[1] Under the leadership of Floro Bartolomeu, Nogueira Acioly and Padre Cícero, an army of peasants resisted the invasion of federal government forces and marched to Fortaleza to depose Franco Rabelo.

[3] From 1894 onwards, the First Republic began to consolidate in the Brazilian government, which would be dominated by the coffee elites of the states of São Paulo and Minas Gerais, later giving rise to the Café com Leite politics.

The administration's actions were justified by a project to moralize political customs, alleging corruption, as well as reducing social inequalities with the appointment of military personnel instead of politicians to the positions of interventors.

The aim of this policy was to create pacts between the federal government and the oligarchies from different regions of Brazil who usually dominated the state administrations, in order to give the presidency autonomy to act.

Until the end of the 19th century, Juazeiro do Norte, located 514 kilometers from Fortaleza, was under the tutelage of the city of Crato, in the Cariri region, a politically important environment for securing votes during Governors' Policy, since its municipalities were still poles of coronelism.

[3][12] While, at the national level, Hermes da Fonseca stabilized as president of the Republic and outlined a new regional power plan, the Acioly family maintained its almost hegemonic domination in Ceará.

Although there were groups opposed to this oligarchy - mainly based on criticism of the economic decisions made by the family - they were considered "fragile" and "immature" for not being able to effectively defeat Nogueira Acioly's political arrangements.

However, in 1912, several popular groups, newspaper writers and their respective editors, as well as student political movements were gaining strength in Fortaleza, with strong criticisms of oligarchic domination, which had remained in power since the end of the Empire.

During a children's march through the streets of Fortaleza, the police reacted with ferocity, causing the death of protesters, which culminated in pressure for the removal of Nogueira Acioly, who resigned on January 24, 1912.

Although the Acioly family controlled state politics, Rabelo, when he took power, refused to negotiate with the former ruling oligarchy and the federal government and allied himself with other organizations, collapsing the Pacto dos Coronéis established by Floro Bartolomeu and Padre Cícero in the Cariri region.

[14][12] Rabelo began a campaign to destabilize any group that supported oppositional politics in the state based on the premise of persecuting and decimating "banditry", mostly represented by the cangaço phenomenon in the Northeast.

[14][15] As a form of retaliation, Floro Bartolomeu traveled to Rio de Janeiro in August 1913 to meet Nogueira Acioly and Senator Pinheiro Machado, an influential figure in the Northeast, to plan Rabelo's overthrow.

[12] When Rabelo's soldiers arrived in Juazeiro do Norte, they were faced with an unusual situation: Padre Cícero, on the advice of Antônio Vilanova, a former fighter in the Canudos War, and his pilgrims had dug a kind of trench around the entire city, which became known as the "Círculo da Mãe das Dores".