4. The Death of a Dictator: The Church in Self-Preservation Mode
The power of the Church seemed, for a long time, to be something absolute and immutable. But this was an optical illusion. In a few years, the institution found itself under attack. Its close relationship with the Franco regime, which had been the source of its power, wealth and influence for so long, now turned into its opposite.
In reality, there were two churches. On the one hand, there was the church of the hierarchy, the cardinals and bishops, who defended the interests of the rich and powerful. On the other hand, in the lower reaches of the church, there were many honest priests who stood close to the working-class men and women who made up their flock. They witnessed at first hand the sufferings and oppression of the people, which made a profound impression on their thinking.
Events outside Spain also had a big impact. In 1962, Pope John XXIII convened the Second Vatican Council, the purpose of which was to define the role of the Catholic Church in the modern world. Its conclusions supported the defence of human rights and religious and political freedom. The Second Vatican Council addressed the issue of modernity and liberalism. On 11 April 1963, Pope John XXIII issued the encyclical Pacem in terris (Peace on Earth). It was the last encyclical drafted by John XXIII, who had been diagnosed with cancer in September 1962 and died two months after its completion.
Pacem in terris was supposed to be about nuclear proliferation, but it also contained some observations on society and the relationship between individuals and humankind, human rights and moral duties, the relationship between the individual and state, rights and duties and so on. This document caused waves in the Church, scandalising the conservatives and providing a point of reference to the progressive layers. This was particularly true of Spain, where, in the last years of the dictatorship, under pressure from the working class and the mass movement, the Church began to move into semi-opposition, at least to the worst excesses of the regime.
These unexpected developments immediately pushed the reactionary Spanish Church hierarchy into conflict with the international body. But they also allowed more progressive Spanish priests to air criticisms, basing themselves on papal declarations and Council documents. But it was above all events within Spain itself, especially the growing movement of strikes and protests by the Spanish workers, that provoked the most serious rifts in the church. Deep splits opened up between the reactionary Spanish church hierarchy that clung stubbornly to the regime, and progressive catholic priests and intellectuals who sided with the workers.
Rapid industrialisation and urbanisation were transforming Spanish society. Spain was no longer a backward economy based on agriculture, with a predominantly rural population, accustomed to obeying the landlord and the priest. The growth of the industrial working class and the spread of radical socialist and communist ideas threatened to undermine the Church’s authority completely. As early as the 1940s the Church had attempted to strengthen its hold on the working class by establishing lay catholic organisations, such as the Juventud Obrera Católica (JOC – Young Catholic Workers) and the Hermandad Obrera de Acción Católica (HOAC – Catholic Action Workers’ Brotherhood).
These organisations were set up to carry the catholic message to the workers. To the degree that the lay Catholics became more acquainted with the social problems and political injustices faced by workers, they became more critical of government and employers’ policies. Gradually, they began adopting a more radical stance against the government, in many cases acting as unofficial trade unions. These activities placed the Church hierarchy in a difficult situation. But in the end, it probably saved the Church from complete destruction. Gradually, the hierarchy began to realise that if they did not distance themselves from the regime, the very future of the Church would be called into question.
Furthermore, many of the priests who served as chaplains to the lay members were themselves being radicalised. These young and idealistic worker priests, as they became known, worked in the barrios (neighbourhoods) where they got to experience the workers’ problems first hand. The aim had been to bring the word of God to the workers. But in many instances the workers had a far greater impact on the priests than the reverse. Many of these priests got involved in illegal union activities. Removing their dog collars as a sign of solidarity with the workers, they became known as curas rojos (red priests).
One remarkable case was Father José María de Llanos, a Jesuit from a wealthy family. By a supreme irony, Father Llanos had once had very close links to the fascist party, the Falange, and had even been asked by General Franco to prepare spiritual exercises for him and his wife. But everything changed when Father Llanos went to work among the poverty-stricken peasants from Andalusia, who were crammed into the seething outskirts of Madrid. Shocked by what he saw, he soon took up the cause of the poor and dispossessed to such an extent that he admitted that they had redeemed him more than he had redeemed them.
