The system was briefly restored during the tenure of President João Goulart between 1961 and 1963, after a constitutional amendment approved by his opponents before the beginning of his term created the post; it was abolished with a [1]plebiscite.

He also chose to create a sort of parliamentary government, whereby the prime minister would be someone who could command a majority in the Chamber of Deputies, the lower House of the Brazilian Imperial Parliament, known as General Assembly.

Sometimes the Emperor would dissolve the Chamber of Deputies and summon new elections (a power he possessed under the Constitution), or dismiss the prime minister, due to his own political beliefs about the efficiency of the Government.

This co-existence of a Head of State with real powers and influence with a prime minister responsible before Parliament was dubbed by many Brazilian political scientists as parlamentarismo às avessas (reverse parliamentarism), a criticism corresponding to their view that, in the parliamentary system created by Emperor Pedro II, the Chamber of Deputies was the weaker party, and the survival of the Cabinet depended more on the confidence of the Emperor than in that of Parliament.

19th century abolitionist leader and historian Joaquim Nabuco said: The President of the Council in Brazil was no Russian Chancellor, Sovereign's creature, nor a British Prime Minister, made only by the trust of the Commons: the delegation of the Crown was to him as necessary and important as the delegation of the Chamber, and, to exert with safety his functions, he had to dominate the caprice, the oscillations and ambitions of the Parliament, as well as to preserve always unalterable the favor, the good will of the Emperor.

The longest continuous prime-ministership corresponded to the period when the Viscount of Rio Branco was in office: he served as President of the council from March 1871 until June 1875.

The events of the proclamation of the Republic on 15 November 1889 started as an unprecedented military coup to remove the Liberal Prime Minister Viscount of Ouro Preto, who had been appointed by the Emperor and who enjoyed the confidence of the Chamber of Deputies.

Marshal Deodoro da Fonseca, the senior leader and military figure in the plot, was supportive of the Conservative Party and took part in the coup upon invitation by other officers who wanted to overthrow the Liberal Prime Minister.

The decision to establish a republican provisional government was taken when Deodoro (who had already proclaimed "Long Live His Majesty the Emperor" during the public acts of the coup) received, from his republican co-conspirator Benjamin Constant Botelho de Magalhães, the false news that the Emperor intended to appoint Gaspar da Silveira Martins, a declared enemy of Deodoro, as the next prime minister.