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Artur Bernardes

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For the Brazilian football manager, see Arthur Bernardes (football manager).
In this Portuguese name, the first or maternal family name is Silva and the second or paternal family name is Bernardes.

His Excellency
Artur Bernardes
GOC
Official portrait, 1922
President of Brazil
In office
15 November 1922 – 15 November 1926
Vice PresidentEstácio Coimbra
Preceded byEpitácio Pessoa
Succeeded byWashington Luís
Other offices held
1952–1953Federal Deputy for Minas Gerais
1951–1951Federal Deputy for Minas Gerais
1946–1951Federal Deputy for Minas Gerais
1934–1937Federal Deputy for Minas Gerais
1927–1930Senator for Minas Gerais
1918–1922President of Minas Gerais
1915–1917Federal Deputy for Minas Gerais
1910–1914Secretary of Finance of Minas Gerais
1909–1910Federal Deputy for Minas Gerais
1907–1909State Deputy of Minas Gerais
1906–1906Mayor of Viçosa
1906–1906President of the Municipal Chamber of Viçosa
1905–1906Councillor of Viçosa
Personal details
Born(1875-08-08)8 August 1875
Viçosa, Minas Gerais, Empire of Brazil
Died23 March 1955(1955-03-23) (aged 79)
Rio de Janeiro, Federal District, Brazil
Political partyPRM (1900–1937)
UDN (1945)
PR (1945–1955)
Spouse
Clélia Vaz de Melo
​
(m. 1903)​
Alma materFaculty of Law of Largo de São Francisco
Signature

Artur da Silva Bernardes (Portuguese: [aʁˈtuʁ da ˈsiwvɐ beʁˈnaʁdʒis]; 8 August 1875 – 23 March 1955) was a Brazilian lawyer and politician who served the 12th president of Brazil from 1922 to 1926. Bernades' presidency was marked by the crisis of the First Brazilian Republic and the almost uninterrupted duration of a state of emergency. During his long political career, from 1905 until his death, he was the main leader of the Republican Party of Minas Gerais (PRM) from 1918–1922 until the party's extinction in 1937, and founder and leader of the Republican Party (PR).

Before his presidency, Bernardes served as governor of Minas Gerais from 1918 to 1922, during which time he founded the current Federal University of Viçosa and prevented American investor Percival Farquhar from exploiting the iron ore deposits in Itabira, cultivating an image of a nationalist and municipalist leader. A status quo and "milk coffee" candidate in the 1922 presidential election, Bernardes was the target of fake letters to harm his image and an attempted coup d'état to prevent his inauguration, the Copacabana Fort revolt. His administration was unpopular in the cities, especially in Rio de Janeiro, and from July 1924 onwards he was attacked by conspiracies and armed revolts by tenentists.

Bernardes' attitude towards the opposition was uncompromising and authoritarian. Out of the states that opposed his candidacy, Rio de Janeiro and Bahia had their dominant parties overthrown, and Rio Grande do Sul fell into a civil war, the Revolution of 1923, in which the federal government brokered a peace deal. In the capital, the political police were reorganized into the 4th Auxiliary Police Bureau. Hundreds of rebel military personnel, worker activists, especially anarchists, and other civilians died in the bombing of São Paulo and the penal colony of Clevelândia. No amnesty was granted to the rebels.

The administration also applied an economic policy of austerity and monetary contraction, fighting inflation and currency devaluation, withdrew Brazil from the League of Nations, carried out a centralizing constitutional reform, the only one of the First Republic, brought the State closer to the Catholic Church, and approved some labor laws while simultaneously repressing unions. After his presidency, Bernardes supported the Revolution of 1930, but in the following years he saw the PRM reduced to a minority faction in Minas Gerais. In his last years he participated in the Oil Campaign. An austere and reserved man, Bernardes was idolized by his followers, the so-called Bernardists, and hated by his enemies.

