ITALY. 



399 



of the budget were in preparation, and in the 

 mean time the Government desired to reserve 

 for itself the initiative in proposals involving 

 fresh expenditure. A bill dealing with pro- 

 motions in the army and navy was promised. 

 The proposed measure for the reorganization 

 of the ministerial departments consisted in a 

 proposal to leave the reorganization in question 

 to the Government itself, to be enacted by a 

 simple decree signed by the King, as it belongs 

 by right to the executive power. This princi- 

 ple was approved by the Chamber, which gave 

 238 votes against 22 for the bill in that form. 



Church and State. The Pope, in an allocution 

 delivered on May 23, wrote as follows concern- 

 ing the difficulty between the Papacy and the 

 Italian Government : 



God grant that Italy, which is particularly dear to us, 

 may also share the spirit of peace with which we are 

 animated toward all nations. We earnestly desire that 

 Italy may put aside her unhappy difference with the 

 Papacy, whose dignity is violated, and chiefly violated 

 by the conspiracy of the sects. The means of obtain- 

 ing concord is to establish a state of things under 

 which the Pope would be subject to no power, and 

 would enjoy that full and real liberty which, far from 

 injuring Italy's interests, would powerfully contribute 

 to her prosperity. 



Taken in connection with a more concilia- 

 tory attitude of the Clerical party, and other 

 indications of the desire of the Vatican for a 

 modus vivendi, it was inferred from this that 

 Pope Leo was inclined to abandon his preten- 

 sions to the temporal power. It was soon 

 made evident, however, that he had no inten- 

 tion of relinquishing his claim to the sovereign- 

 ty of the Papal States, or, at least, to the city 

 of Rome, and it is equally impossible for the 

 Italian Government even to allow a European 

 guarantee of the position of the Pontiff under 

 the law of guarantees, much less to yield up the 

 capital of united and indivisible Italy. "When 

 Signer Bovio interpellated the Government 

 with regard to the rumors that were current, 

 Signer Crispi said that the Government, at any 

 rate, were not seeking a conciliation. The 

 state was at war with no one. He had no 

 wish to know what was going on in the Vati- 

 can, where reigned the Pope, who was not an 

 ordinary man. Time ripened many a question, 

 and might also lead to reconciliation, which 

 would never be detrimental to the national 

 rights. 



On June 15, when Cardinal Rampolla as- 

 sumed the functions of Pontifical Secretary of 

 State, the Pope addressed to him a long letter, 

 in which he expounded his views, and inti- 

 mated that he would be content with the res- 

 titution of the Leonine city. The indispensable 

 condition for pacification in Italy, he declared, 

 was the rendering to the Roman Pontiff a true 

 sovereignty. In the present state of affairs he 

 is in the power, not of himself, but of others, 

 on whom it depends to modify, when and how 

 it pleases them, according to the changes of 

 men and circumstances, the very conditions of 

 his existence. And therefore, during his pon- 



tificate, he had insisted on an actual sover- 

 eignty, not for purposes of earthly grandeur, 

 but as a true and effective protection to his in- 

 dependence and liberty. He claims, in an es- 

 pecial manner, sovereignty over the city of 

 Rome, to which fche steps of the prince of apos- 

 tles were directed that he might become the 

 shepherd, and transmit in perpetuity the au- 

 thority of the supreme apostolate, and which 

 bears in every part, deeply engraved, the Papal 

 imprint, and belongs to the pontiffs by such 

 and so many titles as no prince ever had to 

 any city in his kingdom. 



Commercial Treaty with Austria-Hungary. A 

 new treaty of commerce with Austria-Hungary 

 went into effect on January 1, 1888. It re- 

 mains provisional for six months, at the end 

 of which, when ratified by the Legislature in 

 both countries, it will be signed for ten years. 

 The number of articles of Austrian production 

 which pay duty on entering Italy is dimin- 

 ished from ninety-nine to forty-three, while 

 on the Austrian side the duty has been remit- 

 ted on twenty-eight articles out of sixty-seven. 

 The articles which are still liable to duty pay 

 higher rates than before, the increase being 

 generally one lire for a certain weight or num- 

 ber of articles. Among the goods relieved of 

 duty are wine, brandy, matches, mirrors, seal- 

 ing-wax, steam-engines, glass and crystal 

 wares, musical instruments, cattle, meat, but- 

 ter, and hemp. Among the articles which will 

 henceforth pay a higher duty are beer, leather 

 goods, porcelain, majolica, cheese, and toys. 



The New Triple Alliance. The tripartite treaty 

 by which Italy became a party to the defensive 

 league concluded on October 7, 1879, between 

 Germany and Austria-Hungary was signed for 

 the five years expiring in the autumn of 1887. 

 Although the dominant elements were all in 

 favor of its renewal, the hostility to the com- 

 pact on the part of Republicans and Irredent- 

 ists was not dead, and in the early part of the 

 year it manifested itself in the violent and bit- 

 ter attacks on the ministry in the Chamber, 

 and even in angry demonstrations in the street, 

 for which the military reverse near Massowah 

 served as a pretext. In the spring of 1887 a 

 new alliance was secretly concluded. In Oc- 

 tober, Signer Crispi went to Friedrichsruhe to 

 arrange with Prince Bismarck a final settle- 

 ment of details. The points settled were the 

 contingencies which form a casus belli, the 

 method of diplomatic action, and the delay to 

 be granted to the offending power before de- 

 claring war, the general plan of combined 

 military and naval action, the military and 

 naval forces to be placed in the field and on 

 the sea by each of the three powers, and the 

 territorial modifications and other results to be 

 achieved with a view of securing a lasting 

 peace after a victorious war. Each of the 

 powers agrees not to treat separately for peace, 

 or to desist from war, without the consent of 

 the other two. The original treaty, which 

 Italy accepts in all its parts, was never made 



