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Spain History - 2nd Decline - (1868 - 1931)
The question of government between the various sides was basically
translated into allowing each side to alternatively share power.
This system led to an erratic power base and representation of each
side was devoted to rigging the voting. It is recorded that the
final results of votes in one area was actually published in a
paper the day prior to the counting! Somewhat surprisingly, during
the next politically difficult three decades the country again
blossomed economically and culturally. The people of each region,
the Catalans, the Basques and the Andalusians, all developed their
own industry and commerce and found political freedom - Liberals,
Nationalists, Republicans, Socialists, Communists, and the party of
the Anarchist CNT.
After the death of his first wife King Alfonso took for his
new bride the Austrian Maria Cristina. Several strong
earthquakes were felt in 1885 that caused severe damage in the
eastern Andalucía. The King who had experienced poor health
insisted in touring the damaged areas and subsequently caught a
lung infection and died at the age of 28. Queen Maria Cristina
stepped into the shoes as Queen Regent to rule Spain for 17 years.
Happily for all concerned she was with child and 1886 to great
rejoicing she gave birth to a son, the future King Alfonso
XIII. As she ruled as a Regent she left the political power
to the two men of the time, Antonio Cánovas del Castillo
and Sagasta. In 1897 Cánovas was assassinated and
shortly Sagasta died of old age. These two manipulators
left behind a corrupt and confused Spain which found itself then
involved in the Spanish-American War (1898).
The Spanish representative ruler of Cuba, General Weyler,
had turned his Island's inhabitants against him with his strong
armed policy. The United States of America decided to give
support to the Cubans and sent in the navy by sending their
battleship Maine into Havana harbour. A questionable explosion
ripped open the Maine and killed 260 of her sailors which was
blamed on the Spanish and war was declared. It lasted three
months until Admiral Dewey destroyed the Spanish Squadron
at Santiago de Cuba. In this quick and yet disastrous event by
the Treaty of Paris (1898) Spain lost Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam
and the Philippines, and with it they lost this section of Empire
which dated back to 1492.
In 1902 King Alfonso XIII became of age and took his place
on the throne dispensing with his mother as Regent. Unfortunately,
with the often displaced confidence of youth he actively assumed
political interests and soon led the country into instability.
Within the first four years of his rule there were 33 changes of
the government under no less than 8 different Prime Ministers of
his choosing. Soon, he had to resort to a dictatorial style of
monarchy in order to maintain his throne and for which he also
fortunately found strong support within his army. To some extent
he bought this support by increasing the army allowance on a
regular basis until it became approximately half of Spain's total
budget. In 1905 the army gained considerable power by a new law
that allowed military courts to judge civilians critical of the
state.
After the American debacle Spain attempted to regain some of its
international respect by turning to their possessions in northern
Africa. Spain had the two very small colonies of Melilla and
Ceuta on the Mediterranean coast. In 1880 the lonely Rio Ouro on
the Atlantic coast was added and in 1906 at the Algeciras
Conference both Spain and France were given control over the
country of Morocco. Their eventual slice of Morocco turned out
to be ungovernable due to lack of good communications and
constant warring tribes. When an army column was destroyed by the
Berbers in 1909 Spain attempted to raise an army of reservists in
Catalonia to send to Morocco. The result of this idea was the
infamous Tragic Week in Barcelona when a general strike was
organised by the inhabitants with street barricades. Churches and
convents were damaged, and their occupants treated to severe
physical abuse to the point of death. Police and army took swift
revenge starting by shooting 175 workers as participants in the
revolt. Catalonians at first cowered under the pressure but their
strong resentment was to smoulder into occasional strong outbursts
over the following years.
With the outbreak of the 1st World War (1914-1918) the King kept
the divided public opinion reasonably content by keeping the
country in a state of neutrality. It is to be remembered that his
mother was Austrian and his wife Princess Victoria Eugenia,
a grandchild of Queen Victoria of England. This marriage
of love had brought with it many royal relations in Europe which
included his brother-in-law, Kaiser Wilhelm II.
As in many European countries the post-war period brought Spain
unemployment and more civil unrest. In 1917, a previously created
Union by army officers and known as the Juntas de Defensa
with the aim to defend the state, decided to turn against its own
ruler and talked about mounting a coup. Labour unions
taking advantage of the confusion called a General Strike only to
be ruthlessly crushed by the Juntas de Defensa who instead
defended their original principals. An anarchist Labour Union
(CNT) whose membership was 14,000 in 1914 increased its number to
700,000 by 1919. The City of Barcelona in particular became a
constant hotbed of unrest with assignations and gang warfare, with
an estimated some 1,000 people from different sides being killed
in a five year period. In 1921 in Madrid, the then Prime Minister
Eduardo Dato was gunned down in the street.
In the same year of 1921 an event in Spanish Morocco was to herald
the end of King Alfonso XIII's reign. A force of about
10,000 soldiers led by General Silverstre was slaughtered
in an ambush in a nondescript place named Anual by a meagre force
of Berbers. After two years a report was eventually ready which
placed a major part of the blame on the shoulders of the King and
his interference in army matters. Anticipating the content of the
report was General Primo de Rivera who led an army revolt
in the favour of the King four days before its presentation.