Early life and family[edit]

The Bernardes family house in Viçosa

Artur da Silva Bernardes was born on 8 August 1875 in the village of Santa Rita do Turvo, currently Viçosa,[1] as recognized in history books. His birthplace is disputed by municipality of Cipotânea, where it is stated that the future president was born there, at the time part of Alto Rio Doce, and moved to Viçosa, an already constituted city, at the age of 5.[2] Bernardes was the fourth of nine children born to Antônio da Silva Bernardes and Maria Aniceta Bernardes.[3] One of his brothers, Olegário, would become minister of the Federal Court of Audits, state deputy in Rio de Janeiro and mayor of Teresópolis.[4]

Bernardes' mother descended from the Vieira de Sousa family, one of the coffee nobility families of the Zona da Mata, and his father, a Portuguese immigrant from Castanheira de Pera, a colonel of the National Guard and lawyer in the districts of Alto Rio Doce, Piranga and Viçosa. In the latter he was the first appointed lawyer and then prosecutor.[5][6] According to some biographies, Antônio Bernardes did not attend more than primary school in Portugal.[7] This family was wealthy enough to pay for their son's education, but did not belong to the local political group.[8]

Bernardes (indicated by the arrow) among the students at the Caraça School

Bernardes' strict family education was complemented by the traditional Caraça School,[9][10] where he was enrolled for secondary studies at the end of 1887, at the age of 12. The Caraça School was one of the most prestigious schools in the country.[11] Gilberto Freyre called it a "sad manor in the mountains". The school's schedules control, restriction of visits, surveillance and punishments left their mark on the children of the Minas Gerais elite.[12] The teachers lived in a cloister and penance and "the paddle passed from class to class, from hall to hall, from playground to playground, leveling everyone with its overwhelming dominance".[10]

This experience allowed Bernardes to "value disciplinary power as a shaper of minds and bodies for the nation",[12] in addition to establishing his Catholic religiosity for the rest of his life, while many of his contemporaries flirted with positivism and evolutionism.[11] A favorable biography at the Historic and Geographic Institute of Minas Gerais, of which Bernardes is the patron of a chair, stated that the teachings at Caraça "had a great influence on his moral, religious and public formation: the zeal for the public cause, the scrupulousness in the distribution of government money, the spirit of discipline, order and austerity".[3] At the other extreme, the anti-Bernardist book Terra Desumana (1926), by Assis Chateaubriand, argued that the school instilled in the young Bernardes an authoritarian personality, making him more interested in laws than in human feelings.[10]

At the end of 1889, Bernardes family was no longer able to keep him in Caraça due to the impact of the abolition of slavery on Brazil's coffee economy.[11] The solution came from his brother-in-law José da Graça Sousa Pereira, a partner at the firm Pena e Graça, where Bernardes got a job. This firm in the Viçosa district of Coimbra intermediated the coffee trade between producers and exporters, exposing Bernardes to the rural world. This experience continued in his next job, at the firm Adriano Teles, in Visconde do Rio Branco, where he reached the position of bookkeeper (accountant) at the age of 18, in 1894. The position was the highest an employee could reach[13][14] and gave access to confidential information, proving that Bernardes was a trustworthy employee. His life in Rio Branco exposed him to the problems of modernizing agricultural techniques, as the business group advertised Brazilian products abroad.[15]

Law and journalism[edit]

Student body of the Institute of Sciences and Letters in 1899; Bernardes, Portuguese and Latin teacher, is in the fifth column

With his family in a better financial condition, at the end of 1894 Bernardes was able to enroll in the Externato do Ginásio Mineiro in Ouro Preto, taking advantage of a decree from the state government that opened separate enrollments. There he studied for preparatory exams (equivalent to a university entrance exam) while living in a boarding house and working at several newspapers and briefly as a Post and Telegraph courier. Under the influence of his father and the Caraça School, Bernardes enrolled at the Free Faculty of Law, initially as an attendee student, in 1896, before passing the exams and entering the second year in 1897.[5][14]

As a law student, Bernardes became friends with his colleague and future political ally Raul Soares de Moura, in addition to meeting other figures of future political relevance in Brazil such as Fernando de Melo Viana and José Vieira Marques. In March, Bernardes volunteered for the Bias Fortes Patriotic Battalion, in the context of the War of Canudos, but the unit never went out to fight. Politically, Bernardes was among the admirers of Floriano Peixoto, president of Brazil from 1891 to 1894. The anniversary of the abolition of slavery was commemorated with the creation of the newspaper Academia, of which Bernardes was editor. The following year the Faculty of Law was transferred to Belo Horizonte, but Bernardes, Raul Soares and others preferred to be transfered to the Faculty of Law of São Paulo, which offered much better opportunities in public life; the only other alternative for the political elite with a degree in Law was the Faculty of Law of Recife.[16][17] Of the twelve presidents of the First Brazilian Republic, seven had diplomas from Faculty of Law of São Paulo.[18]