José María Llanos was clearly influenced by the ideas of liberation theology, which was emerging among progressive Catholics, especially in Latin America. He became actively involved in the Workers’ Commissions, which at that time were still an illegal organisation. Later, he joined the Communist Party. His was not the only example.
In Catalonia and the Basque Provinces, religion became mixed with nationalist and linguistic sentiments, which led to clashes within the Spanish Church itself. During the Civil War, Basque priests had dissented from the mainstream church and had supported the Republic and many were executed by the Franco regime. In 1960, Basque priests signed letters protesting the abuses of human rights, the suppression of their culture and the prohibition of their language.
In 1964, Catalan priests followed their example. Until 1965, priests in these two peripheral areas of the country were prohibited from giving sermons in their native languages. The conflicts between the priests and the Franco regime became increasingly public. The spectacle of the police beating up priests became increasingly normal. Following the shooting by the Civil Guard of two building workers in Barcelona, which provoked protest marches, demonstrations and strikes, Cardinal Jubany of Barcelona warned the regime of “the institutionalised violence” provoking the “tumultuous and uncontrollable violence” of the masses.
What he was expressing were the fears held by a growing section of the Spanish ruling class that a policy of continued repression would, given the tremendous growth and militancy of the working class, provoke revolutionary outbursts. The regime viewed the changing stance of the church with a mixture of horrified incredulity and bitter resentment. The Arias Navarro government even succeeded in causing a conflict with the Vatican over its attempt to silence the Bishop of Bilbao, thus risking the excommunication of the whole Spanish state.
In 1974, Bishop Antonio Añoveros published a homily demanding the recognition of the national identity of the Basque people. He had, like several of his counterparts in other Spanish cities, spoken of the need for more social justice, and was immediately accused of threatening national unity. He was placed under house arrest and threatened with exile. Only with the last-minute intervention of Franco and an envoy from the Holy See, was this damaging rift between the two warring arms of the state patched up.
The Church Asks for Forgiveness
Ironically, the Church was the first segment of the ruling circle to extricate itself from the Franco regime, recognising with its habitual astuteness that things had changed. Pressure from the grass-roots priests, who were in closer contact with the people, gradually made its effects felt in the upper echelons of the Church hierarchy in Spain.
There was a constant stream of anti-hierarchical manifestos written by priests. The relentless pressure from below, which in turn was a direct result of the massive wave of strikes and protests, forced the church hierarchy to distance itself from the regime in the early 1970s. Sensing that a change of political regime was inevitable and, sensing the hatred which was directed towards itself, the Spanish Church rapidly prepared to give itself a makeover. In 1971, a joint assembly of bishops and priests issued a public statement that would have been unthinkable only a few years earlier. In the statement the Church in effect apologised for its role during and after the Civil War. It said: “We humbly recognise and ask forgiveness for the fact that we failed to act at the opportune time as true ministers of reconciliation among our people who were divided by a war between brothers.” In January 1973, it issued a further statement in which it “expressed support for profound changes in our institutions to guarantee fundamental rights for citizens, such as the right of expression and association”.
Furthermore, the document affirmed that the Church needed no privileges, and that it sought to co-operate with the state but on the basis of a new formula of collaboration that excluded clerics from the state’s political institutions. It also called for reconciliation between Spaniards; no more division into conquerors and conquered.
It was an important step aimed at putting distance between the Church and the state. By way of reply, the Caudillo reminded the Church that the Civil War had been fought in defence of Christian civilisation, and that it had been blessed by the bishops as a crusade. But by now, things had gone too far. In order to save itself from total shipwreck, the Church had to jettison many of the links that had bound it to the sinking regime.
The Church was beginning to seek points of support in the workers’ movement. In its initial stages the CCOO had links to the Roman Catholic Church. On 24 July 1968, after the big miners’ strikes in Asturias, the Bishops’ Conference condemned Spain’s government labour organisations and issued a call for free trade unions. Some Church-sponsored labour groups that were permitted to operate openly in Spain, notably HOAC and the JOC, adopted the idea that socialism represented the true Christian ideal. Many brave fighters of the working class emerged from the JOC and HOAC during the 1970s.
