Spain’s Second Republic: Rise, Fall, and Legacy
Proclamation of the Second Republic
The municipal elections of April 12, 1981, resulted in a clear victory for Republican parties. On April 14, the monarchy was abolished, and the Second Republic was proclaimed, met with enthusiasm by much of the Spanish population. A provisional government, led by Niceto Alcalá Zamora, was formed and promised general elections with universal male suffrage (over 23 years old) on June 28, 1931, to form Constituent Cortes.
This general election saw a 65% voter turnout and gave victory to leftist (PSOE, Radical Socialist Republican Party, Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya) and center (Radical Party, Progressive Party) parties. Right-wing parties (Monarchists, Carlist League, Catalan Regionalist League, PNV) secured less than a hundred of the 484 parliamentary seats.
The interim government did not initially accept the Catalan Republic proclaimed by Catalan nationalist leaders. Francisco Maciàs, its first president, created a commission to draft a statute of autonomy for approval by the Spanish Cortes.
The Constitution of 1931
The Bill of Rights included freedom of religion, expression, assembly, association, movement, residence, and the inviolability of domicile and correspondence. It abolished all hereditary privileges and introduced the possibility of socializing property and public services.
The court elected Niceto Alcalá Zamora as the first president of the Republic for a six-year term. Manuel Azaña became the first prime minister.
Challenges and Conflicts of the Second Republic
The International Framework
Europe witnessed the rise of totalitarian systems (Fascism in Italy, Nazism in Germany) presented as solutions to the crisis of European democracies. Simultaneously, the Stalinist regime, through various communist parties, attempted to export the Soviet model to other European countries where populations felt frustrated by parliamentary democracy’s inability to resolve the economic crisis.
Economic and Social Conflict
The Second Republic’s proclamation coincided with the Great Depression, which began in New York in 1929. Spain’s relative economic isolation and reliance on the primary sector lessened the crisis’s initial impact. However, in 1932, agricultural exports declined due to the European crisis.
The Agrarian Problem
Spain remained largely agricultural. In 1931, the Republican government introduced agrarian reforms, including prioritizing local laborers, establishing an eight-hour workday, mandating land cultivation, and prohibiting the eviction of smallholders. The law allowed for the expropriation of uncultivated large estates, transferring ownership to the Institute of Agrarian Reform.
The Republic’s social policy focused on increasing wages to boost purchasing power, consumption, and industrial production. However, the economic crisis led to rising unemployment and social unrest in both rural areas and cities. In 1932, the Civil Guard violently suppressed a peasant demonstration in Castilblanco (Badajoz), resulting in six deaths. A year later, in Casas Viejas (Cádiz), the Civil Guard crushed a peasant uprising, killing 25.
Church-State Relations
The 1931 Constitution established a secular regime, separating church and state. The government implemented reforms, including regulating religious orders, prohibiting them from teaching, and expelling the Jesuits. These measures created tension between the Catholic Church and the Republic. Cardinal Segura, Primate of Spain, was expelled for criticizing the regime’s secularism. Some Catholics and clergy opposed the Republic and later supported Franco’s 1936 uprising. However, Basque clergy and Christian Democrats (PNV and the Democratic Union of Catalonia) did not support the rebellion.
Military Problem
The largely monarchist Spanish Army posed a threat to the Republic. Minister of War Manuel Azaña sought to modernize, professionalize, and ensure the army’s loyalty through the Azaña Law. Some senior officers, known as “Africanists” and members of the clandestine Spanish Military Union (UME), viewed these measures as an affront and were suspicious of the decentralization process.