Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 143 Christmas

Time passed quietly, and soon it was Christmas of 1872.

The palace will be much more lively at Christmas this year because it welcomes its hostess, Queen Sophie.

Carlo himself didn't care, but in order to prevent Queen Sophie from getting bored in the huge palace, he decided to hold a large court banquet to liven up the Madrid Royal Palace on Christmas.

Banquets are not only an important means of communication for noble ladies, but also a way to strengthen communication among nobles.

In fact, except for a few nobles such as Duke Jacobo, Carlo had not seen many Spanish nobles for a long time.

It is necessary to connect the nobles and deepen their relationship through this court banquet. After all, the nobles are also Carlo's helpers.

In fact, the reason for all this is that the Spanish royal family is too small. The entire royal family only has the king and the queen, and it is indeed very monotonous during festivals.

However, Carlo never treated himself badly in life. Although there were only two people in the royal family, the servants in the entire palace added up to hundreds of people, and there were more than ten chefs responsible for cooking, who could prepare food with different flavors from various European countries.

The clothes that Queen Carlo and Queen Sophie wear on a daily basis are all made specifically for the royal family by private tailors. Each piece of clothing costs hundreds of pesetas, and some expensive dresses even cost more than ten thousand pesetas.

In order to prepare this huge court banquet, more than a dozen chefs who are proficient in the cuisines of various European countries were mobilized to prepare a variety of exquisite foods.

After several years of development, Carlo's wine industry has become a well-known enterprise among Spanish wine estates.

After all, the fact that Carlo himself advertised the wine has invisibly raised the profile of this wine. Although the wine sold to the common people is not a Royal Winery brand that is exclusively for the royal family, the wine is produced in the royal winery.

The high-end Royal Winery has become one of the main choices for nobles to host banquets. After all, this is the king's industry, and the nobles have to give it some respect.

Even though most of the nobles own their own wine industry, taking out one or two bottles of wine from the royal winery during the banquet can not only please His Majesty the King, but also directly demonstrate the expenditure of the banquet.

The wines from the Royal Winery are relatively expensive, just like Moutai in later generations. Regardless of whether they taste good or not, the price is there anyway.

It is precisely because of its higher selling price that the wine produced by the Royal Winery is still relatively popular among Spanish aristocrats and capitalists.

Even because it is located on the Iberian Peninsula, the wines of the Royal Winery are quite popular among the Portuguese aristocracy.

Also because of Queen Sophie, a lot of royal winery wines were exported to the Austro-Hungarian Empire every year and were well received by the Austro-Hungarian nobles.

After all, it is one of the top ten wine producing regions in later generations, and the taste and output of Spanish wine are relatively excellent.

Stimulated by the wine industry, Spain has added many grape plantations and started to cooperate with the royal wineries.

Compared to farming, the income from growing grapes is higher. However, the Royal Winery has strict requirements on the variety and appearance of grapes. For grapes of poor variety and appearance, they can only cooperate with small wine estates to produce wine brands for the general public.

Carlo's winery also has a red wine brand that focuses on cost-effectiveness, called Iberia Estate. The quality of the wine from Iberia Estate is obviously much worse than that of the Royal Winery.

Both in terms of wine quality and packaging, there is a world of difference compared to the wines from the Royal Winery.

However, poorer quality and packaging also mean lower prices. The lowest price of wine from the Royal Winery is over 100 pesetas per bottle, which is equivalent to a Spanish person's annual income.

The wines from Iberia Estate are generally sold at less than 10 pesetas, and there are even ultra-cheap wines at 2-3 pesetas.

As for the market of inferior wines with lower prices, Carlo does not plan to get involved for the time being. After all, it is impossible for the royal winery to dominate the entire Spanish red wine market, so it is better to target the more profitable mid-to-high-end market.

Although the inferior wine market has a larger sales volume, the profit per bottle of wine is very low and it is entirely based on volume.

Currently, Royal Winery occupies more than 50% of the high-end wine market in Spain and is very common at banquets of aristocrats and capitalists.

The wines from Iberia Estates account for about 35% of the mid- and low-end market, while the rest of the market is occupied by a dazzling array of other Spanish wine brands.

The wine market alone brings the Spanish government millions of pesetas in fiscal revenue and even creates tens of thousands of jobs.

In addition, the fame of Spanish wine due to the export of high-end red wine has made the Spanish government attach great importance to the development of grape planting and the wine industry. It has even issued corresponding support policies to encourage people to grow grapes and implement certain tax cuts for the red wine industry.

For Spain, a lot of land can be used to grow grapes and produce unique Spanish-style wines.

This can effectively promote the development of the grape industry. Compared with simply growing grain, the income from growing grapes will be obviously higher.

But the bad news is that there is a country to the north of Spain that is even more famous for its grape industry, and that is France.

French wine was truly popular in Europe, and even caused a rush for it among most of the European nobles.

Of course, this also has certain historical reasons. During the heyday of France, the language used in European aristocratic diplomacy was French.

When the nobles gave their children an elite aristocratic education, in addition to learning their own language, the first foreign language they learned was French.

With the spread of French, French wine also sold well throughout Europe. Although France has been in continuous decline, the love of French wine by nobles in various countries has not diminished much.

There are even legends about Lafite in later generations. Although most of the Lafite on the market are counterfeit products, the fact that it is so famous also proves how large and well-known the French wine industry is.

Although Spain is also one of the top ten wine producing regions in the world, it obviously cannot compete with France in terms of wine.

