the formation of the new institutional order though a combination of pressure and collaboration with the Vargas government to obtain concessions for the Church. He

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Active Catholic intellectuals in Brazil in the 1930s was an important figure, alongside the Catholic intellectuals, in shaping the relationship between the state and the Church. 7 Leafing through correspondence between Mário de Andrade and Manuel Bandeira, I found an interesting reference which suggests that the idea of Mário taking up the Catholic leadership was cogitated: “Striving to assign the role of successor to the Catholic leader Jackson de Figueiredo to Tristão de Athayde, Hamilton Nogueira (1897-1981) establishes in ‘Tristão de Athayde and the spiritual route of a generation’ an ideological counterpoint, with MA on one pole: ‘If you observe his [Athayde’s] intellectual evolution a tendency towards unity, synthesis and hierarchization is always evident’. [In MA], in contrast, one can see dispersion ... a veritable atomization of reality which distances itself more and more from the truth that he seeks” (Correspondence between Mário de Andrade & Manuel Ban- deira, org. Marcos A. de Moraes, São Paulo: IEB/Edusp, 2000, p.491). Although mere spe- culation on my part, I thought it interesting. 8 Architecture in Brazil during this period attracted the attention of internationally renowned architects such as Le Corbusier who, on a journey from Rio de Janeiro to Buenos Ai- res, was impressed by the work of Brazilian architects, including Lúcio Costa and the newcomer Oscar Niemeyer. Later, he said that he was fascinated with the suave features of Brazilian architecture and collaborated in the design of the Cultural Palace. 9 Apud SCHWARTZMAN; BOMENY; COSTA, 2000, p.227. 10 Apud NUNES, 2000, p.320. 11 Apud SCHWARTZMAN; BOMENY; COSTA, 2000, p.100.

Article received on March 31, 2012. Approved on December 12, 2014.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19

A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’: on the border between the political, intellectual, and religious spheres A revista A Ordem e o “flagelo comunista”: na fronteira entre as esferas política, intelectual e religiosa

Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira*

Resumo Abstract Nos anos 1920, durante o período da In the 1920’s, during the Neo-Christiani- neocristandade, surgiu uma das mais ty period, one of the most influential influentes gerações de líderes leigos ca- generations of Catholic lay leaders in the tólicos na história da América Latina, history of Latin America was centered reunidos em torno do Centro Dom Vi- around the Dom Vital Center. The main tal. O principal núcleo de irradiação das source for spreading the ideas of this ideias do grupo católico foi a revista (de group was the monthly magazine A Or- periodicidade mensal) A Ordem, lança- dem, launched in 1921. The main objec- da em 1921. A proposta deste artigo é tive of this paper was to present the core apresentar os elementos centrais utiliza- elements used by secular elites to under- dos pelas elites leigas para solapar o pro- mine the communist project, such as the jeto comunista, tais como: a noção de notion of private property, the question propriedade privada, a questão da orga- of the organization of society and the nização da sociedade e a comparação comparison between communism/reli- entre comunismo e crenças religiosas. gious beliefs. The concept of ‘intellectual’ Entende-se aqui o conceito de “intelec- is understood in a broader sense, specifi- tuais” num sentido amplo, referindo-se cally referring to the role played by eccle- mais especificamente ao papel desem- siastical layers in the struggle for su- penhado pelas camadas eclesiásticas na premacy, in the political, intellectual and luta por supremacia no campo político, even the ‘religious’ fields. intelectual e mesmo “religioso”. Keywords: catholicism; communism; Palavras-chave: catolicismo; comunis- “visions of the world”. mo; “visões de mundo”.

* Universidade Estadual do Paraná (Unespar), campus Paranaguá. Paranaguá, PR, Brasil. Doutorando em História Social, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ). Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69013 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira

We need to confront communism as a complete denial of Christ and the Church and not as a temporary phenomenon which only affects our material interests or our social positions. Its danger is much more profound. Tristão de Ataíde

One of the great challenges of this paper is to trace new analytical parameters about the relations between intellectuals and society in Brazil in the 1930s. Based on defined theoretical and methodological criteria, it is proposed to look at the intellectual field following the indications of Karl Mannheim and Pierre Bourdieu. Noting that all the individuals in a determined ‘field’ share a certain number of fundamental interests, the question thereby consists of the following: did anti-communism serve as one of the principal means of galvanizing the Catholic intelligentsia, allowing the latter’s action in the political process at that time?1 The notion of ‘field’ is related to the space of relations between distinct social positions, the space of dispute, and the game of power. According to Bourdieu, society is composed of various fields, various spaces gifted with relative autonomy, but governed by their own rules. Nevertheless, he argues that there are general laws of fields (laws of invariant functioning), such as, for example, among the political, philosophical, and religious fields. In effect, “we know that in any field we discover a struggle, whose specific forms have to be investigated in each case, between the new which tries to break the locks of the law of entrance and the dominant who tries to defend monopoly and exclude competition” (Bourdieu, 2003, p.119-120). We start with the premise that that it is only in a very limited sense that individuals create for themselves a manner of talking and thinking. In general, they speak the language of their group and as a result think in the way their group thinks. Each individual is “predetermined in a dual sense by the fact of growing up in a society: they find, on the one hand, a defined situation and, on the other, discover in this situation previously formed patterns of thought and conduct” (Mannheim, 1982, p.31). The Sociology of Knowledge seeks to understand thought in a concrete context of a historical and social situation, since human thought does not emerge and operate in a social vacuum, but in a defined social environment. Individuals in groups either make an effort, according to the character and position of the groups to which they belong, to transform the world of nature and society around it, or, to the contrary, they try to maintain it in a given

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’ situation. In summary, “the direction of this collective will of transforming and maintaining is what produces the guiding thread for the emergence of its problems, its concepts, and its forms of thought” (ibid., p.31-32). However, it is important to emphasize that I use the word intelligentsia for the social groups whose specific task consists of giving society an interpretation of the world.2 In other words, I call intellectuals those groups who claim a monopoly on the right to preach, teach, and interpret the world. According to Mannheim, from the sociological perspective the decisive factor in modern times, in contrast with the situation in the Middle Ages, was the breaking of the monopoly of ecclesiastical interpretation of the world, “maintained by the sacerdotal caste, while there emerged in the place of a strata of closed and entirely organized intellectuals a free intelligentsia” (ibid., p.39-40). Furthermore: concomitant to the liberation of intellectuals from the rigorous organization of the Church, other forms of interpreting the world were being increasingly recognized. Belonging to a determined group goes much beyond bonds of loyalty, obedience, and birth, principally “because we see the world and certain things in the world in the same way that the group sees them (in other words, in terms of the meanings of the group in question). Each concept, each concrete meaning, contains a crystallization of the experiences of a certain group” (ibid., p.49). I would like to turn now to something important to me: how to interpret the struggle between the intellectuals linked to the magazine A Ordem and communists in the period in question? It is important to emphasize that every political conflict, as a rationalized form of struggle for social predominance, aims to weaken the social status of opponents, its public prestige, and self- confidence (ibid., p.65). Can it be denied that those involved in the magazine in question assumed as a group ‘intellectual arms,’ such as refuting as on the theoretical plan their opponents and equally undermining their social position? In the words of Karl Mannheim:

Only in a world in transformation, in which new fundamental values are being created and the old ones are being destroyed, can intellectual conflict reach the point where the antagonists seek to annihilate not only the specific beliefs and attitudes of each other, but equally the intellectual foundations on which these beliefs and attitudes are based. (Mannheim, 1982, p.90)

According to Mannheim, there exists among all groups of intellectuals a ‘sociological connection of unification,’ namely, education. In other words,

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira

“participation in a common cultural inheritance progressively tends to suppress differences of birth, status, profession, and wealth, and unite learned individuals based on the education received” (Mannheim, 1982, p.180-181). Nevertheless, it is social groups (and not the isolated individual) who formulate the theories corresponding both to their interests and to determined situations, since in each specific situation forms of thinking and possibilities of orientation are discovered. Only to the extent that these “structurally condition collective forces continue to exist beyond the duration of an isolated historic situation, is that theories and possibilities of orientation linger” (ibid., p.200). Aware of the moral connotation present in the term ideology, Mannheim postulates the use of the term perspective to designate the global mode of the subject conceiving things, as determined by their historical and social context (ibid., p.287-288). Another central postulate of the Sociology of Knowledge is related to the link between the orientation of certain values and meanings and a given position in the social structure (the way of seeing and the attitude conditioned by collective purposes of a group). As Bourdieu accurately observed, the production of the representations of the social world – conceived as a fundamental dimension of politics – is a quasi-monopoly of intellectuals, since the “struggle for social classifications is a capital dimension of the class struggle and it is through this side that symbolic production intervenes in the political struggle” (Bourdieu, 2003, p.66). he also says that the intellectual is the one who holds the monopoly of production of discourse about the social world. The concept of field proposed by Bourdieu allows the group of intellectuals who gravitated around the Catholic magazine A Ordem and the Dom Vital Center to be worked with accurately, to the extent that the conflict between clergy and communists should be seen as a struggle for supremacy in the political and intellectual fields. It should be emphasized that an author does not connect directly to society, but rather through the structure of an intellectual field, which functions as a type of mediator between the author and society. What is at play in the structure of a field, Bourdieu argues (2003, p.120), “is a state of relations of power between the agents or the institutions involved in the struggle, or if preferred, the distribution of the specific capital, which accumulated in previous struggles orientates later strategies.” To complete the theoretical framework of Bordieu all that is left is to present the concept of habitus,3 understood here as the mental structures through which individuals learn their social world. Habitus is like a cultural matrix which predisposes individuals to make choices.4 This notion allows the

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’ assessment of the propensity of a given social group to select responses from a specific cultural repertoire, in compliance with the demands of a given field or a given context. By constructing a theory of practices, the sociologist allows the possibility of rethinking the process of collective identity formation, since the concept in question emphasizes the nature of interdependence between individual and society. Roughly speaking, habitus should be seen as a system of (structured/structuring) dispositions acquired through learning (implicit or explicit) which functions as a system of strategy generating schemes. Like religious, artistic, or scientific habitus, Bourdieu asserts, political habitus assumes a special preparation. Nevertheless, in the first place,

all the learning necessary to acquire the corpus of specific knowledge (theories, problematics, concepts, historical traditions, economic data, etc.) produced and accumulated through the political work of the professionals in the present and past, or in the most general capacities such as the dominion of a certain language and certain political rhetoric, that of the tribune, indispensable in relations with the profane, or that of debating, necessary in relations among professionals. (Bourdieu, 2001, p.169-170)

In this perspective, the greater part of the actions of social agents are the product of a meeting between habitus (‘incorporated structures’) and field (‘objective structures’). Put simply, habitus, as a structured and general set of collective representations, interiorized in individuals, is constituted in specific historical and cultural conditions, and equally in distinct social spaces, such as family, school, work, etc.

The place of the Catholic intelligentsia in the fight against communism

Analyzing the Brazilian intellectual field, Daniel Pécaut emphasizes that the notion of engagement obtained success, especially at the end of the 1950s, when the idea was voluntary adhesion to popular causes. In the particular context of the 1930s, Pécaut says, Brazilian intellectuals had ties with the Social Sciences, above all Sociology, which indicates both the “discourse that Brazil makes about itself” and the “position that the intellectual occupies in the process of creating the Brazilian nation” (Pécaut, 1990, p.7). He also says that from the thinkers of the 1930s, who outlined in great detail the scheme of good social organization, to those of 1955, who imagined correct development, “all thought

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira themselves equally persuaded that they only expressed what the social actually is, and what actually is development – being convinced that ideas directly commanded historic duty” (ibid., p.8). One of Pécaut’s central theses lies in the affirmation that the two generations of Brazilian intellectuals, that of 1920-1940 as well as of 1954-1964, manifested the conviction that they had an essential responsibility for the process of the construction of nationality. Even with an interval of 30 years, both achieved a notable social impact and furthermore effectively contributed to impose new ‘representations of the political.’ Nevertheless, in relation to intellectuals in 1920s-1940s, specifically concerned with the problem of national identity and institutions, he proposes some nuances in the analysis:

It is true that not all intellectuals from the time shared the same political concepts. Many sympathized with the various authoritarian movements that emerged after the 1930s, or later adhered to the Estado Novo created in 1937. Others kept their distance from this question. The large majority, however, agreed with the rejection of representative democracy and the strengthening of the functions of the state. They also heeded the priority of national imperative and adhered, whether explicitly or not, to a hierarchical vision of social order. Despite their discordances, they converged on the demand of a status of a ruling elite, in defense of the idea that there was no other path to progress except by acting ‘on top of’ and ‘giving form’ to society. (Pécaut, 1990, p.15)

Between 1922 and 1928, Jackson de Figueiredo did not restrict the actions of the Dom Vital Center solely to an intellectual and religious base, but rather sought to imprint on it a political character (albeit a non-party one) in defense of authority, or order and nationalism. In this period, the history of the Center is confused with the political position of its founder, not to mention its very timid actions, far from reaching a large-scale public. After the death of Jackson de Figueiredo in 1928, Alceu Amoroso Lima assumed the presidency of the Center and moved away from political activism.5 To a great extent the reasons for the great prestige enjoyed both by the A Ordem magazine and the Dom Vital Center, notably in the 1935-1938 period, should be sought and even explained in light of the confluence of its objectives with the authoritarian tendencies of the political model of the Vargas administration. Therefore, in the 1920s the Catholic elite concentrated their efforts on the struggle against the strengthening of the lay state, the advance of Protestantism, and the inertia of the Catholic group, as well as leading the Church back to the

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’ center of national political decisions. For a large part of the ruling elite of Catholicism in Brazil it was inconceivable that in a country with a Catholic majority the Church “had forsaken the center of political decisions, occupying an obscure role in the middle of an intelligentsia increasingly based on scien- tificism and anticlericalism” (Groppo, 2007, p.33). It is in this sense that the magazine, prepared by Catholic intellectuals and aimed at them, placed itself as the guardian of Catholic ideas and as an instrument to fight against those identified as enemies. The key question proposed by Cândido Rodrigues is this: to what extent did the magazine incorporate aspects of conservative ideas in its discourse? For this he draws on the thought of the Irish politician Edmund Burke (1729- 1797), one of the first critics of the developments of the French Revolution:

Formulating a conception of history based on the tradition which, in turn, was founded on the principle of authority (which Burke understood as sacralized by tradition), he adopted it (authority) as a parameter for the proper functioning of society. This should inevitably be based on the true legacies of ancestors, including and fundamentally the religions considered as true, such as the inviolability of private property, principally royal and clerical, the primacy of the hereditary monarchy, the sanctity of the king and queen, etc. (Rodrigues, 2005, p.17)

In relation to this, Rodrigues emphasizes that the defense of the authority of monarchs, the papacy, and the clergy, made by Burke and other thinkers in opposition to the religious freedom and the ‘Rights of Man’ propounded in the French Revolution, was in line with the conservative and anti-liberal policy of the Roman Curia, adopted since the middle of the eighteenth century. In effect, the ideas opposed to the developments of the French Revolution also foundation resonance in other thinkers, such as Louis-Ambroise de Bonald (1754- 1840) and Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821). In the context of the implementation of the Spanish republican regime, he highlights the leading place occupied by the Catholic philosopher and politician Juan Donoso Cortés (1808-1853), for whom Catholicism was a ‘medicine’ against revolution (read disorder). Actually, according to Rodrigues, these thinkers – who actively participated in the European scenario from the end of the eighteenth century to the second half of the nineteenth – had a decisive role in relation to questions of a politico-religious nature, “serving as reference in the period which they lived and even later, not only for the Catholic Church, but

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira also for thinkers and governments who, later, used their ideas in the foundations of regimes of force, arbitrary ones” (Rodrigues, 2005, p.20). It is important to highlight that both A Ordem and the Dom Vital Center (1922) “emerged in a social context in which an increasingly agnostic cosmovi- sion tends to be adopted. The struggle which the Catholic intelligentsia waged is in the sense of legitimating itself before this society, combating its political and religious errors” (Velloso, 1978, p.120-121). It should be highlighted that the article by Mônica Velloso was one of the first works to call attention for the affinities between ‘conservative’ European thought6 – represented by names such as Donoso Cortés, Charles Maurras, Joseph de Maistre, and Antonio Sardinha – and the discourse produced by the Catholic intelligentsia, providing a foundation for its ideological counterattack against the attacks of other as- cendant social groups, which had new ‘ideologies.’ In effect, during the 1920s Brazilian intellectuals sought a re-approximation with the state, a process which deepened after the 1930 Revolution. Thus, “there was no significant split between the Brazilian state and authoritarian intellectuals,” but rather “a strong tendency of the state to coopt figures from the intellectual field of various ideological types” (Beired, 1999, p.67). In turn, the intellectuals developed strategies to enter the state apparatus, a fact which denotes a mutual correspondence of interests.

The question of private property and the organization of society

In relation to A Ordem’s articles/editorials, it is interesting to note the confluence of themes dealt with by this Catholic group, notably those of a political and religious nature. However, it is intended here to explore those articles which generally speaking highlight the clash between Catholics and communists, in other words between two ‘visions of the world,’ in the political, intellectual, and even the ‘religious’ field. Karl Mannheim, one of the pioneers of the ‘sociology of intellectuals,’ was the first to demonstrate that competition controls not only economic activity through market mechanisms, the course of events of the political and social sphere, but equally, “provides the driving impulse of various interpretations of the world which, when the social foundations are discovered, are revealed as intellectual expressions of the conflicting groups fighting for power” (Mannheim, 1982, p.290).

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’

The paper will be organized around two central thematic points: the question of private power and the organization of society. It should be clear to readers that we see the intellectuals linked to the Dom Vital Center and to A Ordem to be one of the principal agents – alongside ecclesiastical authorities – charged with the mission of mobilizing (in a long-lasting manner) the largest possible number of social actors gifted with the same vision of the social world. Nevertheless, in relation to the communists, the inverse reading cannot be discarded. Let me explain myself: with the purpose of guaranteeing a long-lasting mobilization, parties should “prepare and impose a representation of the social world capable of obtaining the adhesion of the greatest possible number of citizens.” Furthermore: “conquering positions (whether of power or not) capable of assuring power over his attributaries [sic]” (Bourdieu, 2001, p.174). In summary, the approach proposed by Pierre Bourdieu is based on supporting the following assertion: if, one the one hand, we cannot deny the specific properties of a ‘field,’ on the other we must recognize the “homologous structures” among the various ‘fields,’ such as the Church and the political parties.7 It was during the papacy of Leo XIII (1878-1903) that the Church began to formulate a more progressive social doctrine, especially after Rerum Novarum in 1891. This document marked the late acceptance of the modern world by the Church after its open fight against modernization during a good part of the nineteenth century (Mainwaring, 1989, p.43). Taking into account that the role of the Roman Pontiffs was always to “preserve the flock of the Lord against the wiles of the enemy,” Leo XIII underlined that the right of property, supported on the precepts of natural and divine law, guaranteed the tranquility of public and domestic society. Against Catholic teaching, socialists had conceived the right of property “as a human invention which was repug- nant to the natural equally of men.” Proposing the “communism of goods,” their supporters declared that “it is impossible to patiently deal with poverty,” and in this way the property and privileges of the rich should be violated with impunity (Leão XIII, 1946, p.12). In the Encyclical Rerum Novarum, Leo XIII emphasizes that in the wake of the socialist proposal for the suppression of private property would come the attempt to instigate among the most needy a type of envious hatred. As well as being an unjust measure, especially because it violated the legitimate rights of property owners, it contaminated the functions of the state, compromising all of the social edifice. One of the demands preached by socialism, namely, the conversion of private property into collective property, “would have no other impact than to make the situation of workers more precarious,

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira removing from them the free use of their wages and stealing from them, for this reason, all the hope and possibility of enlarging their assets and improving their situation” (Leão XIII, 1945, p.6). In the same way, according to the Supreme Pontiff, the fruit of labor belongs to the laborer and the private and personal ownership of goods should be considered a natural right, in other words, an innate right of each individual. By appealing to what the Pope called the ‘providence of the state,’ socialists were going against natural justice and breaking family ties. Furthermore, in the place of such acclaimed equality, the socialist solution would result in equality of indigence and misery. Without the support of religion – “fundamental for all social laws” – and the ecclesiastical institution – “the common mother of rich and poor” – it would be impossible to find an effective solution for social conflicts. In relation to the problem of the social question, the Church’s project prescribed union between social classes, inculcating in the poor resignation and in the rich Christian charity. Exercising its authority, the state was responsible for taking care of the common good, so that by “repress- ing agitators, it would preserve good workers from the danger of seduction and the legitimate employers from being stripped of what was theirs” (Leão XIII, 1945, p.28).

On the frontier between the political, intellectual, and religious spheres

In the reading of Marx and Engels, religion is “an expression of an imperfect consciousness of the being of man: not man as an abstract individual, but as a social man, or a collective human being.”8 Stated in another manner, while for the former religion can be defined as the “illusory felicity of the people,” for the latter, it is the “fantastic projection of forces which obscure human existence.” In effect, this declared anti-theist posture “was converted into the habitual language of communist publications and leaders. A notable ideological attitude which had significant repercussions on the judicial system and especially on the practice of the communist method” (Cifuentes, 1989, p.111). In the Soviet Union under Stalin, the eradication of religious beliefs – seen as an “obstacle to human progress” – was the fruit of the ideology of the suppression of alienations (Rivière, 1989, p.102). Following Marxist thought, it became necessary to reduce the strong influence (negative in this case) exercised by religion on the parts of the working class who had not reached class consciousness.

