Antonio Cánovas del Castillo

Alfonso issues the Sandhurst Manifesto, in which he sets the ideological basis of the Bourbonic Restoration, on December 1, 1874.

It is drafted in reply to a birthday greeting from his followers, a manifesto proclaiming himself the sole representative of the Spanish monarchy.

Brigadier General Arsenio Martínez Campos, who has long been working more or less openly for the king, leads some battalions of the central army to Sagunto when Field Marshal Serrano leaves Madrid to take command of the northern army in the Carlist War at the end of 1874, rallies to his own flag the troops sent against him, and enters Valencia in the king's name.

Thereupon the President resigns, and his power is transferred to the king's plenipotentiary and adviser, conservative politician Antonio Cánovas del Castillo.

The December 29, 1874, military coup of Martinez Campos in Sagunto ends the failed republic and enables the rise of the young Prince Alfonso.

Aresenio Martínez-Campos has taken command of Alfonso's forces against the Carlists and has made the fighting less brutal by signing agreements protecting the lives of the wounded and prisoners.

King Alfonso XII, who returns in early January, brings peace to a nation exhausted by civil conflicts, fear of revolution, and electoral manipulation, and will leave politics in the hands of his premiers, beginning with Antonio Cánovas del Castillo.

Spain’s two most urgent problems—ending the civil war unleashed by the Carlists, the partisans of the successors to the Spanish throne in the male line, and drafting the constitution—are both settled in 1876.

The Bourbon pretender to the Spanish throne, Carlos, Duke of Madrid, aka Carlos VII, had organized and now leads the Third Carlist War as the effective ruler much of peninsular Spain between 1872 and 1876.

The pronunciamiento by Martinez Campos had established Alfonso XII as King of Spain on December 29, 1874, marking the end of the First Spanish Republic.

The new Spanish commander, General Fernando Primo de Rivera, marches on February 2 on the remaining Carlist stronghold at Estella, where he meets a force of about sixteen hundred men under General Carlos Calderón at nearby Montejurra.

Calderón is forced to withdraw after a courageous and costly defense, nd the government troops take the town on February 19.

The Carlist forces have not succeeded, and their promises have not been fulfilled.

The Carlist pretender goes into into exile in France on February 28, bringing the four-year conflict to an end.

Alfonso XII’s government, led by Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, enacts Spain’s conservative constitution of 1876, which establishes Spain as a bi-cameral constitutional monarchy, with a lower House (Congreso de Diputados), and an upper House (Senado).

This constitution gives the King the power to name Senators, and to revoke laws if he wants to, and he is also given the title of Commander-in-chief of the army.

Following the defeat of the Carlists, the Spanish government dispatches an army to Cuba to fight the rebels who have controlled the island’s eastern half for seven years.

Spain’s restored Bourbon monarchy provides the most stable government the country has known since 1833.

This stability is sustained by an uneven but respectable economic growth.

The architect of the restoration itself and of the Constitution of 1876 is Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, prime minister from 1875 to 1881 and again from January 1884.

A superb politician, Cánovas had hoped for a civilian restoration; he had accepted Martínez Campos' coup but used the young Alfonso XII to keep the military out of politics.

The Canovite system is artificial in that it requires the contrived rotation in office (turno pacífico) of a Liberal, led by Práxedes Mateo Sagasta, and a Conservative party, led by Canovas; this in turn demands governmental control of elections, which are run by caciques, or local political bosses, who control votes in their districts.

Only in this way can the government selected by the king and the politicians in Madrid obtain a parliamentary majority; extensive corruption and the use of administrative pressures on electors are considered the only ways to make the parliamentary system work in an underdeveloped society.

Alfonso XII, although politically inexperienced, demonstrates great natural tact and sound judgment, qualities that give rise to hope that the monarchy will not suffer if the democratic constitution enacted in 1876 is fully implemented.

Attempts on the King's life (October 1878 and December 1879) and a military pronunciamento against the regime (1883) are not indicative of any general discontent with the restored monarchy; on the contrary, Alfonso enjoys considerable popularity, and his early death from tuberculosis on November 25, 1885, is a great disappointment to those who looked forward to a constitutional monarchy in Spain.

Alfonso's pregnant widow, Maria Christina of Austria, by whom he had had two daughters, serves as regent.

Spain's economy is quite behind those of the other European countries, and during these years, the modernization of the country has taken place on a large scale.

On most fronts, production has been increased due to extreme protectionist measures.

The Assassination of Antonio Cánovas del Castillo and the Decline of Bourbon Spain (1897)

The assassination of Antonio Cánovas del Castillo on August 8, 1897, marked the end of the relatively stable era he had inaugurated with the Restoration of the Bourbon monarchy in 1875. His death came at a time when his policies were increasingly under strain, particularly in overseas affairs and domestic governance.

Challenges to Cánovas’ Policies

By the late 1880s, Cánovas’ conservative policies faced mounting threats from two major fronts:

1. The Crisis in Cuba and the Threat of War with the United States

   • Cánovas’ overseas policy relied on military repression to suppress Cuban nationalist movements, but his efforts ultimately failed.
   • The 1895 Cuban War of Independence, led by José Martí, proved to be Spain’s most serious colonial challenge.
   • Spain’s refusal to grant Cuban independence brought it into direct conflict with the United States, setting the stage for the Spanish-American War (1898).

2. Internal Political and Social Unrest

   • Widespread discontent over the cacique system of electoral manipulation fueled growing demands for expanded suffrage.
   • The repression of Spain’s working class, marked by mass arrests and the use of torture, intensified social tensions.
   • Anarchist movements, fueled by working-class grievances, became more radicalized in response to state oppression.

The Assassination at Santa Águeda (1897)

On August 8, 1897, Cánovas was shot dead at the spa of Santa Águeda, in Mondragón, Guipúzcoa, by Michele Angiolillo, an Italian anarchist. Angiolillo saw the assassination as revenge for the Spanish government’s brutal suppression of anarchists, including mass arrests, executions, and the use of torture.

A Spain Without Cánovas: The Path to National Humiliation

Cánovas did not live to witness the final collapse of Spain’s overseas empire in 1898, when the Spanish-American War led to the loss of Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. His assassination left Spain without one of its most experienced conservative statesmen at a moment of profound crisis.

In the wake of his death, Spain entered a period of national humiliation and self-examination, with the "Generation of 1898" emerging to critique Spain’s declining global status and the failures of its outdated institutions. The assassination of Cánovas thus symbolized not only the violent opposition to his rule but also the broader unraveling of Spain’s political and imperial stability.