Andoni Txasco, who was blinded by the police following the Vitoria general strike on 3 March 1976, recalls:
The parish priests of the poor neighbourhoods were from working-class families. They saw that the workers were suffering, they were also of working extraction and since the Second Council of Vatican they increasingly had social beliefs or social concerns. Many of them participated and helped on 3 March, opening the churches and protecting people from the police.
I myself participated in the churches in the Catholic workers’ centre, for example. There was also the JOC, the Catholic Working Youth. That was a meeting place where we participated, apart from bowling and socialising, we also held our political meetings.
Quite a few left-wing trade unionist activists and revolutionary youth I knew began their activities in that organisation. I remember one of them, whose name I think was Andrés, but the comrades, perhaps with a degree of good-natured jocularity, always called him El Católico (the Catholic). He didn’t seem to mind. In the underground, everyone had a nickname. It was a necessary security measure.
In working-class communities, many priests allowed their churches and parishes to be used for the purposes of meetings held by workers and left-wing parties. For some years we held all the congresses of the Marxist Tendency in monasteries and convents. Other left-wing groups did the same. They were the only big meeting-places available to us.
I remember well in those days how we used churches and monasteries to hold clandestine Marxist meetings. Some of the monks occasionally gave us some peculiar looks, but in general these were the only places that left-wing organisations could meet with any degree of security. It was this that undoubtedly saved the Church from a disastrous situation following the collapse of the Franco regime.
An increasing number of priests sympathised with the opposition and even actively supported it. This posed a quandary for the authorities. The Church was allowing its buildings to be used by political dissidents, but how could this most catholic regime use repression against the Holy Mother Church?
All this is not to say that the Church abandoned its power, wealth or interests. On the contrary, by deftly moving sideways, it saved itself just in time. By distancing itself from a regime that was clearly ripe for overthrow, the Church could reinvent itself as ‘a church for all Spaniards’, a voice of reason and moderation, a force standing between the contending classes – in a word, the spiritual voice of the Democratic Transition.
The personification of this new cynicism was Cardinal Vicente Enrique y Tarancón, who became Archbishop of Madrid in 1971. Father Francisco García Salve, an outstanding working-class fighter and militant of the PCE gives us a clear picture of his real role:
I visited Cardinal Tarancón in his palace to ask him two specific things: to allow us to use the churches and parish halls for workers’ meetings and to ask him for money to help the families of those imprisoned in the Madrid construction workers’ strike.
We left the meeting terrified that such an intelligent man, a cardinal of the Church, was capable of such cynicism. He more or less denied that the dictatorship would prevent the universal right of assembly and even doubted that they would imprison anyone for exercising their right to strike. He had just married a granddaughter of the dictator. I left that palace terrified.1
Yet Tarancón was lionised by the ‘official’ history as being one of the apostles of the Transition, alongside the king, Suárez and Carrillo.
The attitude of the Church hierarchy was dictated by considerations of ‘realpolitik’ and impregnated with cynicism. But at the bottom level that was not the case. As we have seen, many of these courageous priests actively supported the workers in struggle, allowing them to use their churches for clandestine meetings. Quite a few priests joined the revolutionary movement, some of them getting married and leaving the church altogether. The following interview gives us an idea of how this transition was made.
Interview with a Worker Priest
Early in 2018 I interviewed Imanol Olabarría, a former Basque priest who later became a leading figure in the Vitoria general strike of March 1976. I asked him to describe his experience as a worker priest. This is his story, told in his own words:
Imanol: I come from a large family and was the eldest brother. My father participated in the Civil War on the losing side and he was in the workers’ battalion. When he left the army, I was four years old at home with mother and when they told her that my father was coming, according to her, I ran out onto the road to meet him. Then, because the foundry where he worked had been destroyed in the war, we had to move, so we ended up in a small town near Durango, called Yurreta.
Later I was in the seminary of Derio, in Vizcaya. I seem to recall that it was originally built as an insane asylum, but at the time of the Republic, the building belonged to the Diputación (Council). There was an empty structure: the beams, the floors, etc., and at a certain moment it was given over to the Church to make into a seminary, as it was pretty central for Guipúzcoa, Álava and Vizcaya. The seminary was opened, and when I was there, there were thirty-odd students on my course.