In São Paulo, Bernardes worked an editor for the newspaper Correio Paulistano, a member of the Notary's Office of Senator Álvaro de Carvalho's father and a professor of Portuguese and Latin at the Institute of Sciences and Letters of São Paulo.[19] Bernardes and Raul Soares became friends with another native of Minas Gerais at the Faculty, Arduíno Bolívar, and possibly joined an academic secret society, the Bucha. During holidays, contact was maintained through letters, and during one of these periods, in 1899, Bernardes gained fame defending a defendant in the Viçosa criminal court. The accuser was his father. Upon receiving his bachelor's degree in Legal and Social Sciences in December 1900, he pursued a career as attorney. Prestigious among his colleagues, Bernardes was chosen for the graduation speech. After arriving in his native Viçosa, Bernardes was welcomed with a demonstration at the train station and a ball.[16][19] A bachelor's degree in Law raised his social status. The district had few qualified lawyers, and his professional colleagues had a strong presence in the Brazilian republican state, as they intermediated public and private interests.[20]

At the age of 25, still in 1900, Bernardes opened a law firm in Viçosa. Shortly afterwards, his father resigned from his position as prosecutor to avoid a conflict of interest with his son's career. The next two years were filled with constant travel to neighboring cities. In addition to law, Bernardes started working at the weekly Cidade de Viçosa, owned by a local political leader, senator Carlos Vaz de Melo,[21] leader of local directories and supporters of the Republican Party of Minas Gerais (PRM), the only one in the state.[22] The PRM represented the interests of southern Minas Gerais and the Zona da Mata,[23] and Viçosa was a municipality with significant agricultural production in the Mata, although it was not among the largest in the region.[24] Bernardes' interest in politics was visible. Since his academic days, Cidade de Viçosa presented him as a member of the local elite and representative of bourgeois values, and he published several articles in the newspaper,[25] including an article on the revision of Brazil's 1891 Constitution in 1901.[26]

Marriage and children[edit]

The Bernardes family in 1932: Clélia Bernardes sits in the center, with her husband standing third from left to right

Bernardes' passion for Clélia Vaz de Melo, the daughter of Carlos Vaz de Melo, opened the doors to the political world when the senator authorized their marriage, which took place on 15 July 1903. Artur Bernardes was now his father-in-law's political heir.[8] Bernardes and Clélia had been dating for a decade, but her father did not allow the marriage before the end of the course.[27] The couple had eight children: Clélia, Artur, Maria da Conceição, Dhalia, Rita, Sylvia, Geraldo and Maria de Pompeia.[28] Of these, Artur Bernardes Filho followed his father's career and was a federal deputy, constituent, senator and vice-governor of Minas Gerais, reaching the position of Minister of Industry and Commerce in 1961.[29]

The Vaz de Melo-Bernardes became one of the family groups that dominated, with a certain stability, the zones, regions, electoral districts or municipalities of Minas Gerais.[30] Kinship with at least one other politician can be observed in 51.7% of a sample of 511 Minas Gerais politicians between 1891 and 1930, according to a collective biographical study by Amílcar Vianna Martins Filho. Bernardes was also very typical of the Minas Gerais political class due to his bachelor's degree in Law, shared with 61.6% of the sample. 17.6% had secondary education in Caraça.[31]

The family's rural properties were directly benefited by some of the fiscal, budgetary and tax decisions praised by Cidade de Viçosa, such as the reduction in prices on the Leopoldina Railway.[32] Artur Bernardes appeared in the 1907 Laemmert Almanac as a farmer in the Viçosa region,[33] and throughout his life he was a coffee planter and director-owner of a sugar factory in Ponte Nova.[34] Minas Gerais was an agrarian society, but education and the liberal profession (law) had more direct relationships with the political career.[31]

Political rise[edit]

City ​​councillor (1904–1907)[edit]

Bernardes' participation in elections was not immediate, and he refused an offer from his father-in-law to support a candidacy for federal deputy. Instead, Vaz de Melo assigned his son-in-law to welcome the State President (governor) Francisco Sales and other politicians. Bernardes gradually made contacts and demonstrated his rhetoric.[35] In 1904 he ran for special councillor for the Viçosa district of Teixeiras. Despite his previous statements about reforming the Constitution, in October Bernardes claimed in Cidade de Viçosa that he did not want elected positions and only appeared on the PRM ticket at the last minute, "yielding to the orders of friends in the District".[36]

