Primary public education in Maranhão:

The nineteenth century from the legal system

Abstract

The article discusses primary public education in the province of Maranhão in the nineteenth century, the approach highlights the laws, statutes and regulations that guided and institutionalized education in Maranhão. For this research, we used the bibliographic review as a methodology, which served as a basis to guide and develop the ideas of the work, as well as to raise the reports of the digital collection of the Benedito Leite Public Library, which presents the time frame of education in the nineteenth century. Through the results of the study, it was confirmed that the education implemented in the province of Maranhão had records and was based on the interests of the current elite, there were interests that focused on professionalizing a part of the population and excluding another part, as identified by the Law of 1854 that Art. 41, $4, which reported that the enslaved population was prohibited from attending school, that is, Art.41, “slaves” cannot be admitted to enrollment. The article's conclusion highlights how inadequate the process of instituting public primary education was, which moves the president of the province and the provincial assembly to discuss a jurisprudence that starts by excluding some social groups.