I left Derio in the year 1965. They were interesting times. I was living in Durango when the Council of John XXIII was announced. That helped to open people’s eyes and certain sectors began to question the role of the Church. Those of us who were in the seminary, in turn, had other points of reference. For example, while I was still a seminarian, Father Manterola, who was a local priest, had made a sermon in Durango for which he was fined, though he did not pay it. And there were other priests who were critical too.
It would be a year-and-a-half before I left the seminary and a trial was held in Durango. Manterola was put on trial for non-payment, and they took away his car (he had a little two horsepower vehicle). Afterwards, for other reasons, another one of our acquaintances, Father Gabica, was imprisoned in a convent in Palencia, in La Trapa. Later, we left the seminary, and I went to a mining area. They sent me there as a priest. And it happened like this.
We had been in the seminary for about four or five years (in the early 1960s). A lot of priests (three hundred and something) had written a letter to Rome complaining about the setup where Vizcaya, for example, depended on the bishopric of Burgos and Donosti (San Sebastián), which depended on Iruña. That was the kind of swindle that went on inside the Church, just like the one that existed at a political level. We also denounced the physical abuse that went on in the seminary.
Well, the ambassador of the Vatican (the nuncio) arrived in Madrid. He came in while we were celebrating the mass and started ranting and raving about all those priests who were sending protests all the time (that also referred to us). And he said: “I want to know what is going on here. Then you can go to the mining area.”
That had the opposite effect to what he intended. You leave the seminary hating the hierarchy of the Church and in a way, you find yourself in crisis too. On the one hand you are sympathetic to the gospel or to the beatitudes but you do not recognise any of this in the structures and hierarchy of the Church. So, you come out a bit confused.
Alan Woods: The Church had enormous power in those days?
Imanol: Yes, yes. For example, if you did not present your certificate of baptism when applying for a job in Altos Hornos [a big steel mill], you did not get in. And the Church collaborated in this. On the other hand, we had heard stories about a bishop of León by the name of Ansel, who was a cobbler by trade. He did not live in a palace but he worked in a doorway mending shoes, and he lived on that. Wasn’t that a return to the beginnings of the Christian religion?
Then you arrive at your destination in the mining area of Vizcaya, and you find that the biggest houses of the village are at your disposal. You start to read a bit about the role of the Church in the times of the Republic, or rather, how it benefited from Francoism. Then you say: what am I doing here? How does this square with my beliefs? So, you go off to give classes and your school is a big building.
In front of us was the national school, a poor little building. People had to pay something to come to our school. I think it was twenty-five pesetas, perhaps not much, but it was still money, and that also gave you a certain prestige and social standing. There was a youth club for the kids. There was even a television. Then we had the priest’s house and the cinema…
I had to get away from all that. I decided to get a job, but I did not know any trade. But that is where I began to support myself. It was a lonely journey. But soon other priests started working together with me. I started working with Periko Solabarria.2
AW: Were you still a priest while you were working?
Imanol: Yes. I was working in a chemical factory in Baracaldo. Another priest worked in a company called Unquinesa and the other one in a carpentry workshop. Those were the three that were working at that time. Why did we start to work? Well, we were working in search of moral coherence, to separate ourselves from the official Church. Then there was the strike at Bandas…
AW: The Bandas strike had a lot of influence. I think it was initiated by the Catholic workers’ movement, the HOAC.
Imanol: Yes. There was a Cuban Jesuit there, called Armentia, and that was a point of reference. There came a moment when the Bandas workers asked for help. And you say to yourself: “maybe this is the answer” … and then one day they say to you: “Hey, we have to cut and run: the police are coming”. Then you run away… But when we started working, we began to see that we were being manipulated and used by the Church. It only organised talks about social problems with the aim of winning workers for the Church. But we had other ideas.
We had already given one talk about social issues. Now we planned to organise another talk with a few people during Lent. The first talk was a social activity, to attract workers to the Church. But before that second talk could be held, the plain-clothes police turned up and asked for Imanol. “What’s the problem?” I asked. “You cannot give that talk tomorrow,” came the answer.
