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52-562: Diego Martínez Barrio PRR Alejandro Lerroux PRR Elections to Spain's legislature, the Cortes Generales , were held on 19 November 1933 for all 473 seats in the unicameral Cortes of the Second Spanish Republic . Since the previous elections of 1931 , a new constitution had been ratified, and the franchise extended to more than six million women. The governing Republican-Socialist coalition had fallen apart, with

104-446: A deep sense of patriotism (he claimed to "carry Spain within his heart" and "in the marrow of his bones" ) was celebrated by the republican press, and it was received well even by José Antonio, then in prison. However, it was met with hostility among the radicals, deepening the rupture within the party. On 31 May 1936, Prieto was shot at a socialist rally in Ecija . After the beginning of

156-646: A large majority of Republicans and Socialists to the Cortes, with the PSOE gaining 116 seats and the Radical Republican Party 94. The state's financial position was poor. Wealth redistribution supported by the new government attracted criticism from the wealthy. The government also attempted to tackle poverty in rural areas by instituting an eight-hour day and giving security of tenure to farm workers, drawing criticism from landlords. An effective parliamentary opposition

208-583: A un escultor: pequeños detalles de grandes sucesos ( Letters to a Sculptor: Small Details of Great events , 1962). Supporting of the notion of further devolution to the Basque Provinces and Navarra , Prieto was greatly opposed to separatism as well as towards the plans of the Basque nationalists in the draft of the Estella Statute, fearing the prospect of the territory becoming a "reactionary Gibraltar and

260-473: Is recorded as expressing his pessimism with these words: "with this brutality we have lost the war". However, historian Julius Ruiz argues that Prieto was not necessarily a steadfast moderate, as he held that Republican victory would require stripping the Church, capitalists and army of their power as they were deemed collectively responsible for the rebellion. In August 1936, Prieto also stated that Republican terror

312-712: The February Revolution that year in Russia (the October Revolution there was still to come) caused it used the military to put down the general strike. Members of the strike committee were arrested in Madrid . Having been involved in organizing the strike, Prieto fled to France before he could be arrested. He did not return until April 1918, when he had been elected to the Spanish Congress of Deputies . Very critical of

364-681: The National Block ( Spanish : Bloque Nacional ), with a total of 14 deputies. Similarly, the Republican Left of Catalonia ( Catalan : Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya , ERC), the Socialist Union of Catalonia ( Unió Socialista de Catalunya , USC) and the Union of Rabassaires ( Unió de Rabassaires , UdR) formed the Catalan Left ( Esquerra Catalana ) with 18 deputies. Five independents joined

416-560: The National Confederation of Labour ( Confederación Nacional del Trabajo , or CNT) trade union movement willing to cooperate with the Republic were forced out of the CNT, which continued to oppose the government. Opposition parties had the support of the church. A new constitution was ratified on 9 December 1931. It included many controversial articles, some of which were aimed at curbing

468-598: The Radical Republican Party beginning to support a newly united political right. The right formed an electoral coalition, as was favoured by the new electoral system enacted earlier in the year. The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party ( Partido Socialista Obrero Español , or PSOE) won only 59 seats. The newly formed Catholic conservative Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right ( Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas or CEDA) gained 115 seats and

520-529: The new constitution . This incorporated a new 6,800,000 electors. The elections were held under Republican electoral law, which would guarantee a certain percentage of seats in a district to a plurality of votes no matter how weak the plurality. This law was amended in July 1933 to make it even more disproportionate (winning a plurality guaranteed 67% of seats and winning a majority guaranteed 80% of seats). This meant it strongly favoured coalitions and it had been passed by

572-706: The Agrarians and one joined CEDA. The other seven, along with one member of Conservative Republican Party ( Spanish : Partido Republicano Conservador , PRC), formed a group of independents called the Independent Right ( Independiente de Derechas ). The Mallorcan Regionalist deputy joined the Catalan League ( Lliga Catalana ), and the independent in favour of the Estella Statute joined the Basque Nationalist Party ( Partido Nacionalista Vasco ). 5 members of

