On a Knife Edge: Dictatorship, Opposition and Resistance
A PRESIDENT ON A TIGHTROPE
On 7 September 1961, Brazil’s Independence Day, João Goulart arrived at the National Congress to be sworn in as president of Brazil. He was forty-three years old, and he arrived impeccably dressed in a navy blue summer suit and disguised his anxiety with a broad smile. It was the third time that a president had taken office that year.1 The atmosphere was festive and the general feeling a mixture of euphoria and relief. The situation in the country was extremely difficult. Inflation was high and on the rise, public expenses were out of control, and an alarmingly high payment on the foreign debt was due in the first months of 1962. The incoming President Goulart was already prepared to implement an emergency plan. He had drawn up a draft for the core reforms, but had not had time to plan a full strategy. And the system was parliamentary; a system that had been hurriedly invented as a convenient solution that gave powers to the Legislature and left the Executive with little scope for action. Congress resolved the political crisis in its own way: to govern, the new president would need to obtain a solid majority in the Federal Chamber.2
The key to creating an alliance in Congress that would allow the government to legislate was the Social Democratic Party (PSD). The party was the most representative of the country as a whole, with effective leaders and a strong electoral base. It was also the central force in the day-to-day activities of Congress, balancing the parties with its combination of support for both conservative and moderate proposals and its capacity for negotiation. President Goulart planned to reconstruct the alliance between the Social Democratic Party and the Brazilian Labour Party (PTB), which had provided political stability during the Kubitschek administration. His goal was to create a base of support for the Executive in the centre of the political spectrum. Yet it was equally important that, as well as garnering the support of the other left-wing parties, he should not lose control of the Brazilian Labour Party.
Time was short and the president was in a hurry: he negotiated the appointment of Tancredo Neves of the Social Democrats as prime minister and encouraged him to put together a Cabinet that included the three main political parties – the Social Democratic Party, the Brazilian Labour Party and the National Democratic Union (UDN) – which he appropriately baptized the ‘Cabinet of national conciliation’. During the sixteen months of parliamentary regime – during which time two further cabinets were formed – President Goulart remained on the defensive, searching for a way to implement his proposal for core reforms.
In foreign policy, the main problem was the negotiations with the United States, specifically regarding the foreign debt and the regulation of foreign capital in the Brazilian economy. In April 1962, President Goulart travelled to Washington to discuss the issue with President Kennedy. The reception was cordial and the American press enthusiastic; but Brazil’s creditors were cautious, and preferred to wait and see the direction the Goulart government would take before proceeding with the negotiations. Suspicion in Washington persisted. Santiago Dantas, the new chancellor, had maintained Jânio Quadros’s independent foreign policy, which – at the height of the Cold War – was unacceptable to the Americans. Brazil did not agree to align with one of the two superpowers – the United States and the Soviet Union – and insisted on diversifying its trade partners. As for Latin America, Brazil opposed the sanctions against Cuba proposed by the United States at the Organization of American States (OAS).3
President Goulart returned to Brazil widely praised, empty-handed, and faced with a multitude of problems. Some, like inflation and the end of the cycle of investment associated with the Targets Plan, had been inherited from the previous government. Others, however, like the question of agrarian reform, had much deeper roots – the extreme inequality of Brazilian society. In the early 1960s, Brazil’s northeast became the virtual heart of the country and agrarian reform was at the top of the political agenda. Landowners, rural workers and the government wrangled over which type of reform should be adopted. In 1961, Francisco Julião, the lawyer who had become the main leader of the Ligas Camponesas (Rural Workers’ Leagues), made it clear that the rural workers’ movement understood agrarian reform as the expropriation of all unproductive farms of over 500 hectares; the payment of compensation by the issue of government debt bonds, the registration of the title deeds in the names of the new owners, and government support for cooperatives. The Social Democratic Party was prepared to discuss agrarian reform – and this was a very positive sign considering the party’s regional support base was sustained by local landowners. But they had a stipulation that agrarian reform had to be carried out within the terms of the constitution: expropriation with immediate cash compensation, or in public debt bonds adjusted according to inflation. The landowners, however, were completely against the reform and were terrified over the idea of rural trade unions. In 1963 they withdrew from negotiations and prepared to fight.4
On the left, the parties did not agree that compensation in cash or in debt bonds adjusted to inflation constituted reform. In their opinion that was a business transaction. Negotiations with the Social Democratic Party ended in stalemate. Meanwhile, the Rural Workers’ Leagues occupied farms in Pernambuco, Maranhão, Paraíba, Goiás, Rio Grande do Sul, Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais and Bahia. In the interior of Pernambuco starving crowds looted warehouses and League leaders were assassinated. The most famous of these was João Pedro Teixeira, the head of the Rural Workers’ Leagues in Sapé, in Paraíba, which had around 10,000 members. After one month as president, João Goulart reacted by creating the Department for Agrarian Policy (Supra), with powers to implement agrarian reform and expropriate land. And to rein in the Leagues, while simultaneously stimulating government support in rural areas, the government organized agricultural worker unions and extended trade union and labour law benefits to small farm owners, leaseholders, squatters and independent producers.
