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Chapter II, Part IV: The Voting

The day after L'Ostende sent his telegram, July 6th, Eugenio Salazar y Mazarredo arrived to Madrid, carrying with him Prince Leopold's acceptance of his candidacy to the throne of Spain. Being adverted of his arrival, Manuel Ruiz Zorrilla convened an extraordinary session of the Courts for the following day. The only matter to be debated would be who would become the new holder of the Spanish crown.

The debate lasted several hours, and some angry discussions were held, but peace among the deputies was held, and Salazar's presentation of Leopold's signed acceptance was met with great applause on part of many deputies. At five PM, after a two-hour recess ordered by the President of the Courts, a voting was finally held, and the results, out of 381 Deputies, were these:

• Prussian Prince Leopold zu Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen: 210
• Proclamation of a Federal Republic: 76
• Carlos María de Borbón y Austria-Este: 20
• Antoine d'Orléans, Duke of Montpensier: 13
• Alfonso de Borbón y Borbón, Prince of Asturias: 11
• General Baldomero Fernández Espartero: 8
• Infanta Luisa Fernanda de Borbón, Duchess of Montpensier: 2
• Proclamation of an Unitary Republic: 1
• Null or none of the above: 5
• Absent: 35, including 18 from Cuba and 11 from Puerto Rico

When the result of the voting became know, the President of the Courts, Radical Manuel Zorrilla, solemnly declared Queda elegido, como Rey de la Nación Española, el señor Leopoldo de Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (It has been agreed that the new King of the Spanish Nation is Leopold zu Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen) in the middle of a thunderous ovation in the chamber of the Palace of the Courts in the Carrera de San Jerónimo, Madrid.

The next morning, July 8th 1870, all Spanish newspapers had in their front page grand titles, stating the proclamation of the Prussian candidate as new King of Spain. Most Spanish people were excited at said proclamation and about their new King, whom many newspapers compared with the man who had created the Spanish Empire, Emperor Carlos I of Spain (and V of Germany), and said that Leopold would bring new greatness to Spain, just like Carlos I had done in his time.

However, this explosion of popular joy did not prevent some jokes to appear about the King's surname, which many found difficult to pronounce, and soon Leopold was nicknamed by the Spanish people as ¡Olé, olé si me eligen! (Olé, olé if I am chosen!), referencing as well how difficult it had been the search for the new king.

This nickname was soon acquired by those sectors that had opposed Leopold's election, among them the Carlists and Isabelines, who started to use it as a derogatory way to refer to Leopold. It would be those same sectors who would start to use the international consequences of this choice as ways to prevent the Prussian Prince from taking the Catholic Monarch's throne.