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624-590: The Agrarians and one of the PRC joined CEDA, although the Agrarians as a whole resisted pressure to join CEDA, and formed the Spanish Agrarian Party ( Partido Agrario Español ). The left Republicans and Socialists attempted to pressure Niceto Alcalá Zamora , the president of the Republic, into cancelling the election results. They did not contest the ballot results but simply rejected the center-right's victory; they argued

676-918: The Azaña government in the hopes it would secure electoral victory for the Spanish left. The governing leftist parties went to the polls divided. The political right, on the other hand, formed the Union of the Right ( Spanish : Unión de Derechas ) which incorporated CEDA, agrarian parties and traditionalists. It stood on a three-point programme: religious and social reforms would be examined and rolled back where needed; agrarian reform would be reversed; political prisoners would be released. These parties threw vast resources into their campaign, with ten million leaflets, 300,000 posters, radio and cinema addresses and aerial propaganda drops. They called upon Catholics to defend order and religion against

728-601: The Civil War, when news of the ruthless and systematic executions of Loyalists by the Nationalists, as part of General Mola 's policy of instilling terror in their ranks, began to filter to the areas held by the government, Prieto made a fervent plea to Spanish republicans on 8 August in a radiocast: Don't imitate them! Don't imitate them! Surpass them in moral conduct; surpass them by being generous. I do not ask you, however, that you should lose either strength in battle or zeal in

780-552: The PSOE. As a journalist in the first decade of the 20th century, Prieto became a leading figure of socialism in the Basque Country . Spain's neutrality in World War I greatly benefited Spanish industry and commerce, but those benefits were not reflected in the workers' salaries. The period was one of great social unrest, culminating on August 13, 1917, in a revolutionary general strike . The government's fear of unrest like that of

832-636: The Primo de Rivera dictatorship, as well as the ambitious plan of infrastructural improvements in Madrid, such as the new Chamartín railway station and the tunnel under Madrid linking it to Atocha railway station . Most of those works that would not be completed until after the 1936–1939 Spanish Civil War . Unlike Largo Caballero, he opposed the general strike and the failed armed rising in October 1934, but he again fled to France to escape possible prosecution. Before

884-516: The Radicals 102. The right capitalised on disenchantment with the government among Catholics and other conservatives. CEDA campaigned on reversing the reforms that had been made under the Republic, and on freeing political prisoners. Anarchists favoured abstention from the vote. These factors helped the election to result in significant victory for the right over the left. Elections in June 1931 had returned

936-470: The Republic was a leftist project and so only leftist parties should be allowed to govern. CEDA insisted it rejected violence and would follow the rules of the republic; Payne notes that while it had lost six members during the campaign to violence from the left, CEDA had not retaliated in kind. However, Payne also observed that CEDA had insisted on making constitutional changes to the republic that would make it much more conservative and Catholic in nature, which

988-550: The Socialists to the left, while the right united into CEDA, which tacitly embraced fascism. On 1 October 1933, Socialist left leader Largo Caballero spoke out against Lerroux's Republicans, suggesting the reform programme of the government, and thus the basis for the Republic itself, was under threat. He warned that if the government itself were the threat, the Socialists would have to withdraw support for it. The following day another Socialist leader, Indalecio Prieto , declared that

1040-679: The Socialists would no longer participate in government, which precipitated its collapse. Alcalá Zamora, who became president in 1931, now requested that Republican Martínez Barrio form a new government. Socialist opposition on both constitutional and ideological grounds meant the PSOE withheld its support for the Barrio government, which was formed on 8 October, but called for fresh elections to be held on 19 November 1933. Nobody should vote, because politics means immorality, shameful business practices, growing fat, excessive ambition, uncontrolled hunger to become rich, to dominate, to impose oneself, to possess

