THE OUTLOOK IN SPAIN. T HE terrible tragedy at Santa Agueda
at once suggests a survey of the political situation in Spain. In Seiior Canovas the Conservative party, it is universally conceded, has lost its best leader and its most powerful intellect. Even his bitterest political opponents admitted the personal charm and high intellectual qualities of the dead Premier. Though bred to literature and famous as a historical writer, Senor Canovas was not of that well- known type of politician manque' whom the library so often furnishes to the political arena. He was a man of affairs, brilliant in conversation, and at the same time weighty and positive in intellect. Sprung from the ranks, he yet conceived in his mind a great and aristocratic Spain bound to the past and handing on its glories to the future. His Cuban policy, however cruelly it may have been carried out by General Weyler, was born, we believe, purely from a certain grand pride which would sacrifice Spain's last real rather than her honour. The condition of Spain is deplorable enough, but we cannot attribute her economic wreckage to the deliberate policy of Canovas, who found himself charged with the solution of a problem which he did not create, but was com- pelled to meet. It is not improbable that Seiler Sagasta, had he been in office, would have taken a sub- stantially similar line, and would have spent life and treasure in quelling Colonial insurrection, primarily to defend a certain not ignoble ideal of Spanish honour. We cannot, therefore, attribute the undoubted failure of the Conservative policy to its dead chief, who was the victim of an almost hopeless political condition. Canovas was far and away the first man in the Conservative party, and his death will leave that party deprived of a great personality. Obviously, Seiior Sagasta will not take office now, quite apart from the patriotic reason he gave (and no doubt truly gave) that no party should be allowed te gain or lose by a tragedy felt to be national. There will be, we must assume, a "Ministry of Affairs," perhaps with Senor Pidal at its head, and that Ministry will, it can hardly be doubted, carry on the Cuban war, but not in so strenuous a fashion, or with so certain an aim as before. The great problem which such a Ministry will have to meet will be the financial problem. The war in Cuba has cost over 0240,000,000, and the end seems no nearer now than it was two years ago. The Spanish debt stands at about .2350,000,000, or about .220 per head of a population mainly poor, and over large districts very poor, and the annual charges are more than half the whole revenue of the country. Blood cannot be got from a flint, and we suspect that increase of taxation is next to impossible for the majority of the population. Unless, therefore, the Conservative party, which represents the landed and financial classes, is prepared to tax specially all kinds of wealth, and unless these classes are also prepared to sacrifice something for this ideal of national great- ness and honour which Canovas held before him as a leading motive, we do not see how the financial problem can be dealt with. But if the financial problem cannot be solved, all talk of subjugating Cuba may be taken as mere histrionics. The Cuban war is a particularly expensive war, and finances at home must be set right before any chance of ending it is possible to Spain. If the "Ministry of Affairs" cannot square accounts, then it seems to us that Senior Sagasta must inevitably resume power, and that he must show his hand as regards Cuba. He has up to the present had the easy role of a, critic, but he would then be compelled to face the issue of a continuance of the Weyler tactics or a very large concession to the Cuban autonomists, on the lines suggested last December in Mr. Cleveland's final message.
Senor Sagasta is over seventy, a vigorous orator, and a very skilful parliamentary tactician ; so agreeable a man that it is said he has not a personal foe. He is what we should call an old-fashioned Liberal of the orthodox economic school, and he has succeeded in attracting to his party not a few of the hidalgo class. There is very little doubt that his ideas are those of a declining school in Spain, a country which is always for ultra courses, for wild revolution or impossible reaction, which has not the political temper, and which, therefore, cannot take kindly to the political creed which, of all others, demands the moderate spirit and the political temper. The probable succession of Seiior Sagasta to power, after a greatly weakened Conservative Ministry shall have failed, would be due rather to his own masterly qualities of leadership and personal popularity, than to any belief in Liberalism per se. That section of the Republicans which follows Senor Castelar would, however, frankly support a Sagasta Ministry with a modified Cuban policy. Sefior Castelar is still, as he has been for nearly a generation, the leading figure in Spain. Were he willing to take office, it would be the best possible solution of the Spanish problem. We suppose such of his Federalism as has survived the insurrection at Cartagena, and the mad " particularism " of that terrible crisis, would lead Senor Castelar to con- coct some kind of Federal arrangement for Cuba ; and it would be interesting to see whether the Cuban intran- sigeants could be got to look at the scheme. But the opportunity will not be given, for Seitor Castelar, though himself accepting the present Constitutional Monarchy, will not, as a Republican, take office under it. This frame of mind seems to us pedantic