Catholicism in the Second Spanish Republic: Religion and Politics in Salamanca, 1930-1936 by Mary Vincent (review)

BOOK REVIEWS137 that swept away the Central Powers and their protectorate, leaving a chaotic but free Poland in its wake. Nearly aU of these documents are gleaned from the recentiy opened Ratti papers in the Vatican Secret Archives, the bulk of them in ItaUan and Latin, the remainder in PoUsh, French, and German.The list of Ratti's eminent correspondents includes Pope Benedict XV; his Secretary of State, Cardinal Gasparri; the nuncio to Munich, Eugenio PaceUi, the future Pius XII; and the Russian Orthodox Patriarch Tikhon, as weU as the leading dignitaries of the PoUsh Church. Like the companion volumes in this series, this item is not intended for a wide audience, but scholars with a serious interest in Pius XI and modern PoUsh church history wUl find in it a wealth of information. Neal Pease University ofWisconsin-Milwaukee Catholicism in the Second Spanish Republic: Religion and Politics in Salamanca , 1930-1936. By Mary Vincent. [Oxford Historical Monographs.] (New York: Clarendon Press, Oxford University Press. 1966. Pp. xiii, 286. $70.00.) This fresh new study of one of the most Catholic provinces in Spain during the Second Republic is composed of two different but related parts.The first half treats the structure and practice of Catholicism in Salamanca province, whUe the second half deals with politics in Salamanca—increasingly dominated by the CathoUc Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas (CEDA)—during the Republican years.The result is a full and rounded account of Catholic Salamanca under the democratic regime. Of the two halves, the first part on Salamanca Catholics is the more original and important, for it provides us with the best account that we have in either English or Spanish of the religious institutions and practices of one of the key CathoUc provinces of northern Spam.Vincent,who began this study as a dissertation under the direction of Frances Lannon, presents chapters on the secular clergy and on the orders, on the structure and practice of religious devotion, and on CathoUc Action and lay activism in Salamanca, achieving a clear, sensitive and weU-rounded portrait of CathoUc life in the province.This is based on extensive research Ln CathoUc pubUcations, the local press, memoirs, and secondary sources. It does not necessarUy alter in any major way our general understanding ofnorthern Spanish Catholicism during these years, but it provides a wealth of information and teUing detail. It is striking, for example, that in a province where approximately half the population were stiU practicing CathoUcs in 1930 the Church had stUl been unable to provide new priests and parishes for the expanding worker districts of the provincial capital. Moreover, in Salamanca as elsewhere, the number of new seminarians declined sharply during the secular years of the RepubUc. 138BOOK REVIEWS The second half of the book, on politics in Salamanca, offers less purely original data, but nonetheless adds to our knowledge of the development of Catholic poUtics under the Republic. Salamanca was one of the chief bases of the Spanish Confederation of Autonomous Rightists, which in each of the last two Republican elections of 1933 and 1936 gained more votes than any other single party in the country.Vincent traces the origins and rise ofthe CEDA in Salamanca, and the increasing polarization of politics, as moderate RepubUcan UberaUsm—which had the support of a minority of voters Ui the province—was steadUy reduced to impotence. In this section there are no surprises but considerable interesting details on the precise local configuration of this trend. Though it does not achieve any strikingly original breakthrough that challenges the estabUshed interpretations, this is an extremely weU done provincial study. It provides one of the best accounts that we have of any province during the RepubUcan years, and its study of Salamancan CathoUcism is exceUent. Stanley G. Payne University ofWisconsin-Madison Die Gründung des Bistums Berlin 1930. By Michael Höhle. [VeröffentUchungen der Kommission für Zeitgeschichte, Reihe B: Forshungen, Band 73.] (Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh. 1996. Pp. 308. DM 78,-.) This book presents a concise history of the Catholic Church in Berlin, which grew from a terra missionis under the authority of Breslau's prince bishops into a unique diocese centered...