a ig a eS il wherea :
now, for this is winter in Braz er the thirty-odd hills which

y i NHE rare beauty of Rio de Janeiro is not

December. Occasional clouds lie ov

waterfront. Yet, the immense figur

and blue and yellow rooftops, the x t :
reflect eth ne of. sunlight. despite the. drifting clouds.

buildings, the pride of Brazil-
ian architecture, are bunched in
the <city. center,. just above the
dirty red brick and.stone of th
Warehouses. : :

Our launch, which takes a full
hour to..cross the bay from the
Galeno airport, skirts the huge

amp . steamers loaded with
Coffee, and makes its way among
Smal] fishing boats in which

Town and black. half-clad men
re hauling nets. It is still early
Morning. Here I am in Rio
88ain. It seems unbelievable.
And here is the city—unchanged.

But the question on my mind
How the politics of Brazil have
Changed in the meantime. On
ay 7, the dynamic Communist
Party of Luiz Carlos Prestes was
Suspended as an electoral body.
D headquarters were closed.
ae of dictatorship’ were re-
Ugits: we had heard in the

aS

The clique of fascists around
ie Owlish figure of President
' aaa Gaspar Dutra had: been

ightenea by * the. great out-
ieee of support for the party

.. ~restes in the state elections
ca vanuary 19. And in the city
Ss pei of Rio, 18 Communists
‘a @been elected out of 50, form-
ie the largest single bloc.
ei ee gripped Brazil's, econ-

meee North American competition

Closed down many factories
oth Tazil's own textile, glass and
» "er industries.

openina the scenes, Standard
Benin New Jersey was seeking
ts to exploit the undevelop-

of RB

Ho. Petroleum resources. Herbert

dickens, » Jr, and A, A. Curtis,
ARR ng for oil concessions, had

ly bywords here.’
aitaes Pawley, the U.S. am-
tery. who complains so bit-
cal] ecause the Communists
istic, United States imperial-
was said to be working

SODAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1947

all

€nd. the inroads of ruth- |

night and day to get around

the constitution and tradition of

Brazil which forbids exploitation

of Brazilian sub-soil by foreign-

ers. en
e 2 ‘

OW had all this affected the
H friends I made here last De-
cember? Were these courageous
men and women who withstood
23 years of illegality and 10
years of fascist persecution still
as optimistic as I found them

to be last winter? I was inter- |

ested in the proceedings of 20
American Republics assembled
in a fancy hotel in Petropolis, 30
miles north of Rio, to form a
‘mutual non-aggression. pact.’

The answer is that everything
is in flux-here in the ordinarily
fluid Brazilian political situation.
The Brazilian reactionaries have
not been able to go through with
their plans. In the last
month they have even suffered
defeats. Brazil’s deep democratic
wellsprings cannot be stifled so

easily. It may be hard for us”

North Americans to understand,
but here it is: |
Although the Communist Party

is closed down as ‘an electoral
organization, and its branches do

not function, and its headquart-

ers. are occupied by police—the
Communists continue an even
more intense activity than ever.

The 16 deputies to the nation-

al parliament continue to occupy ~

their posts, speak on all ques-

tions and take part in all normal.

parliamentary life.

The single Communist Sena-
ior, Luiz Carlos Prestes, how-

ever, is somewhere in Brazil; his ©

colleagues are risking no chances

of some provocation, some mad -

attempt of reaction to take his
life. Early in August, on the
same day that the leading irre-

sponsible papers said that Pres-
tes was in Russia, the short,

Christ on one of the hills is still visible. The »
ae of the cariocas, lying disorderly on the hillsides
And the modern glass and concrete

RIO DE JANEIRO.

affected by the seasons. It is somewhat cooler
s it was summer when I visited here last

descend to the very
The red

black-haired ‘Knight of Hope’
appeared in the senate, took his
seat and then took the floor.
He again called attention to
the disastrous pass to which

General Dutra. was leading the .
- country; he denounced the pres- _

sure of North American business
firms, whose competition is
crushing Brazil’s industry; he

‘called for a program of national

salyation, and urged an inter-
party conference for this pur-
pose. And then Prestes disap-
‘peared again. The effect was
magnetic. The ‘impresna sadia’
(the kept’ press) ‘had to change
its headlines from one edition
to the other.

In fact, the influence of the
Communists is such, especially
in the state governments, that
the day before I arrived the en-
tire legislative assembly of the

important state of Rio Grande ©

do Sul, whose governor is a
member of Dutra’s own Social-

Democratic Party, passed a reso- -

lution affirming unanimous sup-
port for Prestes’ proposal.

situation is characteristic

_of Brazil. The two main poli-
tical parties — the Social-Demo-
crats and the Democratic Na-

‘tional Union—are not only divid-
ed on a national basis, but frag-

mented on a_ state and local
scale.

Last January, the Communists
formed local alliances with dif-
ferent groups in different states,
pursuing a very flexible strat-
egy. The result is that the mili-
tary clique around Dutra is con-
siderably paralyzed, and finds
it hard to act against the Com-
munists nationally’ or locally.

