Chamber of Deputies (Brazil)

The legislatures are counted from the first meeting of the Chamber of Representatives and of the Senate, on 6 May 1826, in the imperial era (the Chamber of Representatives met for preparatory sessions from 29 April 1826 to elect its officers and conduct other preliminary business, but the Legislature was formally opened on 6 May). The Chamber of Representatives and the Senate were created by Brazil's first Constitution, the Constitution of the Empire of Brazil, adopted in 1824. The numbering of the legislatures is continuous and counts all bicameral legislatures elected since the adoption of the 1824 Constitution including the imperial General Assembly and the republican National Congress. The previous constituent and legislative assembly of the Empire of Brazil, a unicameral national assembly convened in 1823 and dissolved by Emperor Pedro I before the Constitution was adopted, is not counted. The inauguration of a new composition of Chamber of Representatives for a four-year term of office marks the start of a new Legislature.

In the imperial era the national legislature was named General Assembly. It was made up of the Chamber of Representatives and the Senate. Senators were elected for life and the Senate was a permanent institution, whereas the Chamber of Representatives, unless dissolved earlier, was elected every four years. When Brazil became a republic and a federal state, the model of a bicameral legislature was retained at the federal level, but the parliament was renamed National Congress. The National Congress is made up of the Chamber of Representatives and the Federal Senate. Both houses have fixed terms and cannot be dissolved earlier. Under Brazil's present Constitution, adopted in 1988, senators are elected to eight-year terms and representatives are elected every four years.

Each Brazilian state (and the Federal District) is represented in the Senate by three senators.

Elections to the Senate are held every four years, with either a third or two thirds of the seats up for election.

The number of representatives elected is proportional to the size of the population of the respective state (or of the Federal District) as of 1994. However, no delegation can be made up of less than eight or more than seventy seats. Thus the least populous state elects eight federal representatives and the most populous elects seventy. These restrictions favour the smaller states at the expense of the more populous states and so the size of the delegations is not exactly proportional to population.

Elections to the Chamber of Representatives are held every four years, with all seats up for election.

Empire of Brazil[2]

• 1st Legislature (1826–1829)
• 2nd Legislature (1830–1833)
• 3rd Legislature (1834–1837)
• 4th Legislature (1838–1841)
• 5th Legislature (1842–1844)
• 6th Legislature (1845–1847)
• 7th Legislature (1848)
• 8th Legislature (1849–1852)
• 9th Legislature (1853–1856)
• 10th Legislature (1857–1860)
• 11th Legislature (1861–1863)
• 12th Legislature (1864–1866)
• 13th Legislature (1867–1868)
• 14th Legislature (1869–1872)
• 15th Legislature (1872–1875)
• 16th Legislature (1876–1877)
• 17th Legislature (1878–1881)
• 18th Legislature (1882–1884)
• 19th Legislature (1885)
• 20th Legislature (1886–1889), dissolved by the 15 November 1889 military coup that proclaimed Brazil a Republic
• 21st Legislature: had already been elected to succeed the 20th legislature, but was not installed due to the proclamation of the Republic. New elections were summoned by the provisional government of the Republic in 1890.

Old Republic[3]

• 21st Legislature (1890–1891), discharged the role of Constituent Congress (1890–1891). The act that summoned the elections for the Constituent Congress and that empowered it to draft a Constitution already established that the Congress would be made up of two Houses, an elected Senate with equal representation for the Brazilian States, and a Chamber of Representatives, each State having a number of representatives proportional to the size of its population. During the drafting of the Constitution, the Congress was to meet in joint session. The Congress was required to adopt a Constitution that conformed to the republican form of government, and that preserved the recently declared Federal model of the State.
• 22nd Legislature (1891–1893)
• 23rd Legislature (1894–1896)
• 24th Legislature (1897–1899)
• 25th Legislature (1900–1902)
• 26th Legislature (1903–1905)
• 27th Legislature (1906–1908)
• 28th Legislature (1909–1911)
• 29th Legislature (1912–1914)
• 30th Legislature (1915–1917)
• 31st Legislature (1918–1920)
• 32nd Legislature (1921–1923)
• 33rd Legislature (1924–1926)
• 34th Legislature (1927–1929)
• 35th Legislature (1930): dissolved by the provisional government after the 1930 Revolution.

