1865 Barcelona Workers' Congress
The 1865 Barcelona Workers Congress was held in December —in September, according to Manuel Tuñón de Lara - from 1865 in Barcelona (Spain) and brought together 22 Catalan workers' societies, taking advantage of a moment tolerance during the final crisis of the reign of Elizabeth II (1863-1868). It was the first workers' congress to be held in Spain, although it was limited to Catalonia. Background. After the Progressive Biennium, workers' societies were once again banned, although some continued to exist underground. There was some initiative to address the social question by members and sympathizers of the  Progressive Party in Catalonia as the foundation in 1862 of the Catalan Working Class Athenaeum. The situation changed in 1864 when the Captain General of Catalonia, Domingo Dulce y Garay, in fact allowed the workers' societies to function, which opened a period of freedom, during which two newspapers of some importance appeared, "El Obrero" and "La Asociación". The first issue of "El Obrero" was released on September 4, 1864, directed by Antoni Gusart i Vila, with the aim of defending "the interests of the proletariat" and achieving the right of workers' association, both for the "resistance to capital" and to  form "workers' societies applied to production and consumption", that is, to form cooperatives, a movement that gained strength by those years and that also gave legal cover to the resistance societies. The idea of holding a Congress in Barcelona to coordinate the existing workers' societies came from "El Obrero". The editors of "El Obrero" thought that the congress would serve to "promote the cooperative movement, which, implanted in England a few years ago, has spread rapidly throughout the European nations." Development. Chaired by Gusart and by various members of the editorial staff of "El Obrero", the Congress was held from  December 24 to 26, 1865 — or in September, according to other sources - at the "Salón Universal" in Barcelona. Some 300 delegates from twenty-two associations attended, according to Josep Termes. Forty, according to Tuñón de Lara. The agenda consisted of the following three points proposed by "El Obrero": The first important agreement that was reached was the formation of a federation of workers' societies and workers' centers in those places where there was more than one society, of which "El Obrero" would be its official organ. One of its objectives would be to propagate "the practice of cooperative societies." The  second was to send a petition to the Government to recognize freedom of association, "since how many exhibitions have been addressed to the Cortes have been as many stones thrown into deep chasm." The "Exhibition" was published in "El Obrero" on January 7, 1866, with Gusart as the first signatory, followed by Ramón Cartañá, Miquel Martorell, Matías Fuster, Josep Morera, Josep Espinal and Josep Roig. The exhibition said, among other things, the following: Politics was not discussed in Congress, "nor was anyone allowed to speak about the state, nor would it have been allowed, as it was not the responsibility  of the meeting."