At that time, members of the priesthood had a lot of weight and prestige in society. So, we were a bit full of ourselves. I thought: “The police are not going to tell me what to do. No way! So, they said the talk was forbidden and the bishop knew all about it. What nonsense!” We paid no attention. And of course, the next day arrived and the police were standing at the door of the church and I said to myself: “Imanol, if they stop you, or they fine you, that’s OK. But if they start fining the people, what then?” So, you go up to the police and say that the meeting has been suspended. And the next day, we would convene a meeting somewhere else – Trapagaran, Ortuella…
We called a meeting attended by eighteen priests. Safety in numbers!
“Tell us what happened?”
“Well, we have given one talk and they banned the second.”
“Damn it all, well, that’s impossible!”
“We’ve got it all recorded on a tape recorder. The ones who got there first recorded everything. Just listen to this.”
“Well, the police have no right to do that!” (By now the priests were getting hot under the collar). We were going to meet the police head on!
They started writing a letter and I said to one of the comrades who was working and who had come along:
“Hey, I’m going to see the bishop. The police told me that the bishop knew about all this.”
So, I presented myself to the bishop, and he said: “Who are you?” I said “I am Imanol from La Arboleda” and so on. The next minute, hell! He starts to yell at me. I threw back at him: “But where did you get your information from?”
“The police,” came the answer. The police! I turned around and without saying another word, I closed the door and left.
The written statement of the priests was now ready. And I said: “Where you have written the word police, you can also put ‘bishop’. Oh yes. The bishop told me so himself.”
Everyone was against the police, because attacking them could somehow give us prestige, but attacking the bishop! That was a bit too much. Periko and I went to work in the morning, and when we returned, the bishop had suspended us a divinis, which means that he forbade us to practice: sermons, confessions, etc. But as far as the hierarchy was concerned, we were not too bothered. We did not even take it into consideration. It no longer affected us.
The attempt to reorganise the Church no longer interested us. In the end, this was an attempt to boost the prestige of the Church, but when we saw that we were being manipulated, we broke with all that. Later I met priests who were expelled and scattered, exiled in places like Palencia, Andalusia and so on. Thirty-seven priests, for example, were sent to jail in Zamora. Some were fined for a sermon. If they did not pay, they were sent to jail for a couple of months. Others who took a position on the manifesto against torture were charged with eight years in prison. In Derio we locked ourselves up with sixty priests, protesting at what was happening at the social level.
I guess, about fifteen of my comrades left everything. Those of us who were working cut all communication and we all ended up in different parts. The main thing was to start working with the people. You do not stop being a worker, but you stop being a member of the Church.
We had finally escaped.
The new heroes of democracy
All of a sudden, everyone and his uncle had become a liberal. They appeared suddenly, unannounced and unexpected, like mushrooms after a thunderstorm. The newly-formed Liberal Opposition contained such lifelong ‘democrats’ as Gil Robles (founder of the original Spanish Fascist party, CEDA [Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas, Spanish Confederation of Autonomous Rights], in 1934).
There was certainly no lack of comedy in this great political drama, as when Don Juan of Bourbon, the Old Pretender, found himself deprived of access to his yacht in Mallorca as a fitting punishment for ‘sedition’.
Did anyone take these heroes of Spanish liberalism seriously? The police? Hardly. The regime? They were legally tolerated. The workers? They were too busy shedding their blood to win their freedom to care what the liberals talked about. Who then? The answer can be found in the pages of World Marxist Review.3 This Stalinist publication informs us that:
Diverse political factors have come together for joint struggle against fascism – communists, socialists, members of Workers’ Commissions, some monarchists and those members of the business world who understand that the Franco regime is an obstacle to economic growth.
For their part, Santiago Carrillo and the Spanish Communist Party (PCE) took the ‘evolution’ of the Spanish business world, the archbishops, monarchists and even old Gil Robles very seriously.
Already in 1973, when the regime was on its last legs, Gil Robles participated in the formation of the ‘Democratic Junta’ – a coalition of the PCE with liberals, former fascists and monarchist parties, or more correctly sects. At a time when Spain was being shaken by a massive strike wave and the regime was split and in crisis, when an ever-growing number of workers were risking their lives despite the threat of arrests and shootings, striving to change society and looking for a clear lead, the Communist Party were calling for national unity, for a coming together of monarchist, capitalist, Falangist and worker opposition to the regime.
