When Princess Leonor vows on Tuesday around 11:30 a.m. to “guard and ensure” the 1978 Constitution, as the current King Felipe VI did. did 37 years ago, she will neither be alone nor the only woman in the main gallery in the chamber. Congress. The heir to the throne is already supported on this stage by her family, the Queen and Infanta Sofia. And in the picture for history, her presence will be recorded alongside the president of the Cortes, the socialist Francina Armengol, and five of the nine members of the chamber’s board will be women, and 44% of the parliamentarians (deputies and senators) from the room. The incumbent government also has equal rights. It is the big, more than just symbolic difference from the portrait of January 30, 1986, when male MPs held 94% of the seats. Speakers of the Constitution and deputies from all parties of this second legislative period, the first in which Felipe González’s PSOE won, reconstruct for EL PAÍS how male this chamber was, how the tide has turned and to what extent this is important for the consolidation of democracy , which subjugate institutions such as the monarchy with this solemn act in order to respect the values of the sovereignty of citizens.
Only two of the 350 congressmen who took this institutional oath to the Constitution of the then Prince Felipe are still active and will be in the Chamber this Tuesday. One of them is the incumbent Minister of Agriculture Luis Planas, then the Socialist MP for Córdoba at the age of 33, who remembers almost everything about this historic session and the important political context. The other is Ignacio Gil Lázaro from Vox, who was then with Alianza Popular, the embryo of the PP.
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The swearing-in of the current King’s Constitution was planned and celebrated on January 30, 1986, at the end of the first legislative period of a full 202-seat PSOE cabinet led by Felipe González, seven months after the inauguration of Spain in the European Commission and one Day before the controversial referendum on NATO membership is called, contrary to promises. “Sometimes,” notes Planas, “these laws are seen as protocols, but they are constitutional acts aimed at strengthening the head of state and institutional stability.” “This oath expresses the commitment to respect and ensure respect for the laws and citizens, and in the current case, it reflects the most important change that has taken place in Spanish society since 1986, namely the role of women in Spain.”
The government of Felipe González in 1986 together with Kings Juan Carlos and Sofía. The then president poses with his vice president Alfonso Guerra and the 15 ministers of the third cabinet.MILLÁN / BARRIOPEDRO (EFE)
The socialist minister emphasizes that there were hardly any female representatives in this congress, one in the executive committee and none in the González government. In the cabinet of Pedro Sánchez, also a socialist, 12 of the 22 ministries are headed by women and three are vice presidents. Planas does not believe that it is a coincidence that these are socialist governments and boasts: “The PSOE is the only party that adheres to the constitutional representation and has always supported the institutions and the monarchy.” During the constitutional debate The socialists passionately supported the republic and abstained from voting on the state model when it came to voting for or against parliamentary monarchy.
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Adolfo Suárez Illana, son of former President Suárez, who was already in opposition at the time, points out this fundamental evolution of the PSOE since Juan Carlos I sanctioned the constitution on December 27, 1978, two days before its entry into force, in conversation that his father and the then monarch that day stated: “The PSOE had cold-heartedly received this signature from Don Juan Carlos and when leaving, the king mentioned it to my father and he said to him: ‘It will improve, no. Don’t worry.'” , my goal was not so much this oath, but my commitment that your grandchildren can be celebrated and that these will be fulfilled.'” It will happen this Tuesday, although the King Emeritus is not in the hall will be present to see it because La Zarzuela and the former head of state himself do not consider it appropriate. Yes, he will be present later at the private and family celebration at El Pardo Palace.