On 19 November, the District's 52 voters unanimously elected him. Carlos Vaz de Melo died three days later, and Bernardes succeeded him as director of Cidade de Viçosa in January, which began covering extra-municipal issues and supporting the councillor's political opinions. On the first day of the year Bernardes published yet another defense of the reform of the Constitution, promising that "this newspaper will be a fierce and merciless fight against the idea, promoted by some, of changing nothing in the fundamental law". This ambition would be realized two decades later, when Bernardes assumed the presidency.[37][38] The program presented in the article was to enhance the municipalities and defend the interests of farming, commerce and industry.[39] Other articles discussed the issues of local coffee farming and production alternatives, representing the interests of producers and traders.[40] His speech was compatible with that of governor João Pinheiro, whose agenda included encouraging education and polyculture.[41]

In June 1905 Bernardes was appointed colonel of the National Guard, which legitimized his local power and conferred honors and privileges.[42] Elected president of the City Council the following month, he preferred to remain vice-president. The following year he was elected again, accepted and was invested as executive agent, a position equivalent to mayor.[43] The executive agent was chosen by the City Council.[44] At a Congress of Municipalities held in Leopoldina, in October 1907, Bernardes was invited by deputy Ribeiro Junqueira to give a speech on behalf of the heads of the Executive in the region.[43][45]

This rapid rise was not accepted by all veterans; José Teotônio Pacheco, Viçosa's political leader and former ally of Vaz de Melo, broke his ties with Bernardes and led the municipal opposition. The "Bernardistas" and "Pachequistas" fought for power in Viçosa for a decade. In the election of a councillor in 1906 and in the renewal of the entire City Council at the end of the following year, the Bernardists won by a small margin of votes.[45][46] Cidade de Viçosa accused the Pachequistas and their newspaper A Reação of lacking patriotism and republicanism.[47] Bernardes exchanged letters with João Pinheiro, pledging his support and making several requests to Viçosa.[48]

Deputy and secretary of finance (1907–1918)[edit]

Bernardes, in the center, between two other state deputies in 1907

His deceased father-in-law's prestige was still enough for Bernardes to be included in the list of candidates for state deputy for the PRM and elected for the second district in March 1907. In the state Chamber, he was elected secretary of the board in 1907 and 1908, gave speeches about the problems of agriculture and helped approve João Pinheiro's tax reform. This last position facilitated his nomination to run for federal deputy in 1909.[33][43] The candidates for Minas Gerais' federal deputy positions were colonels or intellectuals, both chosen by the state governor and the PRM Executive Committee, known as "Tarasca", made up mostly of politicians from the southern Minas Gerais. The party prided itself on promoting the careers of young politicians.[49] Its rule was elitist and centralized, controlling political appointments, pressuring the press, co-opting pressure groups and guaranteeing their votes through coronelism and fraud.[50] Being chosen as a PRM candidate was equivalent to being elected.[8]

Francisco Bernardino Rodrigues Silva, a lawyer from Juiz de Fora and previous occupant of the seat, ran as an independent candidate against Bernardes, with the support of Pachequistas from Viçosa. In January 1909 Silva obtained more votes than his rival, but a Commission for the Recognition of Powers, whose rapporteur was Altino Arantes, stripped 2,552 votes from Bernardes in Viçosa and 3,339 from Silva in Juiz de Fora. Under orders from the PRM, the Chamber of Deputies approved the decision and Bernardes was awarded more than a thousand votes above his competitor. According to Afonso Arinos de Melo Franco, the PRM confirmed Bernardes because he was "a young and energetic leader", an "experienced commander of officialdom in one of the toughest municipal struggles in Zona da Mata".[43][51]

Portrait as Finance Secretary in 1913

In this first period in the Chamber of Deputies, Bernardes did not stand out nor took part in the technical committees. His greatest achievement was in Viçosa, where he guaranteed presidential candidate Hermes da Fonseca the majority of votes in the 1910 presidential election.[43][51]

On 7 September 1910, Bernardes resigned his position as federal deputy and returned to Belo Horizonte to take over the state Finance Secretariat, appointed by governor Júlio Bueno Brandão. Minas Gerais had one of the largest economies in the country, and therefore the position further boosted Bernardes' career. His management focused on increasing revenue, creating tax collection offices, negotiating the taxation of mining products shipped through São Paulo and Espírito Santo and reorganizing the Minas Gerais Receipt Office in Rio de Janeiro.[52][53] These measures still had a regionalist bias, avoiding harming the interests of coffee growing in Zona da Mata.[54]

