Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

After Franco, What?

  • Chapter
Book cover Juan Carlos of Spain

Part of the book series: St Antony’s Series ((STANTS))

Abstract

Shortly before his investiture Juan Carlos told a foreign journalist that his overriding goal was ‘the restoration of real democracy’, by which he understood the establishment of a Western-style parliamentary monarchy. The king’s reasons for advocating such a system of government were at once simple and complex. The period since Carrero Blanco’s assassination had given him a realistic foretaste of what was in store for him as king of a Francoist monarchy and it was a prospect he did not relish. Although the situation after Franco’s death was different in that he had inherited some of his powers, Juan Carlos could still be held hostage by the government, the Cortes and the Council of the Realm, institutions over which he had relatively little control. His first goal was therefore to become genuinely independent of the executive and legislative institutions of the country, something that could only be achieved in the context of a fully democratic parliamentary monarchy.1

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Notes and Reference

  1. Newsweek, 3 November 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Newsweek, 3 November 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  3. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 193–6; author’s interviews with Primo de Rivera and De la Mata.

    Google Scholar 

  4. López Rodó, La larga marcha, pp. 476, 493; Tamayo, Lo que yo he conocido. Recuerdos de un viejo catedrático que fue ministro, p. 428 ff.

    Google Scholar 

  5. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 186–92; Figuero and Herrero, La muerte, pp. 164–9. The king told Borchgrave that he was planning to appoint ‘a fifty-year old centrist who calls himself an apolitical technocrat’. Newsweek, 8 December 1975. Author’s interview with Oreja.

    Google Scholar 

  6. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 211–13.

    Google Scholar 

  7. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 213–16; Bayod, Franco visto, pp. 407–8, 417. In an interview with Silva on 3 December the king assured him that Arias would be replaced. Silva, Memorias, p. 324.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Suárez/Toledo; Areilza, Diario, p. 13; Oneto, Anatomía, p. 141.

    Google Scholar 

  9. Juan Carlos had no doubt read Fraga’s article ‘La Monarquía de España’, ABC, 14 November 1975, in which he further elaborated his programme. Fraga, En busca del tiempo servido, p. 15.

    Google Scholar 

  10. Author’s interview with Fraga. Fraga, En busca, pp. 20–1.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Author’s interview with Oliero; Areilza, Crónica p. 168; Areilza, Diario, p. 16.

    Google Scholar 

  12. Areilza, Diario, p. 15; ABC, 7 November 1975. Silva Muñoz, Memorias, pp. 324–6; Garrigues y Díaz Canabate, Diálogos conmigo mismo, p. 163.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Vilallonga, The king, p. 98.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Author’s interview with Osorio; Osorio, Trayectoria, p. 124.

    Google Scholar 

  15. Author’s interview with Suárez; Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 217–20, 416.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Author’s interview with Suárez.

    Google Scholar 

  17. Author’s interview with Martín Villa.

    Google Scholar 

  18. San Martín, Servicio especial, pp. 116, 245.

    Google Scholar 

  19. Areilza, Diario, pp. 76–7; Gutiérrez Mellado, Un soldado de España, p. 40.

    Google Scholar 

  20. López Rodó, Memorias, IV, pp. 217, 226.

    Google Scholar 

  21. Areilza, Diario, pp. 20, 77; Mundo Obrero, 1 January 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  22. Newsweek, 5 January 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  23. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 233–4, 368–9.

    Google Scholar 

  24. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 314–16.

    Google Scholar 

  25. Areilza, Diario, p. 84; Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 329–30.

    Google Scholar 

  26. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, p. 361.

    Google Scholar 

  27. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 331–2; Areilza, Diario, pp. 164, 168.

