La Canadenca strike

[4] It was, likewise, the first major action of the CNT after the reorganization into single unions carried out by the Regional Confederation of Catalonia, which the entire organization would later adopt.

[5] The choice to start the strike at the principal electricity company of Catalonia, vital for the industry of the entire region, aimed to make Catalan business owners recognize CNT as a major organized labor force.

[6] In January, weeks before initiating the strike, the Regional Confederation of Catalonia organized an agitation campaign in which it sent its best speakers (among whom were Salvador Seguí, Ángel Pestaña and Manuel Buenacasa) to Levante and Andalusia.

Three days later, on February 5, the workers of the billing section of the company started the strike until the reinstatement of their colleagues and sent a commission to the civil governor, Carlos González Rothwos, the president of the association and the mayor requesting them to intervene.

The workers of La Canadenca published their demands from the company: reinstatement of all those fired, salary increases, dismissal of strikebreakers and no retaliation by the management against the strikers.

The situation worsened: the dependency of a multitude of services and industries on the energy of La Canadenca forced them to stop, a strikebreaker collector was murdered on February 12 and conflicts arose in other sectors such as the public transport drivers and the workers in the newspaper El Diluvio.

He was presented with three conditions and a term of two days to answer, which were: freedom of the prisoners imprisoned since January 16, the opening of the unions and the immunity of the members of the committee.

On March 9 the government to published the decree of the captain general, Milans del Bosch, declaring a state of war and calling to arms all the workers of the companies on strike with a sentence of four years in prison for those who did not appear in their recruitment areas.

For this reason, it sent to Barcelona the sub-secretary of the presidency José Morete; Carlos Montañés, an engineer with Catalan sympathies, was appointed civil governor; and Gerardo Doval held the position of chief of police.

The government was concerned that the strike would spread to other areas of strong CNT presence such as Valencia, Zaragoza or Andalusia and feared that the Unión General de Trabajadores(UGT) would show solidarity.

During March 15 and 16, several meetings were held between the union committee, the civil authorities and the company, which took place at the headquarters of the Institute of Social Reforms, where an agreement with the following terms was reached: the end of the conflict, freedom to all prisoners arrested for "social crimes" who were not subject to trial, reinstatement of all strikers without reprisals, a general and proportional increase in the wages of the workers of La Canadenca, a maximum working day of eight hours and payment of half a month for the duration of the strike.