Enrique Ramos Ramos Y Joan Lluhí Vallescà, Dos Juristas Y Ministros Republicanos De Izquierdas, Al Frente De Las Carteras De Hacienda Y De Trabajo, Sanidad Y Previsión: Un Epistolario Jurídico, Político Y De Recomendación Cruzado En Meses Cruciales De 1936

Previous parts of this contribution, which have been published in this journal, should be consulted for this part to be fully understood. The first part, by Manuel J. Peláez, deals with the correspondence received and sent by Joan Lluhí i Vallescà when he was Minister of Employment, Health and Prevention in two governments during some central and convulsive months in 1936. The second part, by María Encarnación Gómez Rojo, which extended the information on this topic and also included some references regarding the political and legislative activity carried out by Lluhí in the Catalonian Parliament. In a third contribution, also by Peláez, new letters between Lluhí and several correspondent as well as the answers sent by his two secretaries in the Ministry, Rafael Gubern y Julián Amich, were published. The fourth part, by Manuel J. Peláez y María del Carmen Amaya Galván, seemed to be the last contribution devoted to this leftist Catalan politician, who died in Mexican exile in 1944. Enrique Ramos Ramos could very well be the minister he kept the most fluent correspondence with. Even though we believed that all correspondence by Lluhí from the Ministry had been published, we have now realised some letters had been forgotten in a file which had been set aside with the intention of writing Ramos’ biography. This fifth part, also by Manuel J. Peláez y María del Carmen Amaya Galván, will definitely be the last article on Lluhí Vallescà. So far, these contributions had depicted a picture of the tasks carried out by Joan Lluhí i Vallescà when he was head of the Ministry of Employment, Health and Prevention. In this respect, Ramos Ramos is an undoubtedly singular character since he was Minister for the Treasury and for Employment, Health and Prevention in several governments, even though most of them lasted for a very short period of time, and Undersecretary for the President of the Government. Ramos contacted Lluhí to intercede mainly in matters related to several towns in the province of Malaga, in particular to Algarrobo, where he had been born on 7th October 1890, but also on behalf of Melilla, Pruna, Almargen, Totalán, Cañete la Real, El Borge, El Burgo, Teba, Palenciana, Alcaucín, Macharaviaya, Ronda and Bonamocarra. We feel that he is the only one born in such a tiny town from the Axarquia area, Algarrobo, who was a minister in five governments and, even more so, someone who had widened his training as a scientist within the School of Pandectism and the German Civil Law doctrine in the prestigious University of Heidelberg, which was once the most renown university in Germany. Then, Ramos, who was a right-hand man for Manuel Azaña Díaz and a member of the same political parties, «Acción Republicana» (Republican Action) and «Izquierda Republicana» (Republican Left), had an eventful life and had to go into exile, first, to France and, later on, to the United States, where he managed to make a decent living as a lawyer. After that, he came down with a cancer and moved to Germany but was unable to recover from this terrible illness and died in Munich. Ramos was subject to strong criticism by the President of the Spanish Second Republic, Niceto Alcalá-Zamora Torres, who would refer to Ramos as the sticky elf in Azaña’s clique. The «Falange» (Phalange political party) also accused him of having fled Spain with two hundred million pesetas of the time, which is an amazing amount of money; Ramos family considers this a slanderous accusation, such as many others made during the first stage of Franco’s regime. Four unpublished letters by one of the most useful characters present in Joan Lluhí’s letter exchange are also included as footnotes. We are referring to Juan Cremades, who was Public Works Undersecretary during those central months in 1936.