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Portugal CONSTITUTIONALISM
Although the ideology of liberalism was known in
Portugal in
the late 1700s by way of the American and French
revolutions, it
was not until after the Peninsular Wars that it became a
force
with which the monarchy had to contend. Freemasonry
introduced by
foreign merchants played an important role in spreading
liberal
doctrines in Portugal. In 1801 there were five Masonic
temples in
Lisbon, and the first Portuguese grand master was elected
in
1804. The three French invasions encouraged the spread of
liberal
ideas. In 1812 Freemasons founded the Sinédrio, a secret
society
that propagated revolutionary ideas. Radical ideas were
also
discussed by Portuguese who lived in London or Paris where
they
had observed and been influenced by the functioning of the
British and French systems. Newspapers and pamphlets,
despite the
vigilance of the crown's censors and police, were smuggled
into
Portugal and widely read by a small and increasingly
important
educated elite, called the afrancesados, who wanted
to
reconstruct Portugal on the French model. After the
Peninsular
Wars, the exiles themselves returned to Portugal and began
to
agitate for a constitutional monarchy. One of these was
General
Gomes Freire Andrade, the grand master of Portuguese
Masons, who
became the leader of liberals in Portugal. The liberals
were
eventually to be successful because of a crisis of royal
leadership.
Data as of January 1993
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