Second Spanish Republic
The Spanish Republic (), commonly known as the Second Spanish Republic (), was the form of government in Spain from 1931 to 1939. The Republic was proclaimed on 14 April 1931, after the deposition of King Alfonso XIII, and was dissolved on 1 April 1939 after surrendering in the Spanish Civil War to the Nationalists that fought to erode communism out of Spain led by General Francisco Franco.

After the proclamation of the Republic, a provisional government was established until December 1931, when the 1931 Constitution was approved. Once the constituent assembly had fulfilled its mandate of approving a new constitution, it should have arranged for regular parliamentary elections and adjourned. However, fearing the increasingly popular opposition, the Radical and Socialist majority postponed the regular elections, prolonging their power for two more years. During this time, the government of Manuel Azaña initiated numerous reforms to what in their view would modernize the country. In 1932 the Jesuits, who were in charge of the best schools throughout the country, were banned and had all their property confiscated and the army was reduced. Landowners were expropriated. Home rule was granted to Catalonia, with a local parliament and a president of its own.

Soon Azaña lost parliamentary support and President Alcalá-Zamora forced his resignation in September 1933. The subsequent 1933 election was won by the Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right (CEDA). However the President declined to invite its leader, Gil Robles, to form a government, fearing CEDA's monarchist sympathies. Instead he invited the Radical Republican Party's Alejandro Lerroux to do so. CEDA was denied cabinet positions for nearly a year. In October 1934 CEDA was finally successful in forcing the acceptance of three ministries. The Socialists triggered an insurrection that they had been preparing for nine months. A general strike was called by the UGT and the PSOE in the name of the "Alianza Obrera". The rebellion developed into a bloody revolutionary uprising, aiming to overthrow the legitimate democratic regime. Armed revolutionaries managed to take the whole province of Asturias, committing numerous murders of policemen, clerics and civilians and destroying religious buildings and part of the university at Oviedo. In the occupied areas, the rebels officially declared a proletarian revolution and abolished regular money. The rebellion was crushed by the Spanish Navy and the Spanish Republican Army, the latter using mainly Moorish colonial troops from Spanish Morocco.

In 1935, after a series of crisis, President Alcalá-Zamora, who had always been hostile to the government, called for new elections, instead of inviting CEDA, the party with most seats in the parliament, to form a new government. The Popular Front won the 1936 general election with a narrow victory. The revolutionary left wing masses took to the streets, released prisoners and in a few hours, sixteen people were killed and thirty-nine were seriously injured, while fifty churches and seventy conservative political centres were attacked. Manuel Azaña Díaz was called upon to form a government before the electoral process had come to an end; he would shortly replace Zamora as president, taking advantage of a constitutional loophole. The right abandoned the parliamentary option and began to conspire to overthrow the republic, rather than taking control of it.

The disenchantment with Azaña's ruling was voiced by Miguel de Unamuno, a republican and one of Spain's most respected intellectuals, who said that President Manuel Azaña should commit suicide as a patriotic act". On 12 July 1936 a group of Guardia de Asalto and other leftist militiamen, with the approval of the minister of interior to illegally arrest a list of members or the parliament, went to opposition leader José Calvo Sotelo's house and shot him dead. This assassination had an electrifying effect which provided a catalyst to transform what was a "limping conspiracy", led by General Emilio Mola, into a powerful revolt. Three days later (17 July), the revolt began with an army uprising in Spanish Morocco, which then spread to several regions of the country. The military rebels intended to seize power immediately, but were met with serious resistance as most of the main cities remained loyal to the Republic. An estimated total of half a million people would lose their lives in the war that followed.

During the Spanish Civil War, there were three governments. The first was led by left-wing republican José Giral (from July to September 1936); however, a revolution inspired mostly on libertarian socialist, anarchist and communist principles broke within the Republic, which weakened the rule of the Republic. The second government was led by socialist Francisco Largo Caballero of the trade union General Union of Workers (UGT). The UGT, along with the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT), were the main forces behind the aforementioned social revolution. The third government was led by socialist Juan Negrín, who led the Republic until the military coup of Segismundo Casado, which ended republican resistance and ultimately led to the victory of the nationalists.

The Republican government survived in exile, and retained an embassy in Mexico City until 1976. After the restoration of democracy in Spain, the government-in-exile formally dissolved the following year.
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José Giral
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Second Spanish Republic
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1931-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1931
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1939
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14 April 1931
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1 April 1939
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1931
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1932-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1932
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1933
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October 1934
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1935-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1935
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1936-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1936
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12 July 1936
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September 1936
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1976
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17
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