The reactionary cabinets of Caxias, Olinda, and Ferraz followed his, and other parties were formed: authoritative conservatives, uncompromising liberals, and a party of conciliation. The elections of 1860 were a democratic triumph. Great orators came to the fore with a truly tropical eloquence; these "new men," like Antonio Leocadio Guzman in Venezuela, stirred the passions of the people. To oppose their liberal programme conservatives and moderate liberals united in Congress. The reactionaries governed from 1848 to 1862; now the radicals sought for power. The last conservative cabinets fell to pieces before the opposition of Parliament and the protests of the crowd. Despotic monarchy was condemned; constitutional monarchy had many {188} supporters; new elections, in 1863, increased the strength of the liberals and democrats. The Paraguayan war against the dictatorship of Lopez gave unusual prominence to the external life of the country, and political agitation died down. Pedro II., representing the conservative interests of historical and national continuity, was opposed to an unruly liberalism. After one liberal ministry he chose two moderate cabinets, under Olinda and Vasconcellos, which were inclined to conservatism, and finally Itaborahy dissolved the Lower Chamber. The Emperor had gone back ten years; the ministry that in 1852 had marked the triumph of the conservatives was now to rule in the face of a rising tide of democracy. A constitutional monarch by law, he was none the less an autocrat, for he forced his ministries upon a hostile Chamber, and gave politics a direction contrary to the will of the people, and those their suffrage had newly elected. The liberals rose against the reactionary Emperor and demanded reform or revolution. A transformation of the electoral system, of the Draconian code of justice, and of the army, which was really a Prætorian legion supporting an absolute power, and, in the social department, the liberation of the slaves: such was the programme of 1869. A dissident group of conservatives united with the liberals, and a patrician, Nabuco de Araujo, signed the manifesto of the reformers. It was the crisis of the monarchy. Its historical function was nearly at an end; it had organised peace, created unity and nationality, and laid the orderly foundations of the new Brazilian race. Autocracy, necessary in the dawn of the century, was now contrary to democratic development; after 1870 the liberals openly aspired to found a republic.