Spanish town square February 12, 2017

As mentioned, St Augustine's European founders were the Spaniards. They built their town according to Spanish rules. These rules stated that the town should be centered around a public square anchored by the town hall and the Catholic cathedral. Further, when the Spanish adopted their constitution in 1812, they required all their cities to rename their squares "plaza de la constitution" and erect a monument to the new constitution. Then, less than 2 years later, the monarchy regained power and rescinded that order. In fact, they ordered all such monuments to be taken down. The people of St Augustine said "nuts to that". They had spent a lot of money to build the memorial and they weren't going to take it down. Consequently, it may be the only surviving constitutional memorial that exists in the Spanish world today!

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