HE TABLET WEEKLY NEWSPAPER & REVIEW

Pro Ecclesia Dei, Pro Regina et Patria

FOUNDED IN 1840

AUGUST 1st, 1953

NINEPENCE

A Threat to the Missions in India : Signs of a changing official Attitude The Position o f the Straits : Western Policy towards Yugoslavia. By F. A. Voigt Leo XIII after Fifty Years: A Pontificate in Retrospect : II. By Humphrey J. T. Johnson Mary Tudor: 15 5 3 -19 5 $ : Miss Prescott’s Biography. By A. Gordon Smith Frédéric Ozanam: 1853-1953: Founder of the S.V.P. By A. J. Brooker The Church in Norway : Eight Hundred Years after Nicholas Breakspear Book Reviews : By Ursula Branston, Christopher Devlin, S.J., Frederick C. Copleston, S.J.,

Neville Braybrooke, J. J. Dwyer, D. McNeelance, John Eales, Richard Butcher, Christopher Hollis, Gerard Meath, O.P., and A. E. Licudi. Correspondence from K. M. Smogorzewski, Francis X. Curran, S.J., Dr. Letitia Fairfield, Harold Andrews,

T. L. A. Daintith, J. H. Crehan, S.J., and Lord Ventry.

THE DRIFT IN ITALY S IG N O R DE GASPERI has fallen a t th e first vote o f the Chamber. H e has fallen because his old allies, the three little parties, Liberals, Republicans and Saragat Socialists, commanding thirty-seven votes, abstained, with marked ingratitude, and let him fall, while the forty Monarchists, in a spirit o f faction, chose to vote against his 263 Christian Democrats. The rest o f the Chamber consists o f the Communists and their jackal followers, the Nenni-Socialists, with 173 votes together, and the small neo-Fascist group o f twentynine Missini. Both extremes in the Chamber were jubilant, and obviously nothing is to be hoped for from either end. Signor Togliatti is saying th a t Ita ly will have to go through the Communist experience, which would mean his party not saying b u t in tending to come in as a parliam entary party , and never to go ou t again. The Missini are jub ilan t because, the more parliam entary institutions prove unworkable, the more Italy will move in to the position o f having only th e choice between the d ic tatorship o f th e Communists o r the d ic tato rship o f the anti-Communists.

movement then so strong among the Christian Democrats, the feeling th a t neither America nor Britain, then in occupation, had any desire to see the House o f Savoy continue, all combined to bring about a result which is rightly considered to have been a stampeded and insufficiently considered popular decision.

The M onarchist feeling about Signor de Gasperi is th a t he has shown himself singularly adroit in dealing with the Leftwing o f his own party, masterly in the way he and President E inaudi made the party accept so much financial orthodoxy and economic liberalism in place o f the Socialism with which their heads had become filled in the years before 1946. T hat means, they argue, th a t he could have had his way over th e Monarchy, and, in particular, th a t the Referendum was a concession to the Republicans and Liberals and SaragatSocialists whom he had no need to conciliate.

The immediate responsibility is now with the veteran President E inaudi in the Quirinal. He has to see if some other Christian D em ocrat can be found, more acceptable to the Monarchists th an Signor de Gasperi : and here it must be understood th a t the Monarchists a re also conservatives. Much o f their grudge against Signor de Gasperi is for his agreeing to the rushed Referendum which by a narrow majority converted Italy in to a Republic and swept away one o f I ta ly ’s few stabilizing institutions. The existence o f a king undoubtedly saved bloodshed in 1922, as it equally facilitated th e te rm ination o f Mussolini’s regime in 1943. Then the existence o f the Monarchy made i t much easier fo r innum erable Italians in th e public service to continue in their employment and refuse the invitation to go N o r th with the hard core o f Fascism. The country is in no way stronger—it is weaker —for the absence o f th e House o f Savoy : and i f a Referendum were held today the decision would n o t be the same as it was when the spirit o f the partisans, the general Left-wing

It may be th a t the forty Monarchist votes will still be lined up with the Christian Democrats, giving an absolute majority, provided the Christian Democrats choose a m ore Conservative leader, like Signor Piccioni. But if this happens, there will be more and m ore restiveness in the Left Wing o f th e Christian Democrats, which has many o f the youngest and ablest politicians. They a r e acutely conscious th a t the party must remain a mass party ; th a t it is under constant a t tack for indifference to social policies ; th a t it has to meet the charge th a t what it attem p ts is half-hearted and inadequate and not done with any conviction.

Much the most serious danger which Italy faces is th a t Ita lian workers and peasants will le t themselves be inveigled in to Togliatti’s spider’s web, with their habitual scepticism and easy belief th a t they can be sufficiently good Catholics w ithout tak ing ecclesiastical adm onitions a t all literally ; th a t, ju s t as they need n o t go to Mass on a Sunday because they choose n o t to , so they th ink they can disregard p ro h ib itions against supporting th e Communist Party, and can vote fo r it as the one most likely to do something effective fo r them