    Google Scholar 

  28. Sánchez-Terán, De Franco a la Generalitat, pp. 47–56.

    Google Scholar 

  29. Sánchez-Terán, De Franco, p. 51.

    Google Scholar 

  30. Mundo Obrero, 25 February 1976; López Rodó, Memorias, IV, pp. 225–6.

    Google Scholar 

  31. Opinion Poll number 1099, April 1976, IOP; Newsweek, 19 April 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Areilza, Diario, p. 124. The visit to Andalusia was severely criticised by Carlos Alba in Mundo Obrero, 7 April 1976. Bau Carpi, Crónica de veinte años, pp. 286–7; ‘Pancartas para el Rey’, El País, 21 May 1976; Baón, Fraga, genio y figura, p. 79.

    Google Scholar 

  33. Fontán, Don Juan entra en la Historia, pp. 25–6; Areilza, Diario, pp. 21, 41, 44; López Rodó, Memorias, IV, pp. 241–2, 238–9; El País, 5 November 1994.

    Google Scholar 

  34. Newsweek, 4 November 1975; author’s interview with Borchgrave.

    Google Scholar 

  35. Papell, Conversaciones, p. 86; ‘Una prueba para el rey’, El Socialista, December 1975 and ‘Críticas a la Monarquía’, January 1976; Newsweek, 8 December 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  36. Discusión y convivencia, December 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  37. Areilza, Diario, p. 97.

    Google Scholar 

  38. Author’s interview with Puig de la Bellacasa; Discusión y convivencia, December 1975.

    Google Scholar 

  39. Mundo Obrero, 28 March 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  40. Author’s interviews with Múgica and García Trevijano.

    Google Scholar 

  41. The telegram read as follows: ‘I would ask you to convey to your government my extreme dismay, and that of the European Parliament, at a time when it was looking forward to a liberalisation of the political situation in Spain in the longer-term hope of a rapprochement between your country and the European Community. We should welcome with great relief any satisfactory assurances on your part’. When Juan Carlos was told that Garcia Trevijano was amongst those arrested, his first reaction was to observe: ‘this character ought to have his tax returns inspected’. Baón, Fraga, p. 54.

    Google Scholar 

  42. Alvarez de Miranda, Del ‘contubernio’ al consenso, pp. 104–6.

    Google Scholar 

  43. Gil Robles, Un final de jornada, pp. 163–72.

    Google Scholar 

  44. See his ‘Esquema de un camino hacia la democracia’, dated 26 May 1976, in Gil Robles, Un final de jornada, pp. 163–72; Areilza, Diario, pp. 148, 157.

    Google Scholar 

  45. Areilza, Diario, pp. 149–50, 174–5. González always suspected that Areilza’s proposal had been made without the king’s explicit consent. Guadiana, 18–24 May 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  46. Suárez/Toledo; González/Toledo; Osorio, Trayectoria, p. 143.

    Google Scholar 

  47. Fraga/Toledo; González/Toledo.

    Google Scholar 

  48. Author’s interview with Fraga; Otero Novas, Nuestra democracia puede morir, p. 58.

    Google Scholar 

  49. El País, 22 May 1976; Otero Novas, Nuestra democracia, p. 62; Areilza, Diario, p. 179.

    Google Scholar 

  50. Morán, Miseria y grandeza, p. 515; ‘La responsabilidad de Juan Carlos’, Mundo Obrero, 5 May 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  51. Mundo Obrero, 26 May 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  52. Newsweek, 26 April 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  53. The New York Times, 19 June 1976; Fraga, En busca, pp. 49–52; Osorio, Trayectoria, p. 124; Otero Novas, Nuestra democracia, p. 58.

    Google Scholar 

  54. Suárez/Toledo; López Rodó, Memorias, IV, p. 255; Armada, Al servicio, p. 141; Osorio, Trayectoria, p. 167.

    Google Scholar 

  55. López Rodó, Memorias, IV, p. 254.

    Google Scholar 

  56. The king set aside the speech initially prepared for him by Areilza, which enumerated the Arias government’s reform proposals in great detail, and only used the historical references it contained. López Rodó, Memorias, IV, p. 254.