A Macabre Episode
In the last period of his life Franco was like a mummy, something out of a horror B movie, a creature that was artificially kept alive by the wonders of modern science. It is even possible that his death was kept secret from the public out of fear that the announcement would spark off a mass movement on the streets. But there was no way of halting the inexorable processes of Mother Nature.
The totally decayed state of the regime found an adequate expression in the physical state of the aged dictator. For some time, it was clear to everybody that Franco was in an advanced stage of senile decay. In his public appearances, which were increasingly rare, the old man looked more like a skeleton than a living being. His speeches on television were brief, hesitant, and delivered in a trembling voice, always opening with the same words: “Españoles todos” (Spaniards all) and proceeding invariably with the celebrated declaration: “I declare this dam open”, words that became the source of innumerable jests on the part of a sceptical public.
It is striking proof of the regime’s extreme weakness that its very existence depended on a ghoulish attempt to pump life into the lifeless veins of a corpse. But sooner or later nature defeats all attempts to prolong life beyond its limits. In the end, nature proves stronger than the strongest regime – and this was by no means such a regime.
Even as his health deteriorated, the old dictator was as vindictive as ever. In 1975, he issued a harsh ‘anti-terrorist’ law. Five men were sentenced to death, two from ETA and three from the FRAP (Frente Revolucionario Antifascista y Patriota, Revolutionary Anti-fascist Patriotic Front). In protest, fifteen European countries recalled their ambassadors. There were demonstrations and attacks against the Spanish embassies in Europe. Mexico demanded Spain’s expulsion from the United Nations. There were even calls for clemency from the pope. But Franco was deaf to all these appeals. He went ahead with the executions.
Desperate to hold onto power, the leading elements in the clique around the Caudillo decided to do everything in their power to keep Franco alive. A macabre comedy was played out in public in the last months of his life. A horde of doctors and specialists were employed to keep him alive. Throughout this period, it was clear that it was only a matter of time before Franco would die. But the self-evident fact was repeatedly denied by a constant stream of communiqués put out in the government-controlled media.
The dictator’s condition had been steadily declining – a fact that was perfectly evident from the steady stream of medical bulletins, despite all attempts to convey the opposite impression. The rumour mill was now working feverishly. Every other day Franco’s death was announced – only to be hastily denied. It was as if the fate of the entire regime depended on the feeble pulse and fevered breathing of a living corpse. It was a fitting description of the regime itself, a regime so rotten to the core that it could scarcely maintain itself.
On 1 October 1975, the thirty-ninth anniversary of Franco’s ascent to power, this decrepit old man made his final public appearance on the balcony of the Palacio de Oriente. He had difficulty speaking, mumbling his customary clichés: Spain’s problems were all the fault of a Communist-Masonic conspiracy, the politicians, the terrorists… Finally raising both arms, his eyes full of tears he vanished forever from the public gaze.
If that was an attempt to show the public that the old man was alive and well, it backfired badly. Exposure to winds on the palace balcony caused pneumonia, which was followed by a heart attack and intestinal haemorrhaging. Desperate to keep the dictator alive, his supporters ordered three operations. Then there was silence. The country waited with bated breath, some with fear in their heart, many others with a sense of gleeful anticipation.
The final dénouement began on 18 October 1975, when he finally became irreversibly incapacitated. On his deathbed the man whose name once inspired terror now became the target of a million jokes directed at the medical team keeping him alive. One of them was: “Why is General Franco a rebellious soldier?” someone cracked: “Because he won’t get into his box.”
On 21 October, the American Broadcasting Company reported that Franco had died (it took him another month). The Times reported on 22 October that “reliable sources close to the El Pardo Palace household, squashed persistent rumours that Franco was dead”. The phrase “reliable sources” had an especially ironic ring, since everybody knew that Spanish news agencies were notorious for their manipulation of the news when Franco was alive and could confidently be expected to continue this venerable tradition even when he was dead.
I will never forget the sight of the old Catalan anarchist in whose house I was staying in Santa Coloma de Gramenet. As he watched the television screen, avid for the news he longed to hear, he was unable to contain his excitement. Finally, the grotesque comedy was over. His dearest wish had been granted.
