Book, Getúlio 2 (1930-1945) from the provisional government to the dictatorship State N[LS]

Supported by thorough research into national and foreign collections, which included public and personal documents, diaries, newspapers, correspondence, recordings and films from the period, Lira Neto shows how and why, for better or worse, Getúlio Vargas was “the greatest political figure in Brazil in the 20th century”, in the expression of historian Boris Fausto. Soon after gaining federal power, in October 1930, Getúlio found himself faced with the complex challenge of promoting his ambitious reform agenda at the same time as he needed to neutralize, like a patient chess player, the movements of internal and external opposition to the regime. Several dissatisfied political factions, especially the “reactionaries” in São Paulo, insisted on questioning the authority of the all-powerful Gaucho leader. With the 1934 Constituent Assembly - provisional concession to democratic appearances - and the reappointment by indirect election to Catete, Getúlio in reality consolidated his personal supremacy over the country's fragile political institutions. With his plump, good-natured figure, always carrying a cigar and dressed in impeccably clean linen suits, the president forged the immaculate image of “father of the poor”. Like an absolute monarch of the new times, he was the very incarnation of Power, disseminated massively in words and images through official advertising. After the brief democratic interlude, the Estado Novo coup in 1937 reinstituted the open dictatorship, inspired by Salazarism and Italian fascism. The authoritarian turn, justified by the need to crush communist subversion, had the support of the military hierarchy and the powerful Brazilian Integralist Action, of the extreme right. The experienced caudillo, however, chose to do without mass organization, which would ultimately weaken his personal authority, and banned all political groups, including the AIB. The frustrated integralist revenge, with the assault on the Guanabara Palace in May of the following year, gave rise to more political repression, directed by the sinister police chief of the Federal District, Filinto Müller. Externally, the outbreak of the Second World War marked Getúlio's rapprochement with the allied powers and, internally, the decline of the Estado Novo regime. But the contradiction of fighting for democracy in Europe and exercising dictatorial power in Brazil would end up undermining Getúlio's support in the barracks. In November 1945, General Góes Monteiro, his former collaborator, led the military rebellion that ended Getúlio's first fifteen years at Palácio do Catete.