Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right

From Freepedia

The Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas (CEDA) was a Spanish political party in the Second Spanish Republic. It was a clerical conservative party with tendencies which ranged from Christian Democrat to Fascist. It was also described as accidentalist in that it gave no ideological support to republicanism, but merely accepted it as the constitutional structure of the time. Many of its supporters were monarchists.

It was founded on 4 March 1933, by José Maria Gil-Robles and Angel Herrera Oria based on the parties Acción Popular and Acción Católica. Its youth wing, Juventudes de Acción Popular (JAP), was active in street disturbances with socialist and anarchist rivals.

In the 1933 elections, the CEDA won the most seats in the Cortes. President Niceto Alcalá Zamora refused to ask its leader, José Maria Gil Robles, to form a government and put Alejandro Lerroux from Radical party instead. It supported a centrist government led by the radical Alejandro Lerroux; it later demanded and on 1 October 1934 received three ministerial positions. They suspended most of the reforms of the previous government led by Manuel Azaña, provoking an armed miners' rebellion in Asturias on 6 October and an autonomist rebellion in Catalonia. Both rebellions were suppressed which caused mass political arrests and trials.

In elections on 16 February 1936, it lost power to the left-wing Popular Front. Many of its supporters welcomed the military rebellion later in the summer of 1936 which led to the Spanish Civil War, and many of them joined Franco's National Movement. However, General Franco was determined not to have competing right-wing parties in Spain and in April 1937 CEDA was dissolved.

The CEDA was not active during the Franco dictatorship, but its roots led to the establishment of an Alianza Popular after his death as a right-wing democratic party, and this later turned into the successful Partido Popular.