Jango Page #5

to the Brazilian government

funded directly the administration of

anti-Joo Goulart governors.

The Whitehouse was the

headquarters of the government,

where Carlos Lacerda and

Ademar de Barros feIt at home.

I looked into the problem

of slums

and the president was

clearly impressed

with the data I showed him.

Rio de Janeiro, for example,

has an annual deficit

of 10 thousand homes,

and this deficit has been accruing over the

last 10 years.

Which means that we have a deficit,

in Rio de Janeiro alone,

of 100 thousand homes.

And not only was the president impressed,

but he also got in touch with Mr. Goodman

to try and move forward

the ongoing projects

relating to the slums in Guanabara.

We discussed a half-dozen matters;

the problem of the Port of Santos,

the problem of the So Sebastio Port.

The problem of the water supply

to the city of So Paulo;

we have water for 2.5 million inhabitants

and we need water for

4.5 million inhabitants.

We have huge problems,

new highways,

electricity for railroads,

new hydroelectric plants,

many problems

relating to the economy of So Paulo

and of the country.

The cabinet headed by Tancredo Neves

came to an end

when the prime minister resigned

to run in the elections.

The new cabinet,

headed by Brochado da Rocha

survived two months

of successive crisis.

The last prime minister, Hermes Lima,

a member of the Socialist Party,

came to wind up parliamentarism

in the country.

With presidentialism in sight,

the 1962 elections

became more important.

As part of the elections,

the right wing laid down its arms.

To stop the progress of the left,

Brazilian Institute for Democratic Action

- lBAD -,

the advanced arm of lPES,

injected over 2 million

dollars in the campaign

funding the campaign of

250 candidates to the federal congress

and several governors.

Will the democratic institutions

prevaiI over the battle of relentless ambitions?

From crisis to chaos

The country can be dragged

into an irreversible crisis.

What are we doing to prevent

that the Brazilian people be faced

with the tragic choice between

anti-democratic solutions?

We, the intellectuals,

we, the company owners,

we, the men who have

the responsibility to rule,

we, who believe in democracy

and in free initiative,

we cannot remain silent while

the situation deteriorates day by day.

Omission is a crime.!

lf we remain isolated, we'll be crushed.

We must combine our efforts.

Let us direct the actions of the

democrats into one single path

so that we shall not be

victims of totalitarianism.

And it is exactly to coordinate

the thoughts and actions

of all those that do not

wish to remain silent

in light of the catastrophe

that threatens us,

that we have created

a new organism,

with a new message for the

new reality of Brazil.

We have one basic purpose.:

To prevent the difficuIt situation

that the country is facing

from compromising

our democratic institutions

and christian traditions.

The Institute for Social Research and Study

has these basic goals.

Its purposes are clear and well-defined.

The Institute shall execute a plan

to achieve such purposes as.:

The strengthening of the

democratic institutions,:

end of underdevelopment,:

currency stabilization,:

The moralization and efficiency

of the governmental structure.

But lPES cannot be reduced to words.

Action is necessary.

All those dollars

were not enough to prevent the triumph

of politicians committed to

the reforms.

The number of congressmen from UDN dropped

while the number of congressmen

from PTB increased.

PSB maintained the majority.

The new congress

gained a different face.

Politicians regrouped

in fronts.

On the one side,

the Nationalist Parliamentary Front.

And on the other,

the Parliamentary Democratic Action,

the lair of reaction

against the reforms.

One of the most important aspects of

that group of right-wing congressmen,

was the fact that, even though it was

called " Parliamentary Democratic Action" ,

and had little or no democracy about it,

it managed to

turn congress

into a stage for conflicts.

Conflicts that were certainly

based on actual economic interests

but that were being presented

as ideological battles.

When asked to decide

the fate of parliamentarism,

the people returned to Jango the

powers that had been stripped from him.

15 million people voted.

Almost 10 million said

"no" to parliamentarism.

Jango had 3 more years

of government ahead of him.

The president, with a minority in congress,

organized a conciliatory cabinet

where PSB had a majority

of the representatives

and the left-wing

held the most influence.

Democratization in the use of land,

illiterate vote,

rules to govern rents,

fair basis for minimum wage.

Those were the highlights

of a government program

that could achieve

greater social harmony.

Jango intended to end hunger

and misery,

in a country where justice had always

been the dark side of democracy.

The situation in the northeast received

special attention from the government.

The president's plan

in '64 received

the same opposition he had attracted

back in '54 as minister of employment.

Strike seeker,

promoter of class battles

and enemy of capitalism.

The agricuItural workers, mobilized by

the social transformation process,

received a wakeup call

about the longstanding poverty in the fields.

The perspective of small changes

in a country with great inequalities

brought about many illusions.

Thousands of workers,

landless and jobless,

embarked aboard a train of hope,

leaping from the pages of a book

onto the political scene.

With the reforms, Jango

made the country live its utopia.

The president needed the support

of the military.

The tradition of military

intervention in the political life

no longer had the hues of adventure.

The improvisation of the 20s had

been replaced by the ideology of the late 40s.

The Superior War College,

created in 1950

to mirror the North-American War College,

assembled its own political model,

based on the concept of

safety and development.

Challenging the disciplinary rule,

sergeants elected two representatives

in the October '62 elections.

RevoIting against the legal decision

that prevented the investiture

of the elected representatives,

the sergeants followed a

military tradition and rebelled.

Jango had to punish them to

prevent a breach of discipline

that could bring down

the government itself.

Unions, students and politicians

rallied for the rebelling sergeants.

The president pardoned the sergeants,

in a decision that usually

was only granted to officers.

The political activities of the sergeants

intimidated the military chiefs.

General Ozino Alves, a nationalist

with a good reputation among the ranks

was personally trying,

as head of the 1st army

to have the officers

support the government.

Joo Goulart would

soon commit a fatal mistake.

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