Diário de Lisboa
- Shipping to Brazil
- The NEW Under-Secretary of the League of Nations
- On 15 November
Diário de Lisboa's page of 6 November 1926 carried items on shipping to Brazil, a new League of Nations appointment and a new Brazilian president. An editorial signed J. S. argued that a Portuguese-flag shipping service to Brazil had reached a decisive phase. It said Portugal's flag could reach Brazilian ports within months if a study commission reported quickly, and it put its hopes in Mr. Passos e Sousa. A short, playful item greeted the League's new under-secretary, Albert Dufour-Feronce, as heir to a League that Charlemagne had supposedly imagined, carrying the plan forward by persuasion. A news note announced that on 15 November, the anniversary of the Brazilian Republic and the day Washington Luís took office, an exhibition of goods from industries Portuguese settlers had built in Brazil would open at the Sociedade de Geografia.
Translation
Shipping to Brazil
Shipping to Brazil seems to have entered a decisive phase, and if the commission charged with studying the bases on which this important problem is to rest gives its opinion promptly, it is natural that, within a few short months, the flag of the quinas will go to the ports of the great sister Republic. We are indeed convinced that Mr. Passos e Sousa will not be long…
The NEW Under-Secretary of the League of Nations
When he restored the Roman Empire of the West, Charlemagne was already thinking of founding the League of Nations under the aegis of his mighty shield. Mr. Albert Dufour Feronce is thus carrying out a design that dates from very long ago. He carries on the work of his imperial grandfather, not with a drawn two-handed sword, but with the reason that convinces and persuades.
On 15 November
ON 15 November — the anniversary of the proclamation of the Brazilian Republic and the inauguration of its new president, Dr. Washington Luís — an exhibition of products from industries created and maintained by Portuguese in Brazil will open in the "Portugal" hall of the Sociedade de Geografia. The initiative is Pedro Muralha's, under the sponsorship of our colleague the Jornal do Comercio e das Colonias.
Context
Passos e Sousa and the military regime behind the shipping plan
The editorial makes the Brazil line depend on a commission's report and on "Mr. Passos e Sousa". That name tied the project to the officers who had seized power earlier in 1926. Passos e Sousa had commanded the Nossa Senhora da Graça fort, where officers imprisoned after an earlier failed plot won him over to their side. In the 28 May 1926 coup he was one of the generals leading the provincial military forces. The regime that followed dissolved parliament, banned all political parties and brought in censorship. A policy like a state-backed shipping line therefore no longer had to pass through an elected chamber, which helps explain why the editorial looks to a commission and one senior officer rather than to legislation. Newspapers, this one included, were now printed under that censorship. The excerpt breaks off before saying what Passos e Sousa was expected to do, and the page does not name the office he held at the time.
Who was Albert Dufour-Feronce?
The new under-secretary was Albert von Dufour-Feronce, a German who lived from 1868 to 1945. The Deutsche Biographie lists his roles as a wholesale merchant in Leipzig, a German diplomat in London, Under-Secretary-General of the League of Nations and German envoy in Belgrade. A career that took in both commerce and diplomacy fits the item's closing praise of "the reason that convinces and persuades". The Charlemagne lineage belongs to the item's rhetoric. The item imagines Charlemagne as having already planned the League and makes the new German official his heir, calling the emperor his "imperial grandfather". It reads as mock-heroic flattery playing on his German nationality, not as documented genealogy.
Washington Luís takes office on 15 November 1926
The exhibition was set for a double Brazilian occasion. The paper notes that 15 November was both the anniversary of the Republic's proclamation and the day the new president took office. Washington Luís had been elected governor of São Paulo in 1920 and president of Brazil in 1926, and he took office on 15 November 1926. His election was received with great hopes after a period of deep political unrest. By showing goods from industries that Portuguese settlers ran in Brazil on that day, the Lisbon organisers linked the Portuguese community's economic presence in Brazil to a hopeful moment there. Four years later he was deposed by the Revolution of 1930 on 24 October and went into exile in Europe and the United States.
Original
Navegação para o Brasil
A navegação para o Brasil, parece ter entrado numa fase decisiva, e se a comissão encarregada de estudar as bases em que esse importante problema ha-de assentar, der o seu parecer com brevidade, é natural quo, dentro de curtos meses, a bandeira das quinas vá aos portos da grando Republica irmã. Estamos mesmo convencidos quo o sr. Passos e Sousa não tardará
O NOVO sub-secretario da Sociedade das Nações
Quando restaurou o imperio romano do ocidente, Carlos Magno pensou já em fundar a Sociedade das Nações, sob a égide do seu poderoso escudo. O sr. Albert Dufour Ferouce realisa, pois, um designio que data de muito longe. Continua o seu imperial avò, não de montante desembainhado, mas sim com a razão que convence e persuade.
No dia 15 de novembro
NO dia 15 de novembro - aniversario da proclamação da Republica brasileira e posse do seu novo presidente, o sr. dr. Washington Luis - abre, na sala " Portugal " da Sociedade de Geografia, uma exposição de produtos das industrias criadas e mantidas por portugueses, no Brasil. A iniciativa pertence a Pedro Muralha, com o patrocinio do nosso colega Jornal do Comercio e das Colonias.