During this period, the State Employees' Beneficial Bank and the Banco Hipotecário e Agrícola, the future Bank of the State of Minas Gerais, were created. In 1911, new types of long-term loans to municipalities benefited administrations in Zona da Mata and southern Minas Gerais, in a municipalist policy that would yield electoral dividends. Bernardes left the Secretariat at the end of Bueno Brandão's government, in September 1914, and in the following January he was the candidate for federal deputy with the most votes in the district. In this second period in the Chamber of Deputies he chaired the Special Committee on the Accounting Code.[52][53]

President of Minas Gerais (1918–1922)[edit]

Bernardes speaking at the state government candidates' banquet

Deputy Gomes Lima met Bernardes in Viçosa, at the beginning of 1917, to report the choice of Américo Lopes, Secretary of the Interior of governor Delfim Moreira, as the PRM candidate for the state government. Bernardes confirmed his acceptance in a letter to the governor.[55] Américo Lopes was the candidate of former senator and governor Francisco Sales,[55][56] president of the PRM's Executive Committee[57] and leader of one of the three factions existing in the party until 1918. The other two were the followers of Bias Fortes, called "Biistas" and Silviano Brandão's, the "viuvinhas". Zona da Mata politicians were usually supporters of Sales.[58] Américo Lopes' name was contested by Raul Soares, the Secretary of Agriculture, who felt that his Zona da Mata region (he was from Ubá) was discredited. Arguing the moral incapacity of the secretaries' candidacy, especially that of the Interior, Soares convinced president Venceslau Brás, who was from Minas Gerais, to veto the candidacy. The result was a list of candidates, but it omitted Bernardes. Still feeling that Zona da Mata was overlooked, Soares convinced the president to support Bernardes.[59][60]

The name was accepted by governor Delfim Moreira and made official by the Executive Committee in June, reuniting the party. The vice-governor was state senator Eduardo Amaral.[59][60] Although elected deputy again, Bernardes resigned his position to take office at the Palácio da Liberdade, in Belo Horizonte,[61] in September 1918. The secretariat was set up with illustrious figures: Raul Soares and later Afonso Pena Júnior in the Interior, Afrânio de Melo Franco and later João Luís Alves in Finance and Clodomiro de Oliveira in Agriculture, Industry, Land, Transport and Public Works.[57]

Hegemony in the PRM[edit]

Satire in the magazine O Malho about the exclusion of the Salistas from the PRM ticket

As soon as he took office, the new governor broke with Sales and his followers,[62] seen by him and Raul Soares as a symbol of the old coronelism policy, and therefore, a target to be eradicated.[57] With the State apparatus in control, administration positions were handed over to loyal elements.[63] In the elections, 72% of the State Chamber and 50% of the State Senate were renewed.[64] Salista deputies and senators were "beheaded", that is, their votes were not recognized by the State Chamber.[65] In February 1919, Bernardes had the "Tarasca" accept his list of candidates for a quarter of the senators and all the deputies.[66] As of the 17 September convention, each delegate could represent no more than five local districts. In the Executive Committee, all former governors became perpetual members, three new positions were created and the presidency and secretariat would have to change annually.[67]

Within two years, Bernardes imposed his authority over the Tarasca and the colonels.[63] The fight against coronelism obviously did not affect his allies,[67] but these were younger, intellectualized leaders, with some connections to the industrial sector[62] and focused on economic development.[68] A true generational transition took place in the PRM. The first generation, responsible for consolidating the Brazilian Republic in Minas Gerais, was replaced by another that entered public life around the 1910s. Southern Minas Gerais lost its predominance in state politics and the Zona da Mata gained prominence.[62] Members of the government now owed allegiance to the governor and not to the PRM's Executive Committee,[63] but this era of personal power did not last; As soon as Bernardes left the state government, the PRM returned to the Tarasca collegiate system.[68]

Presidential election of 1919[edit]

