In this election, the ruling Liberal Party of Práxedes Mateo Sagasta secured a large majority in the Cortes, granting him the required parliamentary support for a new "turn" in power.

This came following the downfall of Antonio Cánovas del Castillo's Conservative government in December 1892 as a result of an internal split by former minister Francisco Silvela over the issue of political regeneration.

[5][6] Voting for the Cortes was on the basis of universal manhood suffrage, which comprised all national males over 25 years of age, having at least a two-year residency in a municipality and in full enjoyment of their civil rights.

[7][8][9] In Cuba and Puerto Rico voting was on the basis of censitary suffrage, comprising males of age fulfilling one of the following criteria: being taxpayers with a minimum quota—of $5 in Cuba and $10 in Puerto Rico, following a 1892 reform—per territorial contribution or per industrial or trade subsidy (paid at the time of registering for voting); having a particular position (royal academy numerary members; ecclesiastic individuals; active, unemployed or retired public employees; military personnel; widely recognized painters and sculptors; public teachers; etc.

The monarch would play a key role in the system of el turno pacífico (English: the Peaceful Turn) by appointing and dismissing governments and allowing the opposition to take power.

[34][33] In addition, Cánovas' tenure had been plagued by peasant and anarchist rebellions—such as the Jerez uprising or an attempted plot to plant explosives in the Cortes parliament building—with labour conflicts, strikes and protests being commonplace.

[36] Following Cánovas' resignation in December 1892, Práxedes Mateo Sagasta of the Liberal Party was tasked by Queen Regent Maria Christina with forming a new government and holding a snap election.

[39][40] For the Senate, eligibility was limited to those entitled to be appointed as senators in their own right or those who had belonged to one of the following categories: presidents of the Senate and the Congress of Deputies; deputies who had belonged to at least three different congresses or serving for at least eight terms; government ministers; other Grandees of Spain; Army's lieutenant generals and Navy's vice admirals, two years after their appointment; ambassadors after two years of service and plenipotentiary ministers after four; other members and prosecutors of the Council of State, the Supreme Court, the Court of Auditors, the Supreme War Council and the Supreme Council of the Navy, and the Dean of the Court of Military Orders, after two years of service; presidents and directors of the Royal Spanish Academy and the other royal academies (History; Fine Arts of San Fernando; Exact, Physical and Natural Sciences; Moral and Political Sciences and Medicine); full academics of the aforementioned corporations occupying the first half of the seniority scale in their corps, first-class general inspectors of the corps of Civil Engineers, Mines and Forests, full-time university professors with at least four years of seniority in their category and practice (and provided that those had an annual income of at least 7,500 Pt from their own property, salaries from jobs that cannot be lost except for legally proven cause, or from retirement, withdrawal or termination); as well as those who had an annual income of 20,000 Pt or were taxpayers with a minimum quota of 4,000 Pt in direct contributions at least two years in advance, as long as they were of the Spanish nobility, had been previously deputies, provincial deputies or mayors in provincial capitals or towns over 20,000 inhabitants, as well as those who had ever held the office of senator before the promulgation of the 1876 Constitution.