§ 30. No tax of any kind shall be collected except under authority of law. § 31. Trial by jury shall be maintained. ART. 73. Public offices, civil or military, shall be accessible to all Brazilian citizens, provided that the conditions of special fitness, fixed by law, be observed; the accumulation of salaried positions is forbidden. ART. 74. Commissions, positions and offices to be held for life. shall be fully guaranteed. ART. 75. Public officers shall be retired with pay, only in case of becoming unable to perform their duties while in the service of the nation. ART. 76. Officers of the army and navy shall forfeit their commissions, only when condemned, after trial by the competent courts, to more than two years' imprisonment. ART. 77. The military and naval officers shall be tried by special courts for military offenses. § 1. This jurisdiction shall be vested in a Supreme Military Court, whose members shall serve for life, and in the courts martial which may be needed for the proper trial of the cases. § 2. The organization and attributions of the Supreme Military Court shall be governed by law.1 ART. 78. The enumeration of guarantees and rights made in the Constitution shall not exclude other guarantees and rights not enumerated, but resulting from the form of government established and the principles proclaimed by said Constitution. TITLE V.-GENERAL PROVISIONS. ART. 79. The citizen vested with functions belonging to one of the three federal powers shall not exercise those belonging to the other two. ART. 80. Any part of the territory of the Union may be declared in state of siege and the constitutional guarantees suspended in it for a fixed period, whenever the security of the Republic may demand it, in case of foreign aggression or internal disturbance (Article 34, No. 21). § 1. If Congress is not in session and the country is in imminent danger, the federal executive power shall exercise this prerogative (Article 48, No. 15). § 2. In the exercise of this power during a state of siege the executive power shall be restricted to the following measures of repression against persons: 1. To their detention in a place not destined for persons accused of common crimes. This court was organized by the Law of 18 July 1893 (No. 149). 2. To banishment to some other part of the national territory. § 3. As soon as the Congress assembles, the President of the Republic shall report to that body all the exceptional measures which he may have taken, giving his reasons therefor. § 4. The authorities who have ordered such measures shall be responsible for any abuses which may have been committed. ART. 81. Terminated criminal cases may be reviewed at any time, if to the benefit of the condemned parties, by the Federal Supreme Court, which shall amend or affirm the sentence. § 1. The law shall determine the manner and form of the revision. which may be asked for, either by the condemned party, by any one of the people, or ex officio by the Attorney-General of the Republic. § 2. In such revisions, the penalties imposed by the judgment under review shall not be increased. § 3. The provisions of the present article shall apply to military trials. ART. 82. Public officers shall be strictly responsible for the abuses and omissions of which they may be guilty in the exercise of their functions, as well as for their failure, through indulgence or negligence, to exact from their subordinates the proper responsibility for their acts. SOLE S. Public officers shall bind themselves, formally, on taking possession of their offices, to faithfully discharge the lawful duties of the same. ART. 83. Until revoked, the laws of the former régime shall remain in force, except in so far as they are explicitly or implicitly contrary to the system of government established by the Constitution, and to the principles proclaimed by its provisions. ART. 84. The government of the Union guarantees the payment of the public debt, domestic or foreign. ART. 85. The staff and line officers of the navy shall have the same ranks and privileges as the officers of the army of corresponding grade. ART. 86. Every Brazilian is bound to do military service in defense of the country and of the Constitution, in accordance with the federal laws. ART. 87. The federal army shall be made up of contingents, which the States and the Federal District are bound to furnish in accordance with the annual law fixing the strength of the public force. § 1. A federal law shall determine the general organization of the army, in accordance with No. 18 of Article 34. § 2. The military instruction of the corps and branches of the army service and higher military education shall be in charge of the Union. § 3. Compulsory recruiting for military service is abolished. § 4. The army and navy shall consist of volunteers, enlisted without bounty, and if this method fails, draftings shall be made according to a plan previously arranged. The personnel of the navy shall be made up by lot out of pupils of the Naval School, the schools of naval apprentices, and members of the merchant marine. ART. 88. The United States of Brazil shall in no case engage in a war of conquest, directly or indirectly, by itself or in alliance with another nation. ART. 89. A Court of Accounts shall be established to audit the accounts of receipts and expenditures and to pass upon their legality before they are presented to Congress. The members of this Court shall be appointed by the President of the Republic with the approval of the Senate, and shall lose their places only by judicial sentence. ART. 90. The Constitution may be amended upon the initiative of the National Congress, or of the legislatures of the States. § 1. An amendment shall be considered as proposed, when introduced by one fourth, at least, of the members of either house of the National Congress, and accepted, after three discussions, by two thirds of the votes in both houses of the Congress, or, when suggested by two thirds of the States, in the course of one year, each State being represented by a majority of the votes of its legislature. § 2. The proposed amendment shall be considered approved, if, in the following year, after three discussions, it is adopted by a majority of two thirds of the votes in the two houses of Congress. § 3. The amendment adopted shall be published with the signatures of the presidents and secretaries of the two houses, and incorporated in the Constitution as an integral part thereof. 