The Basque History of the World - Mark Kurlansky [111]
When work began in Madrid on a new constitution, two things became clear very quickly. A broad consensus existed that for Spain to have a peaceful future, it had to allow regions—especially Basqueland and Catalonia—a measure of autonomy. But it was equally clear that the Basques were not going to be left to choose the nature of that autonomy. There would be no return to the autonomy of the Foral system. The constitutional committee did not include a sampling of the parties in the Cortes, but rather a group of seven parliamentarians, including one Catalan and no Basques.
In the language of the 1978 Spanish constitution, Basque or Catalan is referred to as “a nationality,” but only Spain is a nation. It states: “The Constitution is founded on the indissoluble unity of the Spanish nation, the common and indivisible fatherland of all Spaniards, and recognizes and guarantees the right to autonomy of the nationalities and regions of which it is composed and solidarity among them.”
Spain has had numerous constitutions since the one General Espoz y Mina placed on a chair and ordered shot in 1812. But the 1978 constitution was the only one that ever declared the Spanish language the sole official language of Spain.
The constitution was to be ratified by popular vote. Arzalluz and the Basque Nationalist Party called on Basques to abstain from the vote. But Monzón believed it would make a stronger statement if Basques showed their disapproval by voting no. He argued, “We cannot accept the Spanish constitution because we are not Spaniards.” But to most Basques, this was an argument for abstention rather than the participation of casting a negative vote.
The constitution was approved by a majority of Spaniards, but not by Basques: While only 11.3 percent of Basques followed Monzón and voted no, more than 40 percent of Basque voters abstained and others cast blank ballots. The constitution was not approved by a majority of voters in any of the Basque provinces. But against the will of the Basque “nationality,” the new constitution became the law of the “nation.” Any further discussion of Basque independence would be questioning “the indissoluble unity of the Spanish nation” and therefore would be unconstitutional.
With the breakup of the state declared unconstitutional and the military given the right, in fact, the constitutional obligation, to intervene if a government violated the law of the land by compromising the indissoluble unity of the state, lawmakers believed that they had given enough assurances to the military to be able to proceed with demands for regional autonomy.
The constitution called for the establishment of seventeen regional entities including Ceuta and Melilla in Africa, which have a combined size of thirty-two square miles. The next smallest is the Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean, and the third smallest is the Autonomous Basque Community of Euskadi. The constitution did not specify the nature of regional government. Each region proposed, subject to Cortes approval, its own idea of what a region should be. New Castile, which includes Madrid, was not interested in autonomy. To no one’s surprise, the Basques and the Catalans wanted more autonomy than anyone else.
To the dismay of many Basques, Navarra became a separate region. Conservative, pro-Spanish elements in Navarra had pushed for a region apart from the three Basque provinces, but whether or not this was the will of the general population was a longstanding debate. In 1981, the so-called politico-militar wing of ETA made a Navarrese referendum on rejoining the Basque region one of its conditions for a cease-fire. Madrid never responded to that item.
The many differences accrued from several historic periods have separated Navarra from the other three Basque provinces in Spain. Going back to Roman times, the Romanization of the Ebro