Spain’s two most urgent problems—ending the civil war unleashed by the Carlists, the partisans of the successors to the Spanish throne in the male line, and drafting the constitution—are both settled in 1876.

The Bourbon pretender to the Spanish throne, Carlos, Duke of Madrid, aka Carlos VII, had organized and now leads the Third Carlist War as the effective ruler much of peninsular Spain between 1872 and 1876.

The pronunciamiento by Martinez Campos had established Alfonso XII as King of Spain on December 29, 1874, marking the end of the First Spanish Republic.

The new Spanish commander, General Fernando Primo de Rivera, marches on February 2 on the remaining Carlist stronghold at Estella, where he meets a force of about sixteen hundred men under General Carlos Calderón at nearby Montejurra.

Calderón is forced to withdraw after a courageous and costly defense, nd the government troops take the town on February 19.

The Carlist forces have not succeeded, and their promises have not been fulfilled.

The Carlist pretender goes into into exile in France on February 28, bringing the four-year conflict to an end.

Alfonso XII’s government, led by Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, enacts Spain’s conservative constitution of 1876, which establishes Spain as a bi-cameral constitutional monarchy, with a lower House (Congreso de Diputados), and an upper House (Senado).

This constitution gives the King the power to name Senators, and to revoke laws if he wants to, and he is also given the title of Commander-in-chief of the army.

Following the defeat of the Carlists, the Spanish government dispatches an army to Cuba to fight the rebels who have controlled the island’s eastern half for seven years.

The rebellion in Cuba has made difficulties for all governments in power in Spain after 1868 and forced abandonment of the most popular of the pledges made by the rebels between 1868 and 1878: the abolition of the arbitrary and socially selective recruitment system.

Like the Carlist Wars, the Cuban War tends to favor the monarchical reaction.

Martínez Campos applies his humane policy in Cuba, ending the Ten Years' War by the Convention of El Zanjón (February 1878), in which Spain promises amnesty and political reform.

The Cortes accepts a new constitution, a compromise between those of 1845 and 1869.

Spain’s restored Bourbon monarchy provides the most stable government the country has known since 1833.

This stability is sustained by an uneven but respectable economic growth.

The architect of the restoration itself and of the Constitution of 1876 is Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, prime minister from 1875 to 1881 and again from January 1884.

A superb politician, Cánovas had hoped for a civilian restoration; he had accepted Martínez Campos' coup but used the young Alfonso XII to keep the military out of politics.

The Canovite system is artificial in that it requires the contrived rotation in office (turno pacífico) of a Liberal, led by Práxedes Mateo Sagasta, and a Conservative party, led by Canovas; this in turn demands governmental control of elections, which are run by caciques, or local political bosses, who control votes in their districts.

Only in this way can the government selected by the king and the politicians in Madrid obtain a parliamentary majority; extensive corruption and the use of administrative pressures on electors are considered the only ways to make the parliamentary system work in an underdeveloped society.

Alfonso XII, although politically inexperienced, demonstrates great natural tact and sound judgment, qualities that give rise to hope that the monarchy will not suffer if the democratic constitution enacted in 1876 is fully implemented.

Attempts on the King's life (October 1878 and December 1879) and a military pronunciamento against the regime (1883) are not indicative of any general discontent with the restored monarchy; on the contrary, Alfonso enjoys considerable popularity, and his early death from tuberculosis on November 25, 1885, is a great disappointment to those who looked forward to a constitutional monarchy in Spain.

Alfonso's pregnant widow, Maria Christina of Austria, by whom he had had two daughters, serves as regent.

Spain's economy is quite behind those of the other European countries, and during these years, the modernization of the country has taken place on a large scale.

On most fronts, production has been increased due to extreme protectionist measures.