Assist and Educate: The National Children's Department and its actions in Cuiabá-MT (1940-1948)

Abstract

The government of Getúlio Vargas formalized the creation of the National Department for Children (DNCr) via Decree-Law 2024, published on February 17, 1940, a document that established “the foundations for the organization of protection of motherhood, childhood and adolescence in the country” (Decreto-Lei nº 2.024, 1940). From this perspective, the article aimed to analyze the genesis and performance of the National Children’s Department in Cuiabá-MT in the period from 1940 to 1948. The paper started from the following question: How did the government of Mato Grosso appropriate the guidelines given by the DNCr for the education, assistance and health of children from the popular classes? The period analyzed is justified by the year of creation of the department – 1940, until its first reorganization by Federal Law nº 282 of 05/24/48 (Lei nº 282, 1948). The theoretical methodological reference is based in a documental qualitative research and the periodicals in circulation were used, DNCr Bulletins, legislation; DNCr publications, among others. The research results demonstrate the movements between the federal and state government to materialize the DNCr's purposes, since this document presented itself more as an articulator and organizer than as an executor; that is, it proposed to think more about actions and solutions. In the state of Mato Grosso, it was possible to perceive that assistance initiatives were mainly centered in the hands of the first lady of the state, Maria de Arruda Muller, who held the presidency of the Society for the Protection of Maternity and Childhood and of the Brazilian Legion of Good Will (BLGW). Thus, the state, with the leadership of the Muller family, was able to invest in childcare, subsidized and monitored by the DNCr and the LBA.