' In the important state of Per-
nambuco, in the far northeast,
the Communists are in an offi-
cial coalition with the Social-

‘Democrats, and the governor is

also a very progressive figure.

When Dutra selected a five-
man commission (sarcastically
called “the five wise men”) in
the national legislature to study
means of ousting the Communist
deputies, he found that represen-
tatives of the Social-Democrats
from the state would not support’
the idea; their local interests are
too closely allied with the Com-
munists who have great support
in Pernambuco.

In fact, the new state consti-
tution is considered ‘Soviet’ in
some quarters; for instance, it
declares that instead of the usual
repressive police, the state of
Pernambuco. shall--have a police
“for the protection of the peo-
ple’s. economy”; this kind of

thing gets in the hair of Dutra

and his fellow-fascists.

’ Not only do the Communist
deputies function but the Com-
munist newspapers — I think
there are seven dailies in the
major cities—continue to publish.

_ Every once in a while, Tribuna

Popular will carry a series of
answers by Prestes to important
questions of the moment.

-It was a strange feeling to

re-visit the editorial offices of

Tribuna Popular, and meet the
same journalists I spent many
hours with last December . . .
Pedro Motta Lima, and his bro-
ther, Paulo, or the managing
editor — tough, professional-look-
ing Aydano Couto do Ferrar (a
figure out of Front Page)—or
the editor-in-chief, Pedro Pomar,
who is also a deputy and who
was national educational direc-
tor of the Communist Party and

one of: its top leaders.

Through the newspapers, there-
fore, and the deputies, the Com-

munists continue their fight for
peace, for constitutional govern- .

ment, for defense of Brazil’s
economy, Even thouhg the Bra-
zilian Confederation of Labor
was arbitrarily suspended for six
months in May, Brazil’s workers
have a voice. Every day, articles
and editorials champion the bat-
tle to improve their conditions.
Ree ee

N° one knows how long this

equivocal situation will last.
The violent dictatorship which
everyone expected after the can-
cellation of the Communist
Party’s registration last May did
not take place. Here and- there
violent repressive measures were
attempted, as in Algoas state,
for example, where the reac-

tionary governor, brother of the

minister of war, Goes Monteiro,
allowed the police to smash up
the Communist newspaper, O
Momento,

But, in general, the Commun-
ists refused to be provoked. They
called on all their members to
remain calm and obey ‘the Elec-
toral Tribunal’s three to two de-
cision. They appealed the case
to the Supreme Court, which is
expected to hand down its rul-
ing before the end of this
month.

But. other dangers do con-
front the Communists here. A
drastic ‘Security Law’ has been
introduced and is being studied
in commission. This would give
legal sanction to _ repressive
measures against democratic
forces.

Another item of the same kind
is an attempt by the minister
of justice, Costa Neto, to pros-
ecute Luiz Carlos Prestes al-
legedly for insulting statements
against Dutra made in an in-
terview early in June, This, too,
is considered part A a war of
nerves here against the Com-
munists. Thousands of denunci-

ations have come from all sorts — :

of popular organizations against
this kind of thing. :

The thought of another frame-
up against Petres (who suffer-
ed eight years’ imprisonment, it
will be remembered) is a mon-.
strous one—even for non-Com-
munists .

Geis the reactionaries tread
water and calculate their
next strokes, the Communists
are planning to take an active |
part in the municipal elections,
scheduled for this autumn. ~Only
in Rio itself was a municipal
government elected last January;
in the bulk of the towns and
cities the first such balloting
since the September, 1945, Con-
stitution will take place now.
It is for these elections, and
_for the eventuality of,a negative
“Supreme Court decision on the
electoral rights of the PCB, that ©
the Communists are planning to —
organize ,another party. oS

are now being circulated to have
it registered with the Electoral
‘ Tribunal. These elections in the
fall will be a major test for

Brazil. A strong vote for the -

Communists, no matter on what
ticket, would be a blow to the
Dutra crowd and might compel
it to back out of the present
half-way house.

So you see, Brazil has :
and yet the spirit remains the ~
same among the scores of Com-
munist leaders and journalists
I have been meeting here again.

Thirty-four-year-old Pedro Po-
mar sat around the dinner table
at his home, chewing the rag
about the events of the past six
months with another of the most
distinguished leaders here, Joao
Amazonas, while Pomar’s six

‘and eleven year-old soéns scram- _

bled on the sofa, reluctant to
go off to bed.

Both Pomar and Amazonas
kad lived through the illegal
days together. Both are now
deputies. Both of them have few
illusions about Brazilian reac-
tion and the fierce pressure of
the North American monopolies
on Brazil’s economy. :

And yet, as was the case last
December, they are optimistic.
They are full of fight, full of —
confidence in their people; in the
favorable development of the
world democratic tide, and in
‘their party and its indomitable
leadership. aig

I had often thought, since my _
trip here last year, that.these
men were over-optimistic. Re-
visiting Rio, I think they have
grown in strength and stature.
They may be hurt further. But

_ they will not be beaten.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 11