Are antidemocratic means necessary to protect democracy? Both the United States, during Reconstruction, and Brazil, from 1964 to 1985, tested this question with periods of military rule rather than liberal democracy. If these military interventions had been effective, they would have achieved the goals they started with and would have had a positive and lasting impact on society. In both countries, although the use of the military provided sufficient efficiency and power to achieve the initial objectives, there were not enough lasting benefits to make military interventions more effective than democracy. To rebuild the South and reform the union, Congress created five military-run districts with soldiers stationed in each district to maintain order. Republicans argued that this militant authority was necessary to protect the liberties of blacks in the South. It provided the efficiency and power needed to prevent the landowning aristocracy from regaining control of the South. They also passed “three enforcement acts that expanded the jurisdiction of the federal courts over civil and voting rights and authorized the president to suspend habeas corpus and use the military to dismember the Ku Klux Klan” (McPherson, 1992, p. 143) . ). In order to expand civil liberties for freedmen, the federal government took away habeas corpus freedom and limited democracy at the state level. Instead of reforming Southern state governments and using democracy to spread freedom, the military removed state government officials and Congress expanded federal courts to act in place of state courts in matters of civil and voting rights. The South has also done more harm than good in the area of ​​military interventions, although it may take longer for the effects to be felt. Works Cited Amado, J. (2003 ). Tent of Miracles (BS Merello, Trad.). I. Stavans (ed.). Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press. Brown, H. B., & Harlan, J. M. (1896). Plessy v. Ferguson (full text).DuBois, W.E. (1903). The souls of black people.Foner, E. (n.d.). Reconstruction (United States history). In the Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved November 17, 2013, from http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/493722/ReconstructionMcPherson, J. M. (1992). Abraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.Roett, R. (2010). The new Brazil. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.Willson, M. (2010). Dance so we don't all fall: Breaking cycles of poverty in Brazil and beyond. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.