and anomalous, but it is final, and consequently any idea of a Castelar Ministry is impossible ; but the support of a Castelar group would be given to a Sagasta Ministry. There are two other Republican groups—the Unionist under Senor Salmeron and the Federalist under Senor Pi y Marge% the former of whom is known in Spain as the. "man of fire," and the latter the "man of ice." These Repub- lican groups are in permanent opposition to any form of Monarchy, but they are not at all Socialist. What their strength is, it is impossible to say, for every Spanish election is manipulated by the Government, and is no real mirror of public opinion. It is strange to note that, not content with three distinct Republican groups, the group of Senor Pi v Haman showed the inherent Spanish tendency to fissure. It has divided itself into two, the rival section being led by one of the grandees of Spain, the Marquis de Santa Marta,—another of the strange anomalies of Spanish life. It reads like the topsy- turvydom of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera. In addition to these four Republican parties, three of which are revolutionary, is the party of Socialism. Probably the Republicans have declined as the Socialists have in- creased, for the Spaniards have found their Republican strife barren of any palpable social results ; and it is, above all things, poverty that is the great problem in Spain, as it is the great problem in Italy. Not the poverty of a tiny section, but of whole social strata,— this is what has led to the growth of Socialism in Spain. We say Socialism, but Spanish Socialism is by no means of the hard, logical German type, but a dreamy semi- Anarchism which wants to destroy nearly every existing institution and then "begin again." We may dismiss this element, however, from the Parliamentary point of view, since it is hardly organised politically, and is probably incapable of political organisation. It works by other and more menacing means.
Conservatism in Spain, as represented by Canovas, is not by any means a purely reactionary creed. It has accepted frankly the Revolution of 1868 and the Con- stitutional Monarchy. The really reactionary element in Spain is the party of the Carlists, which is powerful in its persistence, but which, like every other Spanish party, is divided into two groups,—one led by the Marquis de Cervalbo, the more moderate ; the other by Vasquez de Melia, the more energetic of the two. Thus, in regard to her purely reactionary and legitimist section, Spain is still in the position in which France was before the "Fusion." Carlism has entailed more than one civil war on Spain, and we do not think we do it any injustice when we say that it is probably ready to entail another. Every crisis in Spanish politics is the occasion for Carlist activity, and the Carlists are more likely to rise than are the Republicans, who are divided alike in methods and ideals. That any such rising would be suppressed goes, of course, without saying ; but, in the present disturbed and unhappy condition of Spain, it could not fail to add very seriously to the troubles of the nation, There is abundant Carlist activity all over Western Europe, and the party contrives to raise large sums, but it is so obviously reactionary that the combined Progressive forces of Spain may be trusted to crush it once more if the occasion should need.
Such is the chaotic condition of Spanish politics and of Spanish finance. With a dozen groups in the Cortes, all quarrelling with one another, eachrcomposed of the camp- followers of some leader, most of them devoid of any elementary political insight, it is manifest that Parlia- mentary Government exists more in name than in fact. The tendency of all the Southern peoples to some kind of strong personal rule is obvious in Spain, as it is obvious in every country which Spaniards have colonised. The Spanish Premier, whether Liberal or Conservative, with his army of officials behind him, and his unchallenged power of packing the Cortes with his own followers, is in reality a kind of political dictator acting under the forms of constitutional govern- ment, until some new arrangement of groups in the Cortes places him in a minority and gives his rival a turn. The fundamental trouble in Spain is lack of independence of character, and is of course the inevitable result of centuries of Spanish history. The land of the Inquisition has indeed met with its nemesis. Political life, except of a rudimentary kind, is all but impossible, and for years to come we expect to see the present chaos continue. The best thing that could happen (and it seems that this may very likely happen) is that the Conservative party may be sufficiently powerful to survive in its full strength, and that the Liberals and Possibilist Republicans may form a solid union, thus creating a Ministry and Opposition strong enough to ignore minor factions. The chief political danger seems to come from the Carlists, as the social danger comes from the Anarchists. A firm and resolute system of government can meet the first, but only a great financial readjustment can meet the second. Such a readjustment appears to mean either the relinquish- ment of the Weyler policy in Cuba, or a levy on the rich classes to provide the sinews of war. And finally, while a Conservative Ministry of Affairs is likely to be able to carry on the Government for a time, the outcome of the tragedy just perpetrated appears to be favourable to the combina- tion of Liberals plus Moderate Republicans in the near future.
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