7 - Votes: A Movement/Government Alliance

Summary

The crisis led, in June 1884, to the appointment of a new Prime Minister, the Liberal Manuel de Souza Dantas, committed to a moderate abolitionist reform. The Abolitionist Confederation coordinated abolitionists nationwide to endorse the government and helped draft a proposal for gradual emancipation and conceiving rights to freed people, presented to Parliament in July 1884.The alliance government movement triggered a pro-slavery political backlash, with the creation of civil associations (Plantation Clubs) against the Dantas reform, while the caucus worked to obstruct it in parliament. Dantas then dissolved the House and called new elections. Joaquim Nabuco returned to Brazil to be the star of the coalition abolitionist movement/government, that stood candidates for parliament, in a nationwide abolitionist electoral campaign. The freedom soil campaign continued at the same time. The pro-slavery political faction managed to control the results of the election.The Dantas government fell and the gradual emancipation project was thwarted.