    Google Scholar 

  57. Areilza, Diario, p. 189. One of the Spanish journalists present at the press conference observed that Areilza seemed to ‘dominate the situation, to the point of behaving rudely towards his head of state, interrupting and qualifying the king’s replies’. Ysart, Quién hizo el cambio, p. 57. The PCE was highly critical of the king’s visit, and remained sceptical as to his intentions. Mundo Obrero, 9 and 16 June 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  58. López Rodó, Memorias, IV, p. 254.

    Google Scholar 

  59. Eaton, The forces of freedom in Spain, 1974–79, p. 37; Newsweek, 19 April 1976. According to Juan Carlos, Arias ‘didn’t have the necessary vision to face up to the radical changes the Spaniards were demanding’. Vilallonga, The king, p. 163; Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 372–3; Areilza, Diario, pp. 106–7, 118, 133, 152. Under Suárez a new internal telephone system was installed, enabling the king to talk to ministers and senior military men without fear of being spied on.

    Google Scholar 

  60. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 373–81.

    Google Scholar 

  61. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 381–3.

    Google Scholar 

  62. Areilza, Diario, pp. 14–15, 35, 66, 196; Eaton, The forces of freedom, p. 40; The Washington Post, 8 and 19 June 1976.

    Google Scholar 

  63. López Rodó, Memorias, IV, p. 254; Areilza, Diario, p. 161; author’s interview with Puig de la Bellacasa. The latter was briefly replaced by another career diplomat, Santiago Martinez Caro.

    Google Scholar 

  64. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 397–400.

    Google Scholar 

  65. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, p. 441.

    Google Scholar 

  66. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, p. 465; Areilza, Diario, pp. 146–8, 168.

    Google Scholar 

  67. Areilza, Diario, pp. 107, 134.

    Google Scholar 

  68. Areilza, Diario, pp. 78, 134, 204, 213.

    Google Scholar 

  69. Author’s interviews with Otero Novas and Fraga.

    Google Scholar 

  70. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 417–18; Suárez/Toledo.

    Google Scholar 

  71. Osorio, Trayectoria, pp. 86–90.

    Google Scholar 

  72. Author’s interview with Martín Villa.

    Google Scholar 

  73. Vilallonga, The king, p. 70; Suárez/Toledo; Salmador, Las dos Españas, p. 161. Fernández-Miranda later told a former minister he had selected Suárez because ‘he will do as I tell him’. Fernández de la Mora, Los errores del cambio, p. 29.

    Google Scholar 

  74. Suárez/Toledo; Osorio, Trayectoria, p. 129; Areilza, Diario, pp. 197–9; ‘Arias contra Cambio 16’, Diario 16, Historia de la transición, pp. 283–4.

    Google Scholar 

  75. Suárez/Toledo.

    Google Scholar 

  76. Vilallonga, The king, p. 69.

    Google Scholar 

  77. Areilza, Diario, p. 214.

    Google Scholar 

  78. Bayod, Franco visto, pp. 312–13.

    Google Scholar 

  79. Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, p. 423 ff. The Council of the Realm’s secretary, De la Mata, told Silva Munoz that Suárez would be appointed prime minister on 1 July. Silva Muñoz, Memorias, pp. 332–4.

    Google Scholar 

  80. Morán, Adolfo Suárez. Historia de un ambición, pp. 56–60; Enrique de la Mata, ‘Aquella reunión del Consejo del Reino’, Diario 16, Historia, pp. 291–3; ABC, 7 July 1976; Suárez/Toledo.

    Google Scholar 

  81. Silva Muñoz, Memorias, pp. 334–5.

    Google Scholar 

  82. Suárez/Toledo.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors
  1. Charles Powell
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Copyright information

© 1996 Charles Powell

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Powell, C. (1996). After Franco, What?. In: Juan Carlos of Spain. St Antony’s Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-24423-2_5

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-24423-2_5

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-0-333-64929-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-349-24423-2

  • eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation