Spain’s Restoration Era: Political Instability and Crisis of 1898
The Flawed Foundation of the Spanish Restoration
The formal constitution of the country and the social reality were starkly different. There was a significant gap between the 1876 constitution, technically acceptable, and the reality of a largely rural and illiterate Spain. This discrepancy led to a malfunction of the system, which was exploited by social forces to undermine the constitutional status.
The Mechanics of Power: Turnismo and Electoral Fraud
To rule required a double trust: the courts and the Crown. At least theoretically, the government could not govern if there was no majority in the House. But in reality, the mechanics of turnismo involved another party, because the system worked from top to bottom: the conservative and liberal parties lost power by mutual agreement or internal wear. This engendered fraud in the elections: the party charged with forming a government and calling an election was always the winner.
Caciquismo and the Seeds of Crisis
However, the caciquismo (chieftaincy) and the sham elections that it favored were immoral, and they carried with them the seeds of the crisis of the Restoration. After 1898, it would be considered the evil of the country. The box system favored the imposition by the central administration of deputies little worried about the region. This also led to an arbitrary power that facilitated cronyism, patronage, and subordination. Corruption was also a natural practice.
The Rise of Basque Nationalism
Basque nationalism was less important than Catalan nationalism in its infancy. Very conservative Catholic, the clergy had its main supporter in Sabino Arana, who wrote several books whose basic lines are the affirmation of the Basque race, historic tradition in Catholicism, and anti-Spanish independence. In 1897, he founded the PNV (Basque Nationalist Party).
Economic Progress and Unresolved Problems
No doubt the period of stability represented by the Restoration allowed the country’s economic start, but two major problems remained to be solved: the distortion of popular will at the hands of despotism and the social needs of the working class. Cánovas’s assassination (1897) and the sinking of the fleet in the Caribbean waters marked a turning point in the parliamentary monarchy.
Failed Reforms and Autonomy in Cuba
In November, Moret Sigismund granted a broad amnesty and a regime of autonomy to Cuba. Its content was not only to establish absolute equality among the inhabitants of the Peninsula and the Antilles, introduce universal suffrage, and a parallel constitution, it came too late and did increase the strength of independence and the demands of USA. Once in the Philippines was signed by year end Bicnabató Pact.
U.S. Influence and Imperial Ambitions
The U.S. began to impose a twofold strategy: to have “back home” – Central America and the Caribbean – clean of enemies, and to achieve mastery of both oceans as they had the Panama Canal.
The Moral and Ideological Crisis of 1898
The 98 crisis was fundamentally a moral and ideological crisis, which caused a major psychological impact among the population. That plunged the company into a state of disappointment and frustration also showed the foreign press in Spain as a “dying nation” with a totally ineffective army, a corrupt political system and a political incompetent.
The End of the Restoration and the Rise of Alfonso XIII
The disaster of 1898 meant the end of the Restoration system and the emergence of a new generation working in the reign of Alfonso XIII post98 reformist politics did not carry out deep reforms announced, then in 1923 there was a coup cousin of shore and in 1936 another of the ex geneal was a military dictatorship for nearly 40 years