Death of a Dictator
On a chilly morning, Thursday 20 November 1975, the people of Spain turned on their radios to hear the sound of solemn music. That moment will forever remain in their memories. This was the day eagerly awaited by millions and feared by others when Generalissimo Francisco Franco Bahamonde, the man who had tyrannised Spain for thirty-six years, was dead. At 11.15 pm the previous night, the doctors had finally been given permission to remove tubes and drips to allow him to die. Official dispatches fixed the time of death as 5.25 am, after the morning dailies went to press. On the streets of city centre Madrid, newspaper vendors were soon selling stacks of souvenir issues.
At 10 am, a tearful Carlos Arias Navarro appeared on television, his long face, which in any case seemed to be in a permanent state of mourning, was now twisted in an expression of grief that may even have been sincere, as he announced to the nation with a trembling voice that Franco was no more. Reading out Franco’s last testament, he proclaimed himself “a faithful son of the Church”, who had “no enemies other than the enemies of Spain”. Who exactly those enemies were he did not specify.
In vain the authorities attempted to inject a sense of national tragedy into the situation. Most people were either indifferent to the fate of their ‘beloved Caudillo’ or else were buying in supplies of champagne in expectation of the news of his death. An Irish journalist who was in Madrid at the time recalls that:
At the popular level, throughout the marathon wait for the historic moment of the General’s passing, life in Madrid went on outwardly unruffled. Madrileños (residents of Madrid) followed their usual routine. The affluent middle class frequented favourite restaurants. After-work drinkers were still in the bars. Young people crowded the discos. Workers travelling into the city at 6 am stopped for a drink before starting long shifts. Mothers took children to school and headed to the supermarkets. Old men played bowls and smoked their pipes.4
The right-wing Falangist daily Arriba carried a front-page photograph of Franco giving a victory salute under the headline, ‘Adiós a España’. Not to be outdone, the monarchist ABC published the following outrageous statement without the least sign of embarrassment: “Francoists, less-than-Francoists and even anti-Francoists recognise his human virtues that led him to turn his whole life into an act of service.”
The evening paper Informaciones, carried a picture of the dead Caudillo laid out in his coffin in a military naval-blue uniform covered with star-studded medals. But its accompanying headline betrayed a note of anxiety – ‘Dolor y serenidad tras la muerte de Franco’ – ‘Sorrow and serenity follows the death of Franco.’ That is what they hoped for. But they feared something quite different, and they were not mistaken.
“After death comes Franco’s last plea to avoid division,” was the main story saying he “left Spain face-to-face with the problem of how to evolve peacefully from the thirty-six years of authoritarian rule to a system of liberal democracy”.
Even the form that Franco’s funeral would take was the source of new conflict between the Franco family, the Church and the more liberal elements of the regime. The following day 300,000 mourners chanting “Franco, Franco, Franco” attended open-air mass in the Plaza de Oriente. The General’s corpse was finally deposited in the basilica of the Civil War Memorial at the Valley of the Fallen, close to the fascist Primo de Rivera.
Among the foreign guests for the solemn session was General Augusto Pinochet, the bloody dictator of Chile, King Hussein of Jordan, who organised the massacre of Palestinians in 1970, Prince Rainier, the playboy monarch of Monaco; Imelda Marcos, the wife of the dictator of the Philippines. The United States of America was represented by its Vice President, Nelson Rockefeller.
National mourning was decreed for thirty days, during which all forms of entertainment (except religion and football) were suspended until six o’clock on Sunday afternoon. The bakeries had to close before noon. But in the workers districts from Bilbao to Seville in innumerable flats and houses there were celebrations. And in a matter of hours the supplies of champagne all over Spain ran dry.5
The Game of Thrones Part III: At Franco’s Bedside
Towards the end of his life, Franco was so far gone that they could no longer keep up the slightest pretence that he was able to carry out the functions of Head of State. And so, between 19 July and 2 September 1974, Juan Carlos had stepped into Franco’s shoes. Significantly, one of his first duties in his new role was to head the celebrations on the anniversary of the 1936 fascist uprising against the Spanish Republic on 18 July 1974.
