(Document prepared by the Assembly of Junta Presidents, March 27, 1919)

[297] The social and economic disturbance that the last war has produced in the world has had repercussions in Spain and is producing upheavals whose frequency and intensity are growing minute by minute. In order to control them, the public Power is making ample use of the only disciplined and solid force at its disposal; but the action that is imposed on the troops is of such a nature, and the ultimate recourse of mobilization is employed with such freedom, that the moment has arrived for the Army to raise its voice, moved, certainly not by its own interests, but by the sacred interests of the Fatherland.

As an obligatory antecedent, here is an outline of what happens almost daily.

The slightest difference between capital and labor produces a strike, which is not always restricted to a single industry, since at times even State services are involved. Because of the tight link that today exists among all branches of activity, paralysis of work in a given sector affects those in other sectors, gives rise to the intervention of the Syndicates and directing organisms of the proletarian classes, and the movement spreads, grows, and finally threatens, if it does not disturb, public order. Even before this happens, the irregularity provoked in the national, provincial, or local services upsets normal life for a greater or lesser portion of the country. In order to restore it, the Army is used to carry out civilian duties, although subject to military norms and regulations.

It is not taken into account that the action of the Army must generally be limited, in that which concerns these social conflicts, to [298] guaranteeing order. Since the workers do not dispose of any other legal instrument except the strike to achieve their demands and improvements from their employers, when they are replaced by soldiers and the functioning of the industry or service continues, the Army is tacitly placed, although not in an obvious manner, on the side of capital, separating it from that impartiality and unanimity in those internal matters and quarrels that an institution at the service of the nation -- "of the whole Nation" -- must maintain. It is disregarded, besides, that neither by virtue of its numbers (necessarily insufficient), nor by its professional training, nor by its purpose, nor by its essential nature, is the Army prepared to take charge, with complete probability of success, of the labor done by complex, numerous, skilled, and specially prepared industrial organizations. Thus it turns out that the most diligent zeal, the greatest efforts, the abnegation and the spirit of sacrifice of officers and troops, encounter invincible difficulties.

Improvisation has never been able to replace organization.

In every conflict of this nature, there is unfailingly someone responsible: sometimes the employer, sometimes the worker, sometimes both at once. Well, the Army, which finds itself forced outside its field to resolve problems for which it was not responsible, does not even have "a posteriori" the moral compensation of seeing the guilty ones receive the sanction they deserve. Officers and soldiers abandon workshops, and employers and workers return to them and resume their work as if they were innocent actors and had nothing to do with the damage they have inflicted on the public welfare. It is enough to indicate this point to understand the necessity of reforming the labor legislation. Let others determine if the harm to the country caused by a labor disturbance is less serious than the theft of a roll by a hungry man, but the Army must not continue to be the propitiatory victim of the struggle between labor and capital. This state of affairs is not dignified, nor does it help establish discipline and internal satisfaction in the ranks. Obvious are the risks of partiality in favor of capital, in which the Army, not by its will but because of the functions which it is obliged to carry out, is placed. Since the armed forces are presented as the most powerful, the only effective obstacle, to the demands for betterment of the workers -- apart from the right of petition -- it is natural that syndicalist and analogous organisms (persuaded that once the Army is disabled, there will be no brake or dike to contain them) should try to undermine the bases upon which its effectiveness rests. Thus, when the Army enters the sphere of public and private labor, against it are incited the passions of the turbulent masses and of the revolutionary elements, who are indirectly invited to undermine [299] discipline and obedience in the ranks. Along this route we are heading toward the rule of anarchy, because the Army finds itself combatted by the most daring, not defended by the rest, and knocked about outside its own sphere.

But is it perhaps being suggested that the Army should always remain at the margin of these conflicts, indifferent to what happens around it, and denying its aid to the higher authorities? Not at all.

In every civilized country, the functioning of public services must be guaranteed, but since in practice, an abusive use of the concept "Public Services" is made, the first thing is to define it and to distinguish which entities ought to watch over them and be in charge of them.

They may belong to (1) the State: communications of all kinds; coal supplies; primary materials and consumer goods necessary to the whole kingdom; (2) regional: sources of energy that serve a region composed of various municipalities; (3) municipal: light, energy, communications, etc., corresponding to a town.

According to this classification, it should be understood that while the State must guarantee services of a general character, it is the responsibility of Diputations and City Governments to watch over those of a regional and local nature. In all three cases, it is necessary to adopt preventive measures. By any reasonable standard, it is inadmissible that a public light company, for example, should enjoy the same autonomy and independence as a carpenter's workshop, and that workers in the former should possess the same right to strike as those in a clothing store (without any restriction other than that of advance warning), as if the abandonment of work in every case only concerned employers and workers and not the entire citizenry. There is no effectively interventionist legislation for the State, and in its absence, to supplement it in intense crises, the Army is brought in, without plan or concrete rules.

