Second Spanish Republic

• 1. Proclamation And Constitution

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  The Second Spanish Republic was proclaimed on the 14th of April 1931 after King Alfonso XIII went into exile. This event followed a landslide victory for republicans in the municipal elections held on the 12th of April 1931. A provisional government led by Niceto Alcalá-Zamora took charge immediately. The transition from monarchy to democracy required a new legal framework. A Constituent Cortes was elected in June 1931 to draft this constitution. The document came into force in December of that same year. It established freedom of speech and extended suffrage to women starting in 1933. The constitution stripped the Spanish nobility of special legal status and ended Catholicism's role as the state religion. Articles 26 and 27 imposed strict limits on religious orders, prohibiting them from teaching. Pope Pius XI condemned these measures in an encyclical titled Dilectissima Nobis. José Ortega y Gasset called the article legislating Church actions highly improper. The legislative branch became a single chamber known as the Congress of Deputies. New national symbols included the Himno de Riego anthem and a Tricolor flag with red-yellow-purple fields.

• 2. Reformist Biennium Policies

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  Manuel Azaña initiated numerous reforms during the two years following the approval of the 1931 Constitution. Landowners were expropriated under the agrarian reform program. Autonomy was granted to Catalonia with its own parliament and president. Catholic churches in major cities like Madrid and Sevilla faced arson attacks in May 1932. A revolutionary strike action occurred in Málaga later that year. In 1933, all remaining religious congregations were forced to pay taxes and banned from industry, trade, and educational activities. Police used strict severity to enforce this ban alongside widespread mob violence. A church in Zaragoza was burnt down in 1933. The first military coup against the Republic was planned by monarchist generals but failed. This event became known as the Sanjurjada. Several hundreds of generals were dismissed after the attempt collapsed. Prominent monarchists were imprisoned or fled abroad. The aristocracy faced radicalization of the agrarian reform as punishment. The extreme right did not abandon plans to overthrow the Republic. Organizations like Falange Española emerged as small fascist parties. The culture of the anti-Republican right was described as proto-fascist similar to Italian pre-Fascism.

• 3. Black Biennium And Uprising

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  Events in the period after November 1933 made a civil war seem more likely. The Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right won the majority vote in the 1933 elections. President Alcalá-Zamora declined to invite its leader Gil Robles to form a government. Instead he invited Alejandro Lerroux of the Radical Republican Party. CEDA exerted indirect influence because the government depended on its parliamentary support. The left viewed CEDA as a threat to both progressive reforms and the Republic itself. Francisco Largo Caballero adopted revolutionary Marxist rhetoric within the Socialist Party. A general strike called by the Unión General de Trabajadores developed into an uprising in Asturias. Miners occupied Oviedo killing officials and clergymen. Fifty-eight religious buildings including churches and part of the university at Oviedo were burned. Thirty thousand workers were mobilized for battle within ten days. Rebels declared a proletarian revolution and abolished regular money in occupied areas. The rebellion lasted two weeks until crushed by the army led by General Eduardo López Ochoa. This operation earned him the nickname Butcher of Asturias. Another rebellion by Catalonia's autonomous government was also suppressed with mass arrests following it.

• 4. Popular Front And Polarization

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  New elections were called on the 7th of January 1936 after a series of crises and corruption scandals. The Popular Front coalition won the election on the 16th of February with 263 MPs against 156 right-wing MPs. Moderate center parties virtually disappeared from parliament between the elections. In thirty-six hours following the election, sixteen people were killed and thirty-nine seriously injured. Churches and political centers were attacked or set ablaze across the country. Manuel Azaña was called upon to form a government before the electoral process had fully concluded. He replaced Zamora as president taking advantage of a constitutional loophole. The right reacted as if radical communists had taken control despite the cabinet's moderate composition. They abandoned the parliamentary option and began conspiring to overthrow the Republic. By July 1936, the Falange had only 40,000 members among millions of Spaniards. Miguel de Unamuno told a reporter in June 1936 that President Azaña should commit suicide as a patriotic act. The right firmly believed they would win the election at all levels.

• 5. Assassination And Coup Catalyst

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  Lieutenant José Castillo was shot by Falangist gunmen on the 12th of July 1936. This murder triggered a revenge mission led by Civil Guard Fernando Condés. A group of Guardia de Asalto and leftist militiamen went to José Calvo Sotelo's house early on the 13th of July. Sotelo was arrested and later shot dead in a police truck. His body was dropped at the entrance of one of Madrid's cemeteries. Luis Cuenca is identified as the socialist gunman who committed the murder. Calvo Sotelo had been exhorting the army to intervene against communism. Prominent rightists blamed the government for failing to investigate properly. The event transformed a limping conspiracy into a revolt capable of triggering civil war. Stanley Payne notes that before these events only 12% of officers reliably supported the coup. Franco changed his mind on rebellion within hours of learning of the murder. He dispatched a message to Mola displaying firm commitment three days later. The killing of Calvo Sotelo with police involvement aroused strong reactions among opponents. No effective action was taken against the attackers despite public outcry.

• 6. Civil War Military Dynamics

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  The coup d'état began on the 17th of July 1936 with an army uprising in Spanish Morocco. General Emilio Mola moved south from Navarre while another force attacked from the north. Before long professional Army units controlled much of the south and west. Time Magazine declared the facade of the Spanish Republic crumbling by October 1936. Bloody purges followed in each piece of captured Nationalist territory. Both sides received foreign military aid but Axis powers gave greater assistance than the USSR. France, Britain, and other European powers pursued non-interventionism through the Non-Intervention Committee. The Siege of the Alcázar at Toledo resulted in rebel victory after a long siege. Republicans held out in Madrid despite a Nationalist assault in November 1936. Subsequent offensives against the capital failed at Jarama and Guadalajara in 1937. The bombing of Guernica inspired Picasso's painting and tested the German Luftwaffe's Condor Legion. The Battle of the Ebro in July, November 1938 was the final desperate Republican attempt to turn the tide. When this failed Barcelona fell to rebels in early 1939. Madrid fell in March 1939 ending the war. An estimated total of half a million people died during the conflict.

• 7. Economic Structure And Struggles

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  The Second Spanish Republic's economy was mostly agrarian with many historians calling Spain backward. Major industries were located in the Basque region due to Europe's best high-grade non-phosphoric ore. Catalonia also hosted significant industrial centers. This distribution created immense transportation costs due to mountainous terrain separating resources from industry. Compounding economic woes was Spain's low export rate and heavily domestic manufacturing industry. High levels of poverty left many Spaniards open to extremist political parties searching for solutions. The center of industry sat on the opposite side of the country from resource reserves. These structural issues contributed significantly to social unrest and political instability throughout the era.