principles of Christian civilization". The CEDA won the largest number of seats in elections of November 1933, and Gil-Robles was thus the head of the largest party in the Cortes. However, to avoid conflicts with leftist parties, President Niceto Alcalá-Zamora invested Alejandro Lerroux, leader of the Radical Republican Party, as prime minister instead of Gil-Robles. The appointment of three CEDA ministers to the cabinet in 1934 triggered the leftist Asturian miners' strike that rose, ultimately unsuccessfully, against the government of the Republic. Gil-Robles served as Minister of War under Lerroux from May to December 1935. 1936 elections, defeat and uprising During the February 1936 Spanish general election, the CEDA formed the largest part of the National Front coalition, which also included Alfonsine monarchists and Carlists. Gil-Robles campaigned under the slogan Todo el poder para el Jefe ("All the power to the Chief"), and while he himself was reelected to the Cortes, the conservative National Front narrowly lost the election, with power swinging to the left. The CEDA itself lost ground, winning 88 seats, fewer than the 115 it had won in 1933. Following the narrow victory of the leftist Popular Front and the defeat of the CEDA, support for Gil-Robles and his party declined, losing both votes and membership to the Falange party, founded in 1934, whose share of the vote had been very small in the 1936 elections. Bitterly disillusioned with the failure of their jefe to win the election, the CEDA's youth group Juventudes de Acción Popular went over en masse to the Falange. In the following months and in the volatile situation that arose, Gil-Robles was well aware that a coup was being prepared against the government. Despite his later insistence that he had no part in the coup, the CEDA leader was kept informed of each stage of the plot, and members of his party played important liaison roles, facilitating contact between military and civilian plotters. Gil-Robles himself authorized the transfer of 500,000 pesetas of CEDA electoral funds to General Emilio Mola's military insurgents. Civil War With the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, following the uprising on 17 July 1936, Gil-Robles found himself unwilling or unable to struggle with Francisco Franco for power. Franco himself was determined not to have competing right-wing parties in Spain, and in April 1937 Gil-Robles announced the dissolution of CEDA. After the Civil War, Gil-Robles went into exile. Abroad, he