Brazilian Abolitionist Confederation

Some of the most famous leaders of the Brazilian Abolitionist Movement were involved in the organization, such as José do Patrocínio, Joaquim Nabuco, André Rebouças, Luiz Gama and João Clapp.

[1] The institutionalization of the Abolitionist Confederation occurred within a political and economic context marked by strong international pressure to end slavery in Brazil.

According to a survey carried out in the Almanak Laemmert, Cláudia Regina Andrade dos Santos demonstrates the expansion of associative life in Rio de Janeiro during the 1880s.

Its activities in newspapers, which published articles, pamphlets, essays, artistic productions, translations and manifestos, were responsible for enabling contact at national level between those who led the provinces and the others who took part in the movement.

[4] Initially, the societies that formed the Abolitionist Confederation were mostly student unions, but there was also a social variety, which included associations of printers, commercial employees and former slaves.

There were several historical figures among the anti-slavery groups that joined the Confederation who stood out for their work in the Abolitionist Movement, including Joaquim Nabuco, André Rebouças, Abílio Borges and Luiz Gama.

[1] Abolitionism had several promoters, both regional and national, including Luiz Gama, who, according to Angela Alonso, was the person behind the articulation of judicial activism; Abílio Borges, who united national and international mobilization; José do Patrocínio, who coordinated the excellent strategies in the public arena; and André Rebouças, the most important articulator of the group, since he was an aristocrat and the son of a politician, which allowed him to circulate in public spaces, do business with employers and get close to students and theater professionals.

One of the manifesto's main points was that abolitionist propaganda was not a sentimental anarchist yearning or question, nor was it philosophical, but rather a presentation of the rights contained in parliamentary treaties.

The intention of the document is to ensure that all the provinces and people of the Empire listen to what is being said, because according to the text, slave ownership is criminal, given that human freedom is fundamental for the three natural laws of social progress to operate: solidarity, competition and mutuality.

[7] According to the manifesto, the city of Rio de Janeiro is the space that provides the debate over abolition, by uniting and opposing those interested in the issue from an economic, institutional and political perspective.

The presence of rhetorical elements in parliamentary speeches, streets, conferences and newspaper articles that circulated in the Empire show that the adoption of this discursive practice served as a way of organizing ideas, with the purpose of convincing the public and opponents of the cause.

However, after 1885, the Abolitionist Movement, dissatisfied with the slow pace of the project to gradually abolish slavery, rebelled against the state, changing its peaceful orientation.

Even in the newspapers, the abolitionists constantly affirmed their actions against slavery, such as theatrical performances promoted to raise awareness of the cause, conferences and meetings and the collection of donations for local emancipation funds.

[16] While the literate activists wrote their oratory in the newspapers and followed the heated debates in the news, the illiterate abolitionists consumed the famous cartoons with an anti-slavery message in Angelo Agostini's Revista Ilustrada.

He was also a pioneer in organizing civic ceremonies in the 1860s at his schools in Salvador and Rio de Janeiro, where anti-slavery speeches were made and students wrote and recited poems on the subject; one of whom was Castro Alves (1847–1871).

During civic ceremonies at his abolitionist association Libertadora 7 de Setembro, which were the origin of the conferences-concerts of the 1880s, he received donations that allowed him to buy and distribute letters of freedom.

According to Ricardo Tadeu Caires Silva, from 1850 onwards the theater began to receive a wider and more diverse audience, ceasing to be an exclusively elitist environment.

Inspired by the actions of Spanish abolitionism, which made use of theaters in its propaganda, the Brazilian movement used this space not only as a meeting point to discuss its agendas, but also to provoke reflection in the audience.

Works such as the theatrical adaptation of Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe, and the poem Navio Negreiro by Castro Alves, were several times represented in the artistic repertoire of these events.

The productions moved streetcar lines, which ran at special times to attend abolitionist events, and the small businesses around the theater on performance days.

[20][21] At the end of the event, which combined an artistic performance with a political speech, the audience threw camellias, the flower symbol of the movement, onto the stage.

In this context, meetings, conferences and gatherings formed the essential gear that kept the confederation communicating and brought organization and success to the movement's actions.

[14] The Free Womb Law, enacted in 1871, established the creation of a national emancipation fund, a legal instrument created with the aim of raising resources to buy letters of freedom.

The Emancipation Fund was made up of taxes on the transfer of slave property, the proceeds of six annual lotteries and a tenth of those granted to run in the national capital, fines imposed for non-compliance with the law, donations, and part of the general, provincial and municipal budgets.

Abolitionist associations used public ceremonies and concert-conferences to distribute letters of freedom as a way of advertising and encouraging donations to their respective emancipation funds.

According to Angela Alonso, the liberation campaign was only successful in territories where it was possible to combine the low political organization of local slavery, a facilitating provincial executive and a movement that was structured and connected to the court.

Patrocínio and Nabuco organized events in Paris and London to publicize the feat and move foreign opinion in favour of the actions taken in Ceará.

Teodureto Carlos de Faria Souta, who took office in March 1884 and was also a supporter of abolitionism, followed in Dias' footsteps and approved the Amazonas Abolition Bill, Provincial Law No.

[27] After total abolition in the provinces of Ceará and Amazonas, interprovincial escapes became a strong strategy of abolitionists to free captives, like a Brazilian adaptation of the US Underground Railroads.