The Political Evolution of the Spanish Premier

New Zealand Tablet, 15 December 1910, Page 2054

The Political Evolution of the Spanish Premier

There is a very curious article written in the Echo dp, Paris, by Sr. J. Vasquez de Mella, a deputy of the Spanish Cortes, which deals with the political evolution of the man so prominent before the world at the present time, Sr. Canalejas. At this distance (remarks America) it is impossible to determine with how much reserve these revelations are to be taken, but Vasquez does not hesitate to name the persons of them very distinguished in Church and Statewho were associated with the Spanish Premier in the very remarkable changes of his public career. Canalejas was brought up by his pious mother as a strict Catholic, but the impressions of childhood were afterwards somewhat affected by association with his uncle, Don Carlos, a professor in the University of Madrid. Not succeeding in his university career, he shut his books in disgust, and took to politics and the law. In politics he first trained with the Republicans. « After that the changes were rapid. He was for a time a Royalist, and then developed into an outspoken partisan of a military dictatorship. He kept the press busy with articles in support of that idea, until he became the mouthpiece of Polavieja, the ultramontane General, who was for a time the idol and hope of the non-Carlist Clericals. At that time he was furiously anti-Liberal, when suddenly he vaulted clean over to the opposition camp, broke with the Church, and published in Spanish the famous speech of Waldeck-Rousseau, at Toulouse. The most important event of his career occurred in 1896. The colonies were then in a state of collapse, the attitude of the United States was menacing, and Alfonso's health was a source of serious alarm. It was then that a plot was formed to bring back Don Carlos, by marrying Don Jaime, the son of Don Carlos, to Mercedes, the oldest daughter of Alfonso XII., and to make them sovereigns of Spain, under the active regency of Carlos The writer gives the names of all participants in this plot and specifies their place of meeting. With the exception of two they are all living and will vouch for the truth of Vasquez's words. He himself, though not admitted to the secret sessions, was kept informed of the proceedings day by day, by two persons specially deputed for that purpose. One of those persons is still living and ready to confirm all the statements about this particular incident. In 1897, Sr. Vasquez was entrusted with a special mission by Don Carlos himself. The conspiracy failed,' he says, because Don Carlos, who was always averse to all such arrangements, refused even to listen to the envoy who was sent to him. Whereupon two of the conspirators withdrew from the meeting. One of the two was not Canalejas, who had been all along the most active agent in the scheme. He persevered until the pud.'

'ln making these revelations,' says Vasquez, ' I have no desire to mortify Canalejas, or to seek to revive the fears of the Republicans, who doubt his sincerity. It is only to show that we must be on our guard against drawing any logical conclusions from the policies of Spanish parliamentarians. Nor should we hope to find any logical sequence in their ideas. This is particularly true of Canalejas, who is a very amiable man, very polite, endowed with intelligence and rich in imagination. He has read much, perhaps, too much, for he has gone too rapidly through books which were written very slowly. He is prodigal of assertions, penurious in reasoning, and deserves to a certain point the judgment passed on him by Castillo, who said he had too much stuff in. his style to' cover the very small substance of his thoughts. More than others, he is exposed to the suggestions of his environment. When under the influence of the journalist Figueroa, he was an ardent upholder of the Right; but when Figueroa gave way to Morote,, the present anti-clerical programme was drawn up. Morote had already developed it in the Freemason journals of Vienna. In brief, Canalejas wants to be first somewhere. He cannot be first among the leaders of the Right, for the place is preempted. So he has delivered himself up to the Left. But he is being dragged to the abyss.'

If only half of what this Spanish deputy says be true, it is clear that Canalejas is not a man possessed of the great ambition of freeing his country from the thrall of clericalism; not a valiant knight cavorting on his charger to spear the monster Pope, but a shifty politician who" is constantly out of office; who is all things by turns and nothing long. He is now hoping that his anti-clerical programme will mollify the Spanish Republicans and prevent them from imitating their Portuguese neighbors.