Juan Carlos had been invited to visit the United States by President Richard Nixon. This was only natural since Washington had supported the Franco regime since the 1950s, as part of its Cold War strategy on the basis that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. As well as these historical ties, the Americans had another reason for the invitation. They knew that Franco was dying. Two days later, and equally significantly, his first official act was the signing of a joint statement with the United States, extending the mutual assistance treaty between the two countries.
On 1 October 1975, Juan Carlos appeared side by side with the ailing Franco at a rally organised by the regime in response to international condemnation of the execution of five political prisoners. Two days after Franco went to meet his Maker, Juan Carlos was proclaimed King of Spain by the fascist parliament. He left a posthumous message to the nation: “I ask you to preserve unity and peace and surround the future King of Spain, Don Juan Carlos de Borbón, with the same affection that you offered me.”
Juan Carlos was sworn in as King at a joint session of the parliament and a seventeen-man council of the realm. The Generalissimo died convinced that with the new King, his regime was “atado y bien atado” (tied up and well tied up). He was mistaken – but not at all in his judgement of Juan Carlos.
The official biography on the Casa Real website tells us that:
Following the death of former Head of State Francisco Franco, Juan Carlos was proclaimed king on 22 November 1975 and delivered before Parliament his first message to the nation. In it he expressed the principal ideas of his reign: that of restoring democracy and being the king of all Spaniards, without exception.
But the records prove that this was entirely false. This is how Juan Carlos described the dead dictator:
An exceptional figure enters into history. The name of Francisco Franco will be a highlight of Spanish history, an essential reference point and a key to understanding our contemporary political life. With respect and gratitude, I wish to remember the face of the one who for so many years bore the heavy burden of leading the country.
In a speech to the nation that he delivered on Christmas eve, 24 December 1975, Juan Carlos again paid fulsome tribute to Franco and his legacy:
The year ends on a deep note of sadness because of the illness and death of one who was for many years our generalissimo. The testament that he leaves the Spanish people is undoubtedly a historical document that reflects the enormous human qualities, the enormous feelings of patriotism on which he wished to base his work as head of our nation. We now have a very solid basis on which to build. It is inherited from the generation that was sacrificed and the extraordinary efforts of certain exemplary Spaniards. Today, I dedicate to them a tribute of respect and admiration.
There is no hint or a mention of democracy or mention of the establishment of a democratic transition – in fact, no mention of change of any sort whatsoever. On the contrary, Juan Carlos swore loyalty to Franco’s legacy and said that he would continue his work:
I swear before God and the Holy Gospels to respect and uphold the Fundamental Laws of the Realm and remain loyal to the principles of the National Movement.
But very soon he would be obliged to sing a different tune. The death of the old tyrant provided a fresh impetus to the wave of protests and strikes that swept the entire country. The government responded in the only way it knew – with a bloody crackdown. But gradually it dawned on the King of Spain that the status quo could not be maintained. Probably the US embassy warned him of the danger and suggested that change was inevitable. He had already ditched a live father. He would have little difficulty in ditching a dead dictator. The main thing was that Juan Carlos should survive.
In early December, the king decreed an extremely limited amnesty. Barely one hundred political prisoners were liberated, the leaders of the CCOO imprisoned during the ‘1,001 Court Process’ were among them, whilst over 2,000 political prisoners continued to languish in the regime’s prisons. Limited as the reforms were, they encouraged the workers to go onto the offensive. Throughout the month of December, a wave of mobilisations broke out demanding full amnesty for all political prisoners. On the streets the cry continued to echo: “Amnistía y Libertad!”
[1] Francisco García Salve, Historia de la Transición, Vol. 16, p. 43, Ed., El País.
[2] Also known as Pedro Solabarria, he was considered a pioneer of the worker priest movement. Born in Portugalete, Vizcaya he was a priest in various industrial and mining areas with militant traditions. This exposure developed his political consciousness to a point at which he became a full-time factory worker in 1954 and participated in the trade unions and political struggle.
[3] No. 4, April 1975.
[4] John Cooney, ‘Spain was in flux when I covered the dictator’s death’, The Irish Times, 20 November 2015.
[5] See Charles Powell, Revisiting Spain’s Transition to Democracy.