Eugenio Montero Ríos

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Eugenio Montero Ríos (picture by Kaulak)

Eugenio Montero Ríos (born November 13, 1832 in Santiago de Compostela , † May 12, 1914 in Madrid ) was a Spanish politician and President of Spain ( Presidente del Gobierno ) .

biography

Studies and professional career

After attending school, he completed a law degree at the University of Santiago de Compostela . After graduating he became in 1859 first professor of canon law at the University of Oviedo , before it already in the Department of Canon Law took over at the University of Santiago de Compostela. Later he was appointed professor in this field of law at the University of Madrid .

Together with Antonio Romero Ortiz, a later colonial minister in the cabinets of Zavala and Sagasta , he founded the daily newspaper "La Opiníon Pública" , of which he was editor for many years. In 1876 he was also a co-founder of the Institution for the Freedom of Education ( Institución Libre de Enseñanza ), whose director he became in 1877.

MP and minister during the reign of King Amadeus

Montero Ríos around 1870

After the revolution of 1868 ( La Gloriosa ), which led to the deposition of Queen Isabella II , he began his political career on January 15, 1869 with the election to the parliament ( Congreso de los Diputados ), in which he was initially until May 1873 alternately represented the interests of the constituencies of Pontevedra , Madrid and La Coruña .

During the reign of King Amadeus , he was the minister for clemency and justice ( Ministro de Gracia y Justicia ) from December 20, 1869 to January 1, 1870 , before he assumed this office from January 9, 1870 to January 4, 1871 held the governments of Juan Prim and Juan Bautista Topete . On July 24, 1871, he was also appointed Minister for Appeals for Mercy and Justice in the first cabinet of Manuel Ruiz Zorrilla , which was in office until October 5, 1871 . Finally he took over from June 13, 1872 to February 12, 1873 again the office of Minister for Appeals for Mercy and Justice in the second government of Ruiz Zorilla. During this time, as a staunch supporter of the separation of church and state, he introduced several important reforms such as the Civil Registration Act ( Ley de Registro Civil ) and the Civil Marriage Act ( Ley del Matrimonio Civil ) . During his tenure was also one of the king's main supporters. After his resignation, he followed the king into exile in Portugal in February 1873 .

Promotion to the government president

In the following years he was one of the founders of the Republican Democratic Party ( Partido Republicano Democrático ) alongside Cristino Martos . At the beginning of the restoration of the monarchy in Spain and the coronation of King Alfonso XII. he still held Republican positions and was a co-signer of the Republican Manifesto in 1880. Later he was a representative of liberal views , but ultimately refrained from founding a liberal party in competition with the Partido Progresista of Sagasta.

On August 21, 1881, he was re-elected as a member of Parliament, where he again represented the interests of the constituencies of La Coruña and Madrid until the end of the 36th electoral term in 1886. On November 27, 1885, he was appointed Minister for Funding ( Ministro de Fomento ) in the cabinet of Sagasta, to which he only belonged until October 10, 1886. On October 26, 1889, he was appointed Senator for Life ( Senador Vitalicio ) by royal decree . Sagasta, however, appointed him to his fifth cabinet on December 11, 1892, as Minister for Appeals for Mercy and Justice. However, this time too he lost his ministerial office prematurely after a government reshuffle on July 6, 1893. From November 11, 1894 to July 1, 1895 he was President of the Senate for the first time. He held this office again from April 19, 1898 to March 16, 1899.

After Spain's defeat in the Spanish-American War from April 25 to August 12, 1898, he became president of the Spanish delegation in the negotiations on the Paris Peace Treaty of December 10, 1898, which led to the United States from Spain taking Cuba , Puerto Rico , Guam and the Philippines received but had to pay Spain $ 20 million in return.

On June 10, 1901 he was again President of the Senate and held this office until March 26, 1903.

After Sagasta's death on January 5, 1903, he became, alongside the new party chairman José Canalejas Méndez, the decisive leader of the extreme left-wing faction within the Partido Liberal , which dominated the Liberal Party for a decade and opposed the centrist, rather moderate wing around Segismundo Moret Prendergast stood.

