Chapter 202: Chamber of Deputies Elections and Educational Achievements

After spending an unusual Christmas, the date arrived at January 1, 1876.

Carlo's eldest son, Juan Fernando, was nearly seven months old by Christmas and could already crawl around on Carlo's large bed.

Carlo was quite doting on the little fellow, spending the entire Christmas day playing with little Juan Fernando and fully fulfilling his duties as a father.

It is worth mentioning that the little fellow was also quite fond of his father, Carlo. When Carlo came to the bedside, the little fellow would immediately crawl to his father's side using his hands and feet, which even made Queen Sofia, who had been taking care of the little one for so long, a bit jealous.

With the addition of the little one, the Christmas atmosphere in the Wang Gong became much livelier. Although the Christmas activities prepared by the Wang Gong in previous years were equally grand, the royal family consisted only of Carlo and Queen Sofia, so it still seemed too lonely and quiet.

From now on, the number of Spanish royal family members at every Christmas will surely increase. Queen Sofia's health has now been well-restored, and Carlo also intends to have a second child with Queen Sofia in the new year.

In any case, the Spanish royal family has no financial worries, so naturally, the more princes and princesses, the better. Only with an increasing number of royal members can the royal family branch out and avoid the risk of facing a lack of heirs.

The good news is that both Carlo and Queen Sofia are still young, and they have plenty of time in the next decade or so to have children.

If they are lucky, the number of Carlo's children might be enough to form a football team. The royal family having more children is also a form of leading by example, which can encourage the public to have more children and promote the growth of Spain's population.

As time reached January 1876, the elections for the Chamber of Deputies in Spain's major regions gradually drew to a close.

The first to finish their elections were the Madrid region and several regions with smaller populations. Regions with smaller populations naturally would not receive many seats in the Chamber of Deputies, so the elections for individual seats were naturally very swift.

Carlo also received the election reports for these regions that had completed their elections at the first opportunity. There were a total of 4 regions that had completed their elections: the Madrid region, the Balearic region, the La Rioja region, and the Cantabria region.

Among the fewer than 30 seats in the Chamber of Deputies held by these 4 regions, the Progressive Party still occupied the majority, but the number was no longer enough to form an overwhelming advantage over the Conservative Party.

The proportion of Progressive Party deputies was only about 40%, the proportion of Conservative Party deputies had increased to 30%, and there were only a handful of 2 Liberal Party deputies, accounting for less than 10% of all deputies in these four regions.

Although this was only the result of the elections in four regions, it could to some extent reflect the current support for various parties throughout Spain.

Because the Progressive Party possessed the lingering influence of Prime Minister Primo, it was still temporarily the largest party in Spain. But after the Liberal Party lost the protection of Prime Minister Primo, it was no longer one of the three major parties in Spain alongside the Conservative Party, and there was already a certain gap between it and the Progressive Party and the Conservative Party.

Although Carlo was still optimistic that Mateo could lead the Liberal Party to gradually grow stronger, looking at the current political situation in Spain, the path to leading the Liberal Party to become a powerful party comparable to the Conservative Party and the Progressive Party was destined to be fraught with difficulties.

Another half a month passed, and finally, at the end of January, all 298 seats for the Chamber of Deputies in Spain's major regions were elected, and the new Chamber of Deputies officially held its meeting on February 3, 1876.

The distribution of the 298 seats in the Chamber of Deputies was not much different from what Carlo had estimated at the time. The Progressive Party remained the largest party in Spain, occupying 37. % of the Chamber of Deputies, with a total of 112 seats.

The Conservative Party leaped to become the second-largest party in Spain and significantly narrowed the gap with the Progressive Party. The Conservative Party's proportion was also as high as 33. %, almost becoming the second party in Spain to have over a hundred seats in the Chamber of Deputies.

The Liberal Party performed poorly, occupying only 34 seats in total, accounting for 11. % of the total seats in the Chamber of Deputies.

In addition, about 17. % of the deputies in the Chamber of Deputies belonged to independents; they occupied a total of 53 seats, which was more than the seats of the third-largest party, the Liberal Party.

After the Chamber of Deputies was reorganized, Carlo personally attended the first meeting of the Chamber of Deputies. It must be said that a large meeting of nearly 300 people was indeed livelier than a meeting of 200, and the venue had been temporarily expanded to ensure it could accommodate nearly 300 deputies.

After the establishment of the Chamber of Deputies, the next most important thing was to elect the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies.