1092-619: The actions of the government and army during the Rif War , or "War of Melilla" (1919–1926), Prieto spoke out strongly in the Congress after the Battle of Annual (1921). He also addressed the likely responsibility of the king in the imprudent military actions of General Manuel Fernández Silvestre in the Melilla command zone. Prieto was opposed to Francisco Largo Caballero 's line of partial collaboration with

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1144-688: The beginning of the Spanish Civil War . From 16 March 1936 to 30 March 1939 Martínez was President of the Cortes. In 1936, he was briefly the interim President of the Second Spanish Republic, from 7 April to 10 May. Barrio was born in Seville . A member of the Radical Republican Party , he was the Minister in the Alejandro Lerroux government but later he left the party for dissatisfaction with

1196-489: The bourgeois Republic. The Radical Party campaigned primarily against the Socialists, since they would need the help of the political right if in government. They used mass-appeal slogans such as 'Republic, order, freedom, social justice, amnesty' and were confident following successes at municipal level in 1933. Anarchists such as the CNT-FAI called for abstention: politicians were 'vultures', who must be overthrown by revolution. If

1248-716: The country after Francisco Franco came to power in 1939. He was the Grand Master of the Grande Oriente Español from 1929 to 1934. After the fall of the Republic, he went into exile, first to France and then to Mexico , where, in 1945, he was designated president of the Republic in exile until 1962. Martínez finally returned to Paris , where he died. In 2000, his remains were moved to Seville . Indalecio Prieto Born in Oviedo in 1883, his father died when he

1300-595: The deaths were confined to combatants. Two large bombs were detonated in Barcelona on 1 December while on 8 December, explosions and violence broke out in eight cities. Most fighting took place in Zaragoza and Barcelona but also occurred elsewhere, as did indiscriminate acts of terrorism; trains were derailed and in Valencia, a bridge was destroyed causing a wreckage. In the town of Villaneuva de la Serena, an army sergeant in charge of

1352-445: The dictatorship of Miguel Primo de Rivera . He had bitter confrontations with both men. In August 1930, despite the opposition of party leader Julián Besteiro Fernández , Prieto participated in the Pact of San Sebastián . The broad coalition of republican parties proposed doing away with the Spanish monarchy. In that matter, Prieto was supported by Largo Caballero's wing of the party, as

1404-448: The electorate. The right had spent far more on their election campaign than the Socialists, who campaigned alone. Women, in their first election, mainly voted for the centre-right. Julián Casanova observes that while some republicans and socialists had argued in 1931 against women's suffrage on the grounds it would deliver votes to the right, the right's 1933 victory was the result of a general political rightward shift, rather than because of

1456-415: The female vote. The Communist Party, with perhaps 3,000 members, were at this point not significant. Nationalist Basques won twelve of seventeen Basque seats, a considerable victory. Keeping their promise, the CNT proclaimed a revolution. There were many reasons the Socialists and Republicans lost out; the female vote alone cannot explain the shift. Among them was the disunity of the political left compared to

1508-481: The fight. I ask for brave, hard and steely breasts for the combat,... but with sensitive hearts, capable of shaking when faced with human sorrow and being able to harbour mercy and tender feelings, without which the most essential part of human greatness is lost. However, a couple of weeks after those words, the Modelo Massacre took place in Madrid, much to the dismay of many Popular Front leaders. Saddened, Prieto

1560-517: The government after the March 1938 defeat on the Aragon front after an escalating dispute with the communists. He refrained from active political life for the remainder of the war, exiling himself to Mexico . In 1945, toward the end of World War II , he was one of those who attempted to form a republican government-in-exile and hoped to reach an accord with the monarchist opposition to Francisco Franco ,

1612-631: The government forces tried to establish control over the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (POUM) and the anarchist Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT), the government of Largo Caballero was replaced by that of Juan Negrín , with Prieto being Minister of Defense. Lacking support from the democratic powers, such as France , the United Kingdom and the United States , the Spanish Republic

