"Melancholy Anniversary"

"Our difficulties," boomed President Getulio Vargas, "are faced and conquered with determined courage." But even as the President spoke last week, reporting on his first two years in office, unconquered difficulties piled up: Brazil's foreign trade debts stood at an alltime high of $850 million, the cost of living was up 30% in twelve months, strikes for wage rises of 40% to 50% were sweeping the country. The outlawed Communist party was flourishing. The onetime dictator (1930-45) who astounded his country by making a constitutional comeback seemed unable to find answers to his mountainous problems.

"Melancholy anniversary!" commented the conservative newspaper 0 Estado de Sao Paulo. "After two years Senhor Getulio Vargas still struggles in a vacuum of perplexing inactivity." Said Rio's Correio da Manha, "The hour is ripe for sinister demagogues."

But Brazil's mood appears far from revolutionary. Political tension building toward an eruption of violence is not evident; the voters who swept Getulio into office still feel fond of him. They blame high prices, their worst problem, on "the men around Vargas." In explanation of the old (69) man's inactivity, they would probably accept the statement he made privately last week. "I never knew," said Getulio, "that these first two years would be so hard."

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