Third Assessment History
The true kingdom of Fernando VII in 1814 really begins at the end of the War of Independence, and runs until the king’s death in 1833. This long period is usually divided into three stages: the absolutist six years (1814-1820) the constitutional triennium (1820-1823) and the ominous decade (1823-1833). Overall reaction caused a major interruption in attempt to preserve the old regime at all costs by the most intransigent of absolutism, and meet the expectations of modernization that the Liberals had put in Cádiz.Al end of the reign, around 1830 The country remained mired in economic chaos, both in the field and in the city. Only the Catalan textile industry experienced a slight growth. In addition there are liberal conspiracies, encouraged by the triumph of the Revolution in France (Espoz y Mina, Torrijos) that are aborted. However, it was necessary on the part of Ferdinand VII to admit some timid reforms (creation of the Council of Ministers, the introduction of a formal budget …) which led to the most intransigent supporters of absolutism criticize the position of the king too soft, and the fact to keep ministers suspected of conservatism. Gradually, the so-called realists, were radicalized their positions and began to support the candidature to the throne of Don Carlos, brother of the king, who openly conspired Corona.En this context the succession crisis is triggered. Fernando VII had no offspring of their first marriages tre. In 1829 he married his niece María Cristina that a few months pregnant, openly raised the issue of succession. Fernando VII, and old, wanting to ensure their future offspring son or daughter, that was published in March 1830 the Pragmatic Sanction, which eliminated the Salic Law and re-established the line of succession of the items favorable to female succession. Meant to enforce a decision by parliament in 1789, under Charles IV, which, while it was legal from the legal point of view, was not without a controversial measure in the years that had passed since approval. The Carlist protested angrily, and Don Carlos felt that the move was illegal and violated their rights to the throne. Finally, it becomes a conflict of the first magnitude when it is born the Infanta Isabel heredera.Por then converted into the clash between supporters of the King and the Carlist had crystallized into two opposing parties: one moderate absolutists, allied with the liberal and aristocratic sectors of the supporters of the political and economic reforms, supporting the new queen, who were the only posivilidad change. On the other hand, the uncompromising absolutists who supported the king’s brother, Carlos Maria Isidro. In September 1832 they will produce so-called events of the Farm, when through intrigue is achieved that Fernando VII agonizing final the abolition of the Pragmatic. Once restored, the re-enforced. Immediately dismisses senior ministers Carlist (Calomarde is replaced by a liberal very moderate, Cea Bermúdez) while Maria Cristina is authorized to chair the Council of Ministers, reopen the gunas universities had been closed and the Captains General hardliners are replaced by commanders loyal to Ferdinand VII. In April Charles left the court and moved to Portugal, before Fernando will officially communicate his exile. Cea While seeking support for the mayor and his reformist project túmido, died in September 1833 Fernando VII. With him dies occurs absolutism and the outbreak of civil war, the First Carlist War.
The reign of Elizabeth II is a revolutionary and essential step in Spain’s history: the transition from absolute monarchy to a parliamentary bourgeois state and the passage of an economic system and social context of the old regime to a modern capitalist system. The new ruling class was formed by the alliance of the bourgeoisie and the nobility of traditional businesses. It is a very complex period from the political point of view.
In its first phase, the minority of Queen two regencies, the Maria Cristina (1833-1840) and General Espartero (1840-1843) – the Carlist War (1833-1839), various constitutions (Staff Real, 1834, entry into force of the Constitution of 1812, Constitution of 1837) and continuing revolutionary upheaval.
The second phase, the effective reign of Elizabeth II, can be divided into three stages:
1 .- moderate Decade (1844-1854)
2 .- Progressive Biennium (1854-1856)
3 .- Government of the Liberal Union and final crisis of the reign (1856-1868)
Under an evolution in turbulent and changing appearance, the reign of Isabel II (1844-1868) presents some common characteristics that remain unchanged over twenty five years.
There is, first, the permanence of a regime of liberal conservative monarchy whose embodiment is the Constitution of 1845, in force throughout the period despite the political shifts, except for a few months in 1856 when it was partially modified. The Constitution had a clearly conservative, including a bill of rights very theoretical, which subsequently limit allowed by ordinary laws. He declared the exclusivity of the Catholic religion. National Military suppressed. Legislative power is shared by the Courts and the King. The Senate was very elitist and chosen by the Crown. It established a regime based on sole political participation of an oligarchy of landowners, aristocrats, bourgeois, leading sectors of the professions, higher-level officials, senior military … based on census suffrage excluded the rest of the country. He was also an authoritarian government regime, defenders of order and a strong monarchy with a bicameral system that limited reforms that restricted freedoms and collective infividuales.