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’

Producing a type of synthesis of the socio-historical context of the inter- war period, Tristão de Ataíde9 raised a set of questions which indicated this effort: “Where are we?”; “Where are we going?”; “Where should we go?” (Ataíde, 1935, p.103). He believed that it was possible to define in a single phrase the condition of modern man: being at a crossroads. One of the principal anguishes which deeply worried him was generalized feeling of instability. To the extent that he moved away from the paradigm of medieval and Christian unity, “to deliver himself to the sign of liberty and of undefined and unlimited diversity, – man also lost a sense of responsibility and security” (ibid.). Ataíde believed that societies governed by “the whim of the vote, force, or money” should be regarded with reservation, since “they are always subject to the law of the unexpected and transformation” (ibid.). Some social phenomena could thus be seen as the principal factors in the desegregation of bourgeois society and its general conception of life:10 ‘War,’ ‘Revolution,’ ‘Crisis,’ and ‘Nationalist Reaction.’ Rather than choosing between a ‘catastrophic vision’ and an ‘idyllic vision’ of social reality, Alceu Amoroso Lima preferred to move away from this di- chotomy. According to him, what was fundamental was indicating the four paths which could lead to the building of a ‘New Age,’ “towards which everyone confusingly feels the humanity of our day is heading:” the ‘liberal path’ (primacy of individual liberty/predominance of the bourgeoisie); the ‘socialist path’ (abolition of private property/hypertrophy of the state11/annihilation of the bourgeoisie/dictatorship of the proletariat); the ‘national-totalitarian path’ (“national and authoritarian reaction against the desegregation provoked by the excesses of liberalism and socialism”); and the ‘Christian path’ (“has a moral force and operates on consciences”). Having said this, the first three paths translated one of the indelible marks of the modern world: “the spirit of diversity.” Lima’s thesis is that the twentieth century, after almost three decades in terms of socio-political organization, no longer housed “pure regimes,”12 to the contrary, it was headed to the agglutination of various tendencies (“mixed regimes”). Despite having aspects of “reciprocal hostility and disorder,” the three currents revealed positive traits, such as: 1) Increasing intervention of the state in social life; 2) Gradual incorporation of the economic by the political; 3) Limited remuneration due to collective needs (the capitalist economy exclusively based on the concept of profit being replaced by an economy in which the individual is subordinated to the collectivity as a part of the whole); 4) Corporate organization of society (growing importance of trade unions as

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira professional defense bodies and their gradual incorporation in the political organism of the state); 5) Importance of technical factors (dominion of man over nature as the fruit of material and scientific progress); 6) Social justice (assuring men a minimum in terms of the satisfactory of their individual and family necessities). Establishing who was the enemy was as important for individuals as for the state, with the example of the sick who conferred relevance on the diagnosis of a ‘obscure ailment.’ After the November 1935 risings (which occurred in Natal, Recife, and Rio de Janeiro), the communists convinced “many sceptics of the imminence of a social danger which had successfully adopted the tactic of dis- simulation, to mislead the unwary.”13 At the same time, talking about ‘communism’ was nothing other than dealing with the ‘exotic subject,’ since these episodes marked the appearance of the question on the political agenda. Deepening a little his perspective of the communist phenomenon – synonym of ‘social infection’ –, Alceu Amoroso Lima analyzed the implications of the connections between the school space, the Party, and the state in the construction of pedagogical practices in Soviet Russia.14 What did communism prescribe for education? A principle dear to ‘Soviet pedagogy’ was that “all education is a means of achieving a superior purpose. In other words, teaching and education did not have in themselves their reason of being and are governed by a determined extrinsic purpose” (Lima, 1936, p.320). According to specialists, the ultimate aim of this project was “to construct the new man and give him a general vision of the universe; the short-term purpose is to prepare the paladins of socialism” (ibid.). In summary, the school functioned (through the re-education of youths, adults, and children) as a space reserved for the building of a new “philosophy of life,” better said, another “vision of the world.” Once the role of the institution was defined as a political instrument at the service of communist ideals, the state assumed complete control of all educational activities. In the words of Alceu Amoroso Lima, the success of communism as a social transformation project depended both on ‘elites’ and ‘masses.’ Since this education was to be conceived for a single predetermined end, “no other authority in this question could be tolerated apart from the state, and, more than this, it was the Party which provided the state not only with its ideology, but also its human elements” (Lima, 1936, p.321-322). To prove his honesty, Alceu Amoroso Lima states, the intellectual should not combat communism only by pointing out its fiascos. Equally analyzing its successes, he must distance himself both from the “distortion of facts” and of “value criteria.” An incontestable fact was the importance given by the Soviet

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’ state to education, especially due to the intimate alliance established between the field of politics and that of teaching practices. Furthermore, placing the school at the service of the state implied “the systematic and broad ranging preparation of new generations in a uniform direction according to a pre-established plan... completely rigorous and even militarily subordinated to the interests of the Party and the aims of the Social Revolution” (Lima, 1936, p.329). In this way, the Catholic intelligentsia was responsible for repudiating “Soviet pedagogy,” since this was affiliated to the “dogmatic principles of the materialist philosophy of life and society” (ibid., p.330). In summary, what should the posture of Catholics be towards the communist problem? What worried Alceu Amoroso Lima was the very remote possibility of reconciliation between communism and Catholicism. For him, the attitude of Catholics should be summarized as ‘repulsion by conviction.’ Although certain points are analogous to the two proposals for the organization of the state (such as: professional trade unions; limitation of property; planning of economic life by the state), the Church “always reserved the special rights of personality and social groups, especially the family, against all and any absorption by the state” (Lima, 1936a, p.346-347). Calling attention to the difficulty in comprehending the communist phenomena in its totality, Alceu Amoroso Lima argues that the anti-religious elements of the Marxist-Leninist system is only one part of the doctrine. Actually, this “general philosophy of life” was, at the same time, “a philosophical, historical, political, economic, pedagogical, masonic, Jewish phenomenon, etc., and not only, or even principally, religious” (Lima, 1936a, p.348-349). Nevertheless, according to the author, dealing with it in a manner that is somewhat ‘bluntly,’ without taking into account its ramifications and its extensive and complex origins, could reduce it only to “an expression of the Anti-Christ or to a Jewish- Masonic campaign against the Church” (ibid., p.349), something which is not sustainable. Next, he records that Lenin erred by conjecturing about the possibility of the Russian Revolution extending its ideals in a few years to all of humanity, “some of his adversaries also erred, judging it to be a phenomenon that was merely Russian or ephemeral, which was remain where it had emerged and would only last a short while” (ibid., p.351). Lima, a Brazilian Catholic lay person, sees communism as “the ultimate logical consequence of the most monstrous errors of the modern world, in the inversion of all values, the dehumanization of the world, and the de-Christian- ization of society” (Lima, 1936a, p.353). Seen as the direct heir of ‘individualism,’ communism had found a shelter in the intellectual field thanks to the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira

“terrible sequence of errors which since the Middle Ages had led man to repu- diate God” (ibid.). According to Alceu Amoroso Lima, it is in the “terrain of principles,” fundamentally that the combat had to be concentrated, since the communist ideology “channeled to itself all the small or large anti-Christian or anti-spiritual current which humanity has let proliferate in its breast...” (ibid.). In the section ‘Register,’ the journalist Perilo Gomes presented a report about what was offered to workers in the Soviet Union. According to Gomes, all workers who wanted to obtain a job enlisted through an official government agency, responsible for this area. Of those indicated to a position only one would be chosen; who would undergo a period of 15 days experience, “without other pay than the ‘bread card,’ in other words an authorization to receive a certain quantity of bread for free” (Gomes, 1935, p.245). If he corresponded to the expectations of his employer the worker would be obliged to accept the pay established in the official table, whose value was lower than the cost of living. Refused twice by the employer, the worker would lose the right to enjoy the ‘bread card,’ being evicted from his dwelling, which would lead to penury. The loss of assistance provided by the agency would also lead the individual to another drastic consequence: being considered as dead. In short, his name would not even appear on the list of unemployed. For Perilo Gomes, the Russian government used this trick the reduce the numbers of those ‘without work’ and simultaneously maintain unblemished the reputation of the communist regime.15 The report of the French Jesuit bishop Miguel d’Herbigny – president of the Pro-Russia Commission and honorary president of the Pontifical Oriental Institute – on the religious persecutions carried out by the Bolsheviks also endorsed the thesis that the state had acquired increasingly ‘totalitarian’ traits, to the extent that it concentrated absolute power capable of monitoring any activity carried out by citizens. In turn, it also highlighted the attempt of the Soviet communists to suppress religion and religiosity of individuals or groups through the socialization of the constitutional order, favoring the creation of a new loyalty to the state (Rivière, 1989, p.22). In a mission at the service of the Holy See,16 the prelate found that more than 90 percent of the Russian population was composed of peasants and less than 10 percent of urban residents. In the vision of those in charge of the magazine, socialism had as its principal attraction the promise of the ‘Earthly Paradise,’ granting material happiness to its supporters and to the “millions of misfortunates which liberalism produced, the plutocracy sustains, misery revolts, and irreligion incites,” while

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’ since it “corresponds to this great promise of the universal vengeance of the oppressed against the oppressor, the new destructive force of the current social system has been gaining social force.”17 According to Luiz Sucupira, the horror which socialists had of private property was generally speaking closely linked to how Marx had appropriated the intellectual inventions of others, such as the theory of surplus value attributed to Proudhon.18 In his analysis, Luiz Sucupira argues that in the socialist movement, in addition to the components of ‘prophetism’ and ‘messianism,’ a type of twisted plagiary of the Gospels, since for Marx and Engels, “humanity was heading to an absolutely free future, without oppression, without inequities, without class divisions, without national antagonisms, without government despotisms, without distinctions of race, without social compressions,” (Sucupira, 1937, p.614). In turn, communism had as an underlying promise perfect happiness, in other word the ‘earthly paradise,’ while the ‘old man’ of the past was transformed into the ‘new man’ of tomorrow, the conductor of his history.19 Taking into account that socialism denied freedom of conscience, the adepts of this new ‘church’ were like ‘serfs’ subservient to the dictates of its leaders. According to Sucupira, the cult of Lenin, for example, pushed itself as a vital necessity for the individual. At the limit, those who refused to pay rever- ence to the ‘communist messiah’ incurred the risk of losing their employment and even the bread distributed by the state.20 The reports of travelers who had in loco Soviet experience became one of the most important sources for the Catholic group. In the book Retour de l’U.R.S.S., the observations of the. French writer André Gide (1869-1951) call attention:

I doubt that in any other country, even in the Germany of Hitler, was the spirit less free, more curved, more fearful (and terrorized), more enslaved.... In the USSR it must be admitted now and once and for all, in relation to everything and whatever, there could not be more than one opinion. Every morning Pravda taught what should be known, what should be thought, and what should be believed.21

Another relevant testimony was given by the US writer Max Eastman (1883-1969), a former professor of Philosophy of Columbia University (New York) and editor of the journal Masses. A socialist activist, Eastman had stated that the Bolshevik regime had thrown away any remnants of libertarian ideas, undermining the hope of the construction of a classless society. According to

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira the transcription of his report, the Soviet Union was marked by the “concentration of political power and privileges in the hands of a bureaucratic caste, who supported a more ruthless autocrat than the Czars. This bureaucracy is still called the Communist Party.”22 For the Catholic intelligentsia, these and other statements, such as the former US activist and worker, Andrew Smith, entitled “I was a worker in the USSR,” proved the thesis that Russia was still far from becoming the long dreamed of ‘paradise’ of the working classes. The Ukrainian philosopher Nicolai Berdiaev (1874-1948) became one of the most important theoretical references for the Catholic intelligentsia in the discussion involving the tenuous line which separated communism from religious beliefs. According to Berdiaev, the hostility demonstrated by Russian Communism towards all religion was not the fruit of chance, but a fundamental part of its ‘concept of the world.’ The edification of communist ideas, Berdiaev stated, was characterized by “extreme statism, in which total, absolute power demanded the obligatory unification of thought” (Berdiaev, 1939, p.201-202). The opposition to all types of religion came from the fact that communism aimed to replace Christianity, both by responding to the religious aspirations of the human soul and giving a meaning to life. From this perspective conflict with other religious doctrines was inevitable, since the components of intoler- ance and fanaticism belonged to the universe of communist belief. According to Marxist thought, for the working class to achieve its emancipation it would be necessary to “tear all religious feeling from the heart.” At the limit, “the Church should be separated from social life, buried in the enclosure of conscience, to seek through a policy of progressive extinction, its total destruction” (Cifuentes, 1989, p.112). According to Berdiaev, the true and full communist could never be a religious believer or Christian. Since there is imposed on him “a concept of the world defined beforehand, he has to be materialist and atheist, a militant atheist. It is not enough to share the social program of communism to become a member of the party. It is necessary to accept this faith, in opposition to the Christian faith, in which communism essentially resides” (Berdiaev, 1939, p.211).

Final Considerations

It is worth noting that although the idealization of the Soviet Union did not accompany the realities of Soviet socialism, this process “fed the imagination of the building of this new world.” In this aspect, like the Catholic Church

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’

– personified by Rome –, communism in the twentieth century was characterized by its universal dimension and by the unity of its organization. However, it has to be highlighted that the analogy in question had its limits, since while the Catholic Church tried to administer, with greater or lesser, success, the diversity of religious experiences (the multiplicity of groups which composed it, the heterogeneity of positions adopted), the international communist system only managed to survive by progressively closing itself, frequently eliminating all open and implicit contestation, whether veiled or potential. In the countries where communist parties held political power, for example, “a repressive police apparatus was developed, using all forms of physical violence (internment camps arbitrary arrests, murders, torture, forced confessions, etc.), on a scale without precedent” (Dreyfus, 2004, p.14-15). Nevertheless, reactionary rhetoric and anticommunism, present throughout the Western world, contributed to associate Stalinism and Nazism (single party, single ideology, desire to annihilate civil society, exercise of power through terror) and, equally, to affirm a comparative tendency in recent studies of communism.23 However, what calls attention in this debate is the absence of any attempt to underline what distinguishes communism from fascist and democratic regimes, namely, “the utopia of political power effectively exercised by the lower classes, by the more numerous groups of society, by the groups with less material and cultural resources” (Dreyfus, 2004, p.16). Finally, historians must not neglect other dimensions of the communist phenomena (national and international, political and social, emancipatory and repressive), reducing the history of communism – through value judgements and political prejudice – to a ‘criminal adventure’ and/or a conspiracy of agents and spies at the service of Moscow.

REFERENCES

ARENDT, Hannah. Da Revolução. Trad. Fernando Didimo Vieira. 2.ed. São Paulo: Ática, 1990. ATAÍDE, Tristão de. A Idade Nova e a Ação Católica. A Ordem, Rio de Janeiro, ago. 1935. BEIRED, José Luis Bendicho. Sob o signo da nova ordem: intelectuais autoritários no Brasil e na Argentina (1914-1945). São Paulo: Loyola, 1999. BELOCH, Israel et al. Dicionário histórico-biográfico brasileiro. 1930-1983. v.3. Rio de Janeiro: Forense, 1983.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira

BERDIAEV, Nicolai. Las fuentes y el sentido do comunismo russo. Trad. Vicente Men- devil. Buenos Aires: Losada, 1939. BOTTOMORE, Tom (Ed.) Dicionário do pensamento marxista. Trad. Antonio Mon- teiro Guimarães. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar, 1996. BOURDIEU, Pierre. A representação política: elementos para uma teoria do campo político. In: ______. O poder simbólico. Trad. Fernando Tomaz. 4.ed. Rio de Janei- ro: Bertrand Brasil, 2001. p.169-170. BOURDIEU, Pierre. Algumas propriedades dos campos. In: ______. Questões de So- ciologia. Trad. Miguel Serras Pereira. Lisboa: Fim de Século Ed., 2003. BOURDIEU, Pierre. Razões práticas: sobre a teoria da ação. Trad. Mariza Corrêa. 9.ed. Campinas, SP: Papirus, 2008. CIFUENTES, Rafael Llano. Relações entre a Igreja e o Estado comunista. In: ______. Relações entre a Igreja e o Estado: a Igreja e o Estado à luz do Vaticano II, do Código de Direito Canônico de 1983 e da Constituição Brasileira de 1988. 2.ed. Rio de Janeiro: J. Olympio Ed., 1989. COURTOIS, Stéphane et al. O livro negro do comunismo: crimes, terror e repressão. Trad. Caio Meira. 4.ed. Rio de Janeiro: Bertrand Brasil, 2005. DREYFUS, Michel [et al.]. O século dos comunismos: depois da ideologia e da propaganda uma visão serena e rigorosa. Lisboa: Notícias, 2004. EASTMAN, Max. Reflections on the failure of socialism. New York: The Devin-Adair Company, 1955. FERREIRA, Jorge. Prisioneiros do mito: cultura e imaginário político dos comunistas no Brasil (1930-1956). Niterói, RJ: Ed. UFF; Rio de Janeiro: Mauad, 2002. GIDE, André. Retour de l’URSS. Paris: Gallimard, 1936. GOMES, Perilo. O trabalhador na Rússia. A Ordem, Rio de Janeiro, mar. 1935. GROPPO, Célia Maria. Ordem no céu, ordem na terra: a revista “A Ordem” e o ideário anticomunista das elites católicas (1930-1937). São Paulo: PUC-SP, 2007. Masters’ Thesis in History – PUC-SP. São Paulo, 2007. LEÃO XIII. Quod Apostolici Muneris. Petrópolis, RJ: Vozes, 1946. LEÃO XIII. Rerum Novarum. Petrópolis, RJ: Vozes, 1945. LIMA, Alceu Amoroso. Educação e Comunismo. A Ordem, Rio de Janeiro, abr. 1936. LIMA, Alceu Amoroso. Em face do comunismo (II). A Ordem, Rio de Janeiro, abr. 1936a. MAINWARING, Scott. Igreja Católica e Política no Brasil. Trad. Heloisa Braz de Oli- veira Prieto. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 1989. MANNHEIM, Karl. Ideologia e utopia. Trad. Sérgio Magalhães Santeiro. 4.ed. Rio de Janeiro: Jorge Zahar, 1982. McBRIEN, Richard P. Os Papas. Os Pontífices: de São Pedro a João Paulo II. Trad. Barbara Theoto Lambert. São Paulo: Loyola, 2000.

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’

PÉCAUT, Daniel. Os intelectuais e a política no Brasil: entre o povo e a nação. Trad. Maria Julia Goldwasser. São Paulo: Ática, 1990. PEREIRA, Marco Antônio Machado Lima. “Guardai-vos dos falsos profetas”: matrizes do discurso anticomunista católico (1935-1937). Master’s Thesis in History – Unesp. Franca, SP, 2010. RIVIÈRE, Claude. As liturgias políticas. Trad. Maria de Lourdes Menezes. Rio de Ja- neiro: Imago, 1989. RODRIGUES, Cândido Moreira. A Ordem – uma revista de intelectuais católicos: 1934-1945. Belo Horizonte: Autêntica; São Paulo: Fapesp, 2005. SÁ, Paulo. A Igreja e a questão social. A Ordem, Rio de Janeiro, dez. 1937, p.550. SETTON, Maria da Graça Jacintho. A teoria do habitus em Pierre Bourdieu: uma lei- tura contemporânea. Revista Brasileira de Educação, n.20, p.60-70, maio-ago. 2002. SUCUPIRA, Luiz. O Socialismo em face do Evangelho. A Ordem, Rio de Janeiro, jun. 1937. VELLOSO, Mônica Pimenta. A Ordem: uma revista de doutrina, política e cultura católica. Ciência Política, v.21, n.3, p.120-121, jul.-set. 1978.

NOTES

1 This article is part of a discussion presented in greater detail in PEREIRA, 2010. I would like to thank Capes for funding the research which make this work feasible. I must also mention the decisive support of Professor Sérgio Ricardo da Mata, from the UFOP De- partment of History, above all for the valuable reading indications. 2 According to Mannheim, “the magicians, the Brahmins, and the medieval clergy have to be seen as intellectual strata, each one enjoying in their society a monopolistic control over the formation of a vision of the world in this society...”. (1982, p.38). 3 In relation to the theoretical applicability of the concept of habitus see SETTON, 2002. 4 “Habitus are the principal generators of distinct and distinctive practices – what the worker eats, the sport he practices and the way he practices it, his political opinions and how he expresses them differs systematically from the corresponding consumption or activities of industrial entrepreneurs; but they are also classification schemes, principles of classification, principles of vision and of the division of different tastes. They establish the differences between what is good and bad, between what is distinctive and what is vulgar etc., but they are not the same. So, for example, the same behavior or the same good can appear distinctive for someone pretentious, or ostentatious for another, and vulgar for a third person” (BOURDIEU, 2008, p.22). 5 “In the 1930s, branches of the Dom Vital Center were created in other states, but the Rio de Janeiro cell remained the principal radiating center of Catholic doctrine which had the greatest growth, counting on more than 500 members in this period. Previously informal

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira meetings gave way to courses and talks, attracting an ever more numerous public, composed of intellectuals, professionals, teachers, politicians, businessmen, even not formally linked to the institution. Important people of the time, such as Osvaldo Aranha, Pedro Calmon, Afrânio Peixoto, Tasso da Silveira, Murillo Mendes and Jacques Maritain were invited to give talks and participate in conferences” (GROPPO, 2007, p.30). 6 According to Hannah Arendt, conservatism “as a political creed and as an ideal owes its existence to a reaction to the French Revolution, and it is significant only in relation to History in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” ARENDT, 1990, p.35-36. 7 “In effect, the same way that the Church consecrated for itself the mission of spreading its grace as an institution for all believers, just or unjust, and of subjecting sinners without distinction to divine commands, the party also chooses as its aim bringing to its cause the highest possible number of the discontent (it is always the case that during election the Communist Party directs itself to ‘all progressive republicans’), not hesitating to expand its base and to attract clientele from competing parties, compromising the ‘purity’ of its line and taking advantage in a more or less conscious manner of the ambiguities of its program” (BOURDIEU, 2001, p.184). 8 See, in relation to this, the entry ‘religion’ in BOTTOMORE, 1996, p.316. 9 In 1919, when invited to write the literary criticism of the new press body entitled O Jor- nal, Alceu Amoroso Lima adopted the pseudonym “to hide his identity, since at that time there existed prejudices making the exercise of industrial activities incompatible with intellectual practices” (BELOCH, 1983, p.1829). 10 “The French Revolution marked the political beginning of the bourgeois era, as the En- glish Industrial revolution marked its economic beginning. Each was based on the individual, having the ideal of absolute liberty, characterized by the dominium of the white race, the industrialization of the West, the colonization of the still unknown universe, by the religion of science, and by the decadence of the prestige of religion, by purely aesthetic art, by the cult of culture, by travel for pleasure, by the sexual freedom of man, generalized urbanism, the triumph of open and free economies, universities in which everything is taught without a hierarchy of values, feminism, etc. This, very deliberately accumulated without a glimpse of guidance, some patent traits of this age in which we were educated and in which we generally still live” (ATAÍDE, 1935, p.104). 11 It should be emphasized that for Alceu Amoroso Lima this element was the principal factor responsible for putting at risk the integrity of the rights of the human person, the family, and other social institutions. 12 “In the regime it will manage to impose itself on all peoples and all continents, as the monarchy imposed itself in time on Europe, or as the democratic republics imposed themselves on America” (ATAÍDE, 1935, p.108). 13 LIMA, 1936, p.318. The article in question is the result of various talks about the directives of National Education, promoted by the then minister of Education and Public Health, Gustavo Capanema.

