Spanish General Election, 1898

A general election was held in Spain on Sunday, 27 March (for the Congress of Deputies) and on Sunday, 10 April 1898 (for the Senate), to elect the members of the 8th Restoration Cortes. All 445 seats in the Congress of Deputies (plus two special districts) were up for election, as well as 180 of 360 seats in the Senate.

The election was called amid a period of political unstability following the assassination of previous prime minister Antonio Cánovas del Castillo on 8 August 1897 by Italian anarchist Michele Angiolillo and the brief premiership of Marcelo Azcárraga. Respecting the ''turno'' system, Queen Regent Maria Christina appointed a new government under Liberal leader Práxedes Mateo Sagasta on 4 October 1897, tasking them with the formation of a new majority. In the wake of Cánovas's death, the Conservative Party was left in disarray, split between Francisco Silvela's Conservative Union, a faction led by Duke of Tetuán Carlos O'Donnell and Francisco Romero Robledo's re-established Liberal Reformist Party. The result of the election was a Liberal majority in both chambers.

This would be the last Spanish general election to be held in Cuba and Puerto Rico, as the Spanish–American War, which would start only a few weeks after the election, would lead to the loss of all Spanish colonies in the Caribbean and the Pacific.

Background

The last government of Antonio Cánovas del Castillo (1895–1897) had seen an increase in anarchist activity, with the Barcelona Corpus Christi procession bombing on 7 June 1896 and its consequences dominating the political landscape. Those suspect and arrested for the bombing were tried in the military Montjuïc Castle (the Montjuïc trials), amid accusations of forced confessions through torture. A new anti-terrorist law was approved that year and applied retroactively against the acquitted prisoners, who were deported out of the country. Cánovas' role in the trials and the political repression following the bombings would ultimately lead to his assassination on 8 August 1897 by anarchist Michele Angiolillo. This period also saw the breakout of the Philippine Revolution in August 1896.

Following Cánovas' death, Marcelo Azcárraga took the role of prime minister in the interim until power was handed by Queen Regent Maria Christina to Práxedes Mateo Sagasta and his Liberal Party in October that year. This episode threw the Conservative Party into disarray: most party members acknowledged Francisco Silvela as new leader and joined his Conservative Union; others—considering themselves as the true heirs of Cánovas' ideas—joined Duke of Tetuán Carlos O'Donnell's Tetuanist faction; finally, Francisco Romero Robledo re-established his Liberal Reformist Party and broke away in opposition to Silvela's leadership.

Overview

Electoral system

The Spanish were envisaged as "co-legislative bodies", based on a nearly perfect bicameral system. Both the Congress of Deputies and the Senate had legislative, control and budgetary functions, sharing equal powers except for laws on contributions or public credit, where the Congress had preeminence, and judicial matters, where preeminence was vested in the Senate. Voting for the was on the basis of universal manhood suffrage, which comprised all national males over 25 years of age, having at least a two-year residency in a municipality and in full enjoyment of their civil rights. Following a 1897 reform, universal manhood suffrage was also extended to Cuba and Puerto Rico.

For the Congress of Deputies, 116 seats were elected using a partial block voting system in 34 multi-member constituencies, with the remaining 329 being elected under a one-round first-past-the-post system in single-member districts. Candidates winning a plurality in each constituency were elected. In constituencies electing eight seats or more, electors could vote for no more than three candidates less than the number of seats to be allocated; in those with more than four seats and up to eight, for no more than two less; in those with more than one seat and up to four, for no more than one less; and for one candidate in single-member districts. The Congress was entitled to one member per each 50,000 inhabitants, with each multi-member constituency being allocated a fixed number of seats. Additionally, literary universities, economic societies of Friends of the Country and officially organized chambers of commerce, industry and agriculture were entitled to one seat per each 5,000 registered voters that they comprised, which resulted in two additional special districts for the 1898 election.

As a result of the aforementioned allocation, each Congress multi-member constituency was entitled the following seats:

