Manuel Senante

Manuel Senante Martínez (1873–1959) was a Spanish Traditionalist politician and publisher, until 1931 adhering to the Integrist current and afterwards active in the Carlist ranks. He is known mostly as the longtime editor-in-chief of the Madrid daily El Siglo Futuro (1907–1936). During 8 consecutive terms he served as the Integrist deputy to the Cortes (1907–1923).

Manuel was born to a distinguished Alicantine family. His paternal grandfather, Manuel Senante Sala, was professor of Retórica y Poética at Instituto de Segunda Enseñanza of Alicante and its longtime director (1854–1889). His father, Emilio Senante Llaudes (died 1916), was in 1881–1909 teaching geography and history at the very same institute, in 1891–1904 also serving as its director. In 1907 he assumed directorship of the local Escuela Normal de Maestros. Senante Llaudes wrote a number of textbooks in history, fairly popular in secondary education across Levante. Apart from his educative posts, he was also active as a lawyer, periodista and local politician. His brother Francisco Senante Llaudes was a locally recognized composer and maestro.

At unspecified time Senante Llaudes married a girl from Alicante, María Teresa Martínez Torrejón (died 1885). Her brother Antonio Martínez Torrejón would later become a locally known personality, deputy-mayor, poet and publisher, director of the local daily El eco de la provincia. The couple had at least 3 children, Manuel born as the oldest one. His younger brother José died in infancy; another one, Joaquin, perished at 16 years of age.

The young Manuel was brought up in a fervently Catholic ambience; in the 1890s he studied law in Barcelona and Madrid. By the turn of the century, he returned to Alicante, launching his own career as a lawyer in 1897. Representing his clients in cases ranging from private to commercial law, he gradually grew to prominence and got engaged in politically sensitive cases, like a dispute over a forcibly closed local parish cemetery, speaking for the Alicantine San Nicolás community before the Supreme Court; in 1903 he was already one of the Alicante municipal judges. Manuel Senante married Josefa Esplá Rizo (1870–1957), daughter of the Alicantine merchant marine captain and also a local Alicantine municipal counselor. The couple had 6 daughters (3 of them became nuns) and a son, Manuel Senante Esplá, also a Carlist activist. A lawyer, in the 1930s he defended in court individuals charged with engagement in Sanjurjada. He followed in the footsteps of his father and entered the publishing business, serving as member of the board of El Siglo Futuro in the 1930s; during early Francoism he served as municipal judge in Madrid. Senante's daughter Immaculada married Francisco Urries, catedrático of philosophy in Madrid. The family initially lived at the estate of Santa Rosa in San Juan, now a bedroom suburb of Alicante; in the early 20th century it moved permanently to Madrid.

Senante inherited ultraconservative political outlook from his ancestors. His grandfather was a subscriber of the Carlist daily El Siglo Futuro in the 1870s and in the 1880s, when the newspaper followed the breakaway Integrist path; also his father engaged in politically loaded public disputes. Having completed academic period and driven principally by his profound religiosity, back in his home city Manuel threw himself into Alicantine public activities. He associated with the Conservative Party in 1897 and commenced his long editorial career first by contributing and later by running a local party Andalusian daily, La Monarquía (1899–1900). He became active in numerous local Catholic initiatives, e.g. hosting Junta Organizadora for erection of the Century Cross in Alicante in 1901. Senante started to contribute to El Siglo Futuro himself in 1901, initially with short informative pieces. Already in 1902 he was hailed as “elocuentísimo abogado” and “uno de los católicos más firmes y decididos”.

In the early 20th century Senante dissociated himself from the conservatives and approached Partido Católico Nacional, the Integrist political party; in 1903 he was already reported by the press as “joven abogado alicantino, integrista ayer”. The same year he tried his luck in elections to the Cortes, especially that according to some sources he was already one of the most influential personalities of the Right in the province. He stood as a candidate of Liga Católica, a newly formed electoral platform promoted by the Church in Spain. He fielded his candidature in the south-Levantine city of Orihuela, but was defeated by the famous liberal politician, Francisco Ballesteros.

No source consulted mentions Senante as running in the 1905 elections. He engaged in setting up La Voz de Alicante, the daily which first appeared in 1904 and which he managed as a director. The newspaper was formatted as a broad Catholic tribune, though its Integrist sympathies were evident. Senante was also active in local party structures; his formal position remains unclear, but in 1906 he was already representing the provincial Integrist junta. Apart from pure politics he joined a new initiative, Acción Católica, later presiding over Círculo Obrero of this organization. Displaying some penchant for social issues Senante became member of Instituto de Reformas Sociales, promoted also by the conservative groupings into Instituto Nacional de Previsión; within this structure he entered Consejo de Patronato and represented it within employers’ associations.

Due to a chain of events following the death of Ramón Nocedal, in the 1907 electoral campaign Senante ran as Integrist candidate in Gipuzkoa; though total alien to Basque political milieu he got safely elected, as Azpeitia, a profoundly religious, conservative rural district, had been usually electing Traditionalist candidates. The 1907 triumph turned out to be the start of a fairly long parliamentary career, lasting for the next 16 years. Senante stood as an Integrist candidate from the same Azpeitia district in course of the following 7 election campaigns of 1910, 1914, 1916, 1918, 1919, 1920 and 1923, always emerging victorious. The mainstream Carlists usually refrained from fielding counter-candidates, though at times other parties presented their contenders; twice (in 1918 and 1920) Senante was declared triumphant having faced no competition and elected according to the notorious Article 29. During 3 terms until 1916 he was one of two Integrist MPs in the Cortes; during 5 terms after that date Senante was the sole party deputy in the parliament.