Electoral Carlism of Restoration was vital to sustain Traditionalism in the period between the Third Carlist War and the Primo de Rivera dictatorship. Carlism, defeated in 1876, during the Restauración period recalibrated its focus from military action to political means and media campaigns. Accommodating themselves to political framework of the Alfonsine monarchy, the movement leaders considered elections, and especially elections to Congreso de los Diputados, primary vehicle of political mobilization. Though Carlist minority in the Cortes remained marginal and its impact on national politics was negligible, electoral campaigns were key to sustain the party until it regained momentum during the Second Spanish Republic.
Electoral system
The Spanish electoral system of the Restauración period envisioned that 1 deputy should represent around 50.000 inhabitants. The lower and the only fully electable chamber of the legislative, Congreso de los Diputados, was composed of around 400 deputies.exact number of deputies differed slightly from term to term due to minor peculiarities of the system, see Emilio de Diego García, El Congreso de los Diputados en el reinado del Alfonso XII [PhD thesis], Madrid 2001, , pp. 467-472 Electoral districts were territorially roughly corresponding to existing judicial districts, though there could have been minor local differences.there were few cases of gerrymandering, apparently aimed against Carlism. The example is creation of the Marquina district in Biscay; Javier Real Cuesta, El Carlismo Vasco 1876-1900, Madrid 1985, , pp. 211-212 The districts were falling into two categories: 279 distritos rurales and 88 circunscripciones. The former were electing one deputy; the latter were electing a plurality of deputies, differing in number depending on the number of inhabitants; in these districts a voter was entitled to choose more than one candidate. In both types of districts mandates were assigned according to the first-past-the-post system. Though districts formed provinces and provinces were part of wider regiones, none of these two types of units played any role in the election process.Jesús María Zaratiegui Labiano, Efectos de la aplicación del sufragio universal en Navarra. Las elecciones generales de 1886 y 1891, [in:] Príncipe de Viana 57 (1996), pp. 186-7
Until the 1886 election the eligible voters were Spanish male citizens above 25 years of age with appropriate material status, i.e. those who paid annual fees known as “contribución territorial” in rural areas or as “subsidio industrial” in case of urban residents.effect of the censitarian system on Carlist vote differed across the provinces. In the key Vasco-Navarrese area, eligible voters formed only 3,5% in rural and poor Guipuzcoa, 5,5% in Biscay, 6,3% in Navarre and 11,2% in Alava, see Real Cuesta 1985, p. 233, Zaratiegui 1996, pp. 178, 193 Starting the 1891 campaign the rights were granted to all males above 25 years, which increased the number of potential voters from 0.8m to 4.8m, the latter figure corresponding to 27% of the entire population.Zaratiegui 1996, p. 199 Spanish elections of the Restauración are marked by 2 distinct features: turnismo and caciquismo. According to the turnista routine, elections were organized by one of two rotating pre-appointed parties, Conservatives and Liberals, to ensure their parliamentary majority; the objective was achieved by a wide range of manipulations known as pucherazos.see Rosa Ana Gutiérrez, Rafael Zurita, Renato Camurri, Elecciones y cultura política en España e Italia (1890-1923), Valencia 2003, , 9788437056722 Caciquismo was the system of political corruption based on networks of local party bosses.see José Varela Ortega, El poder de la influencia : geografía del caciquismo en España: (1875-1923), Madrid 2001, Efficiency of both mechanisms decreased over time and varied across the country; rural areas were typically more prone to electoral fraud. Carlism functioned on the sidelines of the system,see Carlos Serrano Lacarra, Oposiciones antisistema: carlistas, republicanos, socialistas y anarquistas, [in:] Julia Santos (ed.), Debates en torno al 98: Estado, sociedad y politica, Madrid 1998, pp. 115-133 deprived of the privileges enjoyed by two partidos turnistas; though there were a few local Carlist bosses or even dynasties,Joan Prats i Salas, Carlisme i caciquisme: Josep de Suelves, Marques de Tamarit, cap carli de las comarques de Tarragona (1890-1918), [in:] Estudis Altafullencs 16 (1992), pp. 123-140 in general caciquismo worked against the Carlist fortunes.general overview of historiographic theories on links between Carlism and caciquismo in Antoni Vives Riera, Carlismo y caciquismo: las subjetividades campesinas en la historia contemporánea de España, [in:] Ayer 83 (2011) pp.151-173. See also Jordi Canal i Morell, Banderas blancas, boinas rojas: una historia política del carlismo, 1876-1939, Madrid 2006, , 9788496467347, p. 173, Angel Garcia-Sanz Marcotegui, Caciques y políticos forales. Las elecciones a la Diputación de Navarra (1877-1923), Pamplona 1992, . Some scholars prefer to talk about Carlist “caudillaje” rather than “caciquismo”, see Lluís Ferran Toledano González, El caudillaje carlista y la política de las partidas, [in:] Jesús Millán (ed.), Carlismo y contrarrevolución en la Espana contemporánea, Madrid 2000, pp. 91-114
