document 1.1 second republic

GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORY DEPARTMENT

Teacher: Maite Fresnillo

SECOND REPUBLIC 1931-1936

PRECEDENTS

San Sebastian pact and the end of the monarchy

In August 1930 the main Spanish political groups met in San Sebastian where they signed a pact asking for the creation of a republican regime:

- Regionalists, constitutionalists, republicans and socialists were the main characters in this pact.

- CNT and EAJ were out of the pact.

From that pact two lines of actions derived: Revolutionary: in 1930 some military upraised in Jaca but they failed. Political, through press and meetings trying to convince people of the

negative things of the monarchy.

As a consequence of the pact, a commission against monarchy was created whose members were Alcalá Zamora (right wing republican), Manuel Azaña (left wing republican) and Indalecio Prieto (socialist).

Judging by the situation, Aznar government assumed the task of organising a progressive electoral process to form constitutional courts. Depending on the procedure established they would begin by municipal elections to substitute those of the dictatorship and then elections for courts would be held.

Municipal elections were held on 12 April 1931 and they became a kind of plebiscite about monarchy. The result was that in almost every provincial capital city republicans won and the following days thousands of people went to the streets asking for a republic.

1.- REGIMEN CHANGE: FROM MONARCHY TO REPUBLIC

In April 14, 1931 the result of the elections was known and Eibar was the first city in which republic was proclaimed. Later Madrid, Barcelona and the rest of capitals proclaimed the new regime as well. Considering that municipal elections have resulted in a proclaim against the crown general Sanjurjo, head of the Civil Guard, said that he would fight in favour of the monarchy but the king Alphonse XIII decided to go to the exile in Rome.

That day nobody went to work or to school.

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The transition from the monarchy to the republican regime was not traumatic, it was achieved without violence and citizens were confident on the new politicians being able to solve the problems of the country.

1.1.- WORK OF THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT

After their success in municipal elections, republicans and socialist formed the provisional government. Instead of Alphonse XIII Niceto Alcalá Zamora, a righ-wing republican, became president and they started immediately working to transform Spain.

First matters

Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya party won the 1931 elections in Catalonia. This party adopted the federalist tradition of Pi i Margall and asked for sovereignty and self-determination. The matter started in Barcelona the 14 April when Francesc Maciá, leader of the Catalanist group proclaimed the Catalan Republic or the Estat Catala inside the Iberian Federation of the Republic.

The representatives of the Provisional Government were worried about what was happening in Catalonia and they urged the leaders of Eskerra Republicana of Catalonia to forget the idea of a Catalan Republic and to ask for an statute instead of that with which Catalan particularism would be recognised. The Provisional Government the 17 April 1931 gave a decree in which Catalonia’s Generalitat was restored and an autonomous government was accepted.

On the other hand, anarchist were exultant with the republic although they considered that it was a bourgeois government but it offered a new atmosphere of freedom and they started considering the possibility of fighting for a libertaire regime.

Church position

When the republic was proclaimed the cooperation of the representative of the Pope in Spanish Church with the new authorities reached to an end.

Peace did not last because the anticlericalism of the government soon influenced in a lot of citizens and actions against church started. Republican citizens were very upset with a pastoral of Toledo arch-bishop, Cardinal Segura. As a result, some provokers set fire to some church’s properties considering that one of the main problems of Spain was church. These incidents provoked that catholic people were against the republic, blaming on Miguel Maura, Government Minister for his passivity. One month later

Segura Cardinal was expelled from Spain (Church had became the enemy of the Republic).

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Constitutional Courts

The Provisional Government called elections for the 28 June. These courts would be constituent, to produce the new constitution.

The political parties that took part in the elections were:

Left wing parties

- RADICAL SOCIALIST PARTY

- REPUBLICAN ACTION This party was progressive and in favour of peace, opposing to any radical position. They signed a compromise with the PSOE to put into practice an advance programme of reforms.

Its leader was Manuel Azaña, an intellectual and famous speaker. He was War Minister in the Provisional Government and head of the government from 1931 to 1933 and from 1936 on president of the Republic.

Republican Action received the votes of the urban middle classes. In 1934 this party and the Socialist Radical Party merged together to create Republican Left.

- PSOE. It was a very important party:

In the 1931 elections they obtained 116 deputies, 58 in 1933 and 33 in 1936. Its main leaders were Largo Caballero, Indalecio Prieto and Julian Besteiro.

- PCE. It was a revolutionary party in favour of the Soviet Union. It was a little group at the beginning (only 400,000 votes in the 1933 elections) but it increased its strength during the Civil War. One of its main leaders was Dolores Ibarruri.

