Despite repeated radio appeals by the revolutionaries asking the population to stay home, thousands of Portuguese citizens descended on the streets and mingled with the military insurgents. The military-led coup returned democracy to Portugal, ending the unpopular Colonial War (in which thousands of Portuguese citizens had been conscripted into military service) and replacing the Estado Novo regime and its secret police (which curbed civil liberties and political freedom). It began as a protest by Portuguese Armed Forces captains against a law: the Dec Lei nº 353/73 of 1973.