Following a brief proclamation of the Catalan Republic on 14 April 1931 and the provisional establishment of the Generalitat as a Catalan government within the new Spanish Republic, the first Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia was approved by the Spanish Parliament in September 1932, recognizing Catalan self-government and establishing a separate Parliament of Catalonia as the legislative branch of the Generalitat, being elected on 20 November 1932. This first legislature was control by the Republican Left of Catalonia ("Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya", ERC), which won the absolute majority of seats, while the conservative Regionalist League, almost hegemonic in Catalonia during the reign of Alfonso XIII, reached the second place but far from the Republican Left. Lluís Companys was appointed the first president of the Parliament. The Parliament appointed the ERC leader, Francesc Macià, as president of the Generalitat and, right after the election, the institution began to pass a progressive legislation in different areas, such as health, culture and civil law, but the institution was suspended between 1934 and 1936 when the Government of Catalonia attempted to create a Catalan State after, among other reasons, a bill to change the taxing of farmers was rejected by the Constitutional Court. The unilateral declaration of sovereignty lasted 10 hours. The Parliament and the government were restored in February 1936 after the victory of Popular Front in the Spanish election, and abolished by Generalissimo Francisco Franco at the beginning of the occupation of Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War. The Parliament of Catalonia, like the rest of the institutions of the Generalitat, went to exile in 1939.