Miquel Roca: «The Spanish Constitution is even more of a guarantee than a problem»

It was within the framework of the First Colloquium on Constitutional Consensus and Democratic Memory, organized by the Spanish Institute of Historical-Legal Sciences with the collaboration of the Córdoba City Council, the University and the Government of Andalusia.

Miquel Roca (Bordeaux, 1940) addressed himself above all to the university students of Law and Business Administration and Management, who listened to him in the Orive Room. “I, like everything here, am an archaeological remains,” he began with humor, and then told them that they could build a better future if those who lived through the transition, in circumstances more difficult, they were able to do it.

His words were above all in defense of the Spanish Constitution of 1978, of which the so-called fathers were “mere writers “They wrote what people wanted.” He told the anecdote of a stranger who asked him on the street in those days: “Roca, this time, this has to turn out well.” Until then, the history of Spain was full “of intransigence.”

«Win the freedom It is not easy, but the most difficult thing is learning to live in it. Respecting your neighbor is complicated, but it has to be done. Not only respect it, but make it possible for you to express it,” he summarized, as a warning.

His words were to praise not only the spirit that made the Constitution possible, but also the validity that it continues to have: “Read it a little, even if it is just skimming. The Constitution is still more of a guarantee than a problem, and there all our problems can find an answer, and those that do not find it are because they are posed against it.

Reading it means cultivating “the constructive memory», contrary to the one that talks about past tragedies, and by insisting on freedom he reminded them that they will have to learn to agree, because maintaining it depends precisely on agreements.

He distinguished between a young democracy and a mature one, such as the Spanish one. «The young one gives a more compact response, while the mature one leaves more open to the presentation of more minority plans, and that is what is talked about in the political pluralism», he highlighted.

The solution is then “to agree and agree, because consensus is the result of necessity, and is raised when there are ambitious objectives.” «Can we make reforms from very strict, circumstantial majorities and contradictory? The answer is no, and the answer is consensus, which makes us adults and turns us into characters who manage the future sensibly,” he summarized.

In the transition, consensus became possible to lay the foundations of a democracy and it is necessary to explain it well, as he said. He recalled, for example, the pacts of The Moncloa and how Marcelino Camachowho had had to give up much of what he stood for, believed it was a good agreement. “I agreed to give up being coherent, but the country needed that effort,” he recalled.

He did not hesitate to remind them that they can now take a stand against the current political system, but not those who lived under Franco and could not express themselves. His last word for the young people was to defend what was done in those years and its comparison with what is happening now: “You are going to have a difficult time, but I am so envious of that.” difficulty».

He also spoke Manuel Aragon (Benamejí, 1944), a prestigious jurist who was a professor of Constitutional Law and a magistrate of the Constitutional Court, who wanted to compare democracy with grass. “The sap is received from the bottom up, that is, from the town, from the land, but the maintenance is from the top to the bottom,” he said.

It has to be done by the institutions that are in charge, and if it is left for a long time, “it does not sprout, it has to be planted again and it can take years.” “Democracy dries up if it does not have continuous watering, and sometimes it is not achieved, because it takes many years and there can be difficulties,” he said.

He spoke of the concordconsensus and exemplariness as bases for the system that was born with the transition that followed Franco’s death and warned of a strong institutional deterioration, “perhaps since 2005, but which has reached its peak in the last six years.”

He listed the problems: “The General Courts are deteriorated, the Government does not respond to parliamentary questions, the decree-law “It is the ordinary way of legislating, there are laws that are very poorly constructed technically and ‘omnibus’ decree-laws are issued, with intrusive amendments.”

The consequence of these problems, and of a presidentialism that has become more evident, is “a institutional deterioration serious, with an unarmed state. He warned of the risk that “all this polarization will end up taking hold if it is not stopped in time.”

Because for Manuel Aragón, the refusal of the transversal pact between different parties, which is what is happening now, “can lead to political discord becoming social discordand that it falls into hatred, which is what was banished in the transition.

Consuelo Madrigal (Segovia, 1956) was the first female State Attorney General in Spain, between 2015 and 2016, and later took part in the trial for the independence ‘procés’ of Catalonia. “Democracy cannot defend itself, if not through the consensus that gives rise to the law, which defends the order of democracy and freedom,” he summarized.

He praised the memory of the transition, which managed to overcome what happened in the Civil War with reason, “because if we only talk about blame and violence, then the terror has no end. He remembered the initial cruelty of the dictatorship and looked for the purpose that was had at the time when democracy arrived: «Between the 60s and 80s the memory of the horrors and sufferings of the Civil War “It was so alive that the vast majority of Spaniards did not want to forget it, but rather wanted it not to be repeated.”

It was the spirit that had already shown Azaña in 1938, with his “peace, mercy, forgiveness”, and that search for harmony was the key to the success of the transition to democracy” as a way to overcome the tragedy that had begun in 1936.

That does not mean that there are no dangers now: “The majority plus one does not allow break the lawdoes not allow us to evade the control of the judicial power, as is often said or intended. What’s more, he criticized the Government for talking about the “excesses of the judicial power.”

“The achievements In the field of freedom they are always provisional, and we must not be afraid to raise our voices in defense of democracy and freedom itself. Being a participatory citizen leads to efforts and courageous resistance, which is manifested with criticism and reconsideration of ideas,” he stated.

The journalist closed the speaking turn Juan Fernandez-Mirandawhich began with a fact: twenty million Spaniards had been born after June 15, 1977, that is, from the first elections free after Franco’s death. They are 40 percent of those who live in Spain, and that so many people were born in freedom is “an exception and a gift that they have to value and know, but also a responsibility.”

In a year’s time it will be half a century since Franco’s death, it will be the time to write and remember a lot about that, and he defended the “virtuous triangle” that the king represented. Juan Carlos I; the president of the Cortes, Torcuato Fernández-Mirandaand the president of the Government Adolfo Suarez. In 19 months they were able to call elections.

“The world admired Spain,” he said, for the way it was achieved: “The King established the destiny, Torcuato designed the tracks and the locomotive and Suárez was in charge.” He invited them to meet him, because democracy had to face four problems, of which “at least three” were resolved.

Thus, there was the social one, with many inequalities that have been attenuated, but also the military one, in a country that had had dozens of coups d’état or attempts since the 19th century. They were given an answer, just like the religious problem, and it could also have happened with the territorial“but the disloyalty of some communities means that it has to be reviewed.”

His bet is “the demystificationbecause you have to know the process to improve it; take the baton from those who did it in the 70s and told it in the 90s and from those who leave the legacy of being critical citizens who can disagree on the basis of harmony. The journalist ended with a phrase from Felipe González: “I prefer to be a son of the transition than a grandson of the Civil War.”