BRAZIL. 



sion, and is inaugurated on the 15th of Novem- 

 ber following. With the Vice-President it is the 

 same. The President may be removed by the 

 Senate, sitting as a tribunal under the presidency 

 of the chief justice, on articles of impeachment 

 presented by the Chamber of Deputies. The 

 President has power to appoint and remove the 

 members of his Cabinet and make all Federal 

 civil appointments, and can appoint diplomatic 

 representatives and Federal judges with the con- 

 sent of the Senate. He is commander-in-ch'iet' 

 of the army and navy. He has power to make 

 war or peace only on the authorization of Con- 

 gress. Ministers address their reports to the 

 President, and can only communicate with the 

 Chambers by letter or in conference with com- 

 missions. The Vice-President of the Republic 

 is President of the Senate. Senators are elected 

 by the Legislatures of the States for nine years, 

 three from each State, one retiring and his suc- 

 cessor being chosen every three years. Sena- 

 tors and Deputies receive equal salaries. The 

 Chamber of Deputies has the initiative in all laws 

 relating to taxation. Deputies are elected for 

 three years by direct popular vote in the propor- 

 tion of one to every 70,000 inhabitants. Con- 

 gress assembles on May 8 of each year, and re- 

 mains in session four months. The President 

 can call an extraordinary session. The present 

 Chamber has 202 members, the State of Minas- 

 Geraes sending 37 ; Bahia and Sao Paulo, each 

 22 ; Rio de Janeiro and Pernambuco, 17 each ; Rio 

 Grande do Sul,16 ; Ceara and the Federal District, 

 10 each ; Para and Maranhao, 7 each ; AlagOas, 6 ; 

 Parahyba, 5 ; Rio Grande do Norte, Piauhy, Ser- 

 gipe, Parana, and Santa Catharina, each 4 ; Goyaz, 

 '3 ; and Matto Grasso and Esperito Santo, 2 each. 

 According to the Federal Constitution, the exec- 

 utive, legislative, and judicial authorities of each 

 State must be separate and independent ; the 

 Governor and members of the Legislature must 

 be elective ; and judges must not be elective nor 

 removable from office except on impeachment 

 and judicial sentence. The Federal District, or 

 Municipio Neutro, consisting of the city of Rio 

 and its environs, an area of 538 square miles, is 

 administered by the Federal Government. At 

 some future time the Capitol is to be removed to 

 a district of 14,400 square kilometres, about 75 

 miles square, reserved as the property of the 

 Union in the center of the republic The pres- 

 ent Federal District will then be constituted as 

 a State. By vote of the Legislatures in two con- 

 secutive sessions and with the consent of Con- 

 gress, States can divide themselves or amalga- 

 mate with other States.- The States alone can 

 levy taxes on exports of their own products, 

 land, inheritances, and industries. Amendments 

 to the Federal Constitution may be presented by 

 one fourth of the members of either House of 

 Congress, and if they are passed to a third read- 

 ing by a two-thirds vote in both Chambers, they 

 will be considered again in the following year, 

 when they must be passed a second time in 

 three readings by a two-thirds majority oi' both 

 Houses before they become law. Or if an 

 amendment is asked for by two thirds of the 

 States after having been proposed and sanctioned 

 by a majority vote given by their respective 

 Legislatures within the same year, then it must 

 be proposed in Congress, and is adopted when it 



receives a two-thirds vote after three discussions 

 in each Chamber. No proposition shall ever be 

 admitted to consideration which tends to abolish 

 the federative republican form of government or 

 the equal representation of the States in the 

 Senate. The original draft declared clergymen, 

 magistrates, police and army officers, and Fede- 

 ral office holders incapable of sitting in either 

 House of Congress, but all restrictions were re- 

 moved by the Constituent Assembly, except that 

 candidates must be registered as voters, and 

 must have been citizens four years to become 

 members of the Chamber and six years to be 

 eligible for the Senate. It is declared that no 

 sect or church shall receive aid from the National 

 or State governments, and that no Brazilian 

 shall be debarred from exercising civil and polit- 

 ical rights or exempt from civic duty on account 

 of religiousb elief or duty. The clauses forbid- 

 ding the establishment of new convents or mo- 

 nastic orders and proscribing the Jesuits were 

 expunged. The protests of Cardinal da Costa, 

 the primate of Brazil, against the civil marriage 

 clause, the secularization of cemeteries, and the 

 exclusion of religious teaching from public 

 schools, failed to impress the Congress, and, 

 while all religious disabilities were removed, 

 these clauses were left standing. 



Marshal Deodoro da Fonseca, the head of the 

 Provisional Government, wa_s confirmed in the 

 presidency by the Constitutional Congress, and 

 General Floriano Peixoto was elected Vice-presi- 

 dent. Their term of office expires in 1894. The 

 Cabinet first appointed by President Fonseca 

 consisted of the following officers : Aristides da 

 Silveira Lobo, Minister of the Interior; Dr. 

 Ruy Barbosa, Minister of Finance ; Benjamin 

 Constant Botelho dei Magalhaes, Minister of 

 War; Admiral Eduardo Wandelkolk, Minister 

 of Marine ; Quintano Bocayuva, Minister of For- 

 eign Affairs ; Dr. Demetrio Nunez Ribeiro, Min- 

 ister of Commerce and Agriculture ; F. de Cam- 

 pos-Salles, Minister of Justice. They still held 

 office at the beginning of 1891, with the excep- 

 tion of the Ministers of Agriculture and the In- 

 terior, who were succeeded by Dr. Francisco 

 Glycerio and Dr. Cesare de Faria Alvin. Mean- 

 while B.C. Bothelho dei Magalhaes was appointed 

 Minister of Public Instruction, Posts, and Tele- 

 graphs, resigning the charge of the War Depart- 

 ment to Gen. F. Peixoto. Early in the year this 

 statesman familiarly known as Benjamin Con- 

 stant, revered by the Republicans as their intel- 

 lectual leader and the chief organizer of the 

 revolution died in office, and by one of the 

 temporary* provisions of the new Constitution, 

 following the article granting a pension to the 

 ex-Emperor " sufficient to guarantee him a de- 

 cent subsistence," it was decreed that Dr. Benja- 

 min Constant's house should be preserved as a 

 national monument. 



Area and Population. The area of Brazil 

 is 3,209,878 square miles, and the population was 

 officially estimated in 1888 at 14,002,335, indi- 

 cating an increase of 41 per cent., or 2*56 per 

 cent, per annum, since the census of 1872 ; but 

 as that census was incomplete, the rate of growth 

 has probably been less. According to its returns, 

 there were at that time 3,787,289 whites, 3,801,- 

 787 mestizos, 1,954,452 negroes, and 386,955 In- 

 dians. In the northern provinces there is a large 