- ANARCHISTS. They did not accept the republican regime and they were ready for revolutionary action. They were willing to fight against right wing parties and state’s security forces.

- AUTONOMOUS REPUBLICAN FEDERATION OF GALICIA. Left wing republicans.

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- REPUBLICAN LEFT OF CATALONIA. They were leftist and nationalists. They won the elections in Catalonia, being their leaders Macia and Companys, who became presidents of the Generalitat.

Right wing parties

- BASQUE NATIONALIST PARTY. In that time it was conservative and catholic. In 1936 Jose Antonio Agirre, leader of the party, became the first Basque Lehendakari of the Basque Government.

- CARLISTS. They organised para-military groups opposing the republic under the direction of Manuel Fal Conde.

More people than ever took part in the elections (%70,14); vote was reserved for male over 25 years old..

A coalition of Left wing Republicans and Socialists won the elections in almost all the provinces, but for Alava, Guipuzcoa and Viscay and Navarre where nationalist and traditionalists won respectively.

In conclusion, even when there were right wing parties, the Congress had a left wing tendency, with some politicians of scarce experience. But there also were the heads of the main parties and some intellectual in between the deputies: Unamuno, Ortega y Gasset and Gregorio Marañon.

1931 Constitution

The following year an assembly of 15 deputies was created to elaborate the new constitution project. Jimenez de Asua, a lawyer member of the PSOE was the president of the assembly and the constitution was of left influence.

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The constitution was approved the 9 December 1931. The state was defined of a republic of workers of every condition. Spain was a democratic and lay state. The state

was central, however, there were autonomous region. At once with this, its basic democratic principle was universal suffrage for men and women. The government had only a chamber and the president was elected for six years.

The day after the proclamation of the constitution the Congress chose Alcala Zamora as President of the Republic and Manuel Azaña became head of government.

The main innovations of the new constitutions were:

-Spain was defined as a democratic republic and sovereignty was national.

-New power organization Legislative power belonged to the congress, the only chamber of the

government.

They introduced a new figure: president of the Republic. Its government lasted six years and he could not be elected again.

For the first time, in order to assure constitutional rights, a constitutional court was created.

-Women right to vote. After a long discussion the constitution accepted that women could vote, it was their first constitution including this article. In Courts many left wing deputies voted against it because women were not well prepared and they were very religious so they could be easily influenced by church. They were afraid of right wing parties obtaining more votes in case women could vote.

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-Citizens’ rights(articles 46 and 48 ). Individual rights were accepted without any limitation. For the first time work, education, health and housing appear in between these rights.

-Limit of property right. (44. article). It was possible to disentitle lands in favour of general interest.

-Territorial organization. Autonomy statutes. (articles 11 to 22). Provinces having had the same culture and history could form an autonomous state. The stepts required in the constitution to obtain autonomy were::

Municipal initiative. The majority of the councils of one region could ask for an autonomous statute.

Plebiscite (consult citizens’ opinion). Two thirds of the electors of the area should vote to obtain it..

Court should approved it later..

With the opposition of right wing groups, in 1932 Catalonia managed to obtain its statute of autonomy: in the case of the Basque Country, they had to wait and it was not accepted until 1936. Galicia’s statute was accepted in 1938.

-State-Church relation. (3, 26, and 27. articles). Religious policy created a lot of controversy. Spanish state was not confessional, it did not have an oficial religion so they should not sustain the church economically. In addition to this, there was a ban on religious communities teaching and, what is more cult was accepted in private.

2.- TWO YEAR REFORMIST: AZAÑA’S GOVERNMENT (1931-33)

Left wing republicans and socialist, after they success in the election formed a coalition government and in order to solve the problems of the country they started an ambitious plan of reforms.

2.1.- Educative reform

Thinking that Spanish backwardness could be solved through an accurate educational programme (44 per cent of Spaniards were illiterate), Azaña’s government faced the difficult task of creating a modern and progressive educative programme to replace religious education.

Republicans and socialists adopted the following secularizer measures, trying to reinforce education and put an end to illiteracy:

Expending in education increased in a 50 per cent. 13.500 new schools were built

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Compulsory elementary education was free and mixed.

Teachers’ salary increased Secondary school improved and university research was supported

These reforms provoked the anger of right wing defenders, mainly when it was settled in the constitution that education would be mixed and free.

2.2.- Military reform

In addition to change education completely, Republican government took another serious field of action: the military reform.

Spanish army was full of problems: there were too many high ranks, soldiers had scarce training and material was too old, almost obsolete.

