O supremo castelo de cartas: um recorte analítico sobre o STF durante a ditadura militar a partir do Inquérito Policial nº 2 - o caso de João Goulart

Abstract

The following study pursue to present a detailed analysis of the Police Inquiry No. 2, a historical law case that was submitted to the scrutiny of the 16 ministers that composed the Supreme Federal Court prior to the publication of the Institutional Act No. 5, during the Brazilian military dictatorship. One of the individuals under investigation – at the time, without having been formally accused yet – was the president deposed by the dictatorial regime itself, João Goulart. Considering this scenario, the trial raises three main debates: which judicial body, if Supreme Federal Court or Federal Justice, had the competence to appreciate the materiality of the case; delving into the challenge of understanding the possible correlation between the Institutional Acts and the 1967 Federal Constitution; and finally discretizing the effects of the suspension of his political rights. The documentary research surrounding the court's decision and normative productions, as well as biographical and bibliographical reflections, aims to produce a critical and contextualized interpretation that allows us to grasp the political core that unfolds from the concern regarding the formal definition of competence. In this way, it also intends to contribute to the Brazilian’s Legal History, through the assessment of the institutions’ actions during moments of exception, by scrutinizing the arguments that were put forth by each minister in the scope of the case, to size the extent of the interferences to which the Supreme Court was subject in the midst of the established military regime’s political struggle for legitimacy.