Aside from this, if the State must guarantee services of a general nature, it is logical that it be able to employ (if it is necessary and other recourses have failed) the organisms of which it disposes, among them the Army, which has lent itself, and lends itself with pleasure and enthusiasm to that task, in order to redound to the benefit of the country and affect the existence of the Fatherland.

The same does not occur, however, with regard to regional and local services. Of course it is understood that just because the tramways in a town cease to run, or it lacks light, or a few factories close, the entire nation need not rouse itself. Life is not even impossible in the disturbed city itself. It must bear responsibility for the solution; it [300] should have foreseen such an eventuality and taken measures at the appropriate time. Those who learn from experience should cut short the evil, licitly supported to the necessary extent by the Diputation and the State. But since the latter arrives at once with military forces, employed as civilian labor to aid the stricken locality, each and every one has grown accustomed to expect salvation from the State and the Army. The idea that they have such an obligation spreads, and we have finally arrived at the sad extreme in which the Army is almost held to account because, with its scant numbers, it has not instantaneously reestablished normality.

When a strike intensifies and intransigence rules, mobilization is resorted to as an ultimate recourse. The mere fact of decreeing it ratifies the presence of the Army, which is always neutral, on the side of capital (although it is not true). The errors do not stop there: it is lost from sight that obligatory military service is not "obligatory civil labor"; from which it can be inferred that the Army is removed from its bases and its natural foundations and is placed in a false, unstable, or untenable situation.

This cannot and must not be. As if all this were not enough, the weight of the law does not fall upon mobilized workers who have broken it; once the strike is over, a sponge is passed over the faults and crimes committed by the soldiers, and the rigors of discipline and the Code are restricted to those individuals on active duty -- precisely the self-sacrificing, the true defenders and saviors of their countrymen -- while for the guilty, the wayward, and the provocateurs, there are only considerations, indulgences, respect, and forgetfulness, when not flattery and praise. This is not the way to maintain discipline: the soldier hears, sees, and draws conclusions. A bad example does not fall into a vacuum.

The Army, protector of the law, is resolved that these distinctions shall cease, that the evil practice of mixing it into social conflicts (which in most cases are political at bottom) shall be finished for good, and that accommodating interpretations and compromises shall be terminated. The Army wants to be isolated from these questions and from partisan maneuvers; otherwise it cannot be the safeguard of order. Free, very free, is the constituted Power to act as it understands best; but once the Army intervenes in the conflict, martial law must be applied without differences or attenuations.

In virtue of the above:

Considering: That the Army, upon intervening as an element of labor in social disputes, strays from its mission, operates between the indifference of some, the implicit hostility of others, and the energy of [301] the majority, has to sustain that which is the responsibility of citizen action, which is every day more dormant and selfish, and that if this trend is not cut short with urgency, it [the Army] will soon be useless for those functions that the Fatherland has entrusted to it and that it has sworn to fulfill, "the Assembly of Presidents," representing all arms, corps, and institutes of the Army, agrees:

First. To lend its aid to the legal Power for the functioning of public services of a general nature under all circumstances, once the other instruments that the State possesses have failed.

Second. To provide labor in other cases (regional and local services).

Third. Like the armed force it is, abiding by its strict and preemptory regulations, it will defend public order and maintain the Law by means of force, which it will exercise without leniency. Thus it will not allow itself to be given missions to parley, compromise, or temporize. Orders must be concrete, clear, and expressive. Once the troops are in the street, the Army will not be responsible for what might occur.

Fourth. Once partial or total mobilization has been decreed and mobilized workers are subject to the same duties as the regular troops, military law shall apply to all equally, and sanctions must be applied inexorably after mobilization. In this sense, the Army will not admit any exemptions from guilt nor any pardon other than those approved by the Cortes and the King.

Fifth. To invite the constituted Power to consider the suitability of reforming the existing legislation with an eye to: (1) exacting responsibility from those causing social conflicts, depending on the case; (2) intervening administratively with greater efficiency in the organization of services of a general nature; (3) preventing clashes between capital and labor, so that the State, Diputations, and Municipalities will not find themselves at the mercy of disputes between employers and workers in those industries that affect the life of the nation, the province, and the city.

Six. To communicate these accords to the Minister of War, so that they might reach the Government as a whole, indicating to him that in operating in this manner, the Army does not think of itself, but of the Fatherland. . . .

[The end of the document is incomplete.]
 

SOURCE: El Liberal, December 2, 1919, pp. 1-2.