Ecclesiastical confiscations of Mendizábal

The ecclesiastical confiscations of Mendizábal (Spanish: desamortización eclesiástica de Mendizábal), more often referred to simply as la Desamortización in Spanish, were a set of decrees which resulted in the expropriation and privatisation of monastic properties in Spain from 1835 to 1837.

The legislation was promulgated by Juan Álvarez Mendizábal, who was briefly prime minister under Queen regent Maria Christina during the reign of the two-year-old Queen Isabel II of Spain. The aims of the legislation were varied. Some of its impulses were fostered by the anticlerical liberal factions engaged in a civil war with Carlist and other reactionary forces. The government wished to use the land to encourage the enterprises of small-land owning middle class, since much of the land was thought of as underused by monastic orders. The government, which refused to compensate the church for the properties, saw this as a source of income. Finally, wealthy noble and other families took advantage of the legislation to increase their holdings.

Pope Gregory XVI gave an account of events from his perspective in an allocution to Catholic church leaders in Rome on 1 February 1836, lamenting the outcome and explaining his decision to withdraw Luigi Amat di San Filippo e Sorso, titular Archbishop of Nicaea, from his role in Spain as papal representative.