The 1808 Crisis: Independence War and Revolution
The Crisis of 1808: War of Independence and Political Revolution
Impact of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Alliance
Charles IV (1788-1808) and his minister Floridablanca, from the moment that the revolution started in France, sought to avoid revolutionary “contagion” from the neighboring country. In Spain, they isolated the French riot.
After a short period of government under the Count of Aranda, Charles IV made a key decision in his reign: he appointed Manuel Godoy as Minister in 1792.
The execution of Louis XVI in January 1793 caused the breakdown of the traditional alliance with France. Spain joined an international coalition and participated in the so-called War of the Convention. The Spanish military defeat was swift and conclusive. The failure of the war led to the Peace of Basel, in which Spain accepted the loss of the Spanish part of the island of Santo Domingo, and a return to the traditional alliance with France against England (Treaty of San Ildefonso, 1796).
The ascension to power of Napoleon in 1799 and the weakness of Godoy’s government led Spain to an increasing reliance on French foreign policy and, therefore, to conflict with England. The consequences soon became apparent: the victory over Portugal, a faithful ally of England, in 1801 in the “War of the Oranges” and the subsequent Spanish annexation of Olivenza did not help to offset the naval disaster of the Franco-Spanish fleet against British Admiral Nelson at Trafalgar in 1805.
Godoy signed the Treaty of Fontainebleau with Napoleon in 1807. This agreement authorized the entry and establishment of French troops in Spain with the purpose of invading Portugal.
At that point, the figure of Godoy was increasingly criticized in the influential circles of the country. This discontent led to the formation of an opposition group around Ferdinand VII, which quickly got to work to end the government of Godoy and the King.
The Cadiz Cortes and the Constitution of 1812
The Provincial Boards and the Central Board
The Abdications of Bayonne had created a vacuum of authority in occupied Spain. Although the Bourbons had ordered the authorities to obey the new king, Joseph I, many Spaniards refused to obey an illegitimate authority. To fill this vacuum and organize the spontaneous uprising against the French, Provincial Boards were organized to assume sovereignty.
Thus, in September 1808, the Central Board was established. In the absence of the legitimate king, it assumed all the powers of sovereignty and established itself as the supreme governing body. As a result of this new situation, the Central Board convened an extraordinary meeting of the Cortes in Cadiz, an act that clearly began the revolutionary process. Finally, in 1810, the Board handed over power to a Regency, which did not stop the call for the Cortes.
The Cortes of Cadiz
Cortes sessions began in September 1810, and two groups of deputies soon emerged:
- Liberals: Supporters of revolutionary reforms, based on the principles of the French Revolution.
- Absolutists or “Subservient”: Supporters of keeping the Old Regime (absolute monarchy, stratified society, mercantilist economy).
The Liberal majority, taking advantage of the king’s absence, initiated the first bourgeois liberal revolution in Spain, with two goals: to adopt reforms that would dismantle the structures of the Ancien Régime and to adopt a Constitution to change the country’s political regime.
Reforms of the Cadiz Cortes
- Freedom of the press (1810).
- Abolition of the seigneurial regime: suppression of jurisdictional domains, reminiscent of feudalism.
- Abolition of the Inquisition (1813).
- Abolition of guilds. Economic, commercial, labor, and manufacturing freedom.
- Disentailment of some church property.