In order to solve problems Azaña, after being appointed as War Minister in the Provisional Government, proposed to some officials to retire in advance without reducing their wages. Half of them accepted the proposal and the number of official reduced drastically. He took also other measures, among them the reduction of the role of the army, putting them under the control of the civilian powers, and Zaragoza’s military academy, under Franco’d direction, was closed down. Anyway, Azaña did not manage to introduce the republican trend in the army; on the contrary, due to the reforms many military were upset against republicans.

On the other hand, republicans did not dare to disintegrate Civil Guard but they deprived them of their superiority. Instead of them they created the Assault Guards, a urban police in favour of the republic.

2.3.- Agrarian reform

Agriculture had two major problems: the existence of big properties and confronted to them an enormous group of workers without land. This is why the necessary agriculture reform had the following aims:

Give land to peasants without it, so they would obtain the support of those groups of people to maintain the regime. At the same time they wanted to finish with conflicts and revolts in agricultural spaces.

Political aim: destroy the economic power of big landowners, a majority of them in favour of the monarchy and anti-republicans.

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Economic aim. Increase agrarian production and the level of rents of peasants so that they could consume other products.

In 1932, after a long and hard discussion, the congress elaborated the Law for Agrarian Reform. In the discussion that followed right wing parties opposed and appeared against any reform, defending the interest of landowners.

The main points of the law were:

The land formerly belonging to Greats of Spain now disappeared was expropriated without paying any compensation.

Estate, land rented for centuries and land not used were expropriated as well; but in these cases the Stated gave money compensations.

Peasants should be established in expropriated land. Later peasants would decide how to work them (in common or individually).

This law was put into practice slowly. Given that they expropriated few land, in 1934 only 8.000 peasants were settled. As a result, peasants were deceptioned with the republic and anarchists proposed revolution as the only way of solving their problems.

2.4.- Religious reform

In this area republican-socialist government attitude was not very appropriate because they hurt many Catholics. In this way the new political regime gained new enemies, some of them powerful. They identified republic with an attack against God. In their opinion divorce, the elimination of religion in schools, the ban on Jesuits and the elimination of the cross from the classrooms were not acceptable.

2.5.- Labour legislation

Francisco Largo Caballero (socialist) organised the necessary deep reforms in an attempt to solve the social conflicts:

Eight hour of work per day and in areas where there were peasants of proletarians without a job land should be worked compulsorily.

To solve work conflicts he created mixed juries with businessmen and workers..

2.6.- Autonomy statutes

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In 1932 Azaña gave an speech in favour of Catalonia’s autonomy. After that deputies voted in favour of the Catalan Statute, that had been discussed for a long time because right wing and centre parties did not approved it.

Basque nationalist tried to obtain their autonomy as well on the basis of the constitution and they started with their process. This was a delicate task because of the reference to religion included in Basque statute that was against the laicism of the constitution.

2.7.- Economic situation

Spain development was delayed respective to the rest of Europe. In addition to this, the influence of the 1929 crisis was negative because as a result of this exportation to European countries, badly hit by the crisis, reduced drastically. Unemployment rose and to make the situation worse, many immigrants came back. Citizens were worried and discontent.

2.8.- Social conflicts

The republic wanted to change completely the basis of the state in administration, political and social aspects. This is why it had to face the attacks of left and right groups but the most important one were the revolutionary attempts of the anarchists. Anarchist unions were in favour of social revolution. They organised several strikes in the name of the CNT. Anarchists attacked the republic continuously and this led to a harsh police repression.

The most grave incident took place the 12 January 1933 in Casas Viejas, a town near Cadiz in which anarchists proclaimed libertarian communism and put siege to the Civil Guard barracks. Assault Guards had to take part in the operation and, not only did they crash the riot but they also killed 14 peasants. This harshness affected the Spaniards and Azaña came in for a lot of criticism when it was known that he gave

the order for the repression. As a consequence of all this workers were less confident on the Republic because they continued living in misery.

In this time the CNT, the anarchists union, passed to be controlled by the FAI (the strongest anarchists) and the radical Largo Caballero separated the moderate socialists.

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2.9.-Organization of the right wing

In 1932 and 1933 the social disturbances led Azaña’s government to its end. The right wing parties organised politically.

The catholic right used the anticlericalism of the republicans as an excuse to attract catholic citizens. In this moment Catholics created the CEDA (Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas). Their main political ideas were:

As they were conservatives, they wanted to change laws related to religion, education, army and family (they opposed to divorce and, in their opinion, the place for a woman was her house).

