Description

The First Brazilian Republic, also referred to as the Old Republic, officially the Republic of the United States of Brazil, was the Brazilian state in the period from 1889 to 1930. The Old Republic began with the coup d'état that deposed emperor Pedro II in 1889, and ended with the Revolution of 1930 that installed Getúlio Vargas as a new president. During the First Republic, the country's presidency was dominated by the most powerful states of São Paulo and Minas Gerais. Because of the power of these two states, based on the production of coffee and dairy, respectively, the Old Republic's political system has been described as "milk coffee politics". At local level, the country was dominated by a form of machine politics known as coronelism, in which the political and economic spheres were centered around local bosses, who controlled elections and would often conduct mass electoral fraud.