The position of Speaker was quite important. Externally, it was the symbol of the chamber, and internally, it held the power to preside over chamber meetings, rule on chamber proposals, and announce the results of election votes.

Because the Speaker of the chamber was also a deputy, the Speaker also possessed all the powers that a deputy had.

The weekly routine meetings and emergency meetings held by the Chamber of Deputies all required the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies to preside. Therefore, the first thing after the establishment of the Chamber of Deputies was for all members to vote to elect a new Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies.

It could also be seen from the distribution ratio of the seats in the Chamber of Deputies that the candidate for the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies would basically be born from either the Progressive Party or the Conservative Party.

However, because neither of these two parties occupied more than 50% of the seats in the lower house, they also needed to win over deputies from other parties or those independent deputies to ensure to a greater extent that their own side's deputy would become the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies.

In terms of the system of the upper and lower houses, Spain currently had certain similarities with the United Kingdom.

Although most cabinet ministers were appointed by the Prime Minister, this did not mean unconditional appointment. Even with the support of the Prime Minister, to become a cabinet minister in Spain, one must first become a deputy in either the upper or lower house.

Only after becoming a deputy could one gain the right to be nominated as a cabinet minister. Such a system could ensure that before becoming a cabinet minister, the parliamentary election could serve as the first round of screening.

Except for a very small number of cases, most of the guys who could become deputies in the upper and lower houses basically had a certain level of ability.

After several days of electoral competition, the Chamber of Deputies finally elected a new Speaker, the deputy from the Progressive Party, Juan Fernandez.

In fact, the struggle between the Progressive Party and the Conservative Party over the Speaker was relatively deadlocked. But considering that the Conservative Party held the two major positions of Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, Carlo fixed the candidate for the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies to the Progressive Party.

Compared to the Conservative Party, the Progressive Party, having been trained by Prime Minister Primo, was currently the most suitable governing party choice for Spain. If it were not for the fact that the number two figure, Ruiz, was too radical, Carlo might not have necessarily determined Canovas as the candidate to succeed Prime Minister Primo.

During the day, he had to attend various meetings of the government and important institutions, and at night, he had to work hard with Queen Sofia.

If it were not for the fact that Carlo had attached great importance to physical exercise since coming to Spain, he would definitely not have been able to withstand such fatigue day and night.

In his spare time, Carlo also had to have some fun with the two maids, Anna and Alice, utilizing his time to the extreme.

Under constant cultivation, Queen Sofia soon brought good news.

Because of the experience brought by little Juan Fernando, Queen Sofia soon realized that she might be pregnant when the pregnancy reaction appeared again.

Although it was their second child, Carlo and Queen Sofia's emphasis on the little fellow in her belly remained undiminished.

From the moment the pregnancy was confirmed, the royal private doctors who accompanied her at all times, and the large number of maids and servants waiting on her at any time, were countless.

The entire Spanish Wang Gong had only a little over a hundred servants in total, and there were as many as twenty people serving by Queen Sofia's side.

Speaking of these servants in the Wang Gong, one had to mention the Wang Gong's quite strict servant selection and training process.

Among these hundred-plus servants, everyone had undergone background checks, which had excluded the infiltration of Republican rebels from the very beginning.

In addition, Carlo also searched for orphans from all over Spain to cultivate, and trained some of those orphans who were loyal enough but lacked sufficient ability in the direction of servants and maids.

Besides the relatively strict selection and training system, Carlo was also quite generous with the salary and benefits for all the servants in the Wang Gong.

The minimum income of the Wang Gong servants exceeded the average annual income of Spaniards, and the average income was far higher than the average annual income of Spaniards.

Especially for servants holding some relatively important positions, their income would be greatly increased to ensure their loyalty to him.

Although Carlo trusted these servants enough, the Royal Security Intelligence Agency also kept these servants under surveillance.

After all, it concerned the safety of himself and his family, so being a little more cautious was not excessive.

On a morning in February, Minister of Education Gerald Wilson requested an audience with Carlo and brought a piece of good news that made Carlo quite happy, which was the latest achievement regarding Spain's literacy education.

"Your Majesty, the education department has calculated the latest results of the literacy education, and the data is completely in line with our expectations." Gerald Wilson was all smiles; the first thing he did when he saw Carlo was to report this good news to him.

Carlo nodded, took the data on literacy education handed over by Gerald Wilson, and began to read it to himself.

The data showed that Spain's literacy education achievements last year, that is, in 1875, were quite good.

