What Spain Owes Catalonia, and Vice Versa

Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s reaction to Catalonia’s independence referendum was as foolish as the vote was reckless. Catalan officials should never have scheduled the vote -- but once they did, Spanish officials should not have tried to stop it. Resolving this conflict just got harder.

Rajoy has tried to portray the referendum, in which Catalan authorities say 42 percent of Catalans voted about nine to one for independence, purely as a matter of law enforcement: Spain’s constitutional court had declared it illegal, so he deployed police to attempt to stop the vote from going forward -- arresting politicians, beating voters, seizing ballot boxes. The violence that broke out was shocking to see in western Europe; Iraqi Kurdistan’s recent independence referendum was more peaceful.