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 A Ordem magazine and the ‘communist scourge’

14 In 1921 a decree was published in Russia “prohibiting all types of religious education to people younger than 18. A short while later, a law was passed in which the prohibition was extended to people of all ages. 1934 – a new statute was published for secondary schools, which stipulated the following: ‘Primary and secondary schools should assure the anti-religious education of students and concern themselves that instruction and school works have as a foundation an active fight against religion and its influence’” (CIFUENTES, 1989, p.113). 15 Since the first months of the regime, according to the historian Nicholas Werth, particularly during the Winter of 1918-1919, working class resistance was broken by the ‘weapon of hunger,’ since ‘ration cards’ were no longer respected. Therefore, to “obtain cards which gave the right to 250 grams of bread per day, and to regain work after the general closure of factories, workers were forced to sign an employment petition stipulating which stipulated that every interruption of production would from then on be considered desertion subject to the death penalty...” (COURTOIS, 2005, p.109). 16 At the beginning of the pontificate of Pius XI, the Pope “made an effort in vain to finish with the persecution of Christians in Russia. His performance, through the intermediation of the French Jesuit Bishop Miguel d’Herbigny, to consecrate bishops in secret was counterproductive. Bishop d’Herbigny was expelled from the country, and the bishops he consecrated were sent to penal colonies” (McBRIEN, 2000, p.367). 17 SUCUPIRA, 1937, p.605-606. The author of the article was a deputy and member of the Catholic group in the preparation and consolidation of the social legislation in the 1934 Constitution . 18 “The originality of Marx is only in knowing how to take advantage of these ideas already exposed and discussed for the purposes of constructing with them a system of government which, leaving the period of utopias and Platonisms, gave way to a socialist workers movements of struggle against capitalism” (SUCUPIRA, 1937, p.606-607). 19 “Adhering to communism thereby implied the radical alteration of the ontological statute of the individual – thus the advertences and the warnings to those who were animated to participate in the revolutionary movement. Similar to the old rites of passage, also present in closer epochs in secret societies, the novate experimented the symbolic ritual of death and resurrection. Being communist, they said, signified abandoning forever a life of certainties, fragmented, incoherent and passively led by events of an unintelligible reality to have absolute dominion over their own beings and the free the peoples from economic slavery, political oppression, and misery” (FERREIRA, 2002, p.68). 20 “Theoretically citizens were classified among the five categories from ‘stomachs,’ the manual workers and soldiers of the Red Army to the ‘idle’– the category in which entered intellectuals, particularly badly situated –, with ‘decreasing’ ‘class rations.’ In reality the system was more complex and unjust. Attended last, the most disfavored – ‘idle,’ intellectuals and ‘aristocrats’ – often received nothing. In relation to ‘workers,’ they were actually divided into various categories, according to the hierarchies of priorities which privileged vital sectors for the survival of the regime ... In the centralized system of supply implemen-

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Marco Antônio Machado Lima Pereira ted by the Bolsheviks, the food weapon had great importance in the stimulation of this or that category of citizens” (COURTOIS, 2005, p.111). 21 GIDE, 1936, apud SÁ, 1937, p.550. It is important to note that Pravda was a newspaper of the Soviet Union and the official organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party (1918-1991). 22 Paulo Sá does not precisely indicate in which texts it is possible to find the reports of Max Eastman about his trip to Russia. Nevertheless, according to Eastman, he traveled to the country for the first time in September 1922, returning to the United States only in 1927 (due to his travels through Eastern Europe, where he finished the book Marx and Lenin, The Science of Revolution, published in London in 1926). Cf. EASTMAN, 1955. 23 “This tendency is not new and is affiliated, at least partially, to the theory of totalitaria- nism, whether to demand or to reject it. The principal interest of this type of analysis is probably to take part of the methodological advances in the dominion of studies of Na- zism, to the benefit of studies about communism” (DREYFUS, 2004, p.27-28).

Article received on March 29, 2012. Approved on December 12, 2014.

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization”: Urban self-images in the Sertões of Bahia1 “Vivemos identificados com a civilização, dentro da civilização”: autoimagens urbanas nos sertões da Bahia

Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira*

Resumo Abstract O artigo aborda as autoimagens urbanas The article looks at the urban self-imag- construídas pela pequena intelligensia es constructed by the petty sertaneja in- sertaneja na Bahia do início do século telligentsia in the early twentieth centu- XX. Por intermédio de textos de memory in Bahia. Drawing on texts from rialistas e da imprensa de suas cidades, memoirs, the local press, and the use bem como do uso que fizeram da foto- made of photography, I investigate grafia, investigo algumas dessas autoi- some of these images of the interior as magens do sertão como contraponto opposed to those crystallized in the na- àquelas cristalizadas no imaginário national imagination, especially after the cional, principalmente após a repercus- impact of Euclides da Cunha’s Os são de Os sertões, de Euclides da Cunha. Sertões. The objective was to try to iden- O objetivo é identificar como as cidades tify how local towns appear in these im- aparecem nessas imagens e de que for- ages and how the latter contributed to ma elas contribuíram para a construção the construction of an urban public de um espaço público urbano no sertão space in the interior of Bahia identified baiano identificado com a civilização, with civilization, which in my opinion ideia a meu ver distante daquelas cons- was different from what was built in ex- truídas pelos olhares externos. ternal perspectives. Palavras-chave: autoimagem; sertão; ci- Keywords: self-images; Sertão; civiliza- vilização. tion.

Images of the Sertões of Bahia

The episode of Canudos was symptomatic in relation to the revelation of an unknown Brazil.2 On the eve of the twentieth century and during the initial

* Universidade do Estado da Bahia (Uneb), Departamento de Ciências Humanas (DCH IV). Jacobina, BA, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69014 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira years of the republican regime, the country was shocked by a social reality which many Brazilians did not know or were not concerned about seeing. One of the results of the conflict was the emergence of the book which marked a phase of self-discovery of Brazil. Os Sertões, the magnum opus of Euclides da Cunha, developed a profound analysis of the country based on the sertão, its inhabitants, and on the war. This was based on his presence in the Bahian sertão in the final phase of the conflict, when he was there as the correspondent of the newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo, in 1897. In parallel to the writer’s narrative, a set of photographs produced by the Bahian Flávio de Barros also left very significant images, produced during the war. In the first editions of Os Sertões some of these photographs were published. It was with this work that a petty sertão intelligentsia in Bahia established a constant dialogue over the following decades, when the self-images of its towns were developed at the beginning of the twentieth century. In this article I propose an approach to the constructions of these self-images of the petty intelligentsia, both through memorialist texts and the local press, highlighting the use they made of photography. The aim was to identify how the cities appear in these photographs and in what way they contributed to the construction of an urban public space in the Bahian sertão, which in my perspective is very different from the images constructed by external viewpoints. According to Ana Maria Mauad, during the nineteenth century it was the foreign perspective which framed Brazil, at the same time that it educated our own viewpoint, making us look at the culture imported from their countries (Mauad, 1997). In nineteenth century photography the Bahian sertaõ was practically only a target of external perspectives. In this configuration, it is possible to note two types: the one of exuberance and the one of misery. Foreign travelers, such as Augusto Stahl and Augusto Riedel, and afterwards Brazilians, such as Marc Ferrez and Ignácio Mendo, focused their lenses on the ostentatious landscape of the Paulo Afonso waterfall. Their photographs have a strong aesthetic appeal, typical of the pictorialist landscape tradition. Other striking images of the sertão produced at the end of the century include the war photographs of Flávio de Barros made during the final campaign against Canudos. The only photographer authorized by the army to cover the war, his photographs had the function of visibility to the winner’s perspective – in other words, civilization faced with the scenario of misery that was the town of Canudos, and the power of the Republic represented by the infantry. While the images constructed by the sertão in the nineteenth century were notably marked by the external perspective, in which most often there

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization” prevailed the logic of the other, with the advent of new transformations which occurred in the technical and cultural scenario of the sertão towns in the first decades of the twentieth century, these towns came to have the opportunity to produce their self-images through photographers based in these locations, where in general there prevailed a logic of showing urban novelties as marks of progress and the civility of its people. Since I make use of photographs contained in memorialist texts and newspapers, some of the characteristics of this media are highlighted. In relation to this, as Hans Belting argues, images should not be confused with their media (Belting, 2009). The former have always a mental quality, while the latter are material. Images and their media exist as two sides of the same coin. Although images emerged first, it is through media that they materialize and their policy of relations is established. Photographic images do not appear in isolation in newspapers. They are part of written messages, they demand captions. Photograph accompany texts with the function of giving visibility to what is said about the towns and also forming a public opinion about them. Therefore, to analyze the context in which these images are inserted, attentive to their uses and functions, they have to be observed accompanied by their respective captions. I believe that the diffusion and reception of the first photographic images which participated in the construction of an urbane and civilized look in the sertão occurred at the beginning of the twentieth century in newspapers from small towns and texts published in the annals of the V National Congress of Geography in 1916. All the papers which were read in the Geography congress are collected in two volumes. Some of these texts had photographs which, despite the poor printing quality, were important in spreading images of the Bahian sertão. In relation to graphical standards, newspapers from small towns were quite precarious, and the printing of photographic plates required a high investment. Usually they were prepared in Salvador, which prevented their constant use in weekly editions. Nevertheless, they were mainly responsible for crystalizing in the local imagination scenes of their own towns, thereby contributing to the education of the perspective of the sertanejo.

“The Land of the Good Beginning”

The advent of newspapers in various parts of the Bahian sertão significantly contributed to the creation of a literary and visual culture in these locations. Published on the pages of these small-scale media was the most

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira important news from around the world, Brazil, and the municipalities themselves, as well as literary and photographic productions. Little by little, the reading public based in the sertão also came to participate in the same adventure of the construction of the Brazilian man who wanted to be civilized, as if they were echoing Euclides da Cunha’s prophecy when he said that “either we progress or we disappear” (Cunha, 2003, p.52). It was generally on Sundays that copies of their weekly papers reached the hands of the Sertaneja population. For some decades they were one of the principal vehicles responsible for bringing world, national, and above local news to individuals in the sertão. In 1898 a small newspaper was launched in Senhor do Bonfim with the suggestive title O Futuro which years later would come to configure a more solid development of the press in that northeastern Bahian town and the project of the public construction of an image of the civilized sertão. Although it was geographically close to the sertão of Canudos, the new town of Bonfim sought to construct a self-image distant from what had been shaped in the lands of Belo Monte, although it was not free from all its marks. For this, the press was convoked as the special spokesperson of the lettered elite, desiring to diffuse this discourse. Photography also played in this context a special role in the visibility or an ordered and urbane sertão. The largest and longest lasting newspaper from Senhor do Bonfim in the first half of the twentieth century was Correio do Bomfim. It started on 1 October 1912 and ran until 1 October 1942. Its owner and director, Augusto Sena Gomes, was a man of letters and seen by more than a few of its contemporaries as “the greatest intellectual of all time” (Silva, 1971, p.122). He exercised the functions of intendente in 1924 and councilor in 1926, 1936 and 1947. He gathered around Correio do Bomfim a significant group of regional intelligentsia, reaching municipalities such as Morro do Chapéu, Miguel Calmon, Jacobina, and Campo Formoso. Throughout the time it circulated the newspaper was the principal voice in the defense of large rural producers in the region against the state and the country, and a restless constructor of a discourse of the civilized city in the sertão. At various moments photography was used as an instrument to help diffuse this self-image, contributing to perpetu- ate a way of seeing the city of Senhor do Bonfim. Nevertheless, the impression of the civilized city was not born with Correio do Bomfim, even though the latter was its principal internal and external propagator. Rather it had been progressively built by the petty intelligentsia in the city since its political emancipation in 1870, and propagated by its greatest representatives. In 1906, Lourenço Pereira da Silva published the first book

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization” about the municipality: Apreciação circumstanciada sobre o município do Bomfim. This work followed the pattern of chorographies in vogue at the time, with a description of the geography and historical facts of the municipality. The author describes his image of the city as follows:

The first sight of this beautiful sertaneja city conveys a pleasant impression, from its sober perspective, principally if it is entered from the Jacobina and Campo Formoso roads. Coming from the north side, also surprising is the panorama, which unfolds to curious views. The sober municipal palace, the beautiful Bomfim Church and other beautifully designed constructions, soon present themselves as indications of the existence of a civilized people. If, on the other hand, one enters by the south side, the beauty of the construction exceeds expectations and also the beautiful orchards enchants us, some of which are within the city; a defect, but a beautiful defect. (Silva, 1906, p.53-54, emphasis added)

José Lourenço sought to call the attention of his readers to the existence of another type of sertão different from the one described by Euclides da Cunha, endowed with an urbanized town and refined inhabitants. According to Lourenço, Canudos had been dominated by ‘crazies,’ by an ideal constructed by ‘gross fanaticism,’ and its community never could have been helped by Senhor do Bonfim. He seeks to establish a clear frontier between the various sertões existing in Bahia at that time. There was the sertão of misery, of ban- ditry, and fanaticism on the one hand, and on the other the productive sertão, of order and civility. It is important to remember that this work was only published a decade after the events of Canudos. According to José Lourenço, his people took pride in the fact that Senhor do Bonfim had been the first city in Bahia to recognize the Republic and that shortly after the end of the Canudos War, the Intendente Antônio Laurindo da Silva Duarte praised some of its heroes, giving their names to three arteries in the city, including giving that of Moreira César to one of its few squares. The consecration of this image of the sertão was defended by Rui Barbosa in a lecture in Senhor do Bonfim during his Civilista Campaign in 1906. 33 years later, in an issue which highlighted the presence of the Federal Interventor Landulpho Alves and his committee for the opening of the First Regional Exhibition of Goats and Sheep, Correio do Bomfim reported that there had been two days festivities in the city for the visit of the “greatest of Brazilians”

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira

(Figure 1). Rui was effusively welcomed in the train stations by a numerous crowd coming from various municipalities in the region. “The greatest genius of the race” arrived there with his committee like a “a procession of light worthy to accompany a sun of immense grandeur.” In his appreciative lecture, Rui Barbosa consecrated the presence of the Sertanejos in what he called the “capital general states of the sertão.” According to the newspapers, in the words of that ‘exalted’ public man, “Bomfim was the Land of Good Beginning – and that the good beginning was walking halfway to the good end.” As stated in this report, these words sounded at the time like a prophecy coming from the lips of those who preached “the gospel of democratic liberties.”3

Figure 1 – Correio do Bomfim, ano XVIII, n.1, 1 out. 1939, p.1.

Correio do Bomfim considered that Rui Barbosa’s prophecy was being realized at that moment. The success of the exhibition was commemorated by the newspaper as an “auspicious event.” Indeed, the relevant issue had six photographic images, a much higher number than normal. Amongst these were four portraits of people from national and international politics whose captions read: “Dr. Landulpho Alves, Federal Interventor in Bahia,” “Dr. J. Rocha Medeiros – Secretary of Agriculture,” illustrating the story on the front page about the First Regional Exhibition of Goats and Sheep; “Cons. Ruy Barbosa”, illustrating

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization” the note remembering his presence during the Civilista Campaign, and “Hitler – the man who could have prevented the war,” illustrating the report about the war in Europe. The other two photographs are records of places in the city. In the first (Figure 2), the “Praça Telve reservoir and Argollo, the Exhibition venue” and in the second (Figure 3), the “City Hall in Bomfim in whose illuminated halls the magnificent ball was held on the night of the 29th, in honor of the Federal Interventor and his illustrious committee.”

Figure 2 – Correio do Bomfim, Figure 3 – Correio do Bomfim, ano XVIII, n.1, 1 out. 1939, p.2. ano XVIII, n.1, 1 out. 1939, p.4.

Therefore, this manner of seeing the town of Senhor do Bonfim as a place of the dawning of a new era in the Sertão, marked by the ordering of its urban space and the establishment of civilization programs of the customs of its people, was followed and defended by the newspaper Correio do Bomfim during three decades it was published. Images were extremely important in this. As has been mentioned, the newspaper’s offices had their own print works and functioning in parallel as a commercial establishment, offering its print services, and as a book and magazine dealership. Illustrated magazines with a large national and state circulation at the beginning of the century, such as Eu

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira

Sei Tudo, Bahia illustrada, Fon Fon, Selecta, Renascença, O malho, Para Todos, Scena Muda, and Moda de Paris, reached the region through the intermediation of the company that owned the newspaper, which also publicized them in its pages. Various purposes were fulfilled, such as entertainment, information, integration and, above all, educating the viewpoint of the Sertaneja population through the photographs and illustrations published. According to Paulo Knauss, the illustrated magazines combined texts and images, establishing a connection between lettered and visual culture (Knauss, 2011, p.7-14). Published in their pages were photographs covering the tendencies of masculine and feminine fashions in the salons and public trips, scenes of artists from the cinema and radio, urban transformations and sporting scenes. Thus, those modes of reading and seeing established in the large urban centers, such as Rio de Janeiro and Salvador, were slowly taking over the lettered spheres of the Sertaneja population, which came to identify with these ideas, slipping into the content of the local printed newspapers, which functioned as its principal spokesperson in this discourse. It can be said that with this the Sertão began its participation in the national public space, especially in the photographic images, principally those transmitted in the illustrated magazines and newspapers. In 1916, Correio do Bomfim published two photographs of the city (Figure 4). Their importance was principally due to the fact that they are possibly the first published images of the urban center of a small Sertaneja town in the Bahian northeast. At the very least it is the first in the newspaper in question, as well as being the oldest in circulation at that time. It was not possible to identify a precise data of the photographs. Although there is no reference of authorship, it is very probable that they are by Ceciliano Carvalho, possibly the only photographer who lived and worked in the town at the time, whose services were also announced in the newspaper. The quality of the reproduc- tions was very precarious, which prevents a better visualization of their details. In the first is part of Praça Dr. José Gonçalves; in the other a perspective of Rua Conselheiro Franco, where, according to the newspaper, the town’s Christmas festivities were held. The photographs sought to publically show in Bonfim, the presence of the streets and alignment of residential buildings. Lourenço Pereira da Silva states that this was the striking aspect of the new part of the city in opposition to the other, “distinguished by the beauty, vastness, and elegance of the construction” of the two existing squares and the streets “in their length and the beauty of their alignments” (Silva, 1906, p.59-60).

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization”

Figure 4 – Correio do Bomfim, ano V, n.16, 24 dez. 1916, p.1.

Nineteen century normative patterns are followed in the photographs, showing details of wide straight roads as in São Paulo or Rio de Janeiro, present in the albums of towns or illustrated magazines. This photographic profile fulfills the function of the official presentation of a town and also helps with the formation of public opinion about it. Thanks to its ‘true effect,’ the photographic image was used at the time for the social functions of the transmission of information and the ordering or urban space, counting on the press as one of its principal transmission vehicles. Margarita Ledo states that the contrast between information and opinion is based on the idea of credibility built in journalistic discourse (Ledo, 1998). For this reason, photography, due to its mechanical character and its documentary appeal, is converted into the principal instrument of authenticity. When in 1897 Euclides da Cunha finally reached the Bahian Sertão, what called his attention in the landscape of the village of Queimadas was the de- crepitude of its poor housing, ungainly and old in its only irregular square. In his wandering around those regions the impression that the journalist from Rio manifested was that perhaps Alagoinhas was “the best town in the interior of Bahia” at the time, with its “wide streets and immense squares” and without

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira

“a narrow lane or twisting alleyway” (Cunha, 2003, p.68). Very probably when Correio de Bomfim transmitted those photographs of its town, it sought to give credibility to what its local chroniclers said, in other words the existence in the middle of those sertões of a small urbe which was expanding and sought to identify with the dictates of a modern aesthetic and harmonized with the novelties of the epoch.

“Land of the Future”

It is very probable that the first photographs of the town of Jacobina to reach public circulation in print media were those printed in the historical memoir of Afonso Costa from 1916, published in the V National Congress of Geography. Before this there was no newspaper in the town, and I could not find them in any of the periodicals in neighboring areas. Although restricted to a select group of interlocutors, this mode of seeing the town ended up constructing and perpetuating a way of entering into its urbanistic, architectural, cultural, economic, and political aspects. The text entitled “My land (Jacobina of yore and now)” was selected to participate in the aforementioned Congress, held by the Geographic Society of Rio de Janeiro and presided by Teodoro Sampaio. Afonso Costa also wrote technical opinions about other texts received from various Bahian municipalities. The Congress, amongst other aspects, was relevant in the promotion of could be seen and talked about in the municipalities which composed the state of Bahia, many of them recently created at the time, and had a total of 1057 participants (Cardoso, 2011). Participating were the principal representatives of lettered elites in the Bahian municipalities, presenting their memoirs or chorographies, amounting to 75% of those inscribed in the congress. This select group was composed of doctors, lawyers, teachers, and public employees, amongst others. Afonso Costa was the most eminent of this circle in Jacobina, though at the time he was already working and living in Salvador. The title of Afonso Costa’s text makes a subtle reference to the poem Canção do Exílio, by Gonçalves Dias. Like that poet, Costa wrote what can be considered to be the greatest ‘poem’ dedicated to his land, when he had left it. Nevertheless, to the contrary of the poet from Maranhão, Afonso Costa did not return to his native land, having moved from Salvador to Rio de Janeiro, where he became part of Carioca Academy of Letters and the Brazilian Historic and Geographic Institute, dying in 1955. It is possible that he lamented the fact that the small Sertão town did not offer the necessary conditions for a man like

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization” him to remain there. Nationalist and with a strong nativist sentiment, his historical memoir constituted an internal perspective of the Sertão, at the exact moment in which a feeling of self-discovery was growing in Brazil. His intellectual formation was strongly marked by the dominant prism of Positivism reigning in institutions at the time, and his flowery writings had a strong Parnassian connotation. The word future was really on the agenda of those Sertaneja towns. A promising future was what the new century announced for the sertão in the words of its chroniclers. Afonso Costa’s text is marked both by a discourse which praises the glorious past, and by the hope for the promising future for his town. The first town created in the Sertão of Bahia and responsible for sup- plying the Portuguese crown with the gold extracted in the eighteenth century, in the nineteenth century Jacobina entered a phase of economic stagnation, in part resulting from the discovery of diamonds in the region of Lavras Diamantinas. Only in 1888 was it granted the status of a town, with the title of the “Agricultural Town of Santo Antônio de Jacobina.” In Afonso Costa’s text there is a prognosis of the destiny of Jacobina as a ‘land of the future,’ principally after the arrival of the long awaiting railway which would promote its economic expansion (Costa, 1916). Despite believing in the future development of his land, Afonso Costa’s posture in relation to the aesthetic of the streets and public buildings denoted a grievance for being distant from the ‘modern urbe.’ In the 1923 text 200 an- nos depois: a então villa de Jacobina, he states that the city was ‘elegant’ due to the mountainous landscape and the two rivers which ran through its middle, but its appearance in relation to urbanism and architecture did not correspond to the ‘good taste’ expected from what was “one of the richest lands in the state of Bahia” (Costa, 1923). In his 1916 memorial, Afonso Costa published four photographs of Jacobina.4 Two scenes of the urban center near Praça da Matriz: one looking towards the church and the other towards Praça Rio Branco; a view of the ar- raial (village) of Itapicuru, and finally a partial external view of the town. There is no reference of authorship, something common at the time. In his History of Jacobina, the photograph have the significance of a ‘real effect.’ It was through these images that little by little a pattern of urban visuality was constructed for the town, often repeated in other photographs. Among the images selected by the historian, greater emphasis was put on the area close to Praça da Matriz, possibly the only one worthy of being externally visualized at that time. Itapicuru was probably presented as it was an areas where the directors

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira and workers of Companhia Minas de Jacobina had lived. The final image, a partial view from above, assumes a distanced and wide-ranging perspective of the urban landscape that was both objective and scientific. In the 1930s, the local press published images which directly or indirectly echoed these four photographs. During the first half of the twentieth century, the press, along with photography, was one of the medias which most contributed to the formation of an education of a viewpoint in Jacobina and to the construction of a self-image of the city identified with civilization. Between 1933 and 1943, there circulated in the region what would be the longest-lasting and most influential newspaper in Jacobina in the first half of the century: O Lidador. It was owned by Nemésio Lima a businessman from the town of Mundo Novo, where he had worked as a journalist with the newspaper Mundo Novo. O Lidador deserves to be highlighted in regional terms as the newspaper which most invested in the power of image, principally photography, publishing them as portraits, urban views, and advertisements. It was one of those most responsible for spreading photography in the sertão of Jacobina, promoting and educating the perspectives of sertanejos in the region. In the 1930s and 1940s the cultural frontiers which separated the sertões from the outside, modern and capitalist, world began to weaken. I believe that this became possible principally due to photographic images. Participating in the experience of the creation and fruition of its self-images, the sertanejo perceived that he was living in harmony with the modernity of the Old World. Siegfried Kracauer, marked by a feeling of social disenchantment, denounced at the time the flood of photographs becoming part of people’s lives. The great production of photographs was present in various places, especially in newspapers and illustrated magazines, obscuring from society its own economic and cultural reality. Kracauer refered to an attitude of political domination by some sectors of society, promoting, amongst other items, the cleansing of social memory. He stated that “never was there a time so little informed about itself. In the hands of the dominant society the invention of illustrated magazines is one of the powerful instruments to strike against knowledge” (Kracauer, 2009, p.75). The juxtaposition of images, in my opinion, prevented the formation of consciousness about facts. The ‘idea-image,’ like an avalanche of photographs attracts indifference in relation to the things that people want to say. In the illustrated magazine the public saw the world that they prevented themselves from perceiving. Observing the specificities of the Bahian sertão it

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization” can be noted that this type of mediatic visual control was also reaching those populations. Compared with other newspapers from the region, the use of images was a distinctive mark of O Lidador. The commemorative issue of its second anniversary, on 7 September 1935, contained the surprising number of 104 photographs. I did not find in any other newspaper from the region such a significant quantity of photographs in a single edition, which indicates the audacious character of the editor in that venture. The massive use of images in the press in the initial decades of the twentieth century was widely diffused in illustrated magazines, which certainly served as inspiration for that anniversary issue in Jacobina. As announced in O Lidador, the photographs published in the special issue had the intention of showing what was related to the “social and economic progress” experienced by the city at that moment.5 The newspaper circulated with 24 illustrated pages, in comparison with four in its normal issues. The director ordered that the clicheries (plates) be prepared in Salvador for the printing of photographs, which counted on the direct collaboration of the resident photographer in Jacobina, Juventino Rodrigues, one of those praised in this issue for the services he provided to society in his studio, Ideal Photo. The predominance of the use of portraits in the universe of photographs can be seen, corresponding to 75 percent of the total. Among these the most important were individual portraits. In general, they were images of those who were part of the political, economic, professional, educational, and artistic life in Jacobina and in Bahia. In summary, there prevailed the idea that the city was gifted with special people in a wide variety of areas, and more than this fundamentally these were the ones most responsible for its phase of development. The image of the sertão is, thus, one of a place marked by enterprising men. If, as Euclides said, the sertanejo was above all strong, when he devoted this strength to civilization, progress was inevitable. The newspaper suggest this idea, principally with its suggestive name. In the headline of the leading story – “Two years conquered!” – four portraits can be seen underneath with captions stating they are three founders of local newspapers and an assiduous collaborator of O Lidador: Amado Barberino, Francisco Vieira, Nemésio Lima and Paulo Bento, respectively (Figure 5). The photographs which highlight urban views appear in second place in quantity, and are distributed over various pages of the newspaper. In one of them (Figure 6), entitled “Picturesque Jacobina,” there appear four images accompanied by captions: a view of the quay on the Ouro River, whose caption

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira

Figure 5 – O Lidador, n.103, 7 set. 1935, p.1. calls attention to the cement bridge linking Praça da Matriz to Rua Dr. Pedro Lago; a partial view of the town taken from one of the hills surrounding it; a partial view of Praça da Matriz, highlighting in the background the bandstand and Matriz Church, constructed with the authorization of the Queen of Great Britain at the beginning of the eighteenth century (the caption states the seventeenth); finally, a partial view of Praça Rio Branco, where the weekly markets were held and where the seat of public power and security were located. It is valid to point out that the places in the images make a clear allusion to those mentioned in the 1916 article by Afonso Costa. This was the ‘idea-image,’ according to Kracauer, who participated in the public construction of Jacobina as a town at that time. In other pages are some photographs which highlight important new constructions in the context of economic, social, and educational development, such as the railway station; the reinforced concrete Manoel Novais bridge, linking the two parts of the city cut by the Itapicuru River; Antônio Teixeira Sobrinho Hospital and the Luiz Anselmo da Fonseca building which housed schools – the last three were built during the municipal administration still in power at that time. It can be seen that in the image transmitted by the press the city was ex- periencing a time of progress. This perception was sensitively captured by the

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization”

Figure 6 – O Lidador, n.103, 7 set. 1935, p.3. chroniclers at the time, who saw those works as the long desired participation in the civilized world, albeit in a quiet manner, characteristic of a small town without the “infernal movement of the automobiles” which marked life in the metropoles.6 Progressing without losing traditions, this was the proposition defended by the local intelligentsia. The newspaper indicate that traditions such as “bumba meu boi, cirandinha, quilombos, dança de velho, marujada, etc.,” still lived in Jacobina, as they had not been removed by the reforming function of those days. Even with the permanence of traditions, the report stated that “despite all this, we live with civilization, in civilization.”7 The photographs of the jazz group, philharmonic orchestras, bailes de micareta, and organized picnics served as witnesses of the new habits and the customs that had emerged (Figure 7). However, like Afonso Costa, the newspaper critic was concerned with the non-existence of aesthetic public works consistent with its economic importance and natural beauty, such as public gardens. The modernizing image of the city was emphasized by the newspaper with the use of photographs in which directly or indirectly machines appear as symbols of progress, such as the train station or cotton processing machines. One of these, set up in the town, authenticated the idea of a phase of prosperity. Three photographs together on a page highlighted a report about Companhia

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira

Figure 7 – O Lidador, n.103, 7 set. 1935, p.4. de Força e Luz de Jacobina (Figure 8). According to the text, “with everything good and useful that Jacobina possesses, it cannot be denied that ‘Cia. de Força e Luz de Jacobina’ occupies the front rank.” The center image, a little above the others, stamps the portrait of Coronel Galdino César de Moraes, president of this company and considered by the company as principally responsible for the work. Alongside this are the inside of the mill and the dam built on the Ouro River. The use of photographs sought to associate the image of the coronel with progress. Implicitly, the newspaper sought to transmit that in the jingoistic context of a modern and nationalist Brazil led by Getúlio Vargas, there was space for the participation of small sertaneja towns as supporting actors for its growth. Apparently, in the local imagination, that promising ‘future’ dreamt by Afonso Costa was finally becoming reality.

Old sertões, new times, other images

Those hegemonic images of the Bahian sertões, crystalized in the national imagination as places where drought, misery, fanaticism, and violence pre- dominated, principally with the repercussion of the magnum opus of Euclides da Cunha, were to a great extent softened by their sertanejo interlocutors

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 “We identify with civilization, within civilization”

Figure 8 – O Lidador, n.103, 7 set. 1935, p.7. through the advent in their small urbes of series of novelties identified with the presence of the long desired civilization. The arrival of the railway station, the press, entertainment such as theatre and cinema were great motivations for the promotion of new habits for those populations. Nevertheless, it was above all with photography that they learned to construct their self-images. Examining these images constructed a privileged window to visualize the marks of these new times in the Bahian sertão.

REFERENCES

BELTING, Hans. Antropología de la imagen. Buenos Aires: Katz, 2009. CARDOSO, Luciene Pereira Carris. Os congressos brasileiros de geografia entre 1909 e 1944. História, Ciências, Saúde – Manguinhos, Rio de Janeiro, v.18, n.1, p.85-103, jan.-mar. 2011. COSTA, Afonso. 200 anos depois. A então villa de Jacobina. Revista do Instituto Geo- gráfico e Histórico, Bahia, 1923. COSTA, Afonso. Minha terra: Jacobina de antanho e de agora. In: CONGRESSO BRA- SILEIRO DE GEOGRAFIA, 5. Anais..., v.II, 1916. CUNHA, Euclides da. Canudos: diário de uma expedição. São Paulo: Martin Claret, 2003.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Valter Gomes Santos de Oliveira

CUNHA, Euclides da. Os sertões. São Paulo: Nova Cultural, 2003. KNAUSS, Paulo et al. (Org.) Revistas ilustradas: modos de ler e ver no Segundo Rei- nado. Rio de Janeiro: Mauad X: Faperj, 2011. KRACAUER, Siegfried. O ornamento da massa. São Paulo: Cosac Naify, 2009. LEDO, Margarita. Documentalismo fotográfico. Madrid: Cátedra, 1998. MAUAD, Ana Maria. Imagem e Autoimagem no Segundo Reinado. In: ALENCAS- TRO, Luiz Felipe (Org.) História da Vida Privada no Brasil: Império: a corte e a modernidade nacional. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 1997. SILVA, Adolpho. Bonfim, Terra do Bom Comêço. Salvador: Ed. Mensageiro da Fé, 1971. SILVA, Lourenço Pereira da. Apreciação circumstanciada sobre o município do Bomfim. Bahia: Typografia d’ “A Bahia”, 1906.

NOTES

1 This article is one of the results of the research about the social circuits of photography in the sertões of Bahia, which counts on the financial support of Universidade do Estado da Bahia (Uneb). 2 Expression taken from Correio do Bomfim, 13 Oct. 1940, were reference to the trips of President Getúlio Vargas to Goiás and Amazonas and his probably visit to Canudos. 3 “Lembrando as festas do Ruy”. Correio do Bomfim, ano XVIII, n.1, 1 out. 1939, p.2. 4 The poor quality of the images in the tests reproduced does not allow their visualization. 5 “O Lidador – Edição especial a 7 de Setembro”. O Lidador, n.100, 11 ago. 1935, p.1. 6 “Jacobina Pittoresca”. O Lidador, 7 set. 1935, p.3. 7 “Sociedades e Festas”. O Lidador, 7 set. 1935, p.4.

Article received on August 16, 2012. Approved on December 12, 2014.

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division: the debates about Paraná province and the Imperial representative system, 18431 A emancipação negociada: os debates sobre a criação da província do Paraná e o sistema representativo imperial, 1843

Vitor Marcos Gregório*

Resumo Abstract A criação de novas unidades administra- The creation of new provinces in the tivas no Brasil Império raramente é utili- Empire of Brazil is rarely used as a tool zada como ferramenta para se entender a for understanding the dynamics of poli- dinâmica político-econômica do pe- tics and economy of this period. How- ríodo. Entretanto, a análise dos docu- ever, the analysis of the documents pro- mentos produzidos pelos ricos debates duced during the rich parliamentary parlamentares em torno desse tema de- debates about this question demon- monstra que essa prática precisa ser re- strates the need to revise this practice, vista, uma vez que a reorganização do because territorial reorganization in- território envolvia mais do que simples- cluded more than political emancipa- mente emancipar extensões de terras: tion. It meant implementing some very significava proceder a alterações funda- important changes in the running of the mentais no funcionamento do sistema country’s political system. In this con- político do país. Neste sentido, o proces- text, the emancipation of the fifth co- so de emancipação da quinta comarca de marca of São Paulo, the future province São Paulo, futura província do Paraná, é emblemático, por trazer à tona elemen- of Paraná, is important because it high- tos importantes para o entendimento lights elements which help to under- dessa dinâmica. Questões como a sobre- stand these dynamics. Questions like vivência da nova unidade administrativa, the survival of the new province, the a perda de população e renda por parte loss of population and revenue by São de São Paulo, as relações nem sempre pa- Paulo, the conflictual relations between cíficas entre as províncias e a posição do provinces, and the official position of governo central nesse contexto estiveram the central government, were in focus colocadas em foco todo o tempo. during all this process. Palavras-chave: Paraná; Parlamento; Keywords: Paraná State; Parliament; Império. Empire.

* Doutorando em História Econômica, Universidade de São Paulo (USP), Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). São Paulo, SP, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69015 Vitor Marcos Gregório

On 12 April 1843, Deputy Joaquim José Pacheco, a representative of São Paulo, presented to the Chamber of Deputies a request for information from the government. He asked that the House be sent all the documents and clari- fications possible about the intention of the ‘peoples’ of the comarca (a, political, administrative, and judicial district) of Curitiba to be politically emancipated from São Paulo. Also requested was data about the population of that territory, its population and boundaries, with the intention of better in- forming the parliamentarians about the need to grant – or refuse – its elevation to the category of province (Anais, 12 April 1843, p.767). This marked the start of the long and bitter debate about the creation of the province of Curitiba. It would take ten years for this decision making process to be completed, when the region – now with its name altered to Paraná – achieved its separation from São Paulo. In 1843, however, it was one of the principal themes of the parliamentary legislature, capable of mobilizing deputies completely, who took positions in favor of and against the measure, thereby forcing the Saquarema administration to clearly position itself on the question. As in the case of the Comarca of Rio Negro – whose political emancipation had been approved at the beginning of these discussions –, what was in play was more than the creation of a new administrative unit. Distinct projects of state, as well as the relationship between the center of power and the peripheral regions of the Empire, and also between the latter, were all debated. However, more than this was involved. The 1843 debates about the elevation of Curitiba comarca provoked a situation of extreme tension in a legislature which, as mentioned, was marked by a large conservative majority. At stake was something which led parliamentarians aligned to this party to oppose the position assumed by the Saquarema group in relation to this question. A profound division opened in the São Paulo delegation in the Chamber of Deputies, however without removing from this the political force necessary to postpone the question indefinitely – going against the directives of the conservative cabinet. Analyzing the debates about the political emancipation of the Fifth comarca of São Paulo signifies studying a moment in which the imperial representative system was fully functioning. In which, in the calculation of many parliamentarians, political alignment was reduced to a second level, being overlooked in favor of other interests and projects judged to be more important. In other words, it means analyzing a privileged theme to understand how the Brazilian state was being constructed in the middle of the nineteenth

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division century. This is because, with a still greater intensity in the case of the creation of the Province of Rio Negro, it was capable of causing behavior that appeared nothing like what was expected from an assembly formed by a virtual unanim- ity of members aligned with a political group which had a well-defined position about what was being proposed. The context in which this process occurred also contributed to increase its importance. In this particular case, something that acquires greater importance is the fact that less than a year previously the Paulista liberals had been military defeated, after starting a reaction to the political movement known as Regresso. According to Divonzir Beloto, João da Silva Machado was given responsibility for the mission of ‘pacifying’ the comarca which, however, had still not rebelled. Sent to Curitiba at the beginning of 1842, he immediately established contacts with the local liberals. The motive was the possibility that this group was the most willing to support their fellow Sorocaba supporters and the Farrapos, as a possible strategy to put the central government in difficulty, then run by the Saquaremas (Beloto, 1990, p.60-68). Knowing that the emancipation of the comarca was one of the principal demands of this group, Machado quickly proposed an agreement. If the comarca remained calm and did not support either of the two armed revolts, the Baron of Monte Alegre (José da Costa Carvalho), who had just assumed the position of President of the Province of São Paulo, would personally intercede with the minister for its elevation to the status of province. Actually, Curitiba Comarca did not offer any support to the armed movements, with the Sorocaba Rising being rapidly suppressed by the legalista forces. Nevertheless, this did not signify that the region was not agitated, nor that it did not threaten to support the Paulista liberals. According to correspondence sent by João da Silva Machado to the President of São Paulo:

I will report to Your Excellency with minute detail what has been occurring in this comarca. The news of the rebellion in Sorocaba spilt confusion here as it arrived jointly with the 1st Proclamation, order, and various letters. As a result nocturnal meetings were held, some wanting separation, nominating a president, others a provisional government with three members, others finally I do not know what. Until the Chamber met to empower the police. This was when fortunately those letters arrived which Your Excellency sent through the navy with such speed. With there being one for Lieutenant Colonel Miguel Marques dos Santos, who was here showed its contents to the Chamber, and in addition to the recommendation of the order, assured for them the separation of the comarca,

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Vitor Marcos Gregório

raising it to a province, they were satisfied and their mutiny ended... The decision of this man [Colonel Balduíno] in favor of Legality disarmed the luzida rapazia- da [gallant lads] of Ponta Grossa who had their heads raised and were willing to play all their cards and I know all those in the comarca and my friend Cunha, from Lapa, were afraid. So, the comarca was saved, which was so close to rebel- ling, but now it seems secure... I have given my word that Curitiba will have to be raised to a Province, and thus Your Excellency will not disappoint me.2

In turn, the Baron of Monte Alegre also fulfilled his promise, sending on 30 July 1842, an official letter to the Minister of the Empire, Cândido José de Araújo Viana, asking for the Comarca of Curitiba to be raised to provincial status. According to the president of São Paulo, one of the principal reasons which justified the adoption of this measure was based on

The danger that there would be, the longer these representations go unanswered; in the perpetual fears which the government has of each small commotion which appears in the Empire, whose movement the comarca agitates and follows, due to the dislike of not meriting the attention of their long manifested desires; in the proportions which this state of things offers every revolutionary or demagogue to involve in their plans of disorganization of a very interesting country at all times, and which still is on, much closer to what is in the province of Rio Grande do Sul.3

But it was not only the fear that the comarca would rebel which moved José da Costa Carvalho. Later in his letter, the president of São Paulo mentions that the region was already ready to be raised to a province, referring in support of this affirmation to its population, the ease with which its indigenous population could be civilized, and its general and provincial revenue. Furthermore, it was a frontier region, located far from the center of Paulista power, which made its administration difficult. In relation to the capital of the new administrative unit, Monte Alegre understood that it was located in the city of Curitiba, “located in the Comarca and for this reason, reachable by the other points in it” (Beloto, 1990, p.65-68). It is useful to perceive here that the arguments used until then by the president of the province of São Paulo would be used almost in their entirety by deputies defending this measure in the Chamber, around a year later. The fact that the government needed to negotiate with part of the elite of Curitiba comarca – in the case the liberals from the region – shows the force that these groups could have if they were in a favorable situation Suddenly

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division placed between two embarrassments for the Saquarema administration, they won, with just the possibility of supporting these uprisings, the promise that one of their principal demands would be met. However, there was still the problem that in the logical of the imperial representative system, it was not enough for the central government to support a measure for it to be adopted. The approval of parliament was also needed, which did not fail to discuss the agreement made in Curitiba, almost always criticizing or denying its importance, as will be seen below.

The presentation of two complementary projects: the political emancipation of Curitiba and the annexation of Sapucaí to São Paulo

Another deputy from São Paulo, Carlos Carneiro de Campos, was responsible for justifying a project to raise the comarca of Curitiba to the status of province in a session on 29 April 1843 – a little more than two weeks after the request for information made by Joaquim José Pacheco. In the reasoning he presented to justify his bill, Carneiro de Campos offered his colleagues what would come to be the basis of the arguments favorable to the adoption of this measure (Anais, 29 abr. 1843, p.982-984). In first place, he used an idea which had been widely in the successful demand for the creation of the province of Rio Negro: the distance which separated the territory to be emancipated from the provincial capital. Although he saw this element as representing a serious obstacle to the proper administration of the region, he stated that for him, this in itself was not sufficient to justify the creation of a new administrative unit in the Empire. He said that was because although he was requesting measures that would reduce its losses, there were in the Empire various locations which were also far from any center of power, and which nevertheless were not in the case of being raised to the category of province. Other factors had to be added to this for a policy of such as size to be adopted. Which, in the understanding of the deputy, occurred in the case of the comarca of Curitiba. In other words, the comarca had a sufficient population (around 60,000 inhabitants, according to Carneiro de Campos), a fertile territory capable of offering production more than sufficient to maintain the new administrative apparatus, and the potential for economic growth. Arguments which were undoubtedly quite differentiated, if taken along with those used to justify the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Vitor Marcos Gregório emancipation of the comarca of Rio Negro, a few weeks previously. There the great distance from the center of power was also an important factor, but the lack of a civilized population – with the consequent need to increase it –, and the progressive weakening of an already fragile economy, served to point towards the creation of the province as the most correct decision to be made. However, after this distancing of the two cases, there rapidly emerged among Carneiro de Campos’ justifications a new argument which brought them together again: the need to counter the disorders caused by armed movements. While in the justification of the creation of the province of Amazonas this measure was presented as capable of helping in the pacification of the areas hit by the Cabanagem and to avoid the repetition of this movement, in the case of the emancipation of Curitiba the element which gained force was its proximity to Rio Grande do Sul, large enough to result in, if nothing was done, the overflowing of its conflicts to other regions of the country:

I will finally note that the position of the comarca of Curitiba has always been sensitive to the existence of the disorders of Rio Grande; it has given care to the provincial and general administration of that part of the Empire. It has often been sought to introduce the ideas of the rebellion of Rio Grande in that place, also trying, fortunately unsuccessfully, to afflict the spirits of its inhabitants; thus, its proximity to the province of Rio Grande requires that the action of the government be better seated there, not only so that it can more effectively repel these attempts, but also so that the authorities of Curitiba can more immediately take advantage in favor of the public order of those resources found in the comarca. (Anais, 29 abr. 1843, p.983)

It was not enough to deploy a military force to the region. It was necessary to present the local elite with the means to use the resources available in the comarca and invest them ‘in favor of public order,’ which meant creating a police force, strengthening the national guard, and carrying out public works capable of facilitating the use of the fertile soil of the region, propelling the virtues of economic growth which the comarca possessed. In order to achieve these objectives, political emancipation emerged as a necessary condition, since it would give rise to a Legislative Assembly which, in accordance with the determinations of the Additional Act, would have the necessary autonomy to implement taxes and use the revenues from this for the development of the province. However, this was not the only bill submitted by this parliamentarian. In a possible strategy to compensate São Paulo’s loss of one of its most important

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division comarcas, Carneiro de Campos proposed that part of the territory of Minas Gerais be annexed to this province. As happened with other regions in the province, the comarca of Sapucaí was submitted to the spiritual authority of the Paulista bishop, thereby creating an overlapping of jurisdictional spheres which in the deputy’s opinion needed to be resolved. Actually the problem was so serious that it had been the subject of a report presented in 1837 by the president of Minas, Antônio da Costa Pinto, to the provincial legislative assembly:

In the province there are 128 parishes; 93 are staffed, 33 have asked for parish priests; 93 form the bishopric of Mariana; one belongs to Rio de Janeiro; 4 to Goiás; 6 to Pernambuco; 9 to São Paulo; and 15 to the archbishopric of Bahia. It is worth reminding you gentlemen of the convenience of our diocese having the same limits as our province.4

Added to this was the idea that the region was closer to the capital of São Paulo than of Minas – Ouro Preto –, allowing Carneiro de Campos to justify his proposal (Anais, 29 abr. 1843, p.983). In this way he sought to minimize the opposition of the Paulista caucus to the emancipation of Curitiba, which he certainly knew was enormous. It was a strategy which nevertheless resulted in the postponement of this measure for ten years, by calling down on it the ill will of the Mineira caucus at the same time that he failed to convince the other Paulista deputies to accept the dismemberment of their province. It was necessary to wait exactly one month until the elevation of the fifth comarca of São Paulo to enter into discussion. Rapidly two groups of deputies were formed who proposed to talk about the question. Eight spoke against the proposal in the first phase of debates – José Manoel da Fonseca, Joaquim Otávio Nébias and Joaquim Firmino Pereira Jorge, all deputies from São Paulo; Venâncio Henriques de Rezende, Francisco de Paula Cândido and João Antunes Correia, representatives of Minas Gerais; Joaquim Manoel Carneiro da Cunha, a deputy from Paraíba; and Ângelo Muniz da Silva Ferraz, elected for Bahia –, against three who spoke in favor – Carlos Carneiro de Campos and Joaquim José Pacheco, deputies from São Paulo, and Bernardo Jacinto da Veiga, representative of Minas Gerais. The latter also received support from a speech given by the Minister of the Navy, Joaquim José Rodrigues Torres. Voting indicated, however, that at least momentarily the majority of deputies were favorable to the approval of the project. Once again, the 1843 Conservative Congress found itself divided while debating the creation of a new province.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Vitor Marcos Gregório

The beginning of the debates and the split in the Paulista caucus

The bill for the political emancipation of the comarca of Rio Negro, which had been debated at various moments between 1826 and 1843, received unani- mous support from the representatives of the province to be dismembered – Grão-Pará or Greater Pará – and the parliamentarians who had presided it.5 Actually during the decision making process in the Chamber of Deputies, these deputies formulated and presented the bill twice – in 1826 and in 1839, offering their peers the greater quantity of arguments favorable to the measure, and to systematically refute the objections which emerged during the debates. In the case of the elevation of the comarca of Curitiba to a province, the exact opposite occurred. Although the bill was written and supported by some of the São Paulo representatives, other deputies from this province offered a very bitter resistance to its disposition. Which necessarily provokes the questioning about the reasons which explain this difference in behavior between the two groups directly affected by the proposals. Some elements which can help to resolve this problem are present in the speeches of the parliamentarians involved in the debates. In the decision making process about the political emancipation of the Rio Negro comarca, there constantly appeared in the speeches of the deputies from Pará the idea that the measure was the best remedy for a series of problems afflicting the region. Among these were: the distance separating it from the closet center of power – Belém; the difficulty of administering the territory, as a result of this distance; the difficulty of pacifying the entire province, still the victim of the Cabanagem fighting; the emaciation of commerce, industry, and as a result of this the fi- nances of the comarca – whose revenues did not reflect its economic potential; the lack of a population which could occupy it satisfactorily; and the need to strengthen the external frontiers of the region. Some of these elements can also be applied in the case of Curitiba, albeit with contestations. In this case these included were the existence of external frontiers which needed to be strengthened, the distance which separated the comarca from the provincial capital, and the need to deal with an armed movement in the proximities of the region. However, others were offered in a form that was completely inverted in the Paulista comarca, even from the point of view of those who defended its emancipation. In addition to Carneiro de Campos, Joaquim José Pacheco, another Paulista representative favorable to emancipation, stated:

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division

if memories or anything written about this is resorted to, it can be seen that the comarca has a sufficient population to be raised to a province. Those who propose this idea say that the comarca has 70,000 inhabitants or more; however, we can concede that it has 60, 50,000 souls, I understand that in this case the comarca should still be raised to a province. (Anais, 2 jun. 1843, p.474)

It is difficult to know for certain the real size of the population of the comarca, due to the well-known imprecisions existing in the surveys made at the time. However, Table 1 allows us have an approximate idea of their numbers, once care is taken to consider it only as an indicative tool, since the only sources which allowed its construction are subject to a series of factors which hinder their precision:

Table 1 – Population of Curitiba comarca, 1721-1854

Year Population (number of people) 1721 3,400 1772 7,627 1800 21,843 1816 27,097 1822 32,678 1836 42,890 1847 47,950 1854 62,258 Source: Beloto, 1990, p.80.

In relation to the Curitiba economy, Pacheco again agreed with the opinion of Carneiro de Campos, offering precise numbers for this:

I am persuaded that we all know what is the general and provincial revenue of the comarca of Curitiba; the general revenue for the customs of Paranaguá is for some years 60:000$ or more, and the provincial revenues cannot be ignored by any of the illustrious deputies from São Paulo who are opposed to the bill ... they must have seen that the comarca of Curitiba has earned annually in animal tolls from 100 to 120 contos de réis, and even now, with the disorders of Rio Grande do Sul, this tax has never been less than 70 to 80 contos de réis; this is the principal revenue of the comarca, and so we can consider that that comarca currently has a

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Vitor Marcos Gregório

revenue of 100 to 120 contos, with the expectation to earn much more. (Anais, 2 jun. 1843, p.474-475)

The veracity of these statements and the great importance of Curitiba comarca for the São Paulo province are indicated by the fact that they were not contested by opponents of emancipation, but rather were used to argue against the adoption of the measure. José Manuel da Fonseca, also a São Paulo deputy, and one of those most resistant to dismemberment, stated:

However, if you confess that Curitiba comarca prospers so much, that its revenues and its population have increased under the government it has, why change this government? ... I do not know, Mr. President, why we should prefer a large province to two small ones: São Paulo only in exceptional circumstances pays for its general expenditure: after subdividing the province, how will it do this? Will the new province do this? Having one province which costs the Treasury nothing, we would prefer two living at the cost of the Union, at the cost of the Treasury? (Anais, 30 maio 1843, p.414)

Fonseca was seconded by his colleague, also a São Paulo representative, Joaquim Otávio Nébias. According to this deputy, the provincial revenues had surpluses solely due to the money collected at the Rio Negro crossing, located on the frontier between Curitiba comarca and the province of Santa Catarina. Removing from Paulistas this source of revenue would therefore be disastrous, since the provincial tax collection was already continually falling, which meant that its administration had to constantly use reserve capital. Emancipating Curitiba in this way signified reducing São Paulo, according to this deputy, to a “mendicant province” (Anais, 31 maio 1843, p.440). For the Paulista deputies opposed to the political emancipation of Curitiba, therefore, the province have a lot to lose with this measure. It would lose the transfer of provincial revenues generated from the collection of tolls from the transport of cattle and mules from Rio Grande do Sul to Sorocaba, collected on the Rio Negro crossing; it would lose part of its share of the general revenue, since it would no longer have the Paranaguá customs; and, as will be seen, it would lose part of its political prestige, if the reduction of its territory was followed by a reduction of its representation. To have an idea of the importance of the revenues from the transport and commerce of mules, the following calculation made by Divonzir Beloto is useful:

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division

in the comarca, the mule troops were entered into the Rio Negro Register, upon entering the province. However, the tax was effectively collected in Sorocaba. 3$500 was paid per mule. Of this, 1$000 was sent to Rio Grande do Sul. The remaining 2$500 were provincial revenues. In 1838 32,747 mules were traded, resulting in revenues of 81:869$950 from the provincial total of 292:701$359, or 28%. (Beloto, 1990, p.69-70)

The following table, prepared using the São Paulo taxation data, allows a more precise vision of the importance of the do Rio Negro Register for the provincial economy:

Table 2 – Border charges in the province of São Paulo, 1835-1836 – 1850-1851

Crossing Rio Negro Inheritance Tax on the Year Exit Tolls Charge Register tax sale of slaves

1835-36 –– 81:869$950 31:351$648 28:010$910 16:475$977

1836-37 132:236$697 72:961$780 49:282$769 12:580$340 10:197$760

1837-38 141:515$707 133:934$576 78:597$267 9:995$409 5:125$250

1838-39 67:688$266 57:748$671 100:396$780 20:175$845 16:727$246

1839-40 115:325$227 79:513$690 93:189$983 7:113$828 14:253$553

1840-41 23:263$268 56:196$562 66:999$977 8:424$524 18:087$058

1841-42 129:076$409 33:438$480 45:624$359 9:391$917 17:710$592

1842-43 –– 52:796$314 53:071$675 6:842$120 15:711$131

1843-44 –– 54:996$878 58:955$816 17:295$790 17:917$161

1844-45 71:102$463 31:152$122 83:107$403 13:844$215 19:991$570

1845-46 182:718$482 89:033$000 90:555$000 21:530$000 36:195$000

1846-47 181:883$389 37:478$932 96:809$631 30:166$390 24:689$139

1847-48 151:461$328 38:866$787 79:954$088 15:003$858 21:838$346

1848-49 109:313$368 35:280$560 57:089$514 14:828$466 18:936$674

1849-50 161:035$229 42:378$388 81:224$078 16:658$583 97$500

1850-51 148:461$607 26:692$533 123:842$458 17:393$992 21:931$577 Source: Costa, 2001.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Vitor Marcos Gregório

During the period covered by this data, it can be seen that the tax values from the Rio Negro register always oscillated between the second and third places in importance, reaching their apex in 1837-1838, when river crossing tolls came very close to being the highest source of revenues. However, after 1846 there was a brusque fall in revenue under this heading, which nonetheless did not lead it to lose its third position among the taxes analyzed. It is important to try to understand the reason for this fall, a question which this research cannot explain, since it is outside its scope. What I intend to show with this data is how much revenue São Paulo would lose from the emancipation of its fifth comarca and the ending of the transfer of the taxes charged in the Rio Negro Register. Undoubtedly, this fact was an important element in the calculation of the Paulista deputies involved in the discussion. In relation to the dimension of the revenues from the Paranaguá customs, the analysis of Table 3 can provide quite a precise idea of this, as it was prepared with numbers referring to the trade of that port:

Table 3 – Exports and imports from the Curitiba comarca, via Paranaguá port, 1842/1843 to 1853/1854 (in thousands of réis)

Year Exports Imports 1842-1843 378,579 903,205 1843-1844 – 734,033 1844-1845 396,128 658,964 1845-1846 – 608,084 1846-1847 428,646 804,090 1847-1848 – 1,001,388 1848-1849 808,822 1,020,991 1849-1850 766,209 843,833 1850-1851 648,092 829,592 1851-1852 968,066 1,459,883 1852-1853 629,442 1,348,218 1853-1854 970,189 1,618,198 Source: Beloto, 1990, p.75.

The oscillation in the values related to exports from the comarca can, to a great part, be explained by the differences in quantity and in the value of its principal merchandise, erva-mate, as can be seen in Table 4:

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division

Table 4 – Erva-mate exports, per arroba and price, via Paranaguá Port, 1842/1843 to 1853/1854

Year Exports (in arrobas) Price 1842-1843 155,224 2$054 1843-1844 141,577 2$013 1844-1845 176,275 1$954 1845-1846 150,359 2$092 1846-1847 183,523 1$939 1847-1848 283,847 1$899 1848-1849 372,779 1$899 1849-1850 351,805 1$696 1850-1851 335,682 1$664 1851-1852 473,982 1$780 1852-1853 307,896 1$711 1853-1854 466,022 1$801 Source: Beloto, 1990, p.76.

In periods in which there was a fall in volumes exported and/or prices charged for each arroba of erva-mate – 1848 until 1851, a year which there was a brief rise, interrupted by a new decline until 1853 – the comarca’s export values suffered a corresponding fall, while there was an inverse movement when the product’s trade recovered. This indicates the great importance which erva-mate had for Curitiba comarca and, consequently, for São Paulo, in the years preceding the creation of Paraná province. This calculation, which seeks to take into account the losses the province would have suffered from dismemberment, apparently did not exist for the deputies from Pará. While Curitiba repeatedly emerged as one of the most important portions of the province of São Paulo, Rio Negro almost always appeared as a remote territory, difficult to administer and control, and with an economy which, although it possessed an enormous potential, was still somewhat incipient. According to these parliamentarians their province would lose nothing with dismemberment. Once, as we have seen, their representation in Parliament was not altered, which they made efforts to guarantee. This did not go unnoticed by José Manuel da Fonseca:

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Vitor Marcos Gregório

A notable contradiction! The comarca of Rio Negro must be a province: and why? Because it has decayed a lot. Curitiba comarca must be a province: and why? Because it is flourishing! Rio Negro comarca must be raised to a province because its revenues and population are falling, and because it is not well enlightened; Curitiba comarca must be raised to a province because it has a lot of revenues and population; it is enlightened, very prosperous!!! I lament that the mania of subdivisions of provinces, done at random, has been entering this house!!! (Anais, 30 maio 1843, p.414)

Nevertheless, what could appear to be a contradiction was explained by the political and administrative functioning of the imperial state. If the role of the provincial legislative assemblies is considered, as proposed by Miriam Dolhnikoff, the creation of a province signified the organization of an autonomous government with the capacity to raise the necessary funds to carry out the development of abandoned territories such as Rio Negro comarca (Dolhnikoff, 2005). At the same time, it was justified in the case of territories whose wealth and increase in population gave them the right to administer themselves, taking into account their specific interests, without being submitted to a distant government concerned with other interests, as was the case of São Paulo – whose government was more committed to the expansion of export agriculture than the production of erva-mate from Curitiba. In the case of rich regions, it involved meeting the demands of the elite of the territory to be politically emancipated due to what was considered the right to have their own government. In the case of poor regions, it involved the right of meeting the demands of the elite of a territory which had to support a region that had to be subsidized. Going beyond the discourse, the creation of a province and its own government signified, in the two cases, the creation of employment, an important coin of political exchange in the nineteenth century, and the political strengthening of the local elite, which came to have its own representatives in the parliament and, in this case, it did not matter whether the region was rich or poor. From the point of view of the dominant elites in the provinces which suffered dismemberment, the difference in posture between Paulistas and Paraenses is understandable, due to the differences of the regions to be dismembered. The autonomy conquered under the Ato Adicional (Additional Act) made the provincial coffers dependent on the production and circulation of merchandise, as well as other activities carried out in the territory under its jurisdiction. Coffers which financed investments in the province itself. For this

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division reason, for the Paulista elite the loss of Curitiba was unacceptable, since it was an important source of provincial taxes, while for the Paraense the loss of Rio Negro did not result in the reduction of provincial tax revenues, due to the previous abandonment of the region. There was also the problems of parliamentary representation. The low population of Rio Negro made it easier for the Paraense elite to demand the maintenance of the number of its deputies, creating new representative positions for the new province. However, popu- lous Curitiba, if transformed into a province, would result in a significant loss of population to São Paulo, which feared having the size of its delegation reduced in the General Assembly. This difference in the perception on the part of the deputies of two similar facts – the dismemberment of the provinces which it was proposed to represent –, is not enough to resolve our question. There also remained the doubts about why the Paulista delegation in the Chamber of Deputies was so profoundly divided that its members took diametrically opposing positions, at times based on the same arguments. In this case, the political trajectory of those involved offered elements which allow an explanation to be proposed. The analysis of the careers of the two São Paulo deputies favorable to the emancipation of Curitiba, Carlos Carneiro de Campos and Joaquim José Pacheco, sheds light on some common points between the two. Both were born in Bahia, having arrived in São Paulo to study Law in Largo de São Francisco. In their judicial careers, Pacheco retired as a judge, while Carneiro de Campos exercised the position of dean of the faculty he had studied in. As politicians, Pacheco had a career which, it can be said, was more modest, being elected as a general deputy for São Paulo in five legislatures – sometimes as a replacement –, and was nominated president of the province of Sergipe, a position he held for almost seven months in 1839. Carneiro de Campos on the other hand was elected general deputy for São Paulo on four opportunities, being nominated Senator for the same province in 1857. Furthermore, he was appointed president of the province of Minas Gerais twice, Minister of Foreign Affairs another three, and Minister of Finance once. He also held the position of president of Banco do Brasil and was appointed to the Council of State. He died with the title of 3rd Viscount Caravelas. Both, therefore, marked their careers with pas- sages in places other than São Paulo, becoming at a determined moment not only provincial politicians, but rather politicians of the Empire as a whole, a fact corroborated by the fact that they were born in a province different from the one they represented in Parliament.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Vitor Marcos Gregório

In relation to the analysis of the trajectory of the three São Paulo deputies opposed to the dismemberment of the province, various points in common can also be perceived. José Manuel da Fonseca, Joaquim Otávio Nébias and Joaquim Firmino Pereira Jorge were all born in São Paulo. All graduated in law, with Fonseca doing so in Coimbra. All held the position of general deputy only representing their native natal – Fonseca once, Nébias seven times, and Pereira Jorge three. Fonseca was appointed senator in 1854, also for São Paulo. The only one to hold an extra-provincial position was Nébias, appointed as Minister of Justice for the 1870 conservative cabinet. All three, therefore, represented the province in which they were born, and in general did not exercise political positions elsewhere, with the sole exception of Nébias, who only left São Paulo to serve the imperial administration. This difference in the careers of the members of the two groups helps to understand why Pacheco and Carneiro de Campos proposed the political emancipation of Curitiba, even though it harmed the province they represented, while Fonseca, Nébias and Pereira Jorge defended at any cost the integrity of their native land. This extract from a speech by José Manuel da Fonseca exemplifies the feeling which could also have moved his other two contemporaries:

I must confess to the Chamber (I do not know if this happens to everyone, though I believe what happens to me is natural for all) that my patriotism was not born in Brazil for the provinces, my patriotism is related to some place, even circumscribed, and from there it goes up, it extends to this whole; the Brazil which I adore... the place in which I was born, where my navel is, where I grew, where I played my childhood games, where all my interests are, and what is more, the people who are dearest to me, deserves the greatest love possible. (Anais, 18 ago. 1843, p.797)

It is possible to raise the hypothesis in this case that the distinct origins and trajectories of these deputies created different visions of the problem. In a parliament where deputies oscillated between representing national and provincial interests, representatives from regions different from those they represented could be willing to sacrifice some provincial interests, while those whose careers were also related to the representation of their native province transformed the interests of this into a higher priority.

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division

Interprovincial relations of power: the representative system of the Empire passes through Curitiba

More than the possibility of the creation of a new administrative units in the Empire, the debates about the bill presented by Carlos Carneiro de Campos were an excellent opportunity to discuss various constituent elements of the imperial political system. Among these, one which most mobilized the deputies was the relation of power between the provinces, more specifically between the province of São Paulo and the rest of the country, as well as with its larger and more power neighbor, Minas Gerais. For the opponents of the political emancipation of Curitiba this measure was merely a strategy to punish São Paulo for the 1842 Revolt. According to this argument, dismemberment would have the dual advantage of showing the other provinces what would happen to those who ‘dared’ oppose the political order, at the same time that it would weaken Paulista unity to the point that it would be unable to repeat its error. José Manuel da Fonseca made the following accusation:

It is not distance, Mr. President, it is not revenue, it is not population, none of these things, which gave rise to the bill being discussed and to another two which are in the house, and which separate the north of São Paulo to be annexed to Rio de Janeiro! No, no; it is the revolution which disgracefully appeared in São Paulo last year which gave rise to all of this... some of my compatriots committed a similar error, similar imprudence... there could not be a greater disgrace for a province! It will lose all respect and consideration... (Anais, 9 ago. 1843, p.677)

According to the Paulista deputy, the entire process of debate which began with the presentation of the Carneiro de Campos bill, was a theater, a hoax to disguise the punishment of São Paulo province. The fact that it was being discussed without any official information about the comarca it was intended to dismember, the concern of the central government in defending the measure, even though it was not obliged to do it, and the existence of two other bills which involved the loss of the province’s territory,6 certainly contributed to this feeling. Paulista deputy, Joaquim Firmino Pereira Jorge, actually stated that he would vote against this bill with the sole intention of hindering the emergence and passing of others which intended to make ‘new cuts’ from São Paulo (Anais, 19 jun. 1843, p.676).

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17 Vitor Marcos Gregório

A central idea of the arguments of the Paulista deputies who were opposed to the creation of Curitiba province was the concept of political consideration. According to them, the 1842 Revolt – added to the punishment that it was intended to be imposed for the event – would lead to a political weakening of São Paulo, which would in this way no longer be one of the principal provinces of the Empire. The relationship between this territory and political power was direct. Pereira Jorge stated the following:

The noble deputy says that the question of the division of the territory should not be entered into. However, does part of the territory not bring with it part of the population, and does part of the population not bring with part of the revenue? Furthermore, will the province not lose in political consideration? I believe if we accept this coup and the others that have been proposed, and I cannot guarantee that they will not pass, because I see influential people interested in this, so I ask: will São Paulo province not lose much of its category? Will it not lose in consideration? (Anais, 2 jun. 1843, p.478)

Losing political consideration, in the view of these representatives, meant losing the power to defend their own interests in a political system which used representation as an important motor to make decisions and to formulate public policies. Removing part of the territory of São Paulo would cause the weakening of its political elites – the same ones who had provoked the 1842 movement –, making their future opposition to the decisions of the central government more difficult. This was a strong argument among the São Paulo representatives, causing people born in other provinces, such as the Mineiro João Evangelista de Negreiros Sayão Lobato, Viscount Sabará, to enthusiastically support it. Holding a seat in the Chamber of Deputies on a provisional basis – he was elected as a replacement for São Paulo and substituted, during part of the debates, João Carlos Pereira de Almeida Torres, Viscount Macaé –, he formulated in very wide terms the problem of the weakening of the Paulista province:

it would be very good... if there were a new division of territory in Brazil, so that all provinces were represented in this house by an equal number of deputies. However, I ask, will this be possible? Of course not. Will passing the bill which raises Curitiba comarca to a province achieve this effect? Of course not; to the contrary, the opposite will appear; and why? Because São Paulo province, which is now among the most important, and for this to some extent has an equilibrium

18 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division

with Pernambuco, Bahia, and Minas, will be reduced to a much lower scale, with a much smaller number of representatives. (Anais, 11 ago. 1843, p.703)

In this logic, the political consideration, or better the political importance, of a province can be understood as the amount of representation it had in the imperial parliament. The larger the number of representatives and, thus, the capacity of a determined provinces – and their political elites – to impose their interests in the parliamentary arena, the greater was their political consideration. Reducing the importance of São Paulo could prove disastrous, since it would increase still further the preponderance of some provinces over the rest. According to this argument, provincial groups acted in Parliament according to the interests of the elites who elected them, converting the representative system into a struggle in which the number of deputies – and their capacity to weave alliances – determined the winners and losers. Representatives of the smaller provinces could only align themselves with one of the disputing sides in order to meet, in the best form possible, their most immediate needs. These units of lesser political consideration did not have sufficient power to influence the imperial policy in a decisive form. There was another interpretation of the how the imperial representative system worked. Carlos Carneiro de Campos expressed this in the following terms:

the union of the Empire cannot be maintained by the dominion of one province over another. If I were persuaded that there would have to be political preponderance among provinces, I as a deputy should be the first to seek to undo this political preponderance... For this reason, if the idea of political preponderance was presented to combat the bill, I am thankful because it supports it: I do not want it, I want political equality: I believe that we are here deputies of the Empire, and not of certain provinces (applause). I cannot recognize as a benefit that certain provinces present themselves as causing fear or envy in others. (Anais, 19 jun. 1843, p.678, italics added)

General deputies, therefore, were not responsible for acting motivated by the interests of the provinces which elected them. In this way the dilemma about representing a specific region or an entire nation resurfaces. The debates about the emancipation of Curitiba show that there was still no consensus about which form of representation was most desired or which should in fact prevail. Those defending the measure showed the benefits it would bring for the entire country, such as the defense of external frontiers, greater support for the repression of the Farroupilha Revolt, and the greater development of a large region. On the other hand, those opposed thought predominantly in

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 19 Vitor Marcos Gregório terms of harm to the province of São Paulo, even this could occasionally have disastrous consequences for the Empire as a whole– such as the breaching of the parliamentary equilibrium and the increase in the expenditure of the General Treasury. Independent of the interpretation given to the imperial political system, the fact is that, although ideally all deputies defended a wider territorial reorganization, capable of covering all of the Brazilian empire and equaling the political consideration of all provinces, in 1843 bills were discussed which aimed at only dismembering two specific comarcas. This did not go unperceived by parliamentarians such as Joaquim Otávio Nébias, who stated that although the Empire was badly divided, the lightning bolt of division had only fallen on the provinces of São Paulo and Grão-Pará – nevertheless, the latter was an exceptional case which was not to be taken in to account (Anais, 31 maio 1843, p.439). However, if territorial division proposals represented a bolt of lightning, these were not scheduled to only fall on São Paulo and Grão-Pará. Honório Hermeto Carneiro Leão, then Minister of Justice in the Saquarema cabinet, had previously stated that the province of Minas Gerais should be subdivided into at least another three administrative units (Anais, 31 maio 1843, p.436- 437). Nevertheless, this did not prevent the fact that only the bills about the political emancipation of Curitiba and Rio Negro were presented to the Chamber of Deputies, which led the deputy from Sergipe José de Barros Pimentel to question the attitude of the central government:

Mr. President, I have discovered in this project for the division of São Paulo an idea that means that I am opposed to it, and that it is not pleasant to those who like the morality of government actions. Having first hypothesized the idea of the division of Minas, the government took no steps to present a bill which we could discuss here; to the contrary, it was avid to fully support the idea of the subdivision of São Paulo; it thus should be now asked what was the reason which caused the government to support one and renounce the other? (Anais, 19 jun. 1843, p.664)

Circulating the corridors of the Chamber of Deputies was an argument that sought to explain this difference in the posture of the central government through the results achieved in recent elections. According to this idea, São Paulo was being divided because it had produced results unfavorable to the Saquarema cabinet, while Minas Gerais was being preserved for the opposite reason (Anais, 19 jun. 1843, p.671). Finally, the explanation which found the

20 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Negotiated division greatest echo, principally among the Paulista deputies opposed to the emancipation of Curitiba, placed greater weight on the parliamentary strength of the Minas delegation, which doomed in advance any attempt at dividing the province to failure. Adding a dramatic content to this argument, achieving by resorting to an analogy with the geopolitical situation of the European conti- nent, Joaquim Otávio Nébias stated:

I heard only the noble Minister of Justive [Honório Hermeto Carneiro Leão] say that in his opinion the province of São Paulo should be divided in two, while Minas should be divided into three (applause); but they have insisted on the province of São Paulo and no one had the courage to touch the colossus of Brazil (applause); only the poor Poland (which is how I consider the province of São Paulo) is about to be strangled by Russia... (Anais, 31 maio 1843, p.436-437)

The image of the Mineira Russia interested in ‘strangling’ the Paulista Poland was strengthened, and the presentation of bills for the subdivision of Minas Gerais, with the consequent political weakening of this province, became the necessary counterpoint to the acceptance of the emancipation of Curitiba. To combat this tendency, the Mineiro deputy Francisco de Paula Cândido ironically stated the following:

The noble deputy also did not stop clamoring for the division of Minas! Always the division of Minas, Minas is not important. Well, those who so much bristled about the grandeur of Minas why do they not also call for it to be given a seaport? So there is a reason in fearing its preponderance: is by chance a seaport of little interest in the balance of provincial interests? Give it to Minas, and then project the division into as many thousand parts you want. (Anais, 14 ago. 1843, p.736)

The animosity between Paulista and Mineiro deputies grew rapidly in the wake of the demands of the former for the division of the province the latter represented. José Manuel da Fonseca, most committed to the opposition of the emancipation of Curitiba, sought to take advantage of the situation, by linking this discussion to the annexation of the Mineira comarca of Sapucaí by São Paulo. He formulated in this way a strategy which was capable of making the project completely lose the support it had found among the representatives of Minas Gerais. Later this resulted in the indefinite postponement of the bill presented by Carlos Carneiro de Campos, which would only to returned to seven years later in Senate and in a completely different context.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 21 Vitor Marcos Gregório

REFERENCES

ANAIS da Câmara dos Deputados. Rio de Janeiro. Available at: www.camara.gov.br. BELOTO, Divonzir, A criação da província do Paraná: a emancipação conservadora. Master’s Thesis in History – PUC. São Paulo, 1990. COSTA, Hernani Maia. O triângulo das barreiras: as barreiras do Vale do Paraíba Paulista, 1835-1860. Tese (Doutorado em História Econômica) – Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas, Universidade de São Paulo. São Paulo, 2001. GREGÓRIO, Vitor Marcos. Dividindo o Grão-Pará: os debates sobre a criação da província do Rio Negro na Câmara dos Deputados, 1826-1828. Almanack Brazi- liense, São Paulo. v.1, p.137-152, 2011. Available at: www.almanack.unifesp.br/ index.php/almanack/article/view/720. GREGÓRIO, Vitor Marcos. A província do Amazonas e o sistema representativo no Brasil Imperial: os debates de 1843. Em tempo de Histórias, Brasília, v.17, p.93-106, 2011a. Available at: http://seer.bce.unb.br/index.php/emtempos/article/ view/2890/2497. DOLHNIKOFF, Miriam. O pacto imperial: origens do federalismo no Brasil. São Paulo: Globo, 2005.

NOTES

1 This article is part of a larger research project, funded by Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (Fapesp – the São Paulo State Research Foundation). 2 Correspondence of João da Silva Machado to the Baron of Monte Alegre, president of the province of São Paulo, 23 June 1842. In: BELOTO, 1990, p.63. 3 Letter from the Baron of Monte Alegre to Cândido José de Araújo Viana, Minister of the Empire, 30 July 1842. In: BELOTO, 1990, p.65. 4 Falla dirigida à Assembléa Legislativa Provincial de Minas Gerais na sessão ordinária do ano de 1837 pelo presidente da província, Antônio da Costa Pinto. Ouro Preto: Typ. Do Universal, 1837. p.IV-V. 5 This process is looked at in two articles: GREGÓRIO, 2011, and GREGÓRIO, 2011a. 6 Joaquim José Rodrigues Torres, future Viscount of Itaboraí, had spoken in the Chamber of Deputies to defend the emancipation of Curitiba comarca, although trying to emphasize the fact that neither he nor the government of which he was part were obliged to do this by any agreement supposedly negotiated with the elites of that place. In relation to the territory of São Paulo, what was involved at that moment were representations prepared with the aim of asking for the annexation of the Paulista municipalities of Areias and Bananal to the province of Rio de Janeiro.

Article received on September 13, 2011. Approved on December 12, 2014.

22 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69

Interview Eric Foner

Columbia University, New York, March 28, 2014 Hebe Mattos* Martha Abreu** Transcription: Kristin McGuire.1

Eric Foner (nascido em 7 de fevereiro Eric Foner (born February 7, 1943) is a de 1943) pertence ao corpo docente do faculty member of the Department of Departamento de História da Columbia History at Columbia University since University desde 1982. Foner é o mais 1982. Foner is the leading contempo- destacado historiador contemporâneo rary historian of the post-Civil War Re- do período da Reconstrução que suce- construction period, having written Re- deu à Guerra Civil norte-americana. Es- construction: America’s Unfinished creveu Reconstruction: America’s Unfi- Revolution, 1863-1877, winner of many nished Revolution, 1863-1877, vencedor prizes for history writing, and more de muitos prêmios, e mais de dez outros than ten other books on the topic. His livros sobre o tema. Seus cursos on-line free online courses on “The Civil War gratuitos sobre “A Guerra Civil e a Re- and Reconstruction,” published in 2014, construção”, publicados em 2014, estão are available at the website ColumbiaX. disponíveis no portal ColumbiaX. Em In 2011, Foner’s The Fiery Trial: Abra- 2011, Foner ganhou os prêmios Pulit- ham Lincoln and American Slavery won zer, Lincoln e Bancroft por The Fiery the Pulitzer Prize, Lincoln Prize, and the Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Bancroft Prize. In 2000, he was elected Slavery. Em 2000, foi eleito presidente president of the American Historical da Associação Americana de História. Association.

Reading your essay “My life as a Historian” (Foner, 2002, chap. 1), I got know about the importance of your father and uncle [Jack and Philip Foner] and the so called left wing radicalism of the first half of the 20th century in your first approach on history. In an other essay of the same book, “The Education of Richard

* Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), Centro de Estudos Gerais, Instituto de Ciências Humanas e Filosofia. Niterói, RJ, Brasil. [email protected] ** Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), Centro de Estudos Gerais, Instituto de Ciências Humanas e Filosofia. Niterói, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69016 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu

Hofstadter”, I’ve known about your Ph.D. supervisor at Columbia University. May you talk a little about them and their influence on your formation for us? I grew up in the 1950s basically in what we call the old left, people who had been connected with the communist party, some of them had left, some of them were still sympathetic, but this was a little world, in the era of McCarthyism. It was an almost secret and very insular world. There was a lot of very anti-communist, anti-left sentiment in the country. But this was an insular world where growing up we just learned about things like race in America, the condition of black people in America, which was something nobody talked about, really, no white people were talking about it. Very few. This was before the civil rights movement really got going. But in a sense, I just learned from my father a different way of thinking about American history, where race was the fundamental problem of America, where radical movements were tremendously important in changing American society. At that time in school all you heard about was presidents and robber barons and dip- lomats and that kind of thing. My uncle Philip Foner was a very prolific historian. He created Frederick Douglas. In 1950 or so he put together four volumes – no one had ever heard of Frederick Douglas at that time. Literally, he didn’t exist. He was not in any U.S. history textbook. Today, every textbook talks about Frederick Douglas. But my uncle put him out there, collected his writings, collected his speeches, and helped to make people aware of what an important, brilliant figure he was. And of course they talked about labor history, African American history, and the history of women. Things, which today are totally normal and mainstream, but back then, were way off center. The scholarship was not dealing with that very much. So I grew up in that world, even though I wasn’t intending to be a historian. When I went to college I wanted to be a scientist, not a historian. But what history I knew was very different from what you would normally get in a regular classroom at that time. And then, when I was in college the civil rights movement really began. No, it didn’t really begin, it had been around. But the militant phase of the civil rights movement began in 1960 with the sit-ins of young black students. They became the cutting edge of change at that point. And many of us who were in school at that time and were interested in history really began focusing our attention on where did this come from in American life. The history of race, the history of slavery and abolitionism and, to try to find what we call a useable past, a past that could explain the present. Because the kind of history I’d learned in high school basically said, America was born perfect and has been getting better ever since. So this didn’t exactly explain why the country was falling apart, the

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner turmoil, the problems of the society. So you needed a different history that could actually lead up to the present. And in college here at Columbia I took courses with James Shenton, a great teacher who was very committed to these issues of slavery and race. And that’s how I got interested in this area that I’ve studied most of my career in some way. So I think it’s this combination of the world I grew up in and the world that was all around me when I was actually a student that shaped the way I look at history in many ways. After I graduate here at Columbia I went to England for two years, to Oxford where I studied basically European history. And then I came back and did my Ph.D. here with Richard Hofstadter as my supervisor. So, now, of course that was also a very, very volatile time. Between 1965-69 I was here. That was the height of the anti-war movement, student uprisings, Columbia University’s ‘68, where the students took over the university and occupied buildings. Well, you know about this.

And did you participate? A little bit. I didn’t really participate that much. I was too old by then. The real cutting edge were the undergraduates. The graduate students, we did things, but we were very moderate compared to the young undergraduates. But that was a very lively time to be studying history because again, the whole society was in this turmoil. That also influenced my long-term interest in social movements, radical movements. My second book, after my dissertation, was about Thomas Paine and the American Revolution (Foner, 1976). I got interested in that because of all the social upheaval in the society.

Before, you mentioned that you went to England. In “My life as a historian” (Foner, 2002, chap. 1), you quote four well known historians you were in contact with or were influenced by, between the late 1960s and the early 1970s: Winthrop Jordan, E.P. Thompson, Eric Hobsbawn, and Herbert Gutman. Did you meet Thompson or Hobsbawn during this time in Oxford? When I went to England, 1963-65, I read Thompson, but that still hadn’t penetrated into the education at Oxford very much. And my dissertation book, the first one, was very much political history, ideological history, very little social history in it (Foner, 1995[1970]). It was very much a Columbia dissertation. Columbia, I mean Hofstadter himself, was very strong in this political, intellectual history, or political culture you might say. And I learned a tremen- dous amount from Hofstadter about how to study political ideas, which is

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu really what it’s about. I think it was a good book, and that’s what it was. But after that was finished, and after I taught for a couple of years, I was able to get a grant to go to England. This was the early ‘70s, and I wanted to write a book about American radicalism actually. And I was starting out with Thomas Paine. Now eventually Thomas Paine became the whole book. But that’s when I was there from ‘72 to ‘73, that’s when I really encountered Hobsbawm, Thompson, George Rudé, and their work – British social history, the British version of Marxist history. I attended Hobsbawm’s seminar which he was running in London. And really I re-educated myself over there. Or, added to my education. In other words, social history was just rising at that time, history from the bottom up as they called it. And so my book on Tom Paine is about ideas, but also social history, in a way that my first book wasn’t. I was very influenced by this British radical history way of doing history, so my book on Paine talks about his role among the artisans, the radical artisans, both in England and America, and tries to root him in this social conflict, a little bit more than my first book had done. So it was really there, in the ‘70s, that I became very influenced by, I guess you’d say, British Marxist history – Christopher Hill also. I hadn’t really encountered them that much when I was a student at Oxford. It was seven or eight years later when I was back in England.