Secondly, the rin invariably supported the most conservative and clearly aligned with conservatism. Since 1863 this alignment and the inability of the Queen to connect to the real country led to the gradual departure towards its people and the fall of the monarchy in 1868.
Third, a constant of the reign was the permanent presence of soldiers among the rulers of the country: Narvaez, Espartero, O’Donnell, Prim … The participation of the military in political life due to various reasons, amongst which include the weakness of the parliamentary system in which the parties did not respect the parliamentary game and resorted to the military for access to government through pronouncements or the conviction that a military man at the head of the executive branch, ensured a strong government and better maintenance order reaction both against Carlist as against the revolutionary threat.
A fourth characteristic of the Elizabethan system is the exclusive presence in parliament of bourgeois parties (moderate, progressive and almost exclusively Liberal Union and Democrat or Republican, virtually excluded from parliamentary life.) Parties were not “mass.” Consisted of a very limited group of notables, did not enjoy popular support. They were a group of power that only acted as a party at election time. The control of the press became essential to dominate public opinion.
The final feature of the Elizabethan regime, crucial in its downfall was the exclusion of the vast majority of the country. Neither farmers nor the growing number of industrial workers and urban workers had nothing to thank. In addition to marginalize political life, liberal regime was a continuing deterioration of their living conditions. The farmers lost their lands and went on to become impoverished laborers and tenants following the confiscations.In cities the craft was disappearing as the plants absorb a population that worked in sweatshops and piled into the suburbs along with the unemployed and marginalized population. Faced with this situation, the government only responded violently suppressing protests, demonstrations and strikes, banning organizations and their leaders executed in the name of order. In the final years of the reign of socialist ideas were penetrating shaping the labor movement.
During the long period of the reign of Elizabeth II, amid an ongoing state of political turmoil and against the backdrop of the Carlist Wars and the consequences will produce a chain of changes in legislation and economic life of the country that are going to require final establishment of bourgeois society and capitalist. The richness that defines the social scale, giving ownership, nno wonder why many of the changes that occur have a double purpose: to establish and strengthen private property without the limitations of the old regime, and form a ruling class in merging the old feudal lords and the new capitalist owners.
The transformation occurs in two phases:
Until 1844, the transformation is aimed primarily at dismantling the legal order of the ancien regime (confiscation of Mendizabal, abolition of primogeniture and the judicial system, freedom of enclosure of land and marketing of agricultural products, ban unions, freedom of industry , elimination of internal customs essential to the creation of a national market, elimination of tithing …)
In the period of effective government of Isabel II, but especially in the stage known as Progressive Biennium (1854-1856) will see the construction of the legal order of the triumphant capitalist society. During this short period are the following measures:
The general confiscation Madoz in 1855 that ended back process. The confiscation affected not only the assets of the church (the nineties in the previous stage) but also to own assets (assets of the councils) and community property (property owned collectively by a municipality which belonged exclusively to enjoy all the inhabitants of it), so called general confiscation. This time it demanded payment in cash (the goal was dedicated to the industrialization of the country especially the expansion of the rail). Bourgeoisie Na was again the great benefit, although there was a greater participation of small landowners. Because of this confiscation worsened the living conditions of farmers. But on the whole, the back process clearly contributed to the shift to a bourgeois society. It meant the transfer of a huge mass of land to new owners (old landed aristocracy and urban bourgeoisie) would constitute the new landowning elite.
It took other steps to promote economic modernization of the country that represent the birth of the capitalist economy as the Railways Act 1855 (the railway in Spain to date had little development with only three lines: Barcelona-Mataró, Madrid-Aranjuez and Gijon-Langreo). The law very favorable fixed: regulating construction companies, guaranteed foreign investments, exempted from paying tariffs on imported materials for construction, finance companies allowed to issue bonds. Also prepared a map of lines, radio, centralized and set a track width 23 cm higher than the European. As a result, between 1855 and 1865, there was a boom rail, reaching the 4750 kilometers built compared with 440 the previous decade.In 1856 two important laws were passed: the first governs the issuance of currency, created the Bank of Spain and gave it official. For its part, the Law on Banking and Credit Societies, regulated the establishment of joint stock companies and gave them wide freedom of action. Following two laws in a climate of economic expansion, has increased financial companies, but also railway bank (Banco Santander or Bilbao). Most are drawn into the euphoria left speculative investing in the railways and buying public doubt, although some industry funded and, when crisis erupted after 1864, many of them collapsed.
