A bit of history

In 1931, the Second Republic began in Spain when anti-monarchical leaders came to power.  They introduced a new constitution that included a bunch of reforms.  This limited the power of the Army, the Catholic Church, and the central government.  It established the right to free speech and gave women the right to vote.  It also allowed people to get married, divorced, and buried outside of the Church. In an attempt to lessen the huge gap between the small upper class and the huge lower class, it took away the special legal status of the nobility.

The flag of the Second Republic has three stripes: red, yellow, and purple.  It can still sometimes be seen today.  From the mirador where I got the "rooftop view" of Albayzin, I can see it waving in someone's backyard.

The government of Spain swung back and forth for the next five years, until civil war broke out in 1936.  On one side were the Bando Sublevado, aka the Nationalists, who supported tradition and order.  This included the fascist party, the conservative party, the army, and the Catholic Church.  They also had support from Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy.  The other side was the Bando Republicano, aka the Popular Front, everybody who supported the  Second Republic.  This included most of Spain's working class and peasants, intellectuals, the liberal party, the communist party, the socialist party, and anarchists.  They had support from Mexico, the  Soviet Union, and the International Brigades.  (Fun fact: George Orwell fought for the Republicans!)  In the end, the Nationalist side won in 1939, and Fransisco Franco, a general and strong military leader, came to power.

Franco's dictatorship lasted until his death in 1975, and it made life very difficult for anyone who opposed him.  Most of them had to leave Spain (but considering it was 1939, there wasn't really anywhere for them to go).  A bunch of children ended up in the Soviet Union, and a bunch of communists and others were killed for their political beliefs.  The Church, which totally supported him, had control over all the schools, so they pretty much turned all the children into little Franco followers.  Also, all the divorces and civil marriages that had occurred during the Second Republic were now void. So, anybody who had gotten remarried was considered an adulterer, which a woman could be jailed for.  Franco's motto was "España: una, grande, y libre," and his party, the Falange, adopted the symbols of los Reyes Católicos (shown above).  He wanted Spain to go back to how it was during their time, a powerful, Catholic empire.


After the Axis lost WWII, Franco had to give in to international pressure and ease up a bit.  And... that´s as far as I've gotten in my history class so far.  I find it all really interesting, I just hope I'm understanding it right.  Nowadays people don't really like to talk about what Spain had to go through under Franco's rule.  I think they're just so focused on moving forward from that time.  Not too far from my house, there's a tiny park tucked away in a corner that nobody ever goes to.  In it there is a statue dedicated in 1972 to José Antonio Primo de Rivera, the founder of Franco's Falange Party.  Somebody had splattered red paint on it.  I felt kind of dirty stopping to take a picture of it.  I hope I didn't offend anybody.