In the 1940s and 1950s de Morais worked as a trade unionist and a journalist, becoming a member of the Pernambuco State Assembly and co-founder of the Ligas Camponêsas (Peasant Leagues). After the 1964 coup he was forced into exile, first in Chile, and, as ILO Regional Advisor on Agrarian Reform for Central America, he subsequently worked as Agrarian Reform consultant in Latin America, Portugal and Africa.