Miquel Roca, then spokesman for the pactist and pragmatic CiU led by former Catalan President Jordi Pujol, who was present in the guest gallery on that day 37 years ago alongside Lehendakari José Antonio Ardanza and who was also constitutional speaker, has a vivid memory of that day and will return to the congress as a guest on Tuesday and describes this Tuesday’s event as “the greatness of normality in a constitutional state”. Lawyer Roca, who has defended Infanta Cristina in some proceedings, explains: “It says a lot about the democratic solvency of our system that Crown Princess Leonor, in an act of normal submission, but with magnificence, commits herself to upholding the constitution.” highest representation of the country from an institutional point of view towards democratic values and popular sovereignty, so that it is clear that the most important institution of the state is not on the sidelines.” And it deals with the symbolism of the princess as a woman and shows “that in a “Democracy that is equal for everyone and has no male or gender-specific reservations.”
Anna Balletbó, a Catalan PSC MP for 20 years and at the time skeptical about the durability of the emerging monarchy, today emphasizes the relevance of the fact that the heir is now a woman: “We have to be happy that we will have a queen.” Spain . She will be the third after Queen Juana and Isabel II. Signs of the new times, also in Europe. Leonor is a great asset for the future in the modernization and consolidation of the parliamentary monarchy and represents Generation Z, which today makes up 18% of the population.”
Teresa Cunillera, also from the PSC, highlights two images. The first about the few women I saw in this room 37 years ago. In Congress there were 23 (5.9%). There will now be 154 representatives (44%) and 113 senators (43.2%). The other is about the relevance that they wanted to give to the event itself: “It was all new and unplanned, in this Congress we didn’t even have offices, and Peces Barba, who was very monarchist in nature, wanted to give it pomp.” and solemnity.”
Family photo of the government of Pedro Sánchez, on April 25, 2023.Fernando.Calvo
The idea of the specificity of submission to Parliament is supported by former socialist president Felipe González, who at the time had tensions with the president of the Cortes, socialist Gregorio Peces Barba, over who should be the focus of the event: “It is an act the continuity of Spanish democracy, as we elected and proclaimed it in 1978; The sovereign is the parliament that takes the oath, which is not the case in other European monarchies around us.”
The Vox MP Ignacio Gil Lázaro expresses his emotions: “To experience this act again after years means for me a personal opportunity to reaffirm my commitment to loyalty to the Crown as a symbol of the unity and stability of Spain, as it is Constitution stipulates.” ”
Arturo García Tizón, then a member of Manuel Fraga’s popular coalition, emphasizes his impression that back then “the environment was more peaceful and calm than today”. Josep López de Lerma, of the CiU, insists that in those years “there was a more institutional feeling than today”, confirming that both he, as a member of the Congress Executive Board, and Roca attended the 12-O celebrations, in the Royal Palace or in the rounds took part in contacts with the king for the investitures.
Jordi Pujol is now 94 years old and in poor health, but he conveys through his fifth son Oriol, former secretary general of Convergencia, that he wanted to enter Congress in 1986 out of respect for the parliamentary monarchy, the role played by Juan Carlos I and especially the democratic transition: “How could I not go? I was a protagonist of the transition, I value it positively, although now everyone wants to blame it. The monarchical regime was the pal de paller or the stick that articulated the haystack of transition.” Pujol now recalls that he took advantage of that day’s proximity to the Lehendakari to tell them something he had portrayed in his memoirs and which he, in his capacity as a historian, supported in relation to the collaboration of its ruling classes with the Lehendakari Spanish state: “You Basques are involved in this, you Basques have always been here, we are not.”
Former President Pujol continues to have a good opinion of Juan Carlos I, whom he appreciated for answering him by phone during the long night of the coup attempt on February 23 (when he told him: “Calm down, Jordi, calm down”) ) and from the Royal Family as a whole. . In his memoirs he also thanks Felipe VI. for the official trip he made to Catalonia as Prince of Asturias and Girona in April 1990 and recently for the many details he shared until he shared the cover on September 20 at the 142nd celebrations. Anniversary of La Vanguardia. On the way out when Felipe VI. Approaching him to introduce him to Queen Letizia, the elder Jordi Pujol remarked in surprise: “Excuse me, you are very tall, how tall are you?” Felipe VI. answered him in this warm tone: “I feel like I’m shrinking, I can’t reach 1.97 anymore.”
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