And the work with Herbert Gutman was before… That’s after that. After I came back. I was teaching at Columbia, but then Columbia told me to go away. They basically fired me. Or they said I was not going to get tenure. And Herbert Gutman had just been hired at City College [New York] to revamp their history department, and he offered me a job. Very, very lucky. And so that’s really when I got to know Gutman. I taught for ten years at City College. From ’73 to ’82, something like that. And Gutman was really then the leading spirit of this new labor history in the U.S. and social history, bringing the British kind of perceptions to bear on American history. And I learned an enormous amount from Gutman, working with Gutman, about this in-depth social history that he was pioneering. He was working on his book on the black family at that time (Gutman, 1977). But I was also influenced very strongly, I hate to say it now, by Eugene Genovese, who later became crazy, politically. But at that time he was really the most important proponent of a kind of Americanized Marxist history. And Genovese strongly influenced my work at that time. In a certain sense, my first book was trying to do for the north what Genovese had done for the south – to look at the ideology of anti-slavery. He had studied the ideology of slavery. And I got to

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner know him very well. In the ‘70s, I worked on this short-lived journal that he was the editor of, called Marxist Perspectives. That was, I don’t even know when, late ‘70s I guess. But it was an attempt to bring a form of Marxism into intellectual discourse in the United States. So I had these two. The problem was, Genovese and Gutman hated each other, would not speak to each other. And so trying to be friends with both of them or trying to be influenced by both of them was tricky, you know? But all of those influences were very strong on how I was writing history.

But in a certain way you kept the mixing of the social history with a kind of political and cultural approach… Well, in a sense, that’s what I try to do. And then when I started working on Reconstruction (Foner, 1988), in the end that book is all of this put together, exactly. A lot of it is just political history, national political history. And I learned how to do that at Columbia. But a lot of it is the social history of former slaves, and I learned how to do that from Hobsbawm and Thompson and Gutman. But, also, it has a very strong, I don’t know what you’d call it, “class analysis” of what’s going on. And that I get from Genovese. So it’s a combination of these various influences that had affected me for twenty years at that point of scholarship. So it aspired to be what we were calling at that time a synthesis of everything together, political history, social history, economic history, intellectual history. It’s never possible, but it was trying to do all of it, rather than saying, just do this, just do that, just do this part, that part. Because one of the things I learned with Genovese was slavery was a total system. And the abolition of slavery meant that a whole new total system had to be created. And so you had to look at all these other dimensions. It wasn’t just a political conflict, it wasn’t just a labor conflict, it wasn’t just a racial conflict – it was all of those. All of those things together. So you had to look at all of them. That’s what I tried to do.

That is great, before continuing on this point, just to finish the picture about your relationship with the social movements in the time of the civil rights, can you tell the story about your first class on African American history? Well, someone gave me this recently. [Shows a photo.] This is me, back then, at this class. This is a little historical artifact. Somebody just gave me this the other day. He said he found it somewhere. So I said, my God, look at that. When I finished my Ph.D., I was hired to teach at Columbia and this was ’69,

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 5 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu the height of black power among black students, and there were now a significant number of black students. When I was an undergraduate, there were no black students. This place was just as segregated as the University of Mississippi. But because of the civil rights movement, black students were coming into the college now. And they wanted black history, which is fair enough. But there was nobody – there were only two black professors in the whole place, I think. And there was nobody who could teach black history. And so, they asked me to do it, which I said, yes, I’ll do it. I had some knowledge of it. And then I studied, I worked very hard. And a lot of students took this course, this is the first course I ever taught. But after a while the black students, nationalists, decided they didn’t want a white teacher. For them, it was insulting to have a white teacher teaching black history. So the course was in a kind of turmoil. Students would demonstrate in the classroom. And they walked out of the class one day. And they went to the Spectator, the student newspaper, and said that we want to change the course. And it was very complicated for me because this was the first time I’d ever taught in a lecture course and of course they were right that we need more black professors. But I also kept saying, no. If this is a subject, it has to be judged on its intellectual merits. There’s no such thing as just one type of person who’s going to teach. Who will teach ancient Greek history, then, if we don’t have any ancient Greeks around? So that was my first course. We survived, it got to the end, and that was it. And I taught black history many times after that. And then they did start hiring more black professors. But it was a very challenging and chaotic situation. But the result of that is, ever since then, nothing that can happen in a classroom can faze me. You know what I mean? Nothing can happen that is as challenging and traumatic as that. So, I walk into a classroom with no fear whatsoever, because I’ve already gone through whatever could possibly happen. It was the late ‘60s. That was it. SNCC [Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee] and CORE [Congress of Racial Equality] were throwing whites out, and Black Power was everywhere. So it’s not surprising it was on campus also. So, we survived. That’s what I can say. And this book that I published then, a year later, America’s Black Past (Foner, 1970), basically that was the syllabus for this course, it was just the readings for the course, because there were no such things. Today there’s a vast literature of black history out there. But back then, there were no such books. So I just put together the readings and the publisher published it, and it actually got used very widely for a few years around the country because these courses were suddenly developing all over and nobody knew what to do, how to teach them.

6 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner

The funny thing is, after this was all over, many black people praised me very much as someone who was a pioneer of African American history. And of teaching it. Some years ago I was at an event at Rutgers University, which was celebrating the 40th anniversary of their black history program. And I was on a panel discussion about what’s happened in black history. And I just happened to say – it was a mostly black audience in a big auditorium – and I said, you know I’m delighted to be here because forty years ago I taught the first course ever given at Columbia University, and everybody started applauding. So I said, boy, look at how things have changed. Forty years ago I was denounced as a racist. Today they’re applauding the fact that I taught that course. Some things have changed.

Yes, fortunately, some things change. Let’s then talk about Nothing But Freedom (Foner, 1983). This is your most well-known book in Brazil. It was published there in a time of change 1988, in the centenary of slavery abolition, and helped to create the field of post-abolition studies in the country. It came before your Re- construction and has a comparative approach that you not follow in subsequent works, may you talk to us about the production context of this specific book? I am delighted to hear that of course. Unfortunately it’s the only book of mine that was translated into Portuguese. I would love to see my book on Lincoln or some other book translated and used and available in Brazil. But that requires a publisher to do it somewhere. That book came out of when I was invited to give these lectures, called the Fleming Lectures, at Louisiana State University. Every year they have someone come down and give three lectures on Southern history and then they publish them as a little book. I was then working on Reconstruction, which took me about 10 years. So I was in the middle of that. But it shows you how life is full of serendipity. A few years before I had given a lecture at Duke University on some of my research about reconstruction and the labor problem particularly – land, labor, the struggle over land after the end of slavery, and theories of labor and all this. I was trying to say, you know it’s not just a question of race. In the United States, everything related to blacks becomes race. The opposite of what it used to be in Brazil. But a lot of things are not race. Even though a black person is involved, that doesn’t mean race is the big issue. I was talking about labor and these other questions. And a graduate student in African history came up to me after and said you know there’s a big literature on these questions in Africa, the whole question of how to mobilize black labor and ideologies of labor, and some of it is

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 7 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu relevant to you. And I said, really? She said, yeah, I’ll send you a bibliography. And in her bibliography she also included stuff on the West Indies, and I began reading this and it was amazing because we are very insular. American historians are very insular, maybe a little less so now than we used to be. But because we all believe, or most of us, in American exceptionalism, right? That is the bane of our existence, the belief in American exceptionalism – Because, if you believe America is exceptional, you don’t need to know anything about the rest of the world. It becomes irrelevant. We have nothing to learn from any other history if we are so exceptional. We are exempt from the laws of history. So I didn’t know anything about that. There had been some work, as you know, of comparative slavery going back to [Frank] Tannenbaum and [Carl] Degler and others, Herbert Klein and Genovese. But nothing that I knew of comparing the aftermath of slavery. And every country that had slavery had an aftermath of slavery, right? So, I really was very fortunate that this woman had given me all this and I started reading. And then, again in ‘80-‘81, I was over in England for a year. I was teaching at Cambridge that year. And I got to know people who were really experts on the West Indies. And giving me books. And I realized that these issues of access to land, control of labor, and other things were universal. They couldn’t just be understood within the context of American history. And so I devoted my first lecture in that series of lectures, and in the book, to this question of comparative emancipation. Now, that really did ring a bell here. Nobody knew anything about it. It got a lot of attention in the United States. I’m very glad that in Brazil it also had an impact. It opened up this question which now other people have gone into. But, having said that, I will also say that it’s not so easy to do. And what I did was really very pioneering, or even primitive in a way. Because, for example, there’s very little about Brazil in my book, because, I don’t read Portuguese. So I am a prisoner of the literature that is in English. I mean good works by scholars in Brazil have been translated into English. But a lot of work has not been translated into English. So if you are going to really do this seriously you’ve got to know languages, and even more important, you’ve got to know the historiography, you’ve got to know where this book is coming from. I can pick up a book on Brazil after slavery, but I don’t understand how that fits into a whole intellectual discourse in Brazil. And eventually I could figure that out with the British Caribbean, because I know British history, and it’s all in English, so I can read all the stuff and compare how this scholar and that scholar are doing it. And a lot of the work in Africa. But basically it’s Anglophone. It’s a comparative history, but it’s very much the English speaking world. I’ve learned a lot since then about

8 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner

Brazil, and the very good work that’s been done there of course on this. And then of course Spanish America, the Spanish Caribbean, there’s a whole other literature. Not to mention Haiti, which has another literature. So I’m well aware of the lack of depth in some ways, but at least I was able to put these questions out there. How do we think about the aftermath of slavery? And what are the issues that recur everywhere? I use that as a way of counteracting this exceptionalism. The issue of master and slave in US is not all that different from the issue of master and slave in Cuba or in Jamaica or, maybe in Brazil. The way it’s worked out is different in each national context. But the questions are the same. And even in Africa, the whole question of slavery and forced labor in Africa. Very few people have done that in the U.S. since. There’s, one or two. Rebecca Scott of course has done this, for Cuba and the United States. I found it very fascinating. It’s just a little essay but it’s still a pretty wide open area here in America, 30-odd years after I published that.

Why did you not follow with this comparative dialogue in the writing of Recon- struction? The Reconstruction book is part of a series in American history, the so- called New American Nations Series. In others words, it is domestic history and it’s already 600 or 700 pages. I did not really continue that in that book because I had already said what I have to say in this other book. And here I’m really focused on the internal, because that book has many purposes and one was to finally put into the grave the old view of Reconstruction, which was so dominant. And to do that, I had to really, I don’t know how to put it, I had to really kill it, effectively. And that required a lot of research, a lot of work, a lot of domestic American history, and the comparative didn’t really fit so to speak. But another little, sort of comparative thing I did was this essay called “Why is there no Socialism in America?” (Foner, 2002, chap. 6) which is an old, old debate. It was a paper I gave in England around 1980 or something on theories of socialism or lack there of. But that is implicitly comparative because it’s comparing labor consciousness, socialist consciousness in the U.S. with Europe, and other places. Really in a sense it’s challenging the whole concept that there is a single path of historical development with capitalism, socialism, going in a certain direction. And a lot of that was influenced by work I’d done in England, even though it’s not cited so much. But you’re right, basically my work is internal American history. I think today of course in U.S. history everyone talks about globalizing or internationalizing American history, and that’s all fine. I think it’s great. Anything that cuts against our parochialism is

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 9 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu good. On the other hand, as I said, it’s easier said than done. Most American historians do not know any other foreign language. How are you going to do global history if you only know English?

“If Reconstruction was born in the archives, it was written from the heart” you wrote. I believe that most of Brazilian historians usually do not think about how rooted in the US society was the interpretation that you were fighting in your book. May you contextualize this? It’s still out there in the popular memory. What we call the old Dunning School, which originated here at Columbia over 100 years ago, around 1900- 1910, became the dominant view for at least half a century or more, which was that Reconstruction was a total failure because it was a period of corruption, misgovernment. The reason, according to them, was that black people were incapable of taking part in political democracy. It was racist thinking – the great error was to give the right to vote after the civil war to African American men, former slaves. Women of course didn’t get to vote. They think former slaves were inherently incapable of political participation. They just were going to be manipulated by white people, unscrupulous white people. Therefore it was a terrible error to give them the right to vote, and therefore you have this travesty of democracy and eventually the white southerners banded together and overthrew this, and brought back good government in the South. Now this was very bad history. It was founded in racism, the lack of ability of black people was the underlying premise. But what I think is important, and one of the reasons it had to be killed, totally dead, is that it had very strong political implications, down to the present day. You still hear echoes of it today. That giving rights to black people is a punishment to whites. The South was pun- ished after the civil war because blacks were given the right to vote. It’s taking something away from white people when blacks get better rights. Or second of all that it was a mistake to give them the right to vote anyway, and therefore the South was then correct to take the vote away, which they did, so for 50, 60 years, black people could not vote in the South. It was based on the idea that white southerners understand race relations better than northerners. So any time in the 1920s, ‘30s, ‘40s, ‘50s people would demand change in the South, they’d say, no no no, look at the horrors of Reconstruction. If you give more rights to blacks you’re going to have another Reconstruction. Reconstruction became the example of why nothing should change in the South. And it also became the intellectual foundation for the system of Jim Crow segregation. Oh, and also, it glorified the Ku Klux Klan. The Ku Klux Klan were a group of

10 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner patriotic, well-meaning southerners who just wanted to restore good government in the South. It justified violent terrorism and murder, which is what they really were. The Ku Klux Klan and groups like that killed more Americans than Osama Bin Laden did. And yet they were glorified. There were statues in the South to Ku Klux Klan leaders. So all of that was a good example of what we call the politics of history. The way history affects current thinking about things. So long after Reconstruction was over, this view of Reconstruction was part of the edifice of racism in the United States. And it had to be destroyed. Now I’m not the only person. There had been a generation of historians, starting in the 1960s. Once the civil rights movement came along, the underpinning of this outlook fell apart. You could no longer say, oh well, black people are so inferior that they shouldn’t have any rights. And of course W. B. Dubois had done this in the 1930s with his great book Black Reconstruction in America. But that was ignored by the mainstream academic world. By the 1960s you had people like Kenneth Stampp, John Hope Franklin, Eric McKitrick. Mainstream, very excellent historians, chipping away at one or another part of this story. You had Leon Litwack in the 1970s. And many local studies, Reconstruction in this county in Alabama, slave labor and free labor in this other place they were the building blocks being created by many many scholars and many more documents becoming available. But what I had to do was put it all together in a coherent, new account. It’s not enough to say, well the old guys are wrong. What actually did happen in Reconstruction? Once we say they’re wrong, that doesn’t tell you what the history was. So that’s what I was trying to do. To create a new narrative of Reconstruction, a coherent narrative to take the place of the old narrative. But it’s a political thing as well as a historical thing. And unfortunately, even though they don’t teach the old view in schools anymore, certainly among an older generation of people who were educated in the ‘50s and before, that’s the view of Reconstruction, still the old Dunning School is alive and well out there.

In this sense, how about your subsequent experience as public historian of the period? Well, I wanted to bring good, new history to a broader public than is going to read academic books. I got involved in this public history world, again, almost by accident because the Chicago Historical Society, a very fine institution, asked me to become a curator of a big exhibit on the civil war era, about Lincoln and the civil war era. Because they were pioneering something that is very common now, which is bringing together an outside historian with the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 11 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu people at the museum to figure out how to show history. Because generally speaking before that everything was done internally in these museums and very often the history was very out of date, because they’re not scholarly historians, most of them. So when they asked me to do that, I said, you must have the wrong person. I don’t know anything about how to make a museum exhibition. And they said, no no no, we know how to make museum exhibitions. We don’t know the history though. What are we going to show in our museum exhibition? You determine that. And I said, all right, great, that sounds like a great opportunity. And I learned an enormous amount about what a historical museum is, what they have. Of course only a tiny fraction is shown; they have these vast holdings in storage. And with another excellent curator there, a woman, Olivia Mahoney, we worked together, going through all this tremen- dous array of materials they had, of deciding what was going to be shown, and where and how, and what is the story we’re telling here. And it turned out to be a very successful exhibition. And then after that the Virginia Historical Society asked us to do another one on Reconstruction, which we did. This was the ‘90s and it traveled around for several years as a visiting exhibit to 7 or 8 different venues, North and South. You know, I’ve been involved with the National Park Service about how they present history, at like Gettysburg and other, not just other historical sites. I’ve been involved with TV history, although I don’t really approve of it very much. It usually tends to oversimplify everything. And I speak a lot at public venues.

And you are also interested in history teaching, right? How about the curriculum of history in the schools here in the US? Well it’s very decentralized. There is no national curriculum. It’s state by state, and often city by city. I’ve been involved quite a few times in running in the summers a seminar for high school teachers on Reconstruction. Just one week: how do you teach Reconstruction? I get about 30 of them from all over the country who come. We spend a week talking about Reconstruction. I lecture to them. Then we talk about how to use it in a classroom. I’m not a high school teacher. I can’t tell them what they should do, but they need the history. So I am trying to get these ideas out there as best I can. But it’s an uphill battle because the strength of the old mythology is very powerful.

12 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner

Yes, I remembered Gone with The Wind, I believe even there Ku Klux Klan is still glorified… Gone with the Wind absolutely is the most popular movie ever made in the United States. Well it’s mostly a romance, but it’s set in slavery, and the view of slavery is very out of date. It’s mostly about the civil war, but it has some parts on Reconstruction too. And it still shows the old myth, evil carpet- baggers coming down from the North, blacks being ignorant and manipulated by everybody else. That’s what people get when they go to see Gone with the Wind, absolutely.

And what did you think about this year new movies on the subject of slavery and civil rights, like The Butler and Twelve Years a Slave? I never saw The Butler. Maybe I will one day. Well, Twelve Years a Slave is a big step for movies in the direction of reality. But nobody is making such a movie like that about Reconstruction. It’s too complicated; it’s too bittersweet. Twelve Years a Slave ends on a happy note, in a way, right? This guy gets out of slavery. Of course all the rest of the slaves are left behind, but nonetheless he gets out of slavery back to his family. Reconstruction ends on a very unhappy note. The Klan triumphs, the rights of black people are taken away. That’s not what Hollywood’s trying to show. I don’t think we’re going to get a good movie on Reconstruction any time soon. As somebody said, Hollywood likes a tragedy with a happy ending. Tragedy with a happy ending. Reconstruction doesn’t have a happy ending.

Let’s finally talk about your last book, The Fiery Trial (Foner, 2010). I hope someone in Brazil decides to translate it. Why did you decide to write a Lincoln biography? I have taught American history, well 19th century American history, for a long, long time. If you do that, you’re always thinking about Lincoln in some way or another. And Lincoln pops up. He’s in my first book about the Republican Party, he’s in my book on Reconstruction. But I’d never focused on Lincoln. I think I got interested in writing about Lincoln because I became more and more annoyed at how literature on Lincoln was developing like 10 years ago or so. Because there was a whole literature coming out which saw Lincoln as the great pragmatist, the great realist, the politician. As opposed to the abolitionists who are just fanatics, irresponsible, and causing all sorts of disruption. It’s Lincoln who accomplished everything. And I thought this was

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 13 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu a complete misreading of the dynamics of social change. Lincoln was not an abolitionist. But the relation between Lincoln and the abolitionists was much more symbiotic than antagonistic. It’s a different concept of politics. The abolitionists are working out in the society, trying to change public opinion. That’s politics. It’s just not electoral politics. Lincoln is a man in the political system. But without them, there’s no Lincoln. Without a public opinion hostile to slavery, a guy like Lincoln cannot flourish. So I wanted to counteract this view that Lincoln is the essence of pragmatism, and therefore anyone else who demanded something different was just some crazy person. They were impractical. How do we know they were impractical? Because Lincoln didn’t do it. And Lincoln is practical. It’s a circular argument. So I really wanted [to fight this], but then I got more and more interested in Lincoln’s own views. I became very impressed by the way his views changed over time. Because so often [in historical narratives] Lincoln is just born ready to sign the Emancipation Proclamation. And many aspects of Lincoln’s views are ignored or neglected in the literature. Like some of his racial views, which are not very forward looking. Much of the literature just ignores that, or they’ll just say – oh yeah, he said these racist things, but he didn’t really mean that, that’s just to get elected. He believed that black people should be encouraged to go to some other country, after the end of slavery. Well nobody talks about that but I was very impressed by the fact that Lincoln spent 10 years pushing that point of view. So, on the one hand, I wanted to try to explain Lincoln. But I was also trying to change how people thought about social movements. I was also influenced by the early Obama campaign in 2008. I was writing in that time. A political leader and a social movement, what is the relationship between them? And Obama did not turn out to be Lincoln in my humble opinion, but very few people do. But he came into office as an example of what I’m talking about with Lincoln and the abolitionists.

At the end of the book, when Lincoln is dead, you really think that he was really assuming full citizenship for blacks as a conviction? Well, he was moving. He thought blacks were citizens. What rights they would have was not yet clear. Lincoln is killed at a certain moment. The big mistake that people make when they write about that is they just say okay that is Lincoln’s view right there. What he believed when he was shot, that’s Lincoln’s point of view. But in fact one thing my book shows is Lincoln evolves all the time. It’s completely unrealistic to think Lincoln would have stuck with this view as of April 1865 if he hadn’t been killed. No, Lincoln was always in

14 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner relationship to Congress, abolitionists, black people themselves. There’s no question he would have evolved. Exactly where? We don’t know. That’s not history. It would be like fixing him, if he was killed in 1861, it would be easy to say he would never have emancipated the slaves. Absolutely not. He said, I’m not going to emancipate the slaves. He said that very clearly so obviously he would not. But he lived and he did emancipate the slaves. So, particularly in a time of such crisis, people don’t just stick with one view. So I admire Lincoln a lot, but Lincoln is not a god. Lincoln had flaws like any other human being. But I think this capacity for change, this open-mindedness, this willingness to listen to critics, was what really made him a great leader. He didn’t get stuck as history is moving very fast.

