Spain in the 1930’s Part II

The secularization of education was in fact decreed: the law of June 2, 1933 fully implemented this program, certainly prohibiting the teaching given “by religious and other persons designated for this purpose by the Church”, to the detriment of many families who they found themselves deprived, especially in the field of elementary education, of the only schools that the country could offer at that time. In January 1932 the Jesuits were expelled and in September of the same year all their movable and immovable property was confiscated. In June 1933 these provisions were extended to the properties of all religious orders. To aggravate matters, the ban was given to Cardinal Segura, archbishop of Toledo, primate of ipagna: it was forbidden to bury in blessed ground those who in life had not made an explicit request; we witnessed the spectacle of the devastation of churches and convents, while the troops and police were given orders not to intervene. This policy made the government appear as a persecutor of Christianity, provoking profound reactions everywhere that made the religious problem re-emerge at the forefront of popular consciousness against the doctrine of Marx and Lenin.

According to plus-size-tips, the same social and economic problems were aggravated by the contrasts of opposing religious faiths. Finally, after much hesitation, the agrarian reform was tackled and, on the basis of the Marxist doctrine, tempered in its application by the intervention of the radicals, a first law was promulgated in August 1931 which decreed the nationalization of the large estates. In September 1932 the expropriation law was decided, by way of compensation, not only for large estates, but in general for “large properties”, excluding those managed by owners with rational management criteria. Since socialization was decreed without having adequate means of exploitation, it happened that many of the properties remained completely abandoned due to lack, as well as of working tools,

The national team was threatened with the statute for the autonomy of Catalonia, paying with this risky currency the support given by Esquerra and the anarcho-syndicalists to the socialists of Madrid.

Alongside the Spanish national language, which had to be learned by everyone, “the language spoken by the majority of the population” of the individual regions was recognized with equal rights. On 1 September 1932, Catalonia was recognized as an independent region within the framework of the Spanish republic, pursuant to that art. 12 of the Constitution, which aimed to achieve the autonomy of the regions in the unity of the state. A large part of this autonomy was gradually withdrawn to Catalonia (the hierarchically most important region for fullness of autonomous power) by the governments of 1933-35; to be restored again after the victory of the left in February 1936.

It was finally decided to liquidate the monarchy and the dictatorship with all their residues.

The king was considered perjury and accused of high treason for having violated that Constitution of 1976, which he swore in the open book of the Gospel on the morning of 17 May 1902. The trial in absentia against the king, despite the skilful defense of the count de Romanones, ended with the sentence of November 20, 1931: the movable and real estate assets of the crown, including “bank deposits and bills”, were confiscated “for the benefit of the state”. All those who had taken part in the counter-revolutionary attempt of General Sanjurjo were condemned to the confiscation of assets without compensation. Since nothing could be done against Primo de Rivera, who died suddenly in Paris, all the people suspected of having favored the advent of the dictatorship, under the

All these legislative provisions were promulgated while the Cortes were sitting, but without their collaboration, since they could only deal with constituent work by express provision of the law. Then the republican government repeated its power, so to speak, from the atmosphere of the environment, from the popular will indirectly manifested in the municipal and constituent elections of April and July 1931. The nation thus suffered all the consequences of a threatening form of excess in the mandate, and showed evident signs of wanting to remember it in the next “legislative” elections. In fact, in June 1933 the government could not but allow the expected general elections of the first regular Cortes to be held: elections that took place on November 19 and December 3 and marked the repudiation of the government’s cumbersome two-year legislation. The defeat of the Socialists was complete: from 113 seats they held in the constituent Cortes they fell to 58. Of the 480 deputies who made up the new Cortes, about 210 belonged to the right, 170 to the center, only 100 to the left. The condemnation was clear, and the Socialists received it by resigning. A new government was formed under the old radical Alexander Lerroux who, through many cabinet changes, remained in power until October 1934. they, if not in doctrine, at least in action accepted the principle of constitutional and parliamentary life, after the experiences of 31-33 he had separated from the socialists to support his central government on the right. Gil Robles, head of CEDA (Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas), a conservative agrarian party that made its presence felt in political life until February 1936.

Spain in the 1930's 2