A new Constituent Cortes began the development of a more progressive new constitution which was never implemented. The growing social unrest caused the rupture between Espartero and O’Donnell, appointed leader of a new centrist party, the Liberal Union government chair since July 1856, initiating a process of reviewing the work of the biennial finally brought back Narvaez and the moderates to power in October 1856. Thus became the moderate regime of the constitution of 1845.
The crisis of 1917
In 1902, Alfonso XII’s reign which lasted until 1931. Historical period known as the Restoration crisis that had been carried out by Antonio Canovas del Castillo (1875) in the person of Alfonso XII, son of Isabel II. After his death in 1885, begins the regency of his second wife, Maria Christina of Austria that extends until 1902 when Alfonso XIII, with 17 years of age is declared.
During his reign there is a series of successive crises:
The crisis of 1905 and 1906 concerning the Law of Jurisdictions that involves military intervention in civilian life for he was under the control of the military courts and military code, crimes against the army and against the country.
The crisis of 1909 following the tragic week when the leader of the Liberal Party, Moret, is allied with parties antidinásticos breaking the commitment to solidarity between the parties disputed that shift was the key in the Pact of Pardo and therefore, Canovist system performance.
The crisis of political parties becomes evident after the death of Canalejas in 1912, the last great political leader of the period.
Finally, in 1917 there is a widespread crisis that will jeopardize the system that, from then on, enter into a period of great social unrest and external problems (Annual disaster) that flow in 1923 on the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera and finally in the fall of the monarchy and the proclamation of the Second Republic.
In all these crises behind a series of problems that accrue p or lack of solution: social issues, unrest in the army, anti-clericalism, nationalism and rise of Moroccan problem.
The most serious was the crisis of 1917. This crisis results in a situation of widespread discontent because, although Spain has become a supplier of countries at war during World War I, but the oligarchy of the proceeds benefits (textile entrepreneurs, shippers, bankers … ), while the rest of the country is being subjected to rising prices and food shortages.
Faced with criticism from the opposition, the government responded with the suspension of the Cortes, the arrest of labor leaders Largo Caballero and Julián Besteiro and restriction of civil rights. Then began a revolutionary triple shock: the army, parliamentarians and the working class through the strike generated.
In June, a conflict erupted between the government and the military, embarrassed by the technical backwardness, low wages, inequality between Africans and Spaniards … This creates the Juntas, a sort of military unions, at first raised professional and economic demands but just asking for the “regeneration of a political life” and the formation of a government of concentration.
In July another conflict starts again when the opposition parties are demanding the reopening of the Cortes and Barcelona is convened a National Assembly of Parliamentarians, which proposes a fundamental reform of political life through the convening of a Constituent Cortes.
But the main event of the crisis of 1917 is the general strike convened by the two main labor unions: the CNT, the anarchist, and the UGT, the socialist. This strike has been brewing since last March, but finally broke out in August.
The trigger for it was the rail strike in Valencia but the strike was spreading to other provinces and, as of August 13, became an indefinite general strike. Mining and industrial areas (Madrid, Bilbao, Oviedo, Gijón …) seconded the strike, but in rural areas was more limited response. The Government’s response was harsh, ordering the army to intervene so that the unions were forced to call off the strike, but lasted longer in Asturias and was more violent. The consequences of this strike were very important: a hundred dead, thousands arrested … but also demonstrated the capacity for mobilization of unions with which the military backed down, abandoning his reforms and support the crackdown.
From now on government will be established concentration (Maura, M, Cambo …) initiating a step (1918.1923) characterized by:
Repression of social movements, anarchists especially. In 1921 it generated a sharp escalation of violence from the Canadian strike, a power company Catalan, the lock-out of business, the formation of Free Trade Unions (hired gunmen who killed most of the leaders of the movement worker), the direct action of the anarchists, the Law on Leaks to execute prisoners … culminating in the assassination of Eduardo Dato at the hands of an Anarchist (1921) and the anarchist leader Salvador Segui (1923)
The military effort undertaken in Morocco ends with the disaster of Annual (1921) with consequences similar to those of 98 among the military, and political classes.
The end of economic prosperity generated in Spain by the First World War.
In short, broad sectors consider that the State is adrift and requiring the intervention of a strong hand to save (Primo de Rivera, the surgeon of iron).