José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero an MP he was finally exempted. Zapatero attended his first political rally, organized by the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) in Gijón in 1976. Some political parties had been legal since 21 July 1976, but the PSOE was not legalized until February 1977. The speech of Felipe González, the PSOE leader and future Prime Minister of Spain, who took part in the rally, exerted an important influence on Zapatero. He said, among other things, that "the Socialists' goal was the seizure of power by the working class to transform the ownership of the means of production" and that "the PSOE
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero of morally and legally rehabilitating those who were suppressed during and after the Spanish Civil War, by instituting a Memorial Commission chaired by Vice-Prime Minister María Teresa Fernández de la Vega. On 17 March 2005, Zapatero's government ordered the removal of the last remaining statue of former dictator Francisco Franco that remained in Madrid. Just after he took office, Zapatero repealed the law reforming the Education System passed by the previous government and, in November 2005, introduced his own reform bill. The bill was opposed by the People's Party, the Catholic Church, the Muslim community, The Catholic Confederation of Parents'