Blackmail it

The term estraperlo is used in Spain to refer to the illegal trade of goods subject to some type of tax or rate by the State. By extension, it is irregular activity or intrigue of some kind, and is used as a synonym for black market. Whoever practices black market is called “estraperlista”.

The origin of this acronym lies in a political scandal, produced as a result of the introduction of a Straperlo brand electric roulette game, a name derived from the surnames of those who promoted the business, and who would have contributed numerous letters to the acronym proportional to the participation in the company (other versions affirm that the term comes only from the first two names).

History

Games of chance –especially roulette– were prohibited in Spain, as well as in most European countries. However, in the 1930s, numerous models of pseudo-roulette became popular, happily operating in large casinos across the continent.

Businessmen Daniel Strauss (who had a Mexican passport and spoke Spanish), Perle and Lowann (this last wife of the first) turned their attention to Spain. In Madrid, the government was made up of an alliance of center-right parties, and several members of the Radical Party had been very receptive to the straperlo project.

Throughout the month of June 1934, businessmen and politicians reached an economic agreement to exploit it in the casino of San Sebastián (Guipúzcoa). Several characters in the orbit of the Radical Party would use their influence to obtain authorization, in exchange for a percentage in the business. According to Strauss's version, Alejandro Lerroux (leader of the Radical Party) would receive 25% of the benefits; Juan Pich y Pon, 10%; Aurelio Lerroux (Alejandro Lerroux's nephew), Miguel Galante and the journalist Santiago Vinardell, 5%. In addition, to ensure the cooperation of the Minister of the Interior Rafael Salazar Alonso, Juan Pich y Pon had promised to send him a bribe of 100,000 pesetas, and another bribe of 50,000 pesetas for the General Director of Security, José Valdivia y Garci-Borrón.

The game was banned by the police after it was shown to be fraudulent (because the wheel was controlled by a button and, therefore, the bank won whenever they wanted), which did not prevent it from also working at the Hotel Formentor (Mallorca), where it was later also closed.

The "black market scandal" came to light in October 1935, following the complaint that Daniel Strauss presented to the President of the Republic Niceto Alcalá Zamora in which he demanded "compensation" for the installation costs of the game popularly known as "estraperlo" in the casinos of San Sebastián and Formentor and for the bribes he claimed to have paid to politicians of the Radical Republican Party and to "family and friends" of its leader Alejandro Lerroux. Alcalá Zamora received the complete dossier with all the corruption plot that Strauss sent him, at the beginning of September 1935, and he showed it to Lerroux, who was then the president of the government, but he did not give it any importance and, apparently, told him that it would be very difficult to prove his alleged contacts with Strauss. After the government crisis that occurred in mid-September in which Lerroux resigned from continuing to lead it (according to the historian Gabriel Jackson because Alcalá Zamora forced him to resign r upon learning of the Strauss dossier) the President of the Republic at the beginning of October transferred the complaint to the new radical-CEDA government chaired by Joaquín Chapaprieta, in which Lerroux was a minister, and forced him to debate the case in the Cortes, where a parliamentary commission was formed.

Parliamentary opinion

The opinion of the parliamentary commission indicated that there had been actions "that did not conform to the austerity and ethics that are assumed in the management of public businesses". On October 28, 1935, the Cortes voted guilty to the eight accused by the commission (except Salazar Alonso, former Minister of the Interior who was the one who signed the permit), all of them prominent members of the Radical Party: Juan Pich y Pon, Sigfrido Blasco -Ibáñez, Aurelio Lerroux (adopted son of Alejandro Lerroux) and Eduardo Benzo (former undersecretary of the Ministry of the Interior who had managed the permit), José Valdivia y Garci-Borrón, Miguel Galante and the journalist Santiago Vinardell. The next day, Alejandro Lerroux left the government. Other radical republicans were splashed in Straus's complaint, such as Emiliano Iglesias, Luis Tornar y Casas or Paulino Uzcudun.

This case of corruption, along with the one that broke out shortly after (the so-called Nombela scandal), led to the collapse of the Radical Party, which put an end to the so-called "conservative biennium." After holding general elections in February 1936, these were won by the Popular Front.

Generalization of the term

Since this scandal, the word black market has remained as a synonym for racketeering, intrigue or fraudulent business. Thus, by extension, during the Spanish post-war period, the illegal trade (black market) of articles seized by the State or subject to rationing (decreed by the Franco regime from 1936 to 1952) was also called black market, receiving the name of "black marketeers" those who engaged in such trade.