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1664-611: The influence of the Catholic Church. The constitution was reformist, liberal, and democratic in nature, and was welcomed by the Republican-Socialist coalition, but opposed by landowners, industrialists, the organised church, and army officers. In opposing educational and religious reforms, Spanish Catholics were forced to oppose the government. The press criticised government actions as barbaric, unjust, and corrupt. In October 1931 Prime Minister Niceto Alcalá Zamora resigned and

1716-444: The latter believed that the fall of the monarchy was necessary so that socialism could rise to power. When the Second Spanish Republic was proclaimed on April 14, 1931, Prieto was named finance minister in the provisional government, presided by Niceto Alcalá-Zamora . As Minister of Public Works in the 1931–1933 government of Manuel Azaña , he continued and expanded the policy of hydroelectric projects that had been begun during

1768-488: The law to give disproportionate seats to pluralities and majorities, which ended up favouring broad coalitions. However, the refusal for the Socialists to collaborate with the left Republicans made such a left-wing alliance impossible, while the Spanish right had managed to form its own coalition. The Renovación Española and the Spanish Nationalist Party ( Spanish : Partido Nacionalista Español , PNE) formed

1820-434: The local recruitment post mutinied, along with several soldiers and fifteen civilian anarchists. The mutiny was crushed the next day with seven of its members, including the sergeant, being killed. The CNT-FAI also took control of several small towns, declaring the establishment of libertarian communism, burning records and abolishing money. However, by 12 December the authorities had mostly regained control. Party divisions at

1872-410: The political left but also by the political right. It resulted in an overwhelming victory for the right, with the CEDA and the Radicals together winning 219 seats. Although the political situation was complicated, parties of the right won around 3,365,700 votes, parties of the centre 2,051,500 votes, and parties of the left 3,118,000 according to one estimate. Turnout was around 8,535,200 votes, 67.5% of

1924-594: The political left equated to fascism. The president of the Republic, Niceto Alcalá Zamora entrusted the formation of a cabinet to Alejandro Lerroux , who was reliant on the support of CEDA. This was because Zamora was concerned that CEDA had authoritarian tendencies and thus instead proposed a centrist government under Lerroux that would rely on CEDA's support, which Gil Robles accepted. The CNT responded with an insurrection attempt in December, in which almost one hundred people would die and over another hundred injured, though

1976-690: The politics of Lerroux. Martínez consequently founded and led the Republican Union and participated in the Spanish Popular Front , being elected to government in 1936. He led the integration of the Republican Union into the Popular Front, being elected the speaker of the Cortes (Spanish Parliament). In February 1939, he rejected to replace Manuel Azaña as president of the Republic. Following

2028-528: The privileges of State, both in the name of democracy and in the name of God, the Fatherland and the King. In common with the 1936 election, Spain was divided into multi-member constituencies ; for example, Madrid had 17 representatives. However, each member of the electorate could vote for somewhat less than that – in Madrid's case, 13. This favoured coalitions, as in Madrid when the Socialists won 13 members and

2080-550: The republic, Prieto had arguably maintained a more radical line than Largo Caballero, but he would now be identified as a relative moderate and opposed Largo Caballero's more revolutionary tendency. Prieto gave a thrilling campaign speech in Cuenca on 1 May 1936, prior to the 3 May repetition of the February 1936 election in the district in which the Popular Front would face among the right-wing rival José Antonio Primo de Rivera and, after

2132-435: The resignation of Santiago Casares Quiroga two days after the outbreak of the civil war, he was appointed prime minister on 19 July 1936. As part of his intention to avert war, his cabinet ignored the left wing of the Popular Front, but he would last just a few hours, and he resigned later the same morning, after an unsuccessful appeal to Nationalist General Emilio Mola to avoid war, and was succeeded by José Giral . He fled

