The Restoration Era in Spain: Political Dynamics and Challenges
Restoration. On December 29, 1874, in Sagunto, General Martínez Campos was pronounced in favor of the monarchy of Alfonso XII, marking the end of the short experience of Republican Spain. Alfonso XII of Spain arrived in 1875, and with him, the Bourbons regained the throne. This recovery was the work of Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, who, based on the principles of the Crown and the courts, defended the constitutional monarchy as a form of state doctrine and government (doc. 1). He also advocated for a trust to govern: the monarch, who is preeminent, and the parliament, which requires having a sufficient majority in Parliament as a result of elections, or manipulating the results. This manipulation involved fraud or caciques. Cánovas also promoted peaceful change and mutual agreement between the royalist forces grouped around two parties: the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party. Finally, he defended the settlement in respect of rights and liberties.
Cánovas, appointed Prime Minister by Alfonso XII upon his return to Spain, called for elections to lay the groundwork for the constitutional policies of the monarchy. Under the current electoral law of 1868, universal male suffrage was established, and thanks to abstention and fraud, the ruling party won. The new Cortes adopted the Constitution of 1876, which is reflected in document 2. In this Constitution, the Catholic religion is the state religion, but freedom of worship is guaranteed (doc. 2, s. 11). The Crown shared sovereignty with the Cortes, appointed its Government without the approval of the Cortes, sanctioned and promulgated laws (doc. 2, art. 18), had the right to veto, and exercised supreme command of the armed forces while conducting foreign policy. The Cortes, as established in the Constitution, was constituted by a bicameral Congress, with elected members and a Senate (doc. 2, art. 19). Cánovas’s political stability was based on the existence of two monarchist parties, one in government and one in opposition, which peacefully alternated in power. Thus, there were two major parties: the Conservative Party, led by Cánovas, and the Liberal Party, led by Sagasta. These parties were called dynastic parties, having in common the defense of the Bourbon monarchy and acceptance of the established system, being the only ones forming the Government during the Restoration.
The shift for alternating power in the State Government was accepted and defended by both Cánovas and Sagasta as two basic principles: the exercise of power should not be exclusively in the hands of a single political force, and the change of government could not depend on arbitrary choices. Thus, the system worked as follows: when a government wore out, the king appointed the leader of the opposition party as Prime Minister. To ensure broad parliamentary support, the king decreed the dissolution of Parliament, and the new Government called for elections, which it always won. This situation is well reflected in the images of document 3. Thus, between 1875 and 1902, most governments were headed this way by Sagasta and Cánovas. Their need for governments of the Restoration to win the general election and a majority in the Cortes resulted in a permanent distortion of the development of an extensive network of relationships and influences. At the top of the political system was the minority leader, forming the ruling oligarchy. At the intermediate level were the civil governor, mayors, and Civil Guard, tasked with ensuring that the results aligned with expectations. At the base was the local boss, a character who enjoyed considerable influence over the authorities and residents of a region or territory, especially in rural areas, and used this influence to support government candidates (doc. 4).
Electoral fraud was also widely used, and any method was deemed valid to achieve the desired election results (doc. 4): manipulation of the census, resurrection of the dead, threats, rigging, etc. Throughout the Restoration, the cacique system was deeply rooted in Galicia. The predominance of rural economic backwardness, weakness of the state, and electoral fraud favored cacique clientelism, among which the Gasset, Montero Ríos, Bugallal, and González Besada families stood out in Galicia. In 1898, the Treaty of Paris marked the end of the Spanish colonial empire in America and the Pacific, resulting in a clear manifesto of the inability of the oligarchy to modernize the country, as the Treaty of Paris was signed due to the defeat in the war in Cuba.