Although Rivera did not have the general support of all the
army the King accepted his offer and the government resigned. The
King then appointed Rivera as Prime Minister and but then
refused to hold the required constitutionally election within
three months. This temporary appointment lasted for a period of
six years.
Primo de Rivera was from a landowning family at Jerez de
la Frontera in Andalucía. He had an absolute belief in his own
ability as a righter of wrongs and had a passionate desire
to live social life to its full in most respects. He initially
won considerable public support throughout Spain by using a
fatherly style in his frequent speeches on a recent popular
invention named the Radio. He was to introduce under the mainly
uninterested umbrella of the King a mixture of good and bad
projects. In his favour was the construction of decent main
roads, harbours, dams, electric power plants, improved rail
system, and most importantly, he never executed one person
although censorship was rigidly applied. He even had the
foresight to introduce the concept of Paradors which was to
prove so important later in developing tourism. On the bad side
he had no idea of balancing financial accounts and the country
tottered along on loans from any source of finance he could
discover. His mismanagement seems to have been a copy of his own
personal life where he was completely unpredictable, but beneath
this surface impression there must have been a relentless
strength. Like most Spanish army generals he disliked any
independent political movements and singled out the Catalans.
Rivera created a strong reaction by banning even the
special sardana, a style of folk dance and a tradition
essentially a part of any Catalan celebration. By wily politics
he kept the Catalans with their ardent and many Labour Movements
prevented him from taking control of the province.
In 1927 by crushing a strong Berber revolt in Morocco at a place
named Alhucemas he achieved a major success for his flagging
nation's pride and in particular for its army. When the rebelling
Berbers first showed their intentions Rivera's decided to
negotiate much to the disgust of his younger army officers. However,
he soon changed his plans when he discovered a plot within his own
army to revolt and instead set out to crush the Berbers. Involved
in this whole event was the new Spanish Foreign Legion which also
included a young ambitious officer named Francisco Franco
Bahamone (1892-1975).
Primo de Rivera's final scenes of triumph were in 1929 with
the two important International Exhibitions held in Seville and
Barcelona. Both again were magnificent displays of grandiose and
leaving in their tail another large hole in the state's finance.
This coincided in the same year as the famous Wall Street Crash
and a shattering devaluation of the Spanish currency. Added to this
on the home front was his clash with the army Artillery Corp over
new promotions. King Alfonso XIII dismissed the now old
general in 1930 who then retired to live in Paris for three months,
reportedly dividing his time between a local church and a local
brothel before dying.
King Alfonso appointed General Berenguer to take
Rivera's place but to no avail. In August of 1930, leaders
of anti-Alfonso created a Pact of San Sebastian and this proved to
be the beginnings of the Second Republic. An attempted coup by the
army was squashed in December of the same year and in 1931 when
King Alfonso mounted Municipal elections 46 out of the 50
provincial capitals voted for the Republicans. The Great Depression
which was beginning to sweep Europe did little to help the grave
situation and the Catalans declared itself as an new
Independent Republic. Accepting the inevitable King Alfonso wisely
agreed to abdicate and left for exile, first in France and later
in Italy.
Curiously, during this past period as Spain declined in both
international power and suffered internal political confusion
there were waves created by cultural movements from which appeared
many outstanding Spanish artists of all walks whom that were to
have a decided and permanent international impact. In the realm of
architecture Antoni Gaudí (1852-1926) left his creations for
prosperity. From the world of music came Joseph Anseim Clavé
(1824-1874) and later names such as Enrique Granados
(1867-1916), Isaac Albeniz (1860-1909), Manuel de Falla
(1876-1946), and of course Pablo Casals (1867-1928), the
world's greatest known cello player. In the realm of architecture
Antonio Gaudi stands apart and his many creations can best
be seen in Barcelona. A young artist from Málaga held his first
exhibition in Barcelona in 1900 and his name was Pablo Ruiz
Picasso (1881-1973). The landscape artist Joaquim Sorolla
(1863-1923), the artist and co-founder of the Cubist movement
Juan Gris (1883-1927), Joan Miro (1893-1983),
Salvador Dali (1904-1989) and Antoni Tàpies
(1923-2012). For literature the 1904 Nobel Prize writer José
Echegaray (1832-1916), the 1922 Nobel Prize writer Jacinto
Benavente (1866-1954), the 1956 Nobel Prize writer Juan
Ramon Jimenez (1881-1959). Among other writers, philosophers
and poets, are Miguel de Unamuno (1864-1936), Vicente
Blasco Ibañez (1867-1928), Pio Baroj (1872-1956),
Antonio Machado (1875-1939), José Ortega y Gasset
(1883-1955) and Federico Garcia Lorca (1898-1936). In the
cinema world the film director Luis Buñel (1900-1983).
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