They were enemies of the socialism that put into question the capitalist system and private property and they opposed to the agrarian reform.

Finally, they denied the demands of Basque Country and Catalonia.

CEDA had more than 700,000 affiliates Gil Robles, an authoritarian and strong politic, was the leader of the party. In his speeches he presented attitudes contrary to democracy.

There were other groups more rightist than the CEDA. In 1932 Sanjurjo tried a coup d’ etat against the republic but he failed and the ultra-rights started organising to use violence against the republic.

In 1933 the ultra-monarchist Renovación Española was created. This party merged together all the groups supporting Alphonse XIII and their head was Jose Calvo Sotelo. Some of its characteristics were assumed later by the Franconist state. They denied democracy and right to vote, defending authoritarianism.

Fascist groups were created, the same as in Europe:

Although Onesimo Redondo and Ramiro Ledesma Ramos created the JONS in 1931, it was not until 1933 that it started to reinforce and increase the number of militants.

The best known was Falange Española. In 1933 Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, son of the dictator, created this party opposed to liberalism and Marxism. He opposed to the republic and it was favourable to a Spanish national and centralist government.

In 1934 Falange and JONS merged together to create the Falange Española de las Jons.

In addition to right wing parties, there were centre parties as well. One of the was the Republican Radical Party. It main

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ideological characteristics were: defence of order, opposed to revolution and workers movement and they ignored the reformism society and economy. It was the party of the medium and small bourgeoisie. Lerroux tried to eradicate anticlericalism from the young . He was head of the government from 1933 to 1935.

2.10.-Crisis of Azaña’s government

At mid-1933 the lack of stability of the republic was evident. Economic situation was grave and, in comparison with other European countries, ii was delayed.

Left wing parties wanted faster and deeper social change and they demonstrate their disconformities in the street and at work. On the other side of the spectrum the right wing parties and with them church, army and peasants wanted to stop the changes.

In September of that year the fragmentation was evident so Azaña, pressed by a coalition of the government and the parliamentary opposition . Elections were called and in these, for the first time, women could vote.

3.- RIGHT WING TWO-YEARS (November1933-December 1935

3.1.- Elections and right wing policy

The right wing groups opposing the republic formed a coalition and they proposed a programme to revise the constitution and stop the agrarian reform. The left wing parties did not form any coalition.

In the elections of 1 November 1933 centre-right wing parties won in the election, the Radical Republican Party of Lerroux and the CEDA of Gil Robles. The results came not as a surprise mainly due to the errors of the leftists during the reformist two-years and because the anarchist, following their ideology, did not take part in elections.

Although the CEDA obtained a majority of the votes, Alcala Zamora called Lerroux to form govern. In this way they wanted to avoid the government going too much to the right and, in this way they wanted to avoid a riot of the leftists.

Lerroux had the protection of the CEDA in the parliament, but he did not put any members of that party in his government.

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The main aim of the new government, without hesitation, was to undo the reforms done by the reformists. For that they invalidated all the previous reforms and they took conservatives measures:

Amnesty Law. They freed from prison general Sanjurjo and other who took part in the coup d’ etat.

Agrarian counter-reform: it was designed to undo the process started by the former government. They did an agrarian policy in favour of the landowners and they gave back their lands to the previous owners or they increased the to compensate for the expropriations. All this resulted in worsening the situation of agriculture.

Against what constitution said, they supported the church economicaly.

The programme to build public schools was slowed down.

They left without force Catalonia’s autonomy statute after the facts of 1934.

The counter-reform of the new government provoked the radicalization of the PSOE, UGT, communists and anarchists. The conflicts between right and left wing followers were frequent.

3.2.- 1934 revolution

1934 was a complicate year for the government. Tension among left and wing increased and it would blow up at any moment. There were several strikes and riots and in October the situation reached its highest point.

Three ministers of the CEDA were appointed to the government and this implied the end of the democratic republic and the introduction of fascism (in Europe Mussolini and Hitler were in power). In front of that, socialists and UGT called for a general strike.

The hottest points of the revolution were Asturias, Catalonia and Basque Country.

In the Basque Country the socialist party, CNT, PCE and ELA took part in a general strike and the shooting between the different forces lasted a week.

In Catalonia and Asturias revolutions were strong.

In Catalonia nationalists and independents agreed in the revolution and Companys, the president of the Generalitat, proclaimed the Estat Catalá, the Catalan republic inside the Spanish federal republic. The government answered immediately. They ordered

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the bombardment of the Generalitat and Barcelona’s Town Hall, they declared without force the Catalan statute and Companys was sent to prison.