Vargas Era[4]

• 36th Legislature (1933–1935), discharged the role of Constituent Assembly (1933–1934)
• 37th Legislature (1935–1937), dissolved by the Estado Novo coup d'état.

Legislatures elected under the Republic of 46[5]

• 38th Legislature (1946–1950), discharged the role of National Constituent Assembly (1946).
• 39th Legislature (1951–1954)
• 40th Legislature (1955–1958)
• 41st Legislature (1959–1962)
• 42nd Legislature (1963–1967), already under the Military Regime instituted by the 1964 military coup, the legislature discharged the role of Constituent Congress (1966–1967), under a decree of the military government (AI-4, Fourth Institutional Act), that commissioned the drafting of a new Constitution. The Constitution was voted under duress.

Legislatures elected under the Military Regime

• 43rd Legislature (1967–1970)
• 44th Legislature (1971–1975)
• 45th Legislature (1975–1979)
• 46th Legislature (1979–1983)
• 47th Legislature (1983–1987). The Chamber of Representatives was elected under the process of gradual return to democracy. During that legislature, the last military President handed over power to the first civilian Administration, still elected indirectly, by means of an Electoral College. The 1985 Electoral College, however, was placed under no duress, and elected the Opposition candidates for president and vice president. After the inauguration of the civilian Administration, the 47th Legislature passed a Constitutional Amendment,[6] empowering the next Legislature, that would convene in February 1987 after the 1986 legislative elections, to discharge the role of National Constituent Assembly, empowered to adopt a new Constitution to replace the one inherited from the Military Regime.

Legislatures elected after the restoration of civilian government ("New Republic")

• 48th Legislature (1987–1991), discharged the role of National Constituent Assembly (1987–1988).
• 49th Legislature (1991–1995)
• 50th Legislature (1995–1999)
• 51st Legislature (1999–2003)
• 52nd Legislature (2003–2007)
• 53rd Legislature (2007–2011)
• 54th Legislature (2011–2015)
• 55th Legislature (2015–2019)
• 56th Legislature (2019–2023)

The number of seats per state is distributed according to the number of inhabitants per state, according to the official measurement taken by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics through a census held each 10 years. The Brazilian population is represented by one representative for each 362,013 inhabitants on average, but this proportionality is limited by having a minimum of eight members and a maximum of seventy members per state, these criteria being subject to an apportionment paradox.

Therefore, states with 3,258,117 inhabitants upwards have 9 to 70 representatives. Following this scenario for example the city of São Paulo with its 11,253,503 inhabitants[7] is represented by 31 representatives of the total members of the state and the rest of the state with its 28,670,588 inhabitants are represented by 39 MPs (Member of Parliament).[8]

There is a distorted representation of the Brazilian states in congress, having some groups of representatives representing on average more than the proportion of the population of the state, and others representing less. That proportionality means that Roraima is represented by a representative for every 51,000 inhabitants and, at the other extreme, São Paulo is represented by one representative for every 585,000 inhabitants. This difference is reflected in the representation of the states in the Brazilian Congress, where some states are over-represented, such as Roraima, with 681% of the population represented by their congressmen, and other states are under represented, such as the state of São Paulo, with 63% of the population represented by their congressmen. The proportionality is calculated through the division of the percentage of representatives of a state in the chamber by the percentage of the population of such state in the nation. The population of the state of São Paulo, for instance, elects only 70 representatives to the Chamber, because of the maximum limits of 70 congressmen by state, but it should have 40 more seats.[9]

The House of Representatives is composed of the Bureau of the Chamber of Representatives of Brazil by College Leaders and the Commissions, which can be permanent, temporary, or special inquiry.

• Federal institutions of Brazil
• 54th Chamber of Representatives of Brazil
• 53rd Chamber of Representatives of Brazil
• National Congress of Brazil
• Federal Senate of Brazil

• Official website of the Chamber of Representatives of Brazil
  • Chamber of Representatives' e-Democracy
• Photo 360° of the Chamber of Representatives of Brazil (in Portuguese)
• List of all the presidents of the Brazilian Chamber of Representatives (in Portuguese)