For the Senate, 180 seats were indirectly elected by the local councils and major taxpayers, with electors voting for delegates instead of senators. Elected delegates—equivalent in number to one-sixth of the councillors in each local council—would then vote for senators using a write-in, two-round majority voting system. The provinces of Álava, Albacete, Ávila, Biscay, Cuenca, Guadalajara, Guipúzcoa, Huelva, Logroño, Matanzas, Palencia, Pinar del Río, Puerto Príncipe, Santa Clara, Santander, Santiago de Cuba, Segovia, Soria, Teruel, Valladolid and Zamora were allocated two seats each, whereas each of the remaining provinces was allocated three seats, for a total of 147. The remaining 33 were allocated to special districts comprising a number of institutions, electing one seat each—the archdioceses of Burgos, Granada, Santiago de Compostela, Santiago de Cuba, Seville, Tarragona, Toledo, Valencia, Valladolid and Zaragoza; the Royal Spanish Academy; the other royal academies (History; Fine Arts of San Fernando; Exact, Physical and Natural Sciences; Moral and Political Sciences and Medicine); the universities of Madrid, Barcelona, Granada, Havana, Salamanca, Santiago, Seville, Valencia, Valladolid and Zaragoza; and the economic societies of Friends of the Country from Madrid, Barcelona, Havana, León, Seville and Valencia. An additional 180 seats comprised senators in their own right—the monarch's offspring and the heir apparent once coming of age; Grandees of Spain with an annual income of at least 60,000 Pt (from their own real estate or from rights that enjoy the same legal consideration); Captain Generals of the Army and the Navy Admiral; the Patriarch of the Indies and archbishops; and the presidents of the Council of State, the Supreme Court, the Court of Auditors, the Supreme War Council and the Supreme Council of the Navy, after two years of service—as well as senators for life appointed directly by the monarch.

The law provided for by-elections to fill seats vacated in both the Congress and Senate throughout the legislature's term.

Election date

The term of each chamber of the Cortes—the Congress and one-half of the elective part of the Senate—expired five years from the date of their previous election, unless they were dissolved earlier. The previous Congress and Senate elections were held on 12 and 26 April 1896, which meant that the legislature's terms would have expired on 12 and 26 April 1901, respectively. The monarch had the prerogative to dissolve both chambers at any given time—either jointly or separately—and call a snap election. There was no constitutional requirement for concurrent elections to the Congress and the Senate, nor for the elective part of the Senate to be renewed in its entirety except in the case that a full dissolution was agreed by the monarch. Still, there was only one case of a separate election (for the Senate in 1877) and no half-Senate elections taking place under the 1876 Constitution.

The Cortes were officially dissolved on 26 February 1898, with the dissolution decree setting the election dates for 27 March (for the Congress) and 10 April 1898 (for the Senate) and scheduling for both chambers to reconvene on 25 April.

Candidates

For the Congress, Spanish citizens of age and with the legal capacity to vote could run for election, provided that they were not sentenced to perpetual disqualification from political rights or public offices by a final court's decision, or to afflictive penalties if no legal rehabilitation had been obtained at least two years in advance of the election, or to other criminal penalties if the serving of the sentence could not be proven before taking the office of deputy. Other causes of ineligibility were imposed on those physically or morally incapacitated; bankrupt or insolvent persons who had not paid out their debts; and contractors of public works or services; as well as a number of territorial-level officers in government bodies and institutions being barred from running, during their tenure of office, in constituencies within the whole or part of their respective area of jurisdiction.

For the Senate, eligibility was limited to those entitled to be appointed as senators in their own right or those who had belonged to one of the following categories: presidents of the Senate and the Congress of Deputies; deputies who had belonged to at least three different congresses or serving for at least eight terms; government ministers; other Grandees of Spain; Army's lieutenant generals and Navy's vice admirals, two years after their appointment; ambassadors after two years of service and plenipotentiary ministers after four; other members and prosecutors of the Council of State, the Supreme Court, the Court of Auditors, the Supreme War Council and the Supreme Council of the Navy, and the Dean of the Court of Military Orders, after two years of service; presidents and directors of the Royal Spanish Academy and the other royal academies (History; Fine Arts of San Fernando; Exact, Physical and Natural Sciences; Moral and Political Sciences and Medicine); full academics of the aforementioned corporations occupying the first half of the seniority scale in their corps, first-class general inspectors of the corps of Civil Engineers, Mines and Forests, full-time university professors with at least four years of seniority in their category and practice (and provided that those had an annual income of at least 7,500 Pt from their own property, salaries from jobs that cannot be lost except for legally proven cause, or from retirement, withdrawal or termination); as well as those who had an annual income of 20,000 Pt or were taxpayers with a minimum quota of 4,000 Pt in direct contributions at least two years in advance, as long as they were of the Spanish nobility, had been previously deputies, provincial deputies or mayors in provincial capitals or towns over 20,000 inhabitants, as well as those who had ever held the office of senator before the promulgation of the 1876 Constitution..

Results

Congress of Deputies

Senate

Maps

File:1898 Spanish general election (Congress of Deputies).svg, Election results by constituency (Congress).

Distribution by group

See also

* 1898 Puerto Rican general election

Notes

References

Bibliography

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{{Spanish elections

1898 elections in Spain
1898 in Spain
1898
March 1898 in Europe
April 1898 in Europe