In 1874, the population participating in literacy education in Spain grew to an astonishing one million. Although a large reason for this was that these people wanted to take advantage of the free lunch benefits provided by Carlo, it was undeniable that these people participating in literacy education effectively reduced the proportion of the illiterate population in Spain.

At the beginning of 1875, Spain's illiterate population had already dropped to below 39%; this data was a great improvement compared to the approximately 70% since Carlo had just been crowned.

And a year later, Spain's illiterate population once again saw a sharp decline; currently, the total illiterate population was less than 35%.

According to government data, as of the beginning of 1876, Spain's population was approximately 18. 5 million. (Estimated)

Among them, the illiterate population had dropped to below 6. million, and a large part of this was those young children who could not receive education and the middle-aged and elderly population who were too old.

Apart from these groups, most of the remaining illiterate population were those family pillars who needed to constantly engage in work to earn income.

They really had no spare time to participate in literacy education, and factories would not give them holidays, which was also the biggest difficulty faced by literacy education.

Fortunately, the amendment of the Labor Law could ensure that the vast number of workers and other staff in Spain had more rest time. Although the improvement was not much, according to government estimates, workers could have an average of half an hour to an hour more rest time per day compared to before.

If the 70% illiteracy rate a few years ago was indeed too exaggerated, then the current illiteracy rate of less than 35% could not be considered bad when looking at the whole of Europe.

Although great powers like Britain, France, and Germany had lower illiteracy rates, they were, after all, extremely developed great powers.

There were still large areas in Europe with a large number of illiterate and low-income populations, and the existence of these populations also lowered the average education and income level of Europe.

Looking at the whole of Europe, Spain's average education level and illiteracy rate were not bad; at least it could pass for average.

Especially compared to Russia, which was also a great power, Spain was not doing badly in education. Most of Russia's population was illiterate, and it was extremely difficult to popularize education.

Don't look at the fact that Russia had undergone reforms; the reforms were not thorough. Peasants were still at the very bottom of Russia; let alone the right to education, even their most basic human rights were not valued.

Of course, a large population was also one of the reasons for Russia's strength. The title of "European Bulldozer" was world-renowned, and it also made Russia one of the five traditional great powers in Europe, comparable to Britain, France, Germany, and Austria.

Looking further, great powers like the United States and Italy still had a large gap compared to Russia. Precisely because of this, even if Russia performed very poorly in terms of per capita income and education, it was still a great power, and an undisputed great power at that.

"The Ministry of Education has done a very good job; you have not lived up to Prime Minister Primo's expectations." Carlo looked at Minister of Education Gerald Wilson with satisfaction; he was quite appreciative of this capable Minister of Education.

More than a year ago, Gerald Wilson had proposed a dual-track education model, advocating that general education and technical education should go hand in hand, simultaneously cultivating the high-educated talents and high-technical talents that Spain lacked.

Currently, the dual-track education had already begun to be implemented in Spain, and it was expected that there would be results in a short time. Especially the technical schools established by the Spanish government, which had already recruited a large number of technical trainees.

After these trainees completed their technical training, they would transform into the high-level technical talents that Spain was in urgent need of.

And the Minister of Education, Gerald Wilson, who proposed this system, had long since won Carlo's approval and support, and successfully won re-election as Minister of Education.

Hearing what Carlo said, Gerald Wilson breathed a sigh of relief.

Although he had won Carlo's trust by his own ability, he was, after all, the Minister of Education appointed by Prime Minister Primo and belonged to the Progressive Party.

If Carlo was dissatisfied with the way Prime Minister Primo had monopolized power and intended to completely cut off the existing Spanish government from Prime Minister Primo, then he still had a high possibility of having to say goodbye to the Spanish cabinet government and ending his political career.

Currently, it seemed that Carlo had no intention of completely cutting ties with Prime Minister Primo. Gerald Wilson, as the minister from the same party as Prime Minister Primo, could still remain in the position of Minister of Education and exert his brilliance.

"All of this is Your Majesty's credit." Gerald Wilson flattered him, while secretly expressing his attitude: "If it were not for Your Majesty's support for the dual-track education system I proposed, the education department would not have achieved such remarkable achievements.

If I must say who the greatest contributor to the development of Spanish education is so far, I think it should be Your Majesty. The education department still needs Your Majesty's guidance; I will continue to contribute my remaining heat under your instructions and add bricks and tiles to Spain's educational cause."

(End of chapter)