Main article: 1919 Brazilian presidential election

Two Minas Gerais politicians, Artur Bernardes and Melo Franco, were considered to run for president in the election scheduled for April 1919.[69] For health reasons, the winner of the 1918 election, Rodrigues Alves, never took office, and his vice president Delfim Moreira ruled the country for around eight months until a successor was chosen.[70][71] Bernardes refused his own candidacy, which would have been of interest to Minas Gerais elites, and insisted that the three strongest states (Minas Gerais, São Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul) decided on a new name. Several reasons are speculated for his refusal, such as fears of a lack of support from São Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul or a bad reaction from public opinion, as a Minas Gerais politician already occupied the presidency, and the inconvenience of interrupting a recently installed administration.[72] It would first be necessary to accumulate prestige in the state government.[73][74]

Even without running, Bernardes managed to position himself as the arbiter of succession.[75][76] On 9 February, the Tarasca invested him with leadership of negotiations in Minas Gerais. João Luís Alves and Raul Soares were his emissaries.[77] On the 25th[78] he presided over the Convention in the Federal Senate building, in Rio de Janeiro, to make Epitácio Pessoa, from Paraíba, official as the status quo candidate. São Paulo politicians resented Bernardes for his refusal to support a candidacy by Altino Arantes, governor of São Paulo.[79] Pessoa, a neutral candidate between the three largest states, São Paulo, Minas Gerais and Rio Grande do Sul, was the result of the latter two's rejection to Arantes. The proposal for Pessoa's name came from Minas Gerais and was accepted by São Paulo. Pessoa's victory in the election was no surprise.[78][80]

Reforms and works[edit]

Construction of ESAV in Viçosa

The Bernardes state administration privileged the Zona da Mata.[81] Education was a priority in the program and effective advances were made in public secondary and higher education.[82] 13 school groups and 421 isolated schools were built in primary and secondary education.[81] A new regulation for itinerant agricultural education, on 12 July 1920, reinforced the practical education provided by district and rural schools.[83] In higher education, the government created the Institute of Industrial Chemistry and expanded the clinics at the Faculty of Medicine of Belo Horizonte.[81]

A highlight was the Higher School of Agriculture and Veterinary Science (ESAV), the future Federal University of Viçosa.[84] On 6 September 1920, the governor began the creation process with a decree.[9] The ESAV headquarters would be in a region with a predominance of small and medium-sized coffee farms in the Zona da Mata, which would depend on agricultural modernization to resist the pressures of coffee valorization policies. The city chosen was Viçosa, precisely the governor's hometown.[84] According to the book A Universidade Federal de Viçosa no Século XX, published by Editora UFV, the school's location was not an arbitrary decision by the governor and took into account the topography, water availability and proximity to the Leopoldina Railway. Teaching would be along American lines. The inauguration only took place in 1926.[85]

In agriculture, the Bernardes administration granted favors to Banco de Crédito Real de Minas Gerais and Banco Hipotecário e Agrícola, hoping to alleviate the insolvency of rural cooperatives.[86] The administration reduced export taxes on coffee, livestock and cereals and maintained the coffee price guarantee,[81] which deserved more attention according to the governor.[87] At the suggestion of the Executive, on 20 September 1919, legislators approved a reform of the land tax, seeking to curb fraud and subterfuge in the declaration of land values.[88] Many years ago, this tax was discussed in Minas Gerais as a way of discouraging unproductive large estates,[89] and one of the points of the PRM's economic program was the "remodeling of the tax regime, based on territorial and income taxes, with the gradual suppression of the export tax from the State budget revenue".[90]

A law on the supply of agricultural machinery by the Secretariat of Agriculture was approved in 1919, but would only be effectively put into practice in the following government.[91] For another point of the program, the "settling of the State's territory",[90] four large mixed colonies of German immigrants and national farmers were founded: the Álvaro da Silvera, Bueno Brandão, David Campista and Francisco Sá colonies.[92] The expansion of the road network, mentioned in the program,[90] included the construction of 1,498 kilometers of highways, 138 bridges, subsidies for other highways and the government's acquisition of the Paracatu and Goiás Railways.[93]

The iron issue[edit]

King Albert I of Belgim, in the center, with Bernardes to his left

Bernardes' industrial ambition was to transform the Rio Doce Valley into Brazil's "Ruhr Valley", a complex of mines, railways, steel mills and ports from Minas Gerais to Espírito Santo.[94] Minas Gerais had large unused iron ore deposits,[95] and Brazil's steel production was incipient.[96] Bernardes and Raul Soares wanted a steel industry and were against the simple export of iron ore.[97] The model intended by Secretary of Agriculture Clodomiro de Oliveira was small plants powered by electricity, charcoal and mineral coal from Santa Catarina,[98] with technology from the Mining School of Ouro Preto, where Oliveira was a professor. The use of charcoal brought with it the issue of deforestation, of which Bernardes was aware. His speeches outlined concern with the "conservation of forests and reforestation of the State, threatened with seeing large portions of its territory transformed into bare and barren zones".[91]