In Asturias workers (socialists, anarchists, and communists) started an armed revolt. They used weapons and explosives from the mines, in a riot that lasted from 5 to 19 October. Industrial and mine workers had the province under control, including Oviedo. Franco crashed the revolution with the African army: a lot of people were killed (about 1,500) and more than 30,000 were sent to prison.

After controlling the biggest revolutionary movement of Spain’s history, repression was spread, imprisonments, limitation of work of left wing parties, and others. The force of the revolutionaries angered the government and its repression was hard. The division was so big that a possible agreement between the forces was farther each time.

3.3.-Evolution of the right wing two-years

The 1934 revolution and the corruption problems made weaker the government. Lerroux had to resign due to the straperlo scandal. That problem and the division between the CEDA and the Radical Party led to the dissolution of the courts in 1936 and to the call of election for February.

4.- POPULAR FRONT

4.1. Formation and programme of the Popular Front

One month before the elections, in January, the Popular Front was constituted. The group was born as a left wing coalition in which they were together left bourgeoisies, republican and radical left wing groups: Ezkerra Republicana, Unidad Republicana, PSOE, UGT, Communist Party, POUM. All of them agreed on the defence of the republic because it was evident that the authoritarian right and fascist groups were putting it in jeopardy. So all of them united against a common enemy with the aim of stopping fascism.

Right wing parties created the National Block but they did not reach an agreement.

4.2.- The 1936 elections

In a radicalised atmosphere the following candidatures were presented for the election:

o Popular Front: electoral pact formed in 1936 by Izquierda Republicana, PSOE, PCE, POUM (Partido Obrero de

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Unificación Marxista) and Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya. This pact grouped all the left wing parties. The CNT, having a lot of prisoners in jail, did not ask for abstention this time and supported the group.

o Coalition of right wing parties formed by CEDA and Renovación Española, presented a programme based in the fear of the social revolution. Falange and the PNV went to the elections on their own..

In the 1936 elections left wing parties presented united in the Popular Front. Right wing parties, on the contrary, were separated because Gil Robles, Calvo Sotelo and Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera did not reach an agreement. This is why the Popular Front, with a relatively low difference, won the elections. The new President of the Republic was Manuel

Azaña and the head of government was Casares Quiroga.

The new leftist government tried to put into work again the reforms started in 1931. These were some of their main decisions:

Free people made prisoner after the 1934 October revolution with an amnesty. Put again into force Catalan Statute. Left out of law Phalange and some of its responsible were sent to prison for taking

part in different attempts. They accelerated the application of the agrarian reform: in some weeks more than

230,000 Has. were divided between 150,000 peasants. Military suspicious of plotting were separated. Franco, Mola and Goded were

sent to Canarias, Navarre and Baleares.

New autonomy statutes began to be elaborated. The Catalan statute was approved by plebiscite in June 1936 and the Basque was almost completed in July 1936.

But Popular Front had to answer to some more difficult matters: There were a lot of unemployed

people (about one million). Due to that workers organised strikes and public order was difficult to maintain.

The anger of rightist increased, mainly because land was expropriated again to give it to poor peasants.

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Political tensions increased and, finally, some paramilitary organizations were involved: left and right extremists took the streets; terrorist attacks and political violence became common.

The atmosphere was full of tension. The working left had adopted a clear revolutionary position and the right was looking for the end of the democratic system.

Since April there were several street confrontations between phalange member and socialist, communist and anarchist militias.

By the while, the plotting against the government continued. In one hand, there was a politic plotting conducted by political leaders such as Gil Robles, Calvo Sotelo, Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera. On the other had, the number of generals implicated increased: Franco, Goded, Fanjul, Varela... Mola, head of the Pamplona’s garrison was made the head of the conspirators.

The 12 July extremist right wing gangs assassinated an assault guard: Castillo tenant. The answer was the killing of Jose Calvo Sotelo by a group of anarchists. The confrontation was served

Casares Quiroga’s government had not had taken exceptionally measures although the advise of workers’ associations. In July 17th 1936 the Moroccan army initiated the rebellion against the republican government, the failure led to the Civil War.

The situation was difficult to maintain and with this excuse some rightists and militaries started plotting to try to finish with the Republic. The military began with the preparations in March and it was going to be the fact leading to the bloodiest episode of Spain’s History: Civil War.

The 17 July in Morocco and the 18 in the Peninsula started the riot conducted by Franco general. This was the beginning of Civil War and the conflict lasted for three years, provoking the division of the country. After that Franco’s dictatorship started.

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document 1.1 second republic

Education