Autonomous Basque government

The photograph shows the members of the autonomous government of the Basque Country that was sworn in at the Meeting House in Gernika on 7 October 1936. This was a product of the Republican parliament passing the Basque Autonomy Statute on 1 October. The statute had been under discussion before the military rebellion but the new situation sped up the process and its approval guaranteed the commitment of the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) to the Republican cause. 

This first Basque cabinet was a coalition of all the political forces loyal to the Republic, which included the nationalists of the PNV and the various left-wing parties that made up the Popular Front: the Socialist Party, the Communist Party, the Republican Left, and the Republican Union . The government was dominated by the PNV and led by the President (Lehendakari) José Antonio Aguirre, who also served as minister of defence. Due to the circumstances created by the war, Aguirre had been elected by representative of the municipalities of the province of Vizcaya and some of the province of Gipuzkoa. 

The authority of the Basque government was limited to Vicaya. The rebellion had been successful in Álava and the rebels conquered Gipuzkoa during the summer of 1936. Even there, it functioned only nine months, until the fall of Bilbao in June 1937. In spite of these limitations, it became a symbol of Basque autonomy that was able to function almost as an independent state. Catholic religious practice continued as before and, with only one serious exception: the attack on Bilbao’s prisons and the massacre of 225 rightwing prisoners after an aerial attack on the city on 4 January 1937, public order was maintained. 

In its first program, issued the day it was created, the government set out its principal goals: guaranteeing democratic rights and freedoms, including the freedom of religion; using the existing militas as the basis for creating a Basque army; maintaining law and order; and protecting Basque identity. In the autonomous Basque Country, there was neithre anticlerical violence nor attempted revolution. 

The Basque government spent the years of the Francoist dictatorship in exile, where it continued to bring together diverse anti-Franco forces. It also tried to mobilize opposition to the regime but its activity flagged in the 1950s, as the dictatorship became more consolidated.