History of The Constitution of Brazil - Third Constitution (1934)

Third Constitution (1934)

Background

In 1930, after severe political problemas, the President Washington Luís was overthown by a coup d'état. The 1891 Constitution was put down and the Provisional President Getúlio Vargas ruled as a de facto personal dictator, but the state landed elites (who had controlled the Brazilian state ever since independence) struggled to prevent this from continuing. In 1932, in São Paulo, the Constitutionalist Revolution demanded a Constitution. As a result, a Constitutional Assembly was elected and the constitution was promulgated on July 16, 1934, four years after a coup d'état had overthrown the Old Republic. Vargas accepted this constitution in order to legitimate its power.

The Constitution

It was the shortest-lived Constitution of Brazil, lasting only 3 years (until 1937).

Despite its short life, this constitution was important because it was the first time a Brazilian constitution was written from scratch by directly elected deputies in multi-party elections. As a consequence of this, it incorporated a number of improvements to Brazilian political, social and economical life:

• Granted complete independence to the Supreme Court and subordinated all other courts to it.
• Extended political rights to all adults, regardless of sex.
• Introduced proportional voting for elections to the Chamber of Deputies, which included representatives of the people as well as a minority of representatives from trade unions and other professional organizations - a corporatist device introduced under the shock of the Russian Revolution and the influence of Italian fascism.
• Created a specific electoral court to supervise elections, under the control of the Supreme Court (previously the supervision of elections was under control of the Legislative).
• Following a trend set by the German Weimar Constitution, acknowledged a whole host of social rights alongside political and civil ones: the national minimum wage, the eight-hour workday, mandatory weekly rest, paid vacations and ideminity for unmotivated firing.
• Created a labor court to supervise working conditions and codified rights and duties for both the employers and the employees.
• Was the first Brazilian constitution to list all four basic freedoms (speech, religion, movement and assembly) alongside the basic rights (life, freedom and property).