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Acre (Brazil)

by zeljko heimer

See Brazil

Three Republics of Acre

The Acre flag is split into two parts through a line between the most removed upper part from the shaft, and the nearest inferior to the shaft; the part of up it is yellow and that of down green; in the yellow part, about shaft, is located the star named " solitary star" that symbolizes the light sign that guided to the supporters of the incorporation of the Acre territory to Brazil. The yellow symbolizes the peace and the green the hope, according to Jose Placido of Castro, who adopted the ancient design of the revolutionary era, to proposal of the colonel Rodrigo do Carvalho, directing of the last revolutions in the State. The primitive design had been adopted by Dom Luis Galvez Rodriguez do Arias. The flag was officially adopted by the governing Epaminondas Jacome.

Jaume Olle - 28-JUN-1996

Republics of Acre

First Republic (1899-1900),
Second Republic (1900),
Third Republic (1902-1904).

On account of its wealth in rubber, the brazilians were interested in Acre from the middle of the 19th century. The first breakthroughs date of 1852, continued in 1861 and in subsequent years. The arrival of brazilian colonists in considerable number date from 1877 (3 of April).

Though the territory was under Bolivian sovereignty (by virtue of the Hispano-Portuguese Treaty of 1750), the Bolivians held no presence in the zone. When colonel Pando staged a coup d'état against president Aniceto Arce, and failed, he sheltered in Brazil, and learned of the situation in Acre where the Brazilian colonists had been converted into the real owners of the region.

Pando alerted the Bolivian government and began a diplomatic movement. In 1898 Bolivia established an accession in Acre that provoked the armed revolt of the Brazilian inhabitants, with the support of the authorities of the Amazons State (1 May 1899).

Under the address of the Attorney Jose Carvalho, the Bolivians were forced to abandon the zone. To avoid the return of the Bolivians, the Amazons governor, Ramalho Junior, organized the entry in the region of an adventurers quota to the command of the Spanish Luis Galvez Rodriguez of Arias, who left from Manaus on 4 June 1899, arriving in the ancient Bolivian establishment called Puerto Alonso, that Galvez renamed as Porto Acre, proclaiming there the Republic of Acre on 14 July 1899.

Nevertheless the Brazilian government was considering Acrid Bolivian territory by virtue of the international treaties (above all one recently signed in Ayacucho in the year 1867) by something which sent a military force that suppressed the Acre republic on 15 March 1900.

While the Bolivians had obtained to carry to the zone a small military quota. But soon these quotas remained blocked in Porto Acre by the Brazilians of the region who received new help from the government from Amazon Silverio Neri in the form of a new expedition (called the Expedition of the Poets) under command of the journalist Orlando Correa Lopez which proclaimed the Second Republic of Acre (November 1900) with Rodrigo do Carvalho as president.

Defeated by the Bolivians (24 December 1900), the second republic was extinguished also.

On 6 August 1902 a Brazilian soldier called Jose Placido do Castro, sent by the governor of Amazon Neri, arrived to Acre and begins the so-called Acrean Revolution . The rebels took all the region except Porto Acre , which was not yielded until 24 January 1903. On 27 January 1903 the third Republic of Acre is proclamed , this time counting on the support of the Brazilian president Rodrigues Alves (and of his Foreign minister the baron of Rio Branco) that ordered to occupy a part of the Acre where is I formed the territorial government of North Acre governed by the general Olimpio da Silveira.

In Bolivia had reached the presidency the colonel Pando who marched with troops to combat the revolutionaries.

Before arriving to important combats the Brazilian and Bolivian representatives signed a preliminary agreement of peace (21 March) ratified after by the Treaty of Petropolis (17 November 1903) that was relinquishing all the territory to Brazil in exchange for other territories in Mato Grosso.

Acre was converted in Brazilian federal territory by the Law of 25 February 1904 and executive decree of 7 of April of 1904. It was elevated to Statehood on 15 June 1962.

The former Acre president, Placido do Castro, died on 11 August 1908.

Jaume Olle - 28-JUN-1996