The speeches given by Pedro Segundo and Getulio Vargas during wartime not only reveals their orientation of leadership but in turn provides something else. These discourses gives one a unique window into not only how these leaders chose to perceive the challenges of wartime but how to address them to the national populace. The rhetoric they used had to transform for purposes of mobilization while adapting to shifting political environments. Among one of the features of this adaptation was the choice of which aspects of the national consciousness to stress at pivotal moments. By examining the public speeches of Pedro Segundo and Getulio Vargas one can see the political orientation of both leaders, understand the political climate of both periods, and witness how much Brazil had changed in the eighty-one years between the beginning of the Paraguayan War and the end of WWII.