In September 1919, the Minas Gerais Congress lowered the iron ore export tax for companies that transformed at least 5% of the amount exported into iron and steel. Otherwise, the tax would be a hundred times higher.[99] Laws of the same content were approved in the following years.[100] Several steel plants were founded during this period under the stimulus of the state government, all with low production.[97] The exception was the Companhia Siderúrgica Belgo-Mineira (CSBM),[101] the first medium-sized integrated steel company in Brazil, whose plant in Sabará began operations in 1925. Although far from making the country self-sufficient, it made Minas Gerais export steel workers to the other states. The CSBM was the result of negotiations that began during the visit of king Albert I of Belgium to Brazil in 1920; Bernardes invited him to Minas Gerais to attract Belgian capital, and the state government made an agreement with a Brazilian company, Companhia Siderúrgica Mineira, and another Belgian-Luxembourg company, ARBED.[98][102]

CSBM workers, established with Belgian capital, in 1925

The attitude of the Minas Gerais government was different towards the trade union of American investor Percival Farquhar, who had acquired shares in the Itabira Iron Ore Company and received approval from the federal government to export the iron ore through private lines to the Vitória-Minas Railway and a private port to be built as far as Santa Cruz, in Espírito Santo. In return, Farquhar would install a steel and rolling mill in Santa Cruz, operated with European and American coal. Brazil's National Congress took from 1920 to 1928 to debate the contract, and in the meantime Farquhar negotiated another contract with the government of Minas Gerais, as stipulated in the federal contract.[103][104]

In September 1920, the Minas Gerais Congress authorized the Executive to hire Itabira Iron or another company to install one or more steel plants in the state. Debates between legislators and technicians soured the initial positive attitude, and Clodomiro de Oliveira managed to convince Bernardes to postpone the signing of the contract. The Minas Gerais government doubted the promise of a large steel plant and feared that the company would charge exaggerated prices on the domestic market and create a monopoly on ore transportation.[105][106] Bernardes adopted a nationalist stance, demanding that foreign companies prove the benefits of their contracts.[63] Even so, his messages to the Minas Gerais Congress did not peremptorily reject Farquhar's proposal.[98]

Honours[edit]

Foreign Honours[edit]

References[edit]

Citations[edit]

  1. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 31.
  2. ^ Camargos, Daniel (31 July 2011). "Cidades mineiras disputam título de local de nascimento de personalidades políticas". Estado de Minas. Retrieved 17 June 2024.
  3. ^ a b Araújo, Fernando. "Arthur da Silva Bernardes, patrono da cadeira número 06". Instituto Histórico e Geográfico de Minas Gerais.
  4. ^ "Min Olegário da Silva Bernardes (1950)". Tribunal de Contas da União.
  5. ^ a b Monteiro 1997, p. 37.
  6. ^ Braga 1998, p. 411.
  7. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 30.
  8. ^ a b c Civita 1970, p. 894.
  9. ^ a b Borges, Sabioni & Magalhães 2006, p. 49-52, reproduzido em Personagens e Pioneiros da UFV.
  10. ^ a b c Meirelles 2002, p. 597-598.
  11. ^ a b c Monteiro 1997, p. 38.
  12. ^ a b Souza 2017, p. 223.
  13. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 16.
  14. ^ a b Malin 2015, p. 1.
  15. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 19-22.
  16. ^ a b Malin 2015, p. 2.
  17. ^ Monteiro 1997, p. 37-38.
  18. ^ Motoyama 2006, p. 82.
  19. ^ a b Monteiro 1997, p. 39.
  20. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 26.
  21. ^ Malin 2015, p. 2-3.
  22. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 38.
  23. ^ Monteiro 1997, p. 89.
  24. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 48-49.
  25. ^ Oliveira 2019, p. 23-24.
  26. ^ Monteiro 1997, p. 40.
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External links[edit]

Political offices
Preceded by Governor of Minas Gerais
1918–1922 		Succeeded by
Preceded by President of Brazil
1922–1926 		Succeeded by
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