At 24, Paulista Regina Cecilia Maria Diva Nazário hit the court of the right to vote in the 1922 presidential. The then law student used her knowledge about the Constitution to open an innovative discussion about the political rights of those in the country. The battle yielded a book, considered by activists of the time and current experts a legacy for the Brazilian suffrage movement.
“The lines written by me were drawn up to the sentence, in the rare moments of time off between studies and works. In the simple intention to better disclose what is said about and serving the noble cause than, in Brazil, it will be briefly winning, to the glory of our homeland and respect for its magnna laws,” Nazário wrote in the introduction of the book “Feminine Vote and Feminism: A Year of Feminism” 1923.
Nazario was born in Batatais, Sao Paulo, on November 22, 1897. Daughter of Brazilian Maria Rita de Paula Pinto Nazário and Belgian Louis Yvon Léon Nolf d’Arvelghen, lived in Belgium from 10 to 20 years old, where his father owned a Brazilian coffee roasting and exporting service. In the midst, the family returned to Brazil. Nazario entered the Faculty of Law of the University of São Paulo, in Largo São Francisco, in 1922.
In the same year, she tried to take the title to the presidential elections. He had the support of his father, who asked for information on how to record new voters. But the judge of the Electoral Board of the Sé denied the student’s request, arguing that, based on customs, women traditionally did not participate in the elections, says historian Monica Karawejczyk in an article in the historic magazine of the Public Archive of the State of São Paulo.
“The respected woman was the married woman. One of the arguments that was used was: ‘What is the meaning of having a female vote if the woman’s vote will replicate that of her husband? It’s the same as doing an election twice,'” says the law researcher Laila Maia Galvão. “They could not conceive the idea of an intellectually independent woman.”
Women’s civil law on guidelines such as and divorce was also linked to these ideals, says Galvão. With the conquest of the vote, the way for the other achievements was paved.
Dissatisfied with the judge’s response, the student filed an appeal. The 1891 did not prohibit women from voting, speaking only in direct suffrage. Nazario’s knowledge in constitutional law was fundamental to the case, bringing an innovative argument, says Galvão. Until then, the suffrage movement had a more politics -based rhetoric.
“Her argument, very legal because she is a bachelor of law, draws a lot of attention,” says Galvão. This rhetoric and the book are, for the expert, the main legacies of the suffrage. “She had the wit to organize the material, have the record and something she could spread, be read by other people, inspire others.”
Even with the appeal, the student’s request was denied. In her book, she describes – at 26 years – what happened. It also tells the debates about the right to vote of women at the time and compiles reports on women’s rights in Brazilian politics.
In a letter to Nazario in December 1923, a key to the suffrage movement says the book “is a beautiful service provided to the cause and of great use to its documentation,” says historian Monica Karawejczyk in her article.
The expert describes the work as “a mandatory reference to everyone who wants to research the Brazilian feminist movement”. The book was republished in 2009 by the Official Press publisher of the São Paulo government.
The struggle for female vote in Brazil from the 1920s was a movement mostly of white and upper -class white women, with influential activism by the Brazilian Federation for Female Progress, of which Nazario was affiliated in São Paulo, says social science expert Lenina Vernucci da Silva in his master thesis from UNESP (Paulista State University).
“The diva had all this social condition of positioning themselves, writing in the newspapers, studying in Largo São Francisco and putting herself as a member of that environment. There is no doubt that it was a high middle class movement, women who had studied, who could read and write,” says researcher Laila Maia Galvão.
The 1932 Electoral Code expressed the optional voting right for women, which in 1934 became mandatory for those who held paid public office, according to the TRE-SP (Regional Electoral Court) Electoral Memory Center. The obligation for all came with the Federal Constitution of 1946, along with the right of competition to elective positions – not 20 years after Nazario fights for its title.
After graduating from college, the student married a classmate, Luiz Duarte Ventura, who added the surname to her. She and her husband were directors of the Modern Institute, which offered typing courses and tachigraphy. The school was in João Mendes Square, in downtown São Paulo.
There are no records about the author who talk about her life after this period, according to Lenina Vernucci da Silva. The activist died in 1966.
“The diva would welcome this process of a much larger female presence in the area of law today – the conquest of vote, various rights throughout the 20th century – but probably still battling other causes,” says Galvão.
As part of the initiative all, the Sheet Gifts women with