And the movie about Lincoln, did you see? What did you think? The movie? It’s Hollywood. What do you want? It’s not history. It’s a good Hollywood movie. It’s not history. It’s based on history. But it has no more to do with history than Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar has to do with the history of ancient Rome. It’s a statement about the present, about politicians, about Congress, in the guise of history. In all Hollywood history with maybe a few exceptions, even Twelve years a Slave – it seems inevitable it’s going to elevate one person. That’s just the essence of the genre. I don’t care if it’s Malcolm X, Gandhi, you name it. There’s a whole series of those movies. Twelve Years a Slave is all about Northup. Well, all right, it’s based on his book. But the other slaves are really pretty much in the background, most of the time. You know, you don’t get much of a sense of a lot of other slaves, and their views, their attitudes. So the Lincoln movie was about Lincoln. The problem is that in that world, Lincoln was not the only actor, historical actor. So it gives a very mis- leading view of the dynamics of politics at that time. But you know, the actor was good, and the costumes, pretty good. That’s all right.

[Prof. Martha Abreu asks] Well, how about your current research? Well, I am finishing right now a book, it’s a little different, because it’s about New York City, actually. It’s about what we call the Underground Railroad, fugitive slaves who came to New York, who helped them, where they came from, where they were sent, how it operated. Because there’s a lot of literature on the Underground Railroad, but very little on New York City, because New York was very closely tied into the South. The New York merchants were in charge of shipping cotton all over the place. New York business

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 15 Hebe Mattos and Martha Abreu men were very tied into the South. New York bankers financed southern slavery. So this was a pro-southern city before the civil war. And so, it was tricky dealing with fugitive slaves. Boston was much more anti-slavery so a lot of the work went on secretly here. So it’s difficult to dig up, although I have dug up a lot. And then there were court cases all the time, and those are all public and useful about fugitives captured, and then a case about sending them back. So it’s really about, from about 1830 to 1860, how the issue of fugitive slaves plays out. And also, go back to Twelve Years a Slave, the issue of kidnapping. Because you had slaves escaping to New York and you had New York free people being kidnapped and sent to the South. Solomon Northup was not the only one that happened to. And so, in fact, I juxtapose, you have advertisements in the southern newspapers for fugitive slaves, slave escaped, here’s what he looks like, here’s what he was wearing. Five hundred dollar reward if you capture him. And then in the northern newspapers you have ads for people kidnapped: A child was taken off the streets by someone the other day. Here’s what he looked like. Here’s what he was wearing. Sent to the South, reward if you can get this kid back. So you have this strange two-way transportation of black people in that period. So it’s an interesting story. New York had a very small abolitionist movement, very small, but they were very active in trying to help fugitive slaves and it’s just an interesting detective story, really. And I’m almost finished. It’ll probably be published next spring. I’m going to turn it into the publisher in a month or so. So, it’s basically done. I’ve been digging around in that for a few years. It took a long time to just find out where things are. But there’s more information than I thought there might be.2

We’ve talked about excepcionalism. At this very moment, Brazilian historiographical agenda is also focusing on slavery borders, kidnappings, and illegal enslavement along the 19h Century. The same questions apply. New York State abolishes slavery in the early 19th century, but fugitive slaves carry the law of slavery into New York. There is no slavery in New York. And yet, these people have to be treated as slaves and sent back to slavery. New York has to enforce the laws of Virginia, or South Carolina. So it’s also relevant about the national debate about slavery, and what is the power of slavery, and how far does it reach. After 1850, with a new fugitive slave law in the United States, slaves had to go to Canada. And that’s also interesting because, go back to exceptionalism, we think of ourselves in the United States, as Thomas Paine said, an asylum, anyone who seeks liberty from other countries can come to America, right? People from dictatorships and all. Here are people who had to

16 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Interview: Eric Foner flee America in order to become free. They had to go to Canada. They could not be free in the United States. So this turns the whole image of America over on its head, right? Thousands of people fleeing to Canada to become free. So it’s a very interesting juxtaposition.

REFERENCES

FONER, Eric. America’s Black Past: A Reader in Afro-American History. New York: Harper & Row, 1970. FONER, Eric. Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party Before the Civil War. 1.ed. 1970. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. FONER, Eric. Gateway to Freedom: The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad. New York: Norton & Co., 2015. FONER, Eric. Nada além da liberdade: a emancipação e seu legado. (Trad. de Nothing but Freedom...) Trad. Luiz Paulo Rouanet. Apresent. John M. Monteiro. Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra, 1988. FONER, Eric. Nothing but Freedom: Emancipation and Its Legacy. Baton Rouge: Lou- isiana State University Press, 1983. FONER, Eric. Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877. New York: Harper & Row, 1988. FONER, Eric. The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery. New York: W. W. Norton, 2010. FONER, Eric. Tom Paine and Revolutionary America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1976. In: ______. Who Owns History? Rethinking the Past in a Changing World. New York: Hill and Wang, 2002. cap. 1. GUTMAN, Herbert. The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom, 1750-1925. New York: Vintage Books, 1977.

NOTE

1 Martha Abreu, Associated Professor in History of America at the Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), filmed part of the interview (available at: http://conversadehistoriadoras. com/2014/04/06/conversando-com-eric-foner/). 2 The book has just been launched in the U.S. (FONER, 2015).

Interview received on January 12, 2015. Approved on February 15, 2015.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 17

Assis, Arthur Alfaix What is History for? Johann Gustav Droysen and the functions of historiography

Walkiria Oliveira Silva*

Assis, Arthur Alfaix What is History for? Johann Gustav Droysen and the functions of historiography New York; Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2014. 234p.

The publication of What is History for? Johann Gustav Droysen and the functions of historiography, by Arthur Assis, presents a profitable discussion about the historiography of de Johann Gustav Droysen (1808-1884), an important nineteenth century German historian. Based on the analysis of Droysen’s historiography, Assis offers the reader an wide panorama of German historiography during the nineteenth century, centering on the debates about historicism, a dominant paradigm for German historical knowledge in the nineteenth century, and in the reformulation of pragmatic value for historiography. Arthur Assis’ work is therefore not only directed at specialists or at researchers of Droysen’s work, but at all those who study German and general historiography, intellectual history, and even political historiography, since it highlights the political influences of Droysen’s thought. Arthur Assis is a professor in the Post-Graduate Program of History in Universidade de Brasília, where he works with the areas of theory and the methodology of history. His work configures a deepening of the questions his doctoral research was concerned with, defended in 2009 in the University of Witten, supervised by Professor Jörn Rüsen. The influence of Rüsen’s thought will not pass unperceived by a reader familiarized with his thought. During the reading, Assis’ dialogue with the thought of Rüsen and Koselleck becomes evident. From Rüsen, also a scholar of the thought of Droysen, the dialogue with his theory of history can be perceived, from the importance of historic knowledge for the intersubjective development of our capacity of orientation in the present, aiming at overcoming our lack of orientation. Koselleck’s importance appears in his understanding of the modern concept of history through the

* Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro (UFRRJ). Três Rios, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69018 Walkiria Oliveira Silva transformation of the experience of time linked to the genesis of a new range of socio-political concepts which emerged in light of a new set of transformations beginning in the second half of the eighteenth century. Although Assis has other theoretical references, the dialogue with Rüsen and Koselleck is most significant and enriching. Organized in four chapters, Arthur Assis’ book is structured around a general objective to which his general questioning corresponds: through the downfall of traditional exemplary historiography and the ascension of the modern concept of history, the author seeks to analyze how the pragmatic function of history is redefined in the works of Droysen. Arthur Assis thereby aims to comprehend the epistemological foundation which unites the modern concept of historiography to its traditional value. His aim is evident: understanding Droysen’s thought taking into account the reformulation and re- signification of the pragmatic function of historical science. A very notable aspect of the work is how Assis links Droysen’s theory of history with his political preferences. As he himself states in the introduction of the book, this connection between Droysen’s historical theory and politics is a gap that is very present in studies of the German historian. By analyzing the reformulation of pragmatic nature of history in Droysen’s thought, Assis sought diligently to understand the contradictions and tensions between Droysen`s historical thought and his political tendencies given the turbulent European political reality, principally the German one, during the nineteenth century. The first chapter, “Functions of Historiography until the mid-19th century,” fulfills an introductory role, however, one that is no less important, to the later discussion of the reformulation of the pragmatic value of historiography. Starting with George Nadel’s concept of the ‘exemplary theory of history,’ Assis delimits what he understands by traditional exemplary historiography. Here, the most important task of historians was to “locate in the past atemporal models of action to be immediately applied or avoided in the present” (p.21). Based on this concept, Assis constructs a vigorous analysis of the forms and functions which exemplarity has assumed since the historiography of Antiquity, passing through authors such as Polybius and Cicero, until the emergence of the modern concept of history in the second half of the eighteenth century, extending his analysis until the late nineteenth. He reaches two conclusions: the first is related to the unquestionable importance of the exemplary function for Western historical thought, and the second states that

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 What is History for? until the end of the eighteenth century, various authors sought justifications which could prove or replace the exemplary theory of history (p.35-36). Based on the ascension of the modern concept of history and a new perception of time – the temporalization of Koselleck –traditional exemplary historiography came to be seen as a problem for historical learning, and new paths for the revalorization of the pragmatic value of historiography were proposed. In the second chapter of the work, “The Theoretical Design of a New Justification,” Arthur Assis explains Droysen’s concept of “historical thinking,” the basis of the historical method and the reformulation of the pragmatic function of historiography present in the thought of the German historian. Thinking historically, in other words the subjective capacity to connect in perspective the present and the cognizable past, constitutes the basis of historical science and delimits its functions (p.63). In this point, Assis emphasizes the pragmatic effect and the pedagogic bias of history in Droysen, since the social value of historiography is its capacity to awaken in readers the sense of reality (p.77). Here, Droysen’s thought is influenced by the ideas of the neo-humanist Wilhelm von Humboldt for whom one of the functions of historical knowledge was to awaken the sense of reality, or, in other words, the capacity to perceive the forces, the ideas found beyond historic events. Assis underlines the herme- neutic nature of Droysen’s historic method, since with the factual research there was a link between the past, the present, and the actual researcher. Droysen, as Assis points out, was one of the first intellectuals to use the her- meneutic concept of comprehension as the principal methodical specificity of the human sciences. Once the function of historic knowledge in Droysen is presented through the re-signification of the pragmatic value of history through the subjective capacity of think historically, Arthur Assis begins the second part of his work. In chapters 3 and 4 he seeks to link the historic thought of Droysen, as presented in chapter 2, to the understanding the German historian constructs of his own present. In chapter 3, “Historical Thinking and the Genealogy of the Present”, Assis traces the approximations between Droysen’s thought and the philosophy of history of Hegel, highlighting the importance of Hegalian thought for Droysen’s concept of history. Assis states that for Droysen, like Hegel and other German intellectuals in the nineteenth century, the idea of the historic process such as the conquest of the idea of liberty was fundamental. According to Droysen, interpreting the genesis of the present signified apply- ing his historical method – thinking historically – to understanding the development of the idea of liberty from its beginning until the present time of the

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 Walkiria Oliveira Silva historian (p.104). Assis also presents Droysen’s understanding of political processes whose political consequences had transformed the European political scenario, such as the French Revolution and the Franco-Prussian War. Droysen’s comprehension of the genealogy of his own time is explored by Assis in detail. He analyzes Droysen’s comprehension of the economic, political, and intellectual policies of his time, such as materialism, rationalism, positivism, and capitalism. The final chapter, “The Politics of Historical Thinking and the Limits of the New Function,” aims to fill the gap pointed to by Assis in his introduction, in other words, to point to the tension and convergences between Droysen’s political preferences and his theory of history. According to Assis, after 1840 Droysen was greatly concerned with the formation and transformations of the state of Prussia, while the frontiers between his theory of history and a historiographical production motivated by his political preferences began to become confused. Droysen’s liberal-national position and his position congruent with the Savigny’s historical school of law are presented and analyzed by Assis, who observes the intimate relations between thinking historically and Droysen’s political commitment. Arthur Assis achieves the fundamental purpose of his book: analyzing Droysen’s proposal for the exemplary theory of history, in other words, thinking historically. By presenting the political implications of Droysen’s thought, Assis highlights that every theory is always accompanied by the historical experiences of the intellectual himself. In times in which discussions about the uncertainty of the scientificity of history through post-modern analyzes grow significantly, Arthur Assis’ book fulfills an important role by reflecting and inducing questioning on the forms and functions which historical knowledge assumes given the experiences and transformation of the present time. At the end of the reading, it remains to us to ask: has historical knowledge anything to teach us historically?

Review received on January 31, 2015. Approved on March 1, 2015.

4 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Reis Filho, Daniel Aarão Luís Carlos Prestes: um revolucionário entre dois mundos [Luís Carlos Prestes: a revolutionary between two worlds]

Jean Rodrigues Sales*

Reis Filho, Daniel Aarão Luís Carlos Prestes: um revolucionário entre dois mundos São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2014. 576p.

Luís Carlos Prestes was born in January 1898 and died in March 1990. During his long life he participated in significant moments in Brazilian history, and of the left in particular. In the 1920s, he was one of the leaders of the movement which spread throughout Brazil in opposition to the administration of Artur Bernardes and to way the republication regime was organized. In the 1930s he spent a long period in the Soviet Union, where he definitely adhered to communism and prepared the way to joining the Brazilian Communist Party (Partido Comunista Brasileiro – PCB). After returning to Brazil he participated in the so-called Intentona Comunista (Communist Uprising) in 1935. After the defeat of this he was imprisoned for various years, until he re- emerged in the second half of the 1940, leading a reinvigorated PCB after the end of the war. During the Dutra administration, he faced a new period of persecutions after the revocation of the PCB’s official registration, once again having to go underground. From the end of the 1950s until the 1964 coup he, along with the PCB, experienced the intense years of the Juscelino Kubitschek and Jânio Quadros administrations, the resignation of the latter, and the troubled assumption of João Goulart. Between 1961 and 1964, he was present during the debates of the Grassroots Reforms (Reformas de Base) and other development projects for the country. After the coup, he spent a new and long exile in the Soviet Union, from where he accompanied and was a protagonist in the organic crisis of the PCB. Returning to Brazil in 1979, until his death he directly

* Programa de Pós-Graduação em História, Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro (UFRRJ). Nova Iguaçu, RJ, Brasil. [email protected]

Revista Brasileira de História. São Paulo, v. 35, nº 69, June 2015. Available at: http://www.scielo.br/rbh http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1806-93472015v35n69019 Jean Rodrigues Sales or indirectly participated in the great events related to re-democratization. In general terms, he adopted a position that was critical of the PCB, the parties of the left and the so-called New Republic. Due to the dimension of Prestes’ participation in the events summarized here, we can ask ourselves here about the feasibility of writing a complete biography about his personal and political trajectory during a life of almost a century. The difficulties raised by a venture of this nature can explain the fact that the book Luís Carlos Prestes: um revolucionário entre dois mundos is the first to assume this task.1 In order to take into account the great complexity of the long period studied, Daniel Aarão Reis has divided the trajectory of Prestes into three large periods, demarcated by broader political events and by Prestes’ history within the PCB: 1898-1935; 1936-1964, and 1964-1990. In addition to the merit of writing a biography of a representative figure from the Brazilian left in the twentieth century, the strongest point in the book is the use of a wide range of sources: interviews with activists and former activist who knew Prestes, both those who remained close to or admirers of the legacy of the communist leader, and the critics and those who historically disaf- fected, allowing an analysis of the trajectory of his biography within the party machine; interviews with family members, allowing a glimpse of the personal aspects of this trajectory; sources from the Soviet regime and the Communist International researched in Moscow, and finally, but very relevant, audio recordings of meetings of the Central Committee of the PCB made in exile. Access to the recordings, until then unheard, allowed the analysis of the perceptions of PCB leaders in relation to the situation of the party in the scenario before the return from exile in 1979, and Prestes’ own position at that moment. The debates held by the Central Committee abroad, which appear in the recordings, also help to understand Prestes’ withdrawal from the PCB during the 1980s. In a book of this nature, it will always be possible to point to the lack of certain themes, the need for greater depth in this or that aspect of Prestes’ trajectory, as well as implicit approaches in the history of Brazil or of communism. These are the cases, for example, of the relations of the PCB and of Prestes himself with workers during the twentieth century. Similarly, it is possible to disagree with an interpretation which permeates the book, suggesting that Luís Carlos Prestes’ options had been spent on an impossible dream: a socialist revolution in Brazil. It would perhaps have been useful to expand the analysis and note that during the twentieth century revolutions occurred in

2 Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 Luís Carlos Prestes: um revolucionário entre dois mundos countries in which they were not expected, as well as the victory of the struggles of various peoples in the Third World from the Post-War period onwards. There are also those who have pointed to factual mistakes in the narrative, but these, in my opinion, do not cause important harm to the text, although they involve important questions about Prestes’ personal life. However, the author and publishers’ choice of a form of citation in which at certain moments the sources used as support for the analyses of the book cannot be completely found, has generated discomfort, principally among historians.2 While, on the one hand, the editorial decision has the positive aspect of allowing a fluid narrative, necessary in a book of more than five hundred pages, on the other hand, the imprecision of citations can be noted. This characteristic of the work, which would be controversial in any history book, looms large by dealing with a question which is in itself controversial, such as the life and legacy of Luís Carlos Prestes, making criticisms and divergences almost inevitable. As can be seen, the book has superlative and complex aspects, which por- tray Prestes’ life. The divergences about its result denote the complexity of the task. As a result, whether agreeing or disagreeing with the analyzes of Daniel Aarão Reis, it is essential reading for those who want to know the history of Prestes and communism in the twentieth century.

NOTES

1 The researcher and daughter of Luís Carlos Prestes, Anita Leocádia Prestes, published various works about aspects of the trajectory of her father, but these did not exactly constitute a biography. 2 For some of these criticisms see: PRESTES, Anita Leocádia. “Daniel Aarão Reis e a biografia de Luiz Carlos Prestes: a falsificação da história por um historiador”. In: www. ilcp.org.br/prestes/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=325:daniel-aarao- reis-e-a-biografia-de-luiz-carlos-prestes-a-falsificacao-da-historia-por-um-historiador- &catid=18:artigos&Itemid=140; Acesso em: 12 abr. 2015.

Review received on April 13, 2015. Approved on April 13, 2015.

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 3 INSTRUCTION TO AUTHORS

Scope and editorial policy The Revista Brasileira de História publishes original articles and book reviews in the field of history. All papers will be reviewed by two referees, provided they follow the rules for the presentation of originals. In case of antagonistic reports, there will be a third one. The Editor in charge and the Editorial Committee may refuse texts which do not meet the requirements described in the instructions to authors, without even begining the editorial process. The decision regarding the opportunity of the publication of submitted papers lies with the Editorial board. The Editorial board asks authors and editors not to send books for review, once there is no possibility of attending to all requests. Otherwise, reviews of books are welcome, and they should comply with the following specifications. Each author should have only one article in Editorial process, from its submission to its publication. It should also be observed a period of two years between the publication of a text and the beginning of a new editorial process.

Guidelines for submissions Papers submitted to the Revista Brasileira de História should comply with the following specifications: 1. All submissions shall be presented in two versions, one with and the other without the identification of the author. The program used must be compatible with Word for Windows. Images: 300 dpi. 2. The details of the author shall be on a separate page (full name, academic title, institutional affiliation and address of institution, telephone with area code and email for contact), as well as a declaration that the article is new (a letter stating that the article has not been published elsewhere, nor submitted for evaluation in another journal or book). 3. If the study or research has received financial support, the name of the funding agency should be mentioned. 4. Translations should be accompanied by a permission by the author, along with the original text. 5. Articles shall be between 15-20 pages (A4 format) long, in Times New Roman 12, and with spacing of 1.5. Quotations longer than five lines shall be separate with font 11. Margins: right and lower: 2.0 cm; upper and left: 3.0 cm. Articles shall be accompanied by a title in English, an abstract with a maximum of 10 lines or 140 words (Portuguese and English), 3 keywords (Portuguese and English).

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69 6. Book reviews should have from 1000 to 1500 words. Fonts and margins shall be the same as for articles. They should focus on books published in the last two years in Brazil or in the last four years in other countries. 7. Publication and comments regarding original documents will follow the same specifications for papers. 8. Complete bibliographic references shall be listed in alphabetical order, at the end of the article. When quoted, the work shall be indicated as (Author, year, p.nnn). 9. Notes shall be placed at the end of the text, and shall not number more than 30. Explanatory notes are allowed, once they are necessary and as few as possible. 10. For guidelines related to the bibliographic references, cf. NBR 6023 (ABNT): Books: LAST NAME, First Name. Title of the book in italics: subtitle. Translation. Edition. City: Publisher, year. nnn p. Chapters: LAST NAME, First Name. Title of the chapter. In: LAST NAME, First Name (ed.) Title of the book in italics: subtitle. Edition. City: Publisher, year. p.xxx-yyy. Articles: LAST NAME, First Name. Title of the article. Title of the journal in italics, city: publisher, vol., n., p.xxx-yyy, year. Thesis: LAST NAME, First Name. Title: subtitle. Thesis (PhD in…..) – Institution. City, year. nnn p. Internet: LAST NAME, First Name. Title. Available at: www……….; Accessed on: dd mmm. yyyy. Work presented at meetings: LAST NAME, First Name. Title. In: TITLE OF THE MEETING, number, year, city. Annals… City: Publisher, year. p.xxx-yyy.

REVISTA BRASILEIRA DE HISTÓRIA USP – AV. PROF. LINEU PRESTES, 338, TÉRREO PRÉDIO DE GEOGRAFIA E HISTÓRIA 05508-000 – SÃO PAULO-SP

Revista Brasileira de História, vol. 35, no 69