4. No project having a tendency to abolish the federal republican form of government, or the equal representation of the States in the Senate, shall be admitted for consideration in the Congress. ART. 91. As soon as this Constitution is approved, it shall be promulgated by the presiding officers of the Congress and signed by the members of the same." TRANSITORY PROVISIONS. ARTICLE 1. Upon the promulgation of the present Constitution, the Congress, assembled in joint session, shall choose at once, by absolute majority in the first balloting, and, if such be not obtained, by a relative majority in the second, the President and Vice-President of the United States of Brazil. 1 The governmental draft proposed a majority of three fourths. § 1. This election shall be made through two different votes, one for the President and another for the Vice-President; the votes for the President shall be taken and counted first, and then the votes for Vice-President shall be taken and counted. § 2. The President and Vice-President thus elected shall fill the Presidency and Vice-Presidency of the Republic during the first presidential term. § 3. There shall be no incompatibilities in this election. § 4. As soon as said election is made, the Congress shall declare its mission in joint session as a convention to be ended, and, separating itself into Chamber and Senate, shall enter upon the exercise of its normal functions on the fifteenth of June of the current year, and it shall not for any reason be dissolved. § 5. In the first year of the first legislature, the Senate, as soon as it has completed its organization, shall designate preliminarily the first and second thirds of its members, whose terms shall cease at the end of the first and second triennial periods. § 6. This designation shall be made in three lists, corresponding to the three thirds of the Senate, whereon the names of the senators of each State and of the Federal District shall be inscribed, according to the respective number of votes obtained by them, so that the one first in the voting in the Federal District and in each State shall be placed in the list for the last triennium and the others in the lists of the other triennial periods, according to the relative number of votes obtained by them. § 7. In case of tie preference shall be given to the elder, and if the ages be equal the choice shall be made by lot. ART. 2. The State which, at the end of the year eighteen hundred and ninety-two, shall not have adopted a constitution for itself. shall be, by Act of Congress, subjected to that one of another State, which may be deemed most suitable, but the State thus subjected to the constitution of another State shall have the right to amend that instrument in the manner provided in the same. ART. 3. As fast as the States shall be organized, the federal government shall deliver to them the administration of the services which belong to them under the Constitution, and shall settle the responsibility of the Federal administration in all that relates to said services and to the payment of the respective officials. ART. 4. While the States are engaged in regulating their expenses and during the whole period of organization of their services, the federal government shall grant them special credits for this purpose, under conditions to be established by law. ART. 5. As soon as the States are organized, the classification of the revenues established in the Constitution shall enter into force. ART. 6. In the first appointments of federal and State judges, preference shall be given to the present members of the law courts, and to those judicial officers called desembargadores, who may enjoy the greatest reputation. Judges who have served for over thirty years and can not have positions in the new judicial organization shall be retired on full pay. Those who have served for less than thirty years shall continue to receive their present salaries until they are employed or retired with salaries corresponding to their time of service. The expenses to be incurred in paying the salaries of the judges placed on the retired or reserve lists shall be paid by the federal government. ART. 7. On and after 15 November 1889, a pension shall be paid to D. PEDRO DE ALCANTARA, ex-Emperor of Brazil, which shall guarantee him a suitable maintenance for the remainder of his life. Congress in its first regular session shall fix the amount of this pension. ART. 8. The federal government shall acquire for the nation the house in which BENJAMIN CONSTANT BOTELHO DE MAGALHÃES died, and shall order a tablet to be placed upon the same in memory of that great patriot, the founder of the Republic. SOLE §. The widow of said DR. BENJAMIN CONSTANT shall enjoy the use of said house during her life.1 1 The signatures of the President of the Congress and of the senators and deputies follow. |