SPAIN: Moving to Fill a Power Vacuum

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A dual struggle raged in Spain last week. While Generalissimo Francisco Franco fought to stay alive, his government struggled to keep functioning in a power vacuum. At week's end, as the old dictator still clung to life with characteristic tenacity, the government literally gave up waiting for him to die. It resolved a growing crisis of authority by pressuring a reluctant Prince Juan Carlos de Borbón y Borbón, Franco's heir designate, to become his country's temporary Chief of State. Only after Franco's death or a complicated legal process declaring his incompetence would Juan Carlos be named King, Spain's first monarch since the abdication of his grandfather, Alfonso XIII, in 1931.

The seemingly futile struggle to keep el Caudillo alive was waged inside the second-floor bedroom of the turreted El Pardo Palace outside Madrid, where a 24-man team of doctors attended him round the clock. The medical bulletins that streamed from the sickroom told of "cardiac insufficiency," "gastric hemorrhaging," "intestinal paralysis," "blood clotting" and at least five heart attacks over a 13-day period. Yet the 82-year-old Franco, who a week earlier was believed to be only hours away from death, hung on—just as he had hung on to absolute power for nearly four decades.

Healing Powers. Franco frequently became quite lucid, occasionally chatting with his family and even discussing with Premier Carlos Arias Navarro the lineup of military forces that might confront each other in the Spanish Sahara. At one point the Archbishop of Zaragoza, Pedro Cantero Cuadrado, spread across Franco's bed the gold-embroidered cloak that usually adorns the wooden statue of the Virgin Mary in Zaragoza's Basilica of Our Lady of Pilar. As the archbishop described it, the dictator opened his eyes, wept and kissed the cape—which is reputed to have healing powers.

Downstairs at El Pardo, a steady procession of Cabinet ministers, generals, leaders of the Movimiento National (the sole political party allowed), Roman Catholic churchmen and a few Latin American ambassadors arrived to inquire about Franco's health. Among the callers were exiled King Leka of Albania and Nicolas Franco, 37, the dictator's nephew. Young Franco later told TIME Correspondent Gavin Scott that he was hardly surprised by his uncle's durability. His own father, Franco's 85-year-old brother, suffered a similar illness four years ago and had been kept alive by drugs and machines. "Today," Nicolas said, "my father spends two hours each day working in his garden."

While the generalissimo hovered between life and death, government leaders were trying to head off complete political paralysis. Under the Spanish constitution, major decisions can be taken only by the Cabinet and only when the Chief of State presides; moreover, all decree laws must be signed by him to take effect. With Franco so gravely ill, the government was unsure whether it had clear-cut authority to make decisions—even on matters as pressing as the Sahara crisis. Said a government official last week: "We cannot go on without an active leader."