Word: franco
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Slowly but inexorably, the old order seems to be giving way under Juan Carlos. Last week the 565-member Cortes (Parliament) embarked on the first genuine post-Franco reform by voting to lift a ban on political meetings. The government of aging (67) Premier Carlos Arias Navarro also acknowledged that negotiations were under way for Juan Carlos' father, Don Juan, to renounce his claim to the throne. The traditional Victory Day, May 30, which celebrates the defeat of the Republican side in the civil war, was discreetly renamed Armed Forces Day. In another token of change, portraits of Franco...
...replaced in 1977 by a 300-member Lower House, elected by universal suffrage (long demanded by leftists). There will also be a 285-member Senate with "equal powers." Candidates for the Upper House will be put forward by an entrenched local power system that is the legacy of the Franco era: provincial authorities, government-sponsored labor unions and associations of businessmen. Forty will be members for life. The King will still have sole authority to choose a Premier, but his choice must come from three names submitted to him by the right-wing-dominated regency council, said Interior Minister Manuel...
Despite the dyspepsia of the opposition, it is a fact that for the first time politicians not directly connected to the old Franco apparatus are out of the closet. The press is lively and aggressive. There are still depressing examples of repression in Spain (a claimed 700 political prisoners, 291 of them accused of terrorism). Basques, Catalans and striking workers carrying on illegal political demonstrations can expect head bashings from Spain's 65,000-man civil guard and 40,000 armed police, who are under Fraga's control. "If the opposition wants to make trouble in the streets...
Carlos steadily gains self-confidence. In Franco's waning days, the royal heir designate led a listless life sailing off Mallorca, skiing in Granada, toying with his Nikons and snipping ceremonial ribbons. Today he is at the center of the political vortex and shows a clear and subtle understanding of the conflicting currents. The stream of ministerial cars passing through the gates of Zarzuela Palace, his residence northwest of Madrid, indicates that the King has clout where it counts. Significantly, Juan Carlos is using that clout to receive not only ministers but opposition leaders like Ruiz-Gimenez...
Juan Carlos' public pronouncements have been few and bland. Nonetheless, there are encouraging signs that the King may be a good deal less cautious than either Fraga or Arias, a timid holdover from Franco's days who is probably too venerable and rigid to be the kind of Premier that Juan Carlos needs at such a critical time. The King apparently recognizes that if Spain swings too far left too swiftly, there would be no returning, but in no sense is he acting as a brake on change in Spanish life. On the contrary, he evinces a certain...