Chapter 126 Land Leases Act

Carlo is quite satisfied with the current development speed of Spain.

At the end of 1870, the total mileage of railways in Spain was close to 6,000 kilometers.

At the beginning of this year, the total mileage of railways in Spain has exceeded 6,440 kilometers.

This also means that the total mileage of railways in Spain has increased by thousands of kilometers in the three and a half years from late 1868 to early 1872.

Although the average annual railway mileage is only about 300 kilometers, it is already a big improvement for the Spanish government.

After all, from the birth of railways to late 1868, the total mileage of railways in Spain is only about 5,400 kilometers.

Spain's land area is not inferior to other European powers (mainland), and because of the lack of plain terrain in the country, it needs railways to strengthen economic exchanges between regions.

At present, with Madrid as the center, Spain has built a large-scale railway loop. The capital cities of various regions, including some important cities, are in the planning of the railway loop.

The next railway construction goal of the Spanish government is to include more cities in the railway construction plan, so that Spanish people can easily travel to other cities by rail, of course, including the transportation of goods.

The construction of railways can enhance the importance of Madrid in Spain, while strengthening economic exchanges and stability between regions.

As the center of the Iberian region, the benefits of Madrid are highlighted. From Madrid, it only takes a few hundred kilometers to go to any city in Spain.

Even Barcelona, ​​which is more remote in the northeast corner of Spain, is only more than 600 kilometers away from Madrid.

At the current train speed, the train from Madrid to Barcelona only takes more than a day to arrive. If the time to stay at the station is not counted, the current train speed can even reach Barcelona in more than 20 hours.

In this case, no matter which region of Spain has unrest, the army in Madrid can arrive within a day, which is why Spain has been a unified country until later generations.

No matter how arrogant the Catalan and Basque separatists are, the Spaniards are located in the middle of the country and can go to the rebellious areas at any time to quell the rebellion.

Even if the Portuguese region is included, Madrid is still located in the center of the entire Iberian Peninsula. This is Madrid's geographical advantage and the reason why Madrid can become the capital of Spain.

At the end of April 1872, the first phase of the Spanish government's reform was declared successful, and the reform smoothly entered the second phase.

On May 1, a member of the Liberal Party submitted the "Land Lease Act" to the Spanish Parliament, requiring the government to enact a law stipulating that the rent for land leasing shall not exceed 40% of the annual income of the land.

The purpose of this bill is to protect the rights and interests of farmers who rent land, so that they will not be exploited by nobles and landlords and face the situation of hunger.

This bill is directly aimed at the nobles and churches who own land, and Prime Minister Primo naturally understands the risks.

Therefore, it was the liberal party members who proposed this bill, not the Progressive Party where Prime Minister Primo belongs.

If the proposal of this bill leads to dissatisfaction among a large number of nobles, Prime Minister Primo will hold an emergency meeting to let the parliament repeal this bill.

In order to prevent the nobles from reacting radically, Prime Minister Primo changed the rent from 30% of the annual income to 40%. This rent level is not much different from the 40%-50% rent that the nobles originally required the peasants to pay, in order to prevent the nobles from reacting violently.

Of course, in addition to launching this bill, Prime Minister Primo also made preparations in advance.

First of all, he and Archduke Serrano, as the most powerful representatives of the Spanish nobles, persuaded some nobles to agree to this bill.

Another thing is to ask Carlo to persuade some nobles to agree to this bill to divide the entire noble class.

In general, there are too many nobles in Spain. These nobles hold a large amount of land, which has a very serious impact on the future development of Spain.

In the case of affecting the development of Spain, the government naturally cannot ignore this situation. If these nobles continue to hold such a large amount of land, the development of Spain will be seriously affected in the future.

Of course, as the nobles are the most influential force in Spain, Prime Minister Primo naturally cannot respond too radically.

First of all, Prime Minister Primo does not intend to completely take back the land of these nobles. The government will only persuade some nobles to actively sell their land to the government, and the government will buy these lands at a price higher than the market price as a reward for these nobles.

