NON-INTERVENTION AMONG NATIONS, THE PRINCIPLE OF. 627 



ground of national autonomy the cession of 

 Savoy and Nice by Sardinia to France, by treaty 

 in 1860, was defended. The King, in his proc- 

 lamation to the inhabitants, said, "I could not 

 forget that the great affinities of race, language, 

 and customs render your relations with France 

 more intimate and natural." * The people of 

 Germany long entertained the idea of a gov- 

 ernment based on a common nationality, with 

 Prussia as the leader, before the consummation 

 actually took place. At that period, also, the 

 principle of nationality was invoked for uniting 

 the conterminous peoples of common race in 

 Turkey and Austria. It is also asserted that the 

 annexation of one state to another, when, be- 

 sides the proximity of territories, they have in 

 common between them the same interests, sen- 

 timents, origin, traditions, wants, and man- 

 ners, would be equally just and lawful. But it 

 is a condition that such annexations should be 

 the effect of the free-will of the two peoples. 

 " For, if these annexations were willed, instead, 

 by one only of the two peoples, and submitted to 

 by the other, then, there being violation of the 

 liberty of a people, every intervention for hin- 

 dering such annexation would be just and law- 

 ful, because it would be a defense of the weak 

 against the strong." It was alleged by those 

 who resisted the annexation of some of the 

 states of Italy, that an honest and impartial 

 expression of the approval of the people had 

 not been obtained. 



THE CASE OF SUCCESSION. Again, it is as- 

 serted that, in questions relating to successions, 

 all interventions are unlawful, except when 

 their purpose is to impede the fusion of na- 

 tionalities ; that intervention in favor of vassal 

 states is just, because it is an anomalous alli- 

 ance rather than an intervention ; that it is 

 just in favor of colonies which aspire to their 

 own independence, also in the affairs of arma- 

 ments; political equilibrium is combated as 

 nothing else than a name employed to cover 

 the ambition of some governments. 



THE CASE OF RELIGION. In the case of re- 

 ligion the following view is presented : " Any 

 intervention having for its object to impose 

 religion upon a people is unjust and unlawful, 

 because it impairs the right which every man 

 has to follow that which he believes to be true. 

 Nor can we admit as just the intervention 

 against a state which persecutes the followers 

 of a given religion among its own people. . . . 

 What shall we say of all those foreign interven- 

 tions in favor of the papacy, which, under the 

 pretense of defending religion, were stifling all 

 liberty in peoples subject to the Catholic the- 

 ocracy ? In the eyes of right, such interven- 

 tions are unjust and unlawful, because neither 

 the defense of religion (which was in no wise 

 threatened), nor the need of propping a politi- 

 cal power adverse to the religious character, 

 odious to the peoples themselves over whom 

 it dominated, are means that justify foreign in- 



* Martens, par Samwer, "Nouveau recueiL" tome xvi, 

 p le . 2, p. 541. 



tervention in the internal affairs of a state. 

 But time has given justice its due. The fa- 

 mous breach of Porta Pia, on September 20, 

 1870, has avenged the oppressed: the political 

 power of the papacy has fallen down for ever. 

 Rome has become the capital of resuscitated 

 Italy, and for ten years she has offered to the 

 world the grand spectacle of her being the 

 seat of a new kingdom, and the center of the 

 Catholic faith. Liberty sits by religion : the 

 spiritual independence of the Pontiff, more than 

 to the law of the guarantees, a law of purely 

 internal and not of international character, is 

 intrusted to the honor and loyalty of the Italian 

 people, who well know how to discriminate 

 the sentiment of its own nationality and auton- 

 omy from the respect due to the religious lib- 

 erty of the supreme Pontiff, and to the faith of 

 their ancestors." 



THE ROMAN QUESTION. One might be led 

 to suppose from the sentiments of this extract 

 that* "the political popedom (temporal power) 

 has vanished before the supreme right of the 

 Italian nationality," and that the well-known 

 " Roman question " had ceased to exist. But 

 to allow such a conclusion to remain would be 

 to mislead readers. Some explanation, there- 

 fore, is here necessary. After the Government 

 of Sardinia resolved to effect the " unification 

 of Italy," and had prepared herself by tempori- 

 zation to cope with her powerful adversaries, 

 she found her greatest obstacle to success was 

 the Roman Catholic Church. This was an or- 

 ganization recognized by the European nations 

 as sovereign and independent. It occupied a 

 territory in Italy that had long been subject to 

 the civil jurisdiction of its head, who received 

 and sent forth embassadors, and it was thus 

 admitted to the rank of a civil power among 

 nations. As such civil power it was the fee- 

 blest of all. But it likewise claimed to he a 

 spiritual power, and asserted that it was organ- 

 ized and commissioned by the divine Redeemer 

 of all men to be his representative on the earth, 

 and to teach, with power to effect a reconcilia- 

 tion between him and them in their rebellion 

 against him. These claims were recognized 

 and respected and obeyed by the princes and 

 subjects of most of the civil powers of Europe, 

 among which were Sardinia and the states of 

 Italy. Between the temporal and the spiritual 

 there has been a perpetual conflict, and the 

 question was now agitated in the public mind, 

 why resort should not be made to civil liberty 

 as the means by which to terminate the con- 

 flict between church and state. Count Ca- 

 vour, then the Prime Minister of Sardinia, con- 

 fiding in the omnipotence of political liberty, 

 after mature reflection, launched forth the fa- 

 mous formula, " A free church in a free state." 

 He made it the compass by which to guide 

 his policy.t In the memorable session of Par- 

 liament preceding his death he offered it as a 



* Mancini's Prelections, " The Life of Peoples in the Hu- 

 manity," p. 214. 

 t " Rassegna Nazionale," of Florence. 



