“O mau exemplo vem de cima”: a corrupção nas eleições da província do Grão-Pará (1870-1881)

Abstract

The dissertation discusses corruption in the elections in the Province of Grão-Pará, in relation to the functioning of the electoral process in Brazil, highlighting how fraud occurred in the system. The work seeks to understand corruption in the political, social and economic context of the seventies and eighties of the 19th centuries, showing how the intense political-party disputes intensified debates and accusations. The aim is to contextualize the process of corruption within the electoral system and, according to the situation experienced in the years 1870-1881, within the Empire and the province, showing the existence of fraud and irregularities, as well as how nineteenth-century man viewed these acts and acted in the face of them, which required an analysis of the legislation in force and the Political Constitution of the Empire, with necessary considerations on citizenship, education and inequality. The methodology adopted was based on empirical research into newspapers, letters and reports by provincial presidents within the time frame of the work, located in the National Library, the National Library's Digital Hemeroteca, the Arthur Viana Library, as well as the University of Chicago's website, where the presidents' reports are digitized, in order to find information on political and governmental corruption. After analyzing and processing the sources collected, the discussion was synthesized, focusing on the electoral field, given the number of documents collected on corruption and fraud in elections. In this way, the aim of the study was achieved, which was to debate corruption in the electoral process, within the selected time frame, contextualizing the analysis with current social, political and economic issues, revealing a broader and more detailed understanding of Brazilian democracy and the political history of the province.