The second is this test of the nobles. If successful, it can ensure that landless farmers can also have a part of the guaranteed income when renting land, at least there is no problem with having enough food.

But if it causes strong opposition from the nobles, there will be room for detours on this matter, so as not to cause a strong conflict between the nobles and the government.

Carlo was also very troubled when he learned about Prime Minister Primo's plan.

After thinking about it, Carlo is not suitable for a direct statement on this matter. If he stands on the side of Prime Minister Primo, he will undoubtedly offend a large number of Spanish nobles.

But if he stood on the side of the Spanish nobles, he would not only offend Prime Minister Primo, but also disrupt the progress of Spain's reform.

Carlo naturally understood the harm of the large amount of land held by the Spanish nobles to Spain, and naturally wanted to take back as much land as possible from the nobles.

However, as the largest noble, the king naturally could not stand up and directly oppose the noble class. After receiving Prime Minister Primo's request, Carlo said that he would let the loyalist noble Duke Jacobo make friendly suggestions to some Spanish nobles, and he himself would not come forward.

Carlo would not offend a large number of Spanish nobles at this time. Although many of these nobles have become pests of the country, they are indeed Carlo's biggest supporters at present.

At least until Carlo fully controls the power of the country and minimizes the influence of the nobles on the army as much as possible, he will try to cut some of the nobles.

And now, it is better to stay away from Prime Minister Primo's reform as much as possible. The current nobles are still quite influential. There are a large number of nobles in the government and the army. This is also the reason why Prime Minister Primo has to be careful to test the nobles when he holds the military and political power, instead of directly cutting.

Although he expressed his support for Prime Minister Primo's reform, Carlo also put forward his own request, that is, after the strong opposition of the nobles, Carlo convened the Spanish Parliament and forcibly abolished the bill.

This was Carlo's back-up plan, used to declare to the nobles that Carlo had nothing to do with this incident.

The current king still needs the support of the nobles, and Carlo will not destroy the good relationship with the nobles unless it is necessary to choose.

As expected, after the bill was proposed in the parliament, it immediately attracted the attention of a large number of nobles.

In Spain, the higher the level of the noble's title, the more land the noble controls.

As large landowners, the nobles naturally do not want to see the government promulgate this bill to reduce the rent of farmers' land, because it is really related to their own income.

Although the nobles can still maintain 40% of the land rent after the bill is promulgated, their income has been reduced by at least 20% to 30% compared with before.

In order to prevent the nobles from rioting, Prime Minister Primo mobilized the original revolutionary army to garrison Madrid, and personally found Archduke Serrano to persuade him.

Compared to power, Archduke Serrano doesn't value land that much. Like Prime Minister Primo, he is a noble who was granted a fiefdom, not an inherited title.

Although he has become the pinnacle of the Spanish nobility and has the title of Archduke, Archduke Serrano does not have much land property. Instead, his shares in the Royal United Bank are the bulk of his income.

There are also the new nobles who were granted fiefdoms by Carlo before. Although the new nobles also own some land, these lands are not as good as those of the old nobles.

They are not opposed to this bill, after all, it does not have much impact on their interests.

Under the influence of Prime Minister Primo and Archduke Serrano, although the nobles as a whole expressed dissatisfaction with this bill, there are still many nobles who agree with this bill.

Although most nobles own a lot of land, this does not mean that all nobles are rich.

In fact, there are countless noble families in Europe that are not doing well every year, and there are even more nobles who have to sell their property because of bankruptcy.

There are indeed many nobles in Spain, but the economy of Spain is just like that. The nobles who can really become rich are the great nobles.

Earls and barons are not actually very rich, and their property may go bankrupt at any time due to poor management.

Under the policy of the government to purchase land at high prices, many nobles who are in urgent need of funds due to bankruptcy have taken the initiative to sell their land to the government.

Prime Minister Primo also urgently needs the nobles to take the initiative to sell land to express his position, so he raised the price of purchasing land to 1.5 times the market price.

