Payne 9 A Republic... without Democrats? Had anyone reading this book been in Madrid or Barcelona on the evening of April 14, 1931, or the day following, the scenes of jubilation, accompanied by the general absence of violence, would have convinced him that the new Republic was welcomed by the vast majority of Spanish society. A logical corollary might be that the latter possessed the civic maturity and responsibility to enable a twentieth-century democracy to function successfully. But, as everyone knows, this did not prove to be the case. There remain certain standard explanations for the failure of the Republic. For the Left, this stemmed from the unremitting hostility of the Right, which refused to accept "reforms." For the Right, it resulted from the violence and extremism of the Left, aided and abetted by Moscow, which never intended to practice democracy. For more than a few professional scholars, it stemmed from the civic immaturity and polarization of Spanish society, influenced by the European conjuncture.