In the big cities, the activities of the increasingly organized trade unions led to the creation of the centralized Comando Geral dos Trabalhadores (CGT – General Workers’ Command), and political upheaval began to permeate everyday life. High inflation, loss of purchasing power, and the increased cost of living (which grew from 51.6 per cent in 1962 to 79.9 per cent in 1964) sparked off strikes all over Brazil.5 Apart from alarming business owners, the proliferation of strikes empowered left-wing activists, both inside and outside the trade unions, which were now breaking away from the state control imposed under Getúlio Vargas.
The activities of the left were far-reaching, active and multifaceted. The group included communists, socialists, nationalists, Catholics, workers and numerous alliances. These included parties, associations of sergeants, sailors and marines; of students, trade unions, federations of urban and rural workers, as well as revolutionary groups.6 Despite the disparity between the groups and the obvious difficulties of coming to an agreement, what had previously seemed virtually impossible actually happened: by late 1961 the left-wing parties had formed an unprecedented coalition in order to immediately implement a programme of core reforms. They wanted to start with agrarian reform. The increasing radicalization of groups within the coalition – which refused to negotiate and were determined to implement the reforms by any means available – further complicated the situation. They brought crowds onto the streets to put pressure on the deputies and they directly confronted those who were undecided in Congress. However, with no agreement of terms, the Legislative would not approve a programme that adversely affected the government powerbase, promoted the redistribution of wealth, and advocated social inclusion. Agrarian reform measures would affect the large estates and the volume of agricultural production from the interior. Urban reforms would help control the chaotic growth of the cities, with public transport providing access to the suburbs; real-estate speculation would also be contained. The reform of the banking system foresaw a new state-controlled financial structure. The proposed electoral reform, giving
the vote to the illiterate – who made up 60 per cent of the adult population – and to soldiers threatened the political status quo. Electoral reform also included the legalization of the Communist Party. The planned reform of the foreign capital statute imposed limits on the transfer of profits overseas and nationalized the strategic industrial sector. And finally, the planned reform of the universities would curtail the discretionary power of full professors and reorganize teaching and research programmes to meet Brazil’s national needs.7
The elections in October 1962 brought in new congressmen. Also, eleven new state governors came into office. A warning had been sent to the government: the chances of gradually introducing a moderate reform programme were now virtually non-existent. Not one of the new governorships had been the result of a Social Democratic Party/Brazilian Labour Party (PSD/PTB) alliance; and only one left-wing governor was elected, Miguel Arraes,8 in Pernambuco.9 Despite Leonel Brizola’s victory – he was elected to the Chamber of Deputies with 269,000 votes, the highest number received by any candidate – the balance of power in Congress remained virtually unaltered.
The 1962 elections signalled something else too: the possibility of a coup d’état. The election campaigns had received funding from a number of non-party organizations. The most dangerous among these was the Brazilian Institute for Democratic Action (IBAD), which had been established in Rio de Janeiro in 1959 by the American Central Intelligence Agency. IBAD had poured money into the campaigns of 250 federal deputies and 600 state deputies, as well as those of eight candidates for governor – a practice that was completely illegal under the election laws. The funds came from multinational companies, or companies that were associated with foreign capital, and from United States government sources happy to invest ‘one or two American dollars’ in the conspiracy against President Goulart, as was confirmed some years later by the American ambassador.10 The objective was strategic: to create strong opposition in Congress, block government initiatives, and prepare the way for a coup d’état. After a congressional inquiry had confirmed the presence of widespread electoral corruption and the illegal activities of the Brazilian Institute for Democratic Action, João Goulart closed the institute in 1963. But IBAD had not acted alone. They were aided by an institution with ambiguous, concealed intentions and sophisticated methods: the Research and Social Studies Institute (IPES), founded in 1961 by a group of businessmen from Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, and a handful of officers linked to the Escola Superior de Guerra (ESG – National War College).
In 1949 the joint chiefs of staff of the armed forces had founded the National War College based on the model of the North American college of the same name. The mission was to bring military officers and businessmen together, for them to join forces in support of Brazil’s industrial growth.11 During the 1950s the National War College developed a plan for economic growth and national security specific to the Cold War context. This plan was not restricted to national defence. It was geared towards internal conflict and redefined the role of the army, now considered essential to the maintenance of control over the population. Intelligence and information-gathering was considered essential to the efficiency of the state.