In order to prevent nobles from temporarily purchasing farmers' land and then selling it to the government to make a profit, the Spanish government also promulgated the "Land Sales Law", which stipulates that the land in the hands of farmers can only be sold to the government, and the government will provide a price above the market price to ensure that farmers will not lose money when selling land.

Of course, if they are not desperate, most farmers are unwilling to sell their land. Farmers rely on land for food. If they don't even have the guys to eat, how can they live?

In addition to landlords with a lot of land, those who really sell land are those farmers who can no longer survive by farming.

With these nobles who took the initiative to sell their land and stood up, the noble class, which was originally angry about the bill, was divided into two, forming a split.

Moreover, this bill was not so harsh on the nobles. Their income was indeed reduced, but not too much.

At least the reduced income would not cause the nobles to unite against the government. After all, the current government is not the same as it was a few years ago. Prime Minister Primo's reforms have greatly increased the support rate of farmers for the government. The nobles and farmers are still in frequent contact, and they naturally know how popular the current government is.

In addition, Marshal Serrano and Prime Minister Primo, as members of the nobility, did not oppose the bill, which made some nobles see something more profound in it.

Perhaps such a bill was submitted to the parliament with the support of Prime Minister Primo? If Prime Minister Primo and Grand Duke Serrano both supported the bill, what could they do?

Even Duke Jacopo persuaded some nobles at Carlo's suggestion, which led to the bill being voted on in parliament for several days. During this period, the nobles did not react too strongly.

After learning that the nobles did not react strongly, Prime Minister Primo finally breathed a sigh of relief. Although the nobles are certainly still dissatisfied, at least they have not developed to the point of causing unrest.

As long as the nobles do not make too big moves in the future, after the bill is passed by parliament, the nobles can only pinch their noses and admit it.

Moreover, this bill is not only aimed at the nobles, but also at the church, which also owns a large amount of land.

If Prime Minister Primo still has some attention and concerns about the nobles, he is not so good-tempered about the church.

The large amount of land in the hands of the church also endangers the development of Spain, and these lands are also the target that the Spanish government wants to take back.

There was the abolition of tithes before, and then there was a bill to limit land rent. The income of the church has been greatly restricted.

Prime Minister Primo also considered mobilizing the army to guard against the church. If the church cannot bear such losses and finally chooses to launch a rebellion against the government, then things will develop in the direction that Prime Minister Primo would like to see most.

A large number of troops will solve the church's rebellion in a short time, and the government will have a legitimate excuse to take back the church's land.

Of course, because it affects the interests of both the nobles and the church, Prime Minister Primo also knows that there is a small possibility that the church and the nobles will unite to resist the government.

However, after the division, it is difficult for the nobles to form an iron plate to resist the government. After all, the nobles also have their own interests to consider.

During the reign of Queen Isabel, the nobles almost completely controlled the army. The vast majority of middle and high-level officers in the Spanish army are nobles, and the royal army is a private army led by nobles.

But after the revolution, there were fewer nobles in the army. Many noble officers in the army joined the Carlos rebellion before, and they were also eliminated by the government.

The suppression of the rebellion gave birth to a large number of new nobles. These nobles are different from the old nobles. They support the government's policies.

Coupled with the large number of officers trained by the Royal Military Academy, this has greatly reduced the influence of the nobles on the army.

Unless it really reaches a point where the interests of the nobles are greatly harmed, such as the government forcibly taking back the nobles' land, etc., the nobles are unwilling to directly resist the government.

After all, rebellion against the government is not without cost. If the army formed cannot defeat the government army with overwhelming advantage, the result may be disastrous for these Spanish nobles who launched the rebellion.

There are still many smart people among the nobles. Although it is admitted that this bill will lose some interests, at least the final result is still good, and most of the income can still be retained.

If you take the risk of launching a rebellion to rebel against the government, if the rebellion fails, you may not even be able to keep your noble title.

With the aristocracy remaining silent, the church has become a lamb to be slaughtered. Faced with the situation of either selling land or reducing land income, the bishops of the church headed by Archbishop Pedro also know that they must make a choice.

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