Not to mention France, Italy, across the Mediterranean Sea to the east, also has the world's top ten wine producing regions and is also a competitor for Spanish wine exports. Soon, the Spanish nobles received the news that His Majesty the King would hold a large court banquet at the Royal Palace on Christmas Day.

These nobles naturally had no reason to refuse the invitation personally from His Majesty the King. Of course, no one would refuse the invitation from His Majesty the King. After all, this was not only an opportunity for the King to get closer to them, but also an opportunity for them to get closer to the King.

This large-scale court banquet invited most of the archdukes and dukes near Madrid, and could be considered a high-level gathering of the Spanish aristocracy.

Including Prime Minister Duke Primo and Defense Minister Archduke Serrano, the nobles who participated in the banquet were either highly influential in the aristocracy or high-ranking officials with a certain prestige in the government and the military.

Of course, Antonio Canovas del Castillo and Jovillar Soler were among them.

Cavanos is the current Minister of Agriculture of the Cabinet Government and a major leader of the Spanish Conservative Party. Although Jovillar Soller is just an ordinary member of parliament, he has been reused by Carlo because he showed his loyalty to him earlier.

After all, there are only so many seats in the Spanish parliament, and most of them are in the hands of Prime Minister Primo. MPs like Jovillar Soler who support Carlo are still relatively important.

Just like the last low-rent housing proposal, if Carlo wants to submit something to the parliament, he can ask Jovillar Soller to submit it on his behalf and avoid the risks he would have to take.

Moreover, members of parliament not only have the power to elect the cabinet government, but also have the power to participate in the election of the cabinet government.

After Prime Minister Primo and Archduke Serrano gradually withdraw from Spanish politics, the next cabinet government is destined to be born in the election of members of parliament.

In other words, the current members of parliament are likely to be members of the next cabinet government.

Of course, this assumes that they are still members of Parliament when the next cabinet government is elected.

According to the Spanish Constitution, each region elects a certain number of members based on population proportion to jointly form the Spanish Senate, also known as the Parliament.

Senators are elected every three years and can theoretically serve indefinitely. As long as they are supported by the local Spanish people, they can remain in the Senate.

Because the current Spanish government was elected in February 1869, the election for the next cabinet government will be held five years later in February 2.

When February 1874 came, members of the Senate could take the initiative to run for the position of Prime Minister of the Cabinet, and the final candidate for Prime Minister would be decided after a vote by all members of the Senate.

Although there is no party requirement to run for prime minister, MPs running for prime minister must either be independents or be the de facto leader of a party.

Party members do not have the right to run for prime minister. They can only help the leader of their own party to run for the position of prime minister and then obtain a seat as a cabinet minister in the cabinet.

After all, the Prime Minister is the leader of the Spanish government. If he cannot serve as the top leader in a political party, wouldn't the position of Spanish Prime Minister, which is second only to the Prime Minister, be even more difficult to hold?

If there is a requirement that a party leader must run for election, it is actually screening the prestige of the prime ministerial candidate. Only those with sufficient prestige can suppress the entire cabinet government. On the contrary, a prime minister with little prestige will make the cabinet more chaotic.

Although independents do not have this requirement, it is actually more difficult for them to run for election. If they run as a party leader, they can mobilize the power of the entire party to help them run for election.

But if you are a non-partisan, you can only rely on yourself, and the difficulty will definitely increase several times.

According to the Spanish Constitution, the person who obtains more than 60% of the votes in the Senate will become the Prime Minister of the Spanish government.

If a prime minister can obtain 60% of the votes through his own efforts or the efforts of his party, he will have complete freedom to form a cabinet.

However, if a party alone cannot obtain 60% of the votes, it can join forces with other parties and obtain a combined 60% of the votes.

However, the position of prime minister obtained through a coalition will also have too many limitations. After all, others will not unconditionally help you run for prime minister, and you must make some concessions when forming a cabinet.

The Spanish Constitution stipulates that if a coalition government cannot obtain more than 60% of the votes, the individual or party leader with the most votes will become the Prime Minister of Spain, but other parties and independents will have the right to run for other cabinet seats.

In other words, if 60% of the votes cannot be obtained, all cabinet seats in Spain will be obtained through elections, rather than selecting the prime minister and then appointing the cabinet.

In any case, no matter which method is used to establish a cabinet government, the cabinet government needs to swear allegiance to Carlo as king.

This step was previously a common practice in absolute monarchies, with the aim of demonstrating the king's supreme power to the cabinet government and making them understand who is the master of the country.

Prime Minister Primo retained this practice mainly to protect the monarchy and stability of Spain. After all, since he chose the monarchy as the main body of government, the monarchy and he have been linked.

The more stable monarchical Spain is, the more energy the government led by Prime Minister Primo will have to promote reforms in Spain.

On the contrary, if the Spanish monarchy is not stable, as a supporter of the monarchy, Prime Minister Primo naturally will not have much energy to promote reforms.

The cabinet government is elected by the Senate, and the mayors of each region are also elected by the regional parliaments. Including cities and towns, they are basically elected through the election process.

The Senate and regional parliaments also have the power to impeach officials. Spain's current political system is more like a parliamentary constitutional monarchy, with power basically concentrated in parliament.

What is more similar is the British political system, or in other words, when Spain formulated its constitution, it referred to the provisions of the British Constitution to a large extent.

After all, Britain was undoubtedly the most powerful country in the world at that time and a representative of constitutional monarchy, so it was common to refer to the British Constitution.

As the king of Spain, Carlo is quite special in the Spanish political system. His nominal power is great, but he needs a high level of influence.

If there is no influence in politics and the military, power is more like empty and basically cannot be exercised.

(End of this chapter)