The Research and Social Studies Institute, on the other hand, was an organization with strictly controlled membership and a dual purpose.12 Officially it was a conservative political institution whose mission was to study the political and economic situation in Brazil. It was based in a suite of thirteen rooms on the 27th floor of Edifício Central, in Rio de Janeiro, and had offices in São Paulo, Rio Grande do Sul, Minas Gerais and Pernambuco, which were considered the most strategic states. Members included the country’s richest businessmen, directors of multinational companies with operations in the country, representatives of the most important business associations, military officers, journalists, intellectuals and a group of young technocrats. All of them were active, publishing books, producing films or giving lectures.13 But there was more to the institute’s activities. Its real task was to undermine President Goulart, for which there were two strategies. The first was to undertake a well-orchestrated destabilization plan, which included financing an anti-communist propaganda campaign, funding anti-government protests, and promoting the opposition and the extreme right in politics as well as in business. The second was to draw up the plans for a new government – authoritarian in nature – based on development and the free flow of international capital. Contrary to popular belief, the Research and Social Studies Institute was not just a propagator of anti-communist propaganda, nor a group of right-wing extremists stockpiling arms. It was the nucleus of a coup d’état conspiracy whose members had their own agenda. They were well informed and were very well placed among the conspirators who were to overthrow President Goulart, as they were in the occupation of the state after March 1964.
But the activities of the Research and Social Studies Institute alone were not enough to bring about a coup d’état. Businessmen and military officers could conspire, but with no real support from the masses there was no campaign, propaganda or ideological conviction that could destabilize the Goulart government. A coup d’état was on the horizon, although it was not a realistic option in the short term. By late 1962, however, things began to change, the parliamentary system seemed increasingly vulnerable, and not without help from the president himself. A referendum on the form of government was held on 6 January 1963. The result was an overwhelming victory for the presidential system, which received 9.5 million out of a total of 11.5 million votes.14 For President Goulart, winning the referendum was much the same as having won a new election. And he was not entirely wrong. But he had overlooked an important detail. The victory was not his per se, it was a vote for the presidential system, which had been supported by a number of political parties and their leaders who had an eye to winning the 1965 presidential elections. Even so, the president’s popularity was high and his government was being given the chance to start again. But then, surprisingly, in a year that had begun with so much promise, João Goulart stumbled irrevocably.
THE IDES OF MARCH
In 1963 there were two political agendas in Brazil, one on the left and one on the right, competing to transform the country. Yet there was only limited space for manoeuvre, and even less political will, to resolve political differences democratically. The government had very little power of persuasion and there were too many radical movements, both within and outside Congress. In April that year, on the instructions of President Goulart, the Brazilian Labour Party proposed a constitutional amendment for agrarian reform. Congress delayed six months, and then rejected it. With the defeat of the amendment, the president lost his second opportunity to implement his government’s programme. Nevertheless, he still underestimated the forces aligned against him.
Among the left-wing parties there was a general feeling of self-sufficiency, and a consensus that things were not moving fast enough. The leader of the coalition, Leonel Brizola, was in no way making things any easier for President Goulart. Mr Brizola wanted the government to confront the problem of foreign capital and to summon a new Constituent Assembly whose members would include trade union members, rural workers, and subaltern officers from the armed forces. He claimed Congress had to be bypassed in order to implement core reforms. There is no doubt that Leonel Brizola was hard-headed, but the left-wing parties united under his leadership and he enjoyed unprecedented popularity, particularly among the sergeants in the armed forces and the military police, as well as in the navy and the marines. In 1963 there were 40,000 sergeants in the army, of whom 22,000 declared their support for Leonel Brizola.15 Mr Brizola’s rhetoric, already pretentious, became dangerously radical. And his was not the only revisionist voice. By late 1963 members of the left-wing parties considered their position so strong they denounced Congress as excessively conservative, determined the 1946 Constitution obsolete, and referred to all political activity in Brazil as superficial propaganda.
At the other end of the spectrum
, Carlos Lacerda continued stirring things up in his attempt to destabilize the president. In October he gave a long interview to a North American journalist – reproduced in the Tribuna da Imprensa – which exacerbated the political situation even further. He declared that the situation in Brazil was so serious that the military were debating whether it were better to ‘patronize him [João Goulart], control him until the end of his term or remove him from office altogether’.16 For someone who had learnt the art of politics from Getúlio Vargas, President Goulart overreacted to the declarations: he summoned his ministers and sent a message to Congress requesting the declaration of a state of siege, which would allow him to intervene in the state of Guanabara.17 The reaction was hostile all around. The state governors informed President Goulart that none of them would accept federal intervention in their states. Left-wing leaders feared the same measures might be used against them. And the three major parties – the Brazilian Labour Party, the National Democratic Union and the Social Democratic Party – joined forces and informed the Executive that the state of siege would not be approved.
João Goulart had no choice but to admit defeat and accept that his authority had been weakened. And it was not for the first time. A month earlier he had also lost face over the government’s handling of a military crisis – the Rebellion of the Sergeants.18 The crisis had begun with the decision of the Federal Supreme Court that sergeants who had run for office in 1962 were ineligible for public office. The decision was followed by an unexpected act of military insubordination. In Brasília, air force and navy sergeants, and soldiers from the marine corps, invaded the airforce base and the naval ministry, blockaded the roads and the airports, invaded the National Congress, occupied the Supreme Court building, and kidnapped the Supreme Court president, Victor Nunes Leal, whom they kept under arrest for several hours.
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