General performance overview Carlist votestotals for each year which aggregate results of deputies as listed in the appendix; sourced from the official Cortes service, available here. The numbers listed should be understood as "at least", since they include only votes obtained by successful candidates and exclude votes obtained by candidates who failed to gain the ticket. Note that "votes" might not be identical to "voters", as in multi-mandate districts one voter was entitled to a number of votes. In case a candidate was declared victorious according to Article 29 (no counter-candidate), he is assigned the number of votes he gained in the district during the preceding or (if unavailable) following campaign year votes gathered year votes gathered 1879 536 1903 44,846 1881 2,197 1905 29,752 1884 did not run 1907 87,923 1886 456 1910 69,938 1891 24,549 1914 52,563 1893 45,617 1916 69,938 1896 43,286 1918 90,122 1898 40,481 1919 90,423 1899 11,915 1920 70,075 1901 45,576 1923 52,421 During the period of 1879-1923 general elections were held 20 times; the aggregate number of mandates available was 8,048.Carlos Lozano, História electoral service, available here All branches of Traditionalism combined – the Carlists/Jaimists, the Integrists, the Mellists and the independent candidates - gained 145 mandates, which is 1,8% of the total; however, figures might differ across various scholarly works.different sources provide different figures as to exact number of Carlist deputies, with no source giving the full list of names. A scholarly study gives the figure of 101 Carlist deputies elected between 1891 and 1923, see María Cruz Mina Apat, La escisión carlista de 1919 y la unión de las derechas, [in:] José Luis García Delgado (ed.), La crisis de la Restauración. España entre la primera guerra mundial y la II República, Madrid 1986, , pp. 149-164, referred after Ángel García-Sanz Marcotegui, Jesús María Osés Gorráiz, María Cruz Mina Apat, [in:] Huarte de San Juan. Geografía e Historia 21 (2014), p. 150. Another scholar provides the list which totals in 123 mandates for the 1879-1923 period, yet he adheres to various categorization patterns and might refer to "Carlists", "Traditionalists" or "Carlists and Traditionalists". The number of deputies is given as follows: 1879:0, 1881:2 ("Tradicionalistas", furtherly "T"), 1884:0, 1886:1 ("Carlistas", furtherly "C"), 1891: 7 (C), 1893:7 (C), 1896: 9 ("Carlistas y tradicionalistas"), 1898:5 (T), 1899:3 (C), 1901:7 (C), 1903:7 (C), 1905:5 (C), 1907:11 ("Tradicionalistas y católicos"), 1910:10 (T), 1914:7 (T), 1916:10 (T), 1918:13 (T), 1919: 5 (T), 1920:8 (T), 1923:6 (T), see Roberto Villa García, España en las urnas. Una historia electoral (1810-2015), Madrid 2016, ISBN 9788490971529, pp. 68-70, 97-101 This score positions the Traditionalists far behind two key political groupings of the Restoration era, the Conservatives and the Liberals; together with offshoot branches and related groupse.g. Mauristas, Ciervistas, Villaverdistas, constitutionalists, tetuanists and other branches of Conservatism, Romanonistas, Gamacistas, fusionists, reformists and other branches of Liberalism they seized above 3,500 mandates each.a private website calculates that the Conservatives gained 3,571 mandates and the Liberals gained 3,512 tickets, Carlos Lozano, História electoral service, available here The Traditionalist result is also much worse than this recorded by various and usually highly ephemeral parties and electoral alliances falling into the generic republican-democratic rubric;e.g. Republican Union, Republican Nationalists, Republican Coalition, Republican-Socialists, Democratic Progressists, Possibilists, Democratic Federalists, Radicals and other on aggregate they won some 500 tickets.528 mandates according to Carlos Lozano, História electoral service, available here Traditionalism comes fourth, behind the Conservative, Liberal and Republican political currents. On the overall basis it won more seats than parties which gained dynamics in the 20th century: the Catalanists, the Basques or the Socialists.various groupings focused on Catalan identity (some of them bordering Traditionalism) gained some 140 seats, the Basques (fueristas, nationalists, other) gained some 30 seats and PSOE gained 11 seats
Traditionalist performance measured in terms of the number of voters is difficult to gauge due to different factors, ranging from fraud and manipulation to peculiarities of electoral arithmetic. In the 1890s the aggregate number of votes obtained by Traditionalist deputies in each campaign hovered around 40,000, though given one should also include votes obtained by unsuccessful candidates the number was probably closer to 50,000; this would stand for some 1,7% of all active electorate.exact turnout for all elections of the 1890s is not available; in 1899 there were 2,798,262 people who cast their ballots, Carlos Barciela López, Albert Carreras, Xavier Tafunell (eds.), Estadísticas históricas de España: siglos XIX-XX, vol. 3, Madrid 2005, , p. 1093 In the 20th century the combined number of votes received by victorious Traditionalists in each campaign was some 65,000 on average.in 11 campaigns from 1901 to 1923 the successful Traditionalist candidates received on aggregate 703,000 votes In 1907, 1918 and 1919 it was rather around 90,000,1907: 87,923, 1918: 90,122, 1919: 90,423 which suggests that at best there might have been as many as 100,000 people voting Traditionalism, around 4% of the total active electorate.in 1919 there were 2,342,872 people voting, Barciela, Carreras, Tafunell 2005, p. 1094 Though hardly an imposing figure, even in the early 1920s the Traditionalist electorate was by far larger than e.g. the Socialist one, as until the advent of Primo de Rivera dictatorship PSOE did not manage to attract more than 40,000 voters.José Andrés Gallego, Historia General de España y América: Revolución y Restauración: (1868-1931), vol. XVI/2, Madrid 1981, , p. 383
Periodization