Julián Besteiro
Julián Besteiro | |
|---|---|
Member of the Congress of Deputies | |
| In office 13 March 1918 – 15 September 1923 | |
| Constituency | Madrid |
| In office 4 July 1931 – 2 February 1937 | |
| Constituency | Madrid |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 21 September 1870 PSOE |
| Signature |  |
Julián Besteiro Fernández ([xuˈljam besˈtejɾo], 21 September 1870 – 27 September 1940) was a Spanish socialist politician, elected to the Cortes Generales and in 1931 as Speaker of the Constituent Cortes of the Spanish Republic. He also was elected several times to the town council of Madrid. During the same period, he was a university professor of philosophy and logic, and dean of the department at the University of Madrid. He was imprisoned after the Civil War and died in jail.
Early life
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Born in
A member of the Republican Union, he was elected municipal councillor of Toledo on 8 November 1903.[1]
He became a member of the Agrupación Socialista Madrileña (the socialist circle in Madrid) in 1912. That year he was offered the Chair of Fundamental Logic in the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters at the University of Madrid. Soon after, Besteiro became a member of Unión General de Trabajadores (UGT) trade union, and of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE).[2] In 1913 he married Dolores Cebrián, a professor of physics and natural science at the teachers' training college in Toledo.
In 1917, after the general strike, Besteiro was among many members of the strike committee tried in Madrid; he was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. Following his release under the amnesty campaign, he was elected as a member of the town council of Madrid.[2]
The following year, Besteiro was elected to the Cortes (the Spanish Parliament) as member of the Congress of Deputies for Madrid.[2]
During the dictatorship of Miguel Primo de Rivera, Besteiro favored collaboration by the socialists with the leader. Primo de Rivera offered UGT participation in governing the country. To a certain extent, the arrangement in the mid-1920s appeared to be a success. Opinion within the PSOE turned against Besteiro as the Primo de Rivera regime became more unpopular during the economic downturn as part of the Great Depression.
By the mid-1930s, Besteiro became politically isolated in his opinions on collaboration. This was opposed by the republican front established by the Pact of San Sebastián.[3] Bestiero had also opposed the participation of UGT in the 15 December 1930 general strike. At a joint meeting of the PSOE and UGT in February 1931, Besteiro resigned as President of both the party and the union. (Note: Paul Preston writes that Besteiro resigned as president of the union in 1934.[4])
In 1931 he was elected a councillor of the Madrid town council.
Second Spanish Republic and the Civil War
Still serving in the
Opposing the radicalization of the Socialist movement,[4] he disapproved the socialists' taking part in the armed uprising of October 1934.[7] In February 1936, Besteiro won the highest number of votes of any candidate in Madrid in the Popular Front elections.
Throughout this period, Besteiro had continued to work in the University of Madrid as a Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, as well as to carry out his duties as a parliamentary deputy and councillor of the town council in Madrid. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, and against the urgings of friends, he refused to leave Madrid and seek exile.[2]
With the news of the fall of
Death
After the fall of Madrid to the
Besteiro was buried in the Cementerio Civil of Madrid.
Notes
- ^ Sánchez Lubián, Enrique (9 November 2003). "El republicano más honrado". El Mundo.
- ^ a b c d Jackson, Gabriel. The Spanish Republic and The Civil War, 1931-1939. Princeton University Press. Princeton. 1967. p. 470
- ^ Jackson (1967), The Spanish Republic and The Civil War, 1931-1939., p. 28
- ^ a b Preston, Paul. The Spanish Civil War. Reaction, Revolution & Revenge, Harper Perennial, 2006, p. 71
- ^ Beevor, Antony. The Battle for Spain. The Spanish Civil War. 1936-1939. Penguin books. London. 2006. p. 24
- ^ Preston, Paul. The Coming of the Spanish Civil War: Reform, Reaction and Revolution in the Spanish Second Republic. Routledge. New York. 1994. p. 77.
- ^ Jackson (1967), The Spanish Republic and The Civil War, p. 182
- ^ Beevor (2006), The Battle for Spain, p. 333
- ^ Jackson (1967), The Spanish Republic and The Civil War, pp. 441-442
- ^ Beevor (2006), The Battle for Spain, pp. 391-392
- ^ Beevor (2006), The Battle for Spain, p. 394
- ^ Thomas, Hugh. The Spanish Civil War. Penguin Books. London. 2001. p. 888
- ^ Preston (2006), The Spanish Civil War, p. 319
References
- Comrades! Portraits from the Spanish Civil War by Paul Preston, HarperCollins Publishers ISBN 0-00-255635-9
- Spain's First Democracy: The Second Republic, 1931-1936, by Stanley G. Payne, University of Wisconsin Press ISBN 0-299-13674-4
- Beevor, Antony. The Battle for Spain. The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939. Penguin Books. London. 2006. ISBN 0-14-303765-X
- Jackson, Gabriel. The Spanish Republic and The Civil War, 1931-1939. Princeton University Press. Princeton. 1967. ISBN 0-691-00757-8
- Preston, Paul. The Spanish Civil War. Reaction, Revolution & Revenge. Harper Perennial. 2006. ISBN 0-00-723207-1
- Thomas, Hugh. The Spanish Civil War. Penguin Books. London. 2003. ISBN 978-0-14-101161-5
External links
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