The return of the Republicans who opened a spot in Congress | Culture | EUROtoday

Teachers, attorneys and writers, coming from an enlightened class generally, however not in all, defenders within the flesh of the function that girls had been referred to as to play in a Spain that was making an attempt to take the step into the twentieth century and modernize. Some of the names of these 9 pioneers, who had been political representatives within the Cortes within the Nineteen Thirties, have gone down in historical past, however these of others have been relegated; Its historical past, in any case, has not misplaced its validity.

The articles and profiles written by Margarita Nelken and picked up in Life and ladies. Articles 1916-1931 (Notebooks of basic work, Banco Santander Foundation) and the e-book Republicans. Revolution, battle and exile of 9 deputies (Tusquets), by Miguel Ángel Villena, reconstruct the historical past of the ladies’s trigger in Spain within the twentieth century and its public dimension. Villena gives a choral portrait of the 9 Spanish ladies who occupied a seat between 1931 and 1939: Julia Álvarez Resano (1903-1948), Francisca Bohigas (1893-1973), Clara Campoamor (1888-1972), Veneranda García Manzano (1893-1992), Dolores Ibárruri (1895-1989), Victoria Kent (1898-1987), María Lejárraga (1874-1974), Margarita Nelken (1885-1968) and Matilde de la Torre (1884-1946). Precisely the stays of the latter will arrive, as was her want, this Saturday, March 21, to her hometown, Cabezón de la Sal (Cantabria), from Mexico, the place she died in 1946.

“These women were at the forefront, but Republicans “It’s about an entire generation,” explains the author in a telephone conversation, who continues with this book his investigation into great figures of recent Spanish history after Victoria Kent, a republican passion (Debate, 2007) and Citizen Azaña (Peninsula, 2010). Thus, in this work – which brings together the biographies of the nine republican parliamentarians, all of them from the political arc of the left except one, Francisca Bohigas, the only one who did not go into exile – those of other women such as Constancia de la Mora, María de Maeztu, Zenobia Camprubí, Federica Montseny, María Cambrils, Isabel Oyarzábal or María Teresa León, among others, are intertwined. “They forged friendships, complicities or rivalries in a period in which they revolutionized not only the situation of women, but that of the entire country,” writes Villena. The celebration, promoted by the Ministry of Culture, all through 2026 and early 2027 of the centenary of the creation of the Lyceum Club Femenino of Madrid will delve into the historical past of that heart and the relationships that arose there, intently linked to the entry of girls into politics.

Republicans It offers with the theoretical work on feminism that María Lejárraga and Margarita Nelken undertook of their writings, years earlier than the appearance of the brand new regime of 1931, to the issues that these ladies confronted in an overwhelmingly male political area, with out forgetting the divisions that existed between them because of their place relating to the approval of the feminine vote. Nelken’s texts, now edited and prefaced by Alejandra Rodríguez Parragués, embody interviews and profiles of girls Carmen Baroja or Margarita Xirgu, in addition to their reflections on feminism or ladies and battle. “The greatest danger of feminism is that its triumph can be confused with the sole achievement of political rights,” she writes.

“They had to endure structural machismo, insults and humiliation, even from progressive men like Azaña, who was a notable misogynist,” Villena emphasizes in regards to the feminine deputies. “There were confrontations between them, but the political and ideological rivalries have been greatly exaggerated. Not all of them were friends but they respected each other. There was what today we would call sorority”.

Membership in political parties shortly before the proclamation of the Republic or immediately after brought Campoamor, Kent, Lejárraga and Nelken, belonging to a cultural elite, closer to the Cortes. In other regions such as Cantabria in the case of Matilde de la Torre, Navarra in that of Julia Álvarez Resano or Asturias in that of Veneranda García Manzano, her promotion came through the territorial organizations of the PSOE. The Radical Socialist Party included Victoria Kent in its first lists, the PSOE included Margarita Nelken and the Radical Party included Clara Campoamor. All of them were elected, in Cortes that had 470 deputies, and Campoamor would become part of the constitutional commission, the only woman to date who has participated in the drafting of a Magna Carta.

In the 1933 elections, in which women had the right to vote, the defender of women’s suffrage Clara Campoamor and her opponent, Victoria Kent, were left out of the chamber, but Nelken did continue and she was joined by Lejárraga, De la Torre, García Manzano and Francisca Bohigas, the latter on the CEDA lists. Neither the latter, nor Lejárraga, nor García Manzano managed to renew their seats in February 1936. Kent, Ibárruri, De la Torre and Álvarez Resano did achieve a seat.

The coup of July 18 and the civil strife took them to different places, from the front to exile. “During the Republic and the battle, all of them had nice public publicity, however what occurred to them afterwards is one thing little recognized. They had completely different trajectories, some very harsh exiles, and solely three survived Franco,” recalls Villena, who in addition to consulting the bibliography on this topic—among which he highlights a work by María Dolores Pelayo from 2006—has interviewed descendants of Ibárruri, Kent and Lejárraga. The story that Villena has composed opens the focus and includes the personal history of these women: from the marriage of Julia Álvarez Resano with the also representative Amancio Muñoz Zafra, the decision of Margarita Nelken to be a single mother defying conventions or the homosexuality of Clara Campoamor and Victoria Kent. “Their time in politics took its toll on all of them. In the eight years of the Republic they actually circled a poor nation with a excessive illiteracy price. The change reached many layers of society and was reduce quick by the battle,” concludes Villena.