Manifesto of the Persians
Dated political text in 1814, coinciding with the return of Ferdinand VII of France once the Spanish War of Independence. We consider the collective copyright, as it is manifest that a group of ordinary members of the Cortes of Cadiz, elected after the promulgation of the 1812 Constitution, direct the Spanish monarch. This group of deputies was absolutist ideology and are known as “The Persians, by making reference to the Persian kings at the beginning of writing. The recipient of the text is king and the purpose of it is to convince the king to end with the Constitution and restore absolutism. It is a primary source and direct, important, no doubt, for the study of the reign of Fernando VII.
The text itself is nothing but an attempt to justify theoretically the absolute monarchy, which broadly identify with the enlightened despotism, to finish asking his restoration to the detriment of the liberal regime emanating from the Constitution of 1812.
The historical problem is to restore the absolutist monarchy of Ferdinand VII, after the defeat of Napoleon, and the abolition of the 1812 Constitution and ordinary legislation in a European international context back to the Old Regime.
Absolute monarchy: the dominant political system in Europe in the S. XVI and XVIII, in which the King has the unique power of the state, by uniting in his person the three branches, and is the source of all power and all law, and all this by divine will, so that only is subject to natural law, tradition and their own laws by himself. It is the political institution in which the head of state is exercised by one person, transmitting this right within the family or hereditary dynasty. It is an evolution from authoritarian monarchy XVI.
Constitution of Cadiz: the supreme and fundamental law which is based on the rule of law, which obliges all. Emerged from the bourgeois revolutions of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The current emanating from the sovereignty through their representatives in Parliament and parliaments and are expressed in a written document. It was the first and progressive type. It has also been called the Pepa, to be published on 19 March.
Courts: Body of representative government in the various kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula since the Middle Ages. Formed by each of the estates, convened by the Crown for the sole purpose of seeking advice in a matter of state or to request a tax increase or new tax. Also dealt with the succession of the crown, and swore allegiance to the heirs of the king. They are the legislative and representative organ of sovereignty of the nation, exercising, also a work of government control. Constitutional texts in Spanish predominates bicameral model except the 1812 Constitution was unicameral.
Defeated Napoleon, Ferdinand VII returned to Spain in March 1814. Fernando decides to go to Valencia. There are 69 Members absolutists will deliver the Manifesto of the Persians, requesting the annulment of all approved in Cadiz and around the Old Regime. The king issued the decree of May 4, nullifying the work of the Cortes of Cadiz. Absolutist stage begins. The liberals were arrested or killed and the harsh repression forced many into exile for the first time.
It occurs around the ancien regime in a favorable international situation, that victorious powers and initiate restoration of absolutism in Europe.
An attempt to reform the tax because of opposition from the privileged to pay taxes. The government’s inability to solve these problems without destroying the old social structure generates the collapse of absolute monarchy. He begins to forge an opposition. This liberal minority stars military uprisings. Following the delivery of irrigation replenished the Constitution of 1812 that forced Ferdinand VII to swear in March. Courts restored part of the work of the Cortes of Cadiz but two problems arise:
– The conspiratorially the monarch, which paralyzes its veto all legislation that training can and realistic games absolutist volunteers.
– The liberals themselves split into two tendencies: moderates and radicals. The situation is very troubled and tense. The moderate government until 1822 and then exalted. Ferdinand VII is recovered as an absolute monarch. Again there is fierce repressiveion against the Liberals. The Administration and the army purged. Ferdinand does not restore the Inquisition, but Fe Boards are created in some provinces and a real terror sweeps the country. Emerges a new instrument of repression: the police. Financial problems forced the king to timid reforms. These reforms are frowned upon by traditional sectors of the court, nobility and clergy.
Traditionalists support D. Carlos María Isidro, brother of the king and likely successor, as Fernando has no children. But in 1830, the fourth king’s wife, Maria Kristin, gave birth to a daughter, Isabel. It causes a serious question of succession, as the Salic law was in force. Ferdinand VII promulgated the Pragmatic Sanction, which repeals the Salic Law. They form two sides in court: the supporters of Mr Carlos (absolutist) do not accept it, and intrigue to replace the sick king Salic law. The liberals supported Isabella. M ª Cristina, appointed regent by the illness of Fernando, he leans toward the latter, began reforms and an amnesty decreed; 10,000 exiles returning. Ferdinand VII died in 1833 leaving his daughter Elizabeth, age three, as heir to the throne. D. Carlos does not accept it and proclaimed king. Thus began the First Carlist War.
Received with enthusiasm, King quickly developed what were their intentions with respect to changes in the country in his absence. On May 10 came the King in Madrid, hailed by a population that still saw him as a true savior.
The support of the nobility and clergy absolutist expressed in the document in Valencia had given the king a hundred deputies reactionary, known as the Manifesto of the Persians. Was claimed back in the Old Regime and the starting of 1808. He claimed the unlimited nature of the power of the King, defended the alliance of altar and throne, currency came to mean the unity among the privileged classes and the Crown to stop any change in the social and political system. The document is interesting as a reflection of an ideological trend, the reactionary absolutism, which aims to return to the old regime. In the first paragraph of the text, as a preAmbul, citing a Persian custom, whose autocratic monarchy would face the Athenian democracy and Spartan elective monarchy. As anarchistic and revolutionary period of Cadiz constituent asking for the refund on the throne of its legitimate owner. In this sense, the manifesto is also a justification of these nobles and clergy who could not or would not stop the revolutionary process of the Court of Cadiz, and here are self-righteous to Fernando VII.
The first steps of the king they went to meet the claims of those who supported the coup. The decree of May 4 eliminated the national sovereignty and the institution that represented the Constitutional Court. Were also repealed the Constitution of Cadiz and ordinary legislation. Thus disentailment measures were canceled, the beginnings of tax reform or freedom of the press. He restored the privileges of the nobility and the Church. It revived the Tribunal of the Inquisition and the Mesta, and allowed even the return of the Jesuits.
An immediate consequence of the coup was repression. We proceeded to the arrest and trial of both the pro-French as the Liberals, respectively accused of treason and conspiracy against the King. Nor uncompromising absolutists and liberals received better treatment for the failure of these paid with exile and confiscation of their property. Different treatment given officers who had sworn allegiance to the new King to keep their jobs: most of them were excluded from the repressive measures of Fernando VII.
Ferdinand ruled by successive ministers, permanent political instability in the absence of consistency in the approach to be followed and the failure of the advisers to the king to rule a country that no longer could be governed as before. The real shadow government was that of the clique.
The result was a chaotic six years in which the problems were aggravated to cause the triumph of the military coup of 1820. A number of serious problems finally make nonsense of the absolutist regime. Finally, the delivery of Major Irrigation, January 1, 1820, is successful and receives popular support needed to succeed, restore the Constitution of Cadiz.