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2184-447: The resignation of General Francisco Franco as candidate, Manuel Casanova . He brought Regenerationist memories and proposed Keynesian measures to develop the domestic market of the country. In words directed towards the firebrand faction of Largo Cabrello, Prieto asked for moderation, discipline and the disregarding of revolutionary excesses that would put the democratic government in peril. The speech in which Prieto also displayed

2236-507: The right were to win the election, there would be an uprising, they promised. Thus, anarchists should avoid voting for the left, since overthrowing the government would be preferable. Abstention was supported by Benito Pabón and Miguel Abós  [ es ] . Elections were held on 19 November 1933. A second round of voting was held in sixteen constituencies on 3 December. The campaign and elections were not without violence; thirty-four people were killed and far more injured, primarily by

2288-449: The right, in a system that favoured broad coalitions. The Radicals and their supporters had also shifted to the right. Abstentionalism hindered Socialist and Republican candidates. Overall, the political system in Spain had changed dramatically since the last election. The failure of the Spanish left was also partially attributable to the 1933 electoral law. The second Azaña government had amended

2340-412: The right, with only 5,000 votes less, secured only the remaining 4. This system had been passed in 1933. There would be two rounds of voting; 40% of the vote was necessary in the first round to win. In the event that no list of candidates reached 40%, then a second round would be composed of those achieving at least 8% in the first round. It was the first election in Spain where women had the vote, following

2392-551: The ruler of Spain since the end of the Civil War, with a view to restoring Spanish democracy. The failure of that initiative led to his definitive retirement from active politics. He died in Mexico City in 1962. In Mexico, he wrote several books, such as Palabras al viento ( Words in the Wind , 1942), Discursos en América ( Discourses in America , 1944) and at the end of his life, Cartas

2444-553: The start of the Cortes, after seats had been awarded between coalitions: This left the following divisions in the Cortes: Diego Mart%C3%ADnez Barrio Diego Martínez Barrio (25 November 1883, in Seville – 1 January 1962) was a Spanish politician during the Second Spanish Republic , Prime Minister of Spain between 9 October 1933 and 26 December 1933 and was briefly appointed again by Manuel Azaña on 19 July 1936 - two days after

2496-535: Was led by three groups. The first included Catholic movements such as the Catholic Association of Propagandists ( Asociación Católica de Propagandistas ). The second group consisted of organisations that had supported the monarchy, such as the Renovación Española and Carlists , who wanted to see the new republic overthrown in a violent uprising. The third group were fascist organisations. Members of

2548-425: Was six years old. His mother moved him to Bilbao in 1891. From a young age, he survived by selling magazines in the street. He eventually obtained work as a stenographer at the daily newspaper La Voz de Vizcaya , which led to a position as a copy editor and later a journalist at the rival daily El Liberal . He eventually became the director and owner of the newspaper. In 1899, at the age of 16, he had joined

2600-525: Was subject to severe international isolation during Prieto's last ministry in Spain. Maritime access for Soviet material aid was effectively cut off by the attacks of Italian submarines , and the French border remained closed. After the defeat of the Spanish Republican Armed Forces on the northern front in October 1937, he offered his resignation, which was rejected. Prieto finally left

2652-425: Was succeeded by Manuel Azaña . Radical Party leader Alejandro Lerroux had wanted that job himself and became alienated, switching his party's support to the opposition. This left Azaña dependent on the Socialists, but both the Socialists, who favoured reform, and the conservative right, who were against reform, were critical of the government. Socialists continued to support Azaña, but the left became fractured, driving

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2704-566: Was unnecessary because their internal opponents were already cowed and that Nationalist terror was because of their relative weakness. In September 1936, after the fall of Talavera de la Reina , in Toledo Province , to the rebels, Largo Caballero became the head of the government, and Prieto became Minister of Marine and Air. After the May 3–8, 1937 events in Barcelona in which the communists and

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