Conservative Party (Spain)

Finally, the new leader was the Mallorcan Antonio Maura Montaner, whom Silvela himself had designated as his successor, and who would be president of the Council of Ministers in different stages, the most fruitful and extensive being the so-called "long government" of 1907–1909.

This meant the fracture of the Conservative Party between the supporters of one and the other: the Maurists and the Dadatists or suitable ones, and a crisis that was aggravated by the loss of the 1916 elections.

That context, with the First World War, the general strike of 1917 and the Russian Revolution, made it advisable to turn again to the old conservative politician.

Both cabinets were supported by Eduardo Dato and his like-minded deputies, but the deputy for Murcia and minister Juan de la Cierva y Peñafiel gained power within the conservative movement, and he opposed Sánchez de Toca's acceptance of the Joint Commission of Workers and Employers that tried to put an end to gun-running in Catalonia.

[2][3] In 1920, Dato returned to power continuing his work of social reformism - he created the Ministry of Labour, for which he chose Carlos Cañal - although he repressed with expeditious methods - also defended by Juan de la Cierva and Peñafiel - the anarchist pistolerism in Barcelona.

[2] With the coup by General Miguel Primo de Rivera in September 1923 and the subsequent establishment of the Dictatorship, the Conservative Party and its leaders were distanced from political life until 1930, when the party again became part of the last government of the monarchy, presided over by Admiral Juan Bautista Aznar, who put Juan de la Cierva y Peñafiel at the head of the Ministry of Public Works in 1930–1931, already considered the leader of the Conservatives.

[3] The results of the municipal elections of April 1931 reflected that neither the Liberal nor the Conservative Party had support among the population, and that their power was more artificial than real.

With the proclamation of the Second Republic on April 14, 1931, Juan de la Cierva y Peñafiel tried certainly to prevent Alfonso XIII from going into exile, but it was useless.