Saluting a Brazilian Revolutionary

Saluting a Brazilian Revolutionary 

By Lawrence W. Reed 

Happy Tiradentes Day (April 21) to all Brazilians!

I also wish a Happy Tiradentes Day to people everywhere, because the man for whom the day is named was a revolutionary hero for liberty and independence.

His real name was Joaquim José da Silva Xavier. Born in 1746 in the Brazilian gold mining province of Minas Gerais when the country was a Portuguese colony, he worked as a miner before taking an interest in pharmacy and dentistry. “Tiradentes” was a nickname meaning “tooth puller,” derived from his profession as a dentist. April 21 is celebrated in his name in Brazil. On that date in 1792, he was hanged, drawn, and quartered by Portuguese authorities.

Thomas Jefferson once famously wrote that “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.” He would undoubtedly be proud of Tiradentes, who drew inspiration from America’s Revolution. In support of the liberation of South America from European colonial powers, another American politician, Henry Clay, would declare a few years later, “An oppressed people are authorized, whenever they can, to rise and break their fetters.”

Breaking the fetters binding Brazil to Portugal animated Tiradentes to take up arms. He and other Brazilian patriots aimed to overthrow the rule of Lisbon’s monarchy to establish a homegrown and independent republic. It did not help Portugal’s cause that it had ruled the colony with caprice and cruelty from the early 16th Century. Using slave labor, Portugal extracted huge amounts of gold from Minas Gerais. In 1789, a resistance movement known as Inconfidência Mineira was formed, and Tiradentes became one of its leaders.

The movement's motto was a Latin phrase, Liberta Quae Sera Tamen, which means, “Liberty, albeit late.”

The rebels planned to commence the uprising on the day taxes were due to the Portuguese, but there was a Judas among them. In exchange for a tax break for himself, the betrayer provided the information the Portuguese needed to locate and arrest Tiradentes and the other conspirators. After a lengthy trial in which an unrepentant Tiradentes accepted full responsibility, the hero of the aborted revolution met his grisly end in Rio de Janeiro. But his dream did not die with him.

Brazil gained its independence in 1822 and became a republic in 1889. Since 1890, Brazilians have celebrated Tiradentes Day on April 21 to honor a man whose ideas and courage have inspired them for more than two centuries.

In November 2022, I visited Minas Gerais. With Brazilian friends, I walked the streets of Ouro Preto, once the most important city of Latin America during Brazil’s gold rush (late 1600s to late 1800s).  The picture accompanying this article is of me in Tiradentes Square in Ouro Preto (photo credit goes to my great friend Pedro Tavares Fernandes from Florianopolis).

I salute Tiradentes, a brave and honorable man who sought freedom and independence for his fellow Brazilians!

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(Lawrence W. Reed is President Emeritus, Humphreys Family Senior Fellow and Ron Manners Global Ambassador for Liberty at the Foundation for Economic Education in Atlanta, Georgia. He blogs at www.lawrencewreed.com.)