As a party politician, Montero Ríos was also the patron saint of the Kazike ( Caciquismo ) of Galicia . He also knew how to entrust his sons and sons-in-law, such as the later multiple district president Manuel García Prieto, with offices.

On June 23, 1905 he was finally appointed President of Spain ( Presidente del Gobierno ) . As early as December 1, 1905, however, due to massive opposition to King Alfonso XIII. and his government in the satirical weekly magazine “¡Cu-Cut!” resign because of his legal reforms and hand over the office to his party opponent Moret Prendergast, who subsequently passed a law on jurisdiction ( Ley de Jurisdicciones ) in support of the king.

Following this, he initially largely withdrew from political life. However, he was again President of the Senate from July 1906 to May 12, 1907 and from June 14, 1910 to April 2, 1914.

In his will he ordered the return of the honors awarded to him by the monarchy.

Publications and honorary positions

In addition to his legal and political work, he was already in 1855 editor of the Memoria sobre el origen y relaciones de la Economía Política ("Memories of the origins and relationships of political economy "). After his return from Oviedo to his hometown Santiago de Compostela , he published Ultramontanismo y cismontanismo en la historia y en la ciencia (" Ultramontanism and Cismontanism in History and Science") in 1860 .

In addition, as a member of the Legislative Commission (Comisión de Códigos), he was also the co-author of several important bills, the initiator of judicial constitutional law ( Ley Orgánica del Poder Judicial ) and author of the Revista General de Legislación y Jurisprudencia (General Journal of Legislation and Jurisprudence). In addition, he published an essay on the defeat of Spain after the Spanish-American War in 1898 under the title Opina sobre el desastre colonial .

Montero Ríos was a member and from 1875 to 1876 also president of the Royal Academy of Jurisprudence and Legislation ( Real Academia de Jurisprudencia y Legislación ). As early as December 10, 1878, he became a member of the Real Academia de Ciencias Morales y Políticas , where he took the chair (Sillón) 18 until his death. On December 6, 1901, he was also appointed a member of the Royal Historical Academy ( Real Academia de la Historia ).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ List of Members of Parliament from 1810 to 1977.
  2. ^ The Senate between 1834 and 1923 - Senators , accessed June 7, 2017.
  3. ^ The Senate and its Presidents 1834 to 1923
  4. ↑ Montero Ríos plantea su dimisión ( Memento of May 13, 2001 in the Internet Archive ), article in El Mundo Periodico of November 27, 1998, on el-mundo.es, viewed August 6, 2010 (Spanish)
  5. ^ El 'Libro rojo' de Montero Ríos ( Memento from June 25, 2001 in the Internet Archive ) In: El Mundo Periodico. December 18, 1998, viewed on elmundo.es, August 6, 2010 (Spanish)
  6. ^ "Eugenio Montero Ríos y la Independencia de Cuba". ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Diario Las Americás.com from June 1, 2007  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.diariolasamericas.com
  7. ^ Chronology of Puerto Rico in the Spanish-American War 1868-1922
  8. ^ Presidents of the Congress of Deputies and the Senate from 1869 to 2008
  9. ↑ ( Page no longer available , search in web archives: Comisión de Códigos. Eugenio Montero Ríos ), 1904.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.tcinforma.net
  10. ↑ Opina sobre el desastre colonial.
  11. ^ Presidents of the Royal Academy of Law and Legislation in the 19th Century ( Memento of July 8, 2006 in the Internet Archive )
  12. ↑ Members of the Real Academia de Ciencias Morales y Políticas - Armchair 18 ( Memento from December 24, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
  13. ↑ Members of the Royal Historical Academy ( Memento of the original from December 11, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.rah.es
predecessor Office successor
Raimundo Fernández Villaverde President of Spain
1905 		Segismundo Moret Prendergast


personal data
SURNAME Montero Ríos, Eugenio
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Governor of Spain
DATE OF BIRTH November 13, 1832
PLACE OF BIRTH Santiago de Compostela
DATE OF DEATH May 12, 1914
Place of death Madrid