He studied Law in Madrid. In 1854, he left to Cuba but he returned to Spain when he was elected deputy in Ferrol. Cánovas del Castillo nominated him minister in 1883 and once again minister of Justice in 1895.
He collaborated in the magazine ‘Revista Contemporánea’. When he entered the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, he read the speech titled Índole y extensión de las inmunidades parlamentarias, which he later published in ‘Revista contemporánea’.
In 1875, he was conferred the title ‘Count of Tejada de Valdosera’. He was on the commission that drew up the Constitution of 1876.