A Little Freedom

When Generalissimo Francisco Franco unveiled plans two years ago for Spain's first direct elections in three decades, he did not exactly open up the floodgates of democracy. For one thing, the popular elections were limited to 108 seats, a mere 19% of the Cortes, Spain's Parliament. The rest of the seats in the Cortes continued to be filled by Franco appointees or loyal organizations. Moreover, the campaign rules favored past members of the Cortes, forbade political parties or public fund raising, and required candidates to take a loyalty oath. Leaders of the real op position soon dismissed the whole exercise as a farce, and the Spanish press ran cartoons picturing all 316 candidates competing for the 108 seats as identical, production-line faces.

The results seemed to confirm that harsh view. The roster of new Procuradores (Deputies) reads like Who's Who in the Falangist Establishment: mayors, provincial deputies, civil service employees, labor bigwigs, army officers and a sprinkling of businessmen. But in the twelve months since it took office, Spain's most representative group of public officials has taken to the business of government with precisely the kind of independent spirit that Strongman Franco tried to weed out in advance. The new Cortes members (called family Deputies because they were elected by male and female heads of families) have repeatedly raised issues with the slavishly pro-Franco majority on key legislation. Convinced that Franco's pledge of "democratic evolution" should come sooner rather than later, they have managed to get an airing for their views by the novel tactic of putting on a kind of legislative road show all over Spain. Last week, in their boldest challenge to authority yet, a dozen of them gathered in Valladolid and vowed to keep right on meeting in defiance of a ban recently imposed by Cortes President Antonio Iturmendi Banales.

The Nomads. This caucus procedure has been followed by other factions for years. But whereas other groups met quietly in Madrid, the new Deputies decided to hop from one city to another, their independence encouraged by the fact that many are from the provinces and have their own local bases of power away from Madrid. Before long, the statements they usually issue after each session were taking strong exception to such unpopular Cortes measures as the "regressive" Official Secrets Law and the 1968-69 national budget, and a delighted press could hardly wait to headline the latest blast from los trashumantes sin rodeos (the nomads who don't beat around the bush).

When they met last week, the family Deputies announced firmly that they "reserve the right to meet outside the Palace of the Cortes whenever their interests demand." Their defiance leaves the next move to the Franco government, and almost anything the regime does is likely to have unpleasant consequences. Having all but hand-picked the defiant Deputies, the generalissimo can hardly slap them en masse behind bars--or expect to find more compliant replacements for them. On the other hand, if "this attempt to help bring about a varying of opinion and the democratic evolution of the country," as one Deputy put it, is allowed to succeed, it could well become the focal point of dissent against Franco's rule.

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