Italian general election, 1948

Italian general election, 1948

18 April 1948 (1948-04-18)

All 574 seats to the Italian Chamber of Deputies and 237 (of the 343) seats to the Italian Senate Turnout 92.2%   Majority party Minority party Third party   Leader Alcide De Gasperi Palmiro Togliatti (PCI) (pictured) Pietro Nenni (PSI) Ivan Matteo Lombardo Party Christian Democracy Popular Democratic Front Socialist Unity Leader since 1944 1938 (Togliatti) 1931 (Nenni) 1948 Leader's seat VIII - Trentin-South Tirol XX - Latium (Togliatti) Whole Italy (Nenni) II - Piedmont Last election 207 seats, 35.2% 169 total seats as Front new party Seats won 305 (H) 131 (S) 183 (H) 72 (S) 33 (H) 10 (S) Seat change 98 (H) 14 (H) new party Popular vote 12,740,042 8,136,637 1,858,116 Percentage 48.5% 31.0% 7.1% Swing 13.3% 0.3%[1] new party

Legislative election results map: Light Blue denotes provinces with a Christian Democratic plurality, Red a Frontist plurality, and Gray an Autonomist plurality.

Prime Minister before election Alcide De Gasperi DC New Prime Minister Alcide De Gasperi DC

General elections were held in Italy on Sunday 18 April 1948 to elect the First Republican Parliament.^[2] They were heavily influenced by the Cold War confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States. After the communist coup in Czechoslovakia in February 1948, the US became alarmed about Soviet intentions and feared that, if the leftist coalition were to win the elections, the communist Left would draw Italy into the Soviet Union's sphere of influence. As the last month of the election campaign began, Time magazine pronounced the possible leftist victory to be "the brink of catastrophe".^[3]

The elections were eventually won with a comfortable margin by the Christian Democracy party (Italian: Democrazia Cristiana, DC) that defeated the left-wing coalition of the Popular Democratic Front (Italian: Fronte Democratico Popolare per la libertà, la pace, il lavoro, FDP) that comprised the Italian Communist Party (Italian: Partito Comunista Italiano, PCI) and the Italian Socialist Party (Italian: Partito Socialista Italiano, PSI).

The Christian Democrats went on to form a government without the Communists, who had been in government from June 1944, when the first post-war government was formed, until May 1947.

Electoral system

The pure party-list proportional representation chosen two years before for the election of the Constituent Assembly, was definitely adopted for the Chamber of Deputies. Italian provinces were divided into 31 constituencies, each electing a group of candidates.^[4] In each constituency, seats were divided between open lists using the largest remainder method with the Imperiali quota. Remaining votes and seats transferred to the national level, where special closed lists of national leaders received the last seats using the Hare quota.

For the Senate, 237 single-seat constituencies were created. The candidates needed a two-thirds majority to be elected, but only 15 aspiring senators were elected this way. All remaining votes and seats were grouped in party lists and regional constituencies, where the D'Hondt method was used: Inside the lists, candidates with the best percentages were elected.

This electoral system became standard in Italy, and was used until 1993.

Campaign

The elections remain unmatched in verbal aggression and fanaticism in Italy's period of democracy. The Christian Democrat campaign claimed that, in communist countries, "children send parents to jail", "children are owned by the state", "people eat their own children", and assured voters that disaster would strike Italy if the Left were to take power.^[5][6] Another slogan was, "In the secrecy of the polling booth, God sees you - Stalin doesn't."^[7]

The PCI was de facto leading the FDP, and had effectively marginalised the PSI, which eventually suffered because of this in these elections, in terms of parliamentary seats and political power;^[8] The Socialists also had been hurt by the secession of a social-democratic faction led by Giuseppe Saragat, which contested the election with the concurrent list of Socialist Unity.

The PCI had difficulties in restraining its more militant members, who, in the period immediately after the war, had engaged in violent acts of reprisals. The areas affected by the violence (the so-called "Red Triangle" of Emilia, or parts of Liguria around Genoa and Savona, for instance) had previously seen episodes of brutality committed by the Fascists during Benito Mussolini's regime and the Italian Resistance during the Allies' gradual advance through Italy.

Superpower influence

Regional pluralities in Senate

The 1948 general election could not help but be influenced by the Cold War that was starting between the United States and the Soviet Union.

The CIA, by its own admission, gave $1 million to Italian "center parties".^[9] and was accused of publishing forged letters in order to discredit the leaders of the Italian Communist Party.^[10] The National Security Act of 1947, that made foreign covert operations possible, had been signed into law about six months earlier by the American President Harry S. Truman.

Differences.

"We had bags of money that we delivered to selected politicians, to defray their political expenses, their campaign expenses, for posters, for pamphlets," according to CIA operative F. Mark Wyatt.^[11] In order to influence the election, the US agencies undertook a campaign of writing ten million letters, made numerous short-wave radio broadcasts and funded the publishing of books and articles, all of which warned the Italians of what was believed to be the consequences of a communist victory. Time Magazine backed the campaign and featured the Christian Democrat leader and Prime Minister Alcide De Gasperi on its cover and in its lead story on 19 April 1948.^[6]

The PCI, though, was also being funded by the Soviet Union, according to Mark Wyatt. "The Communist Party of Italy was funded ... by black bags of money directly out of the Soviet compound in Rome; and the Italian services were aware of this. As the elections approached, the amounts grew, and the estimates [are] that $8 million to $10 million a month actually went into the coffers of communism. Not necessarily completely to the party: Mr. Di Vittorio and labor was powerful, and certainly a lot went to him," according to the former CIA operative.^[10]

The Christian Democrats eventually won the 1948 election with 48 percent of the vote, while the FDP received 31 percent. The CIA's practice of influencing the political situation was repeated in every Italian election for at least the next 24 years.^[11] A leftist coalition would not win a general election for the next 48 years, until 1996. This was due to the Italians' traditional bent for conservatism, on one side, but also, even more importantly, to the Cold War, with the US closely watching Italy, in their determination to maintain a vital NATO presence amidst the Mediterranean and retain the Yalta-agreed status quo of western Europe.^[12]

Parties and leaders

Results

Christian Democracy won a sweeping victory, taking 48.5 percent of the vote and 305 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and 131 seats in the Senate. With an absolute majority in both chambers, DC leader and premier Alcide De Gasperi could have formed an exclusively DC government. Instead, he formed a "centrist" coalition with Liberals, Republicans and Social Democrats. De Gasperi formed three Councils of Ministers, the second one in 1950 after the defection of the Liberals, who hoped for more rightist politics, and the third one in 1951 after the defection of the Social-democrats, who hoped for more leftist politics.

Following a provision of the new Constitution of Italy, all living democratic deputies elected during the 1924 general election and deposed by the National Fascist Party in 1926, automatically became members of the first republican Senate.

Chamber of Deputies

Wins in every municipality (without Trentin-South Tirol and Gorizia Province)

Italian Chamber of Deputies after the election.

Senate of the Republic

Elected senators by party. Automatic senators are not included.

References

Further reading

• Blum, William (2000). Killing Hope. Common Courage Press. ISBN 978-1-56751-053-9.  Chapter 2 Italy 1947-1948: Free elections: Hollywood style
• Blum, William (2000). Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower. Common Courage Press. ISBN 978-1-56751-194-9.  Chapter 16 Perverting elections

Elections and referendums in Italy General elections 1861 1865 1867 1870 1874 1876 1880 1882 1886 1890 1892 1895 1897 1900 1904 1909 1913 1919 1921 1924 1929 1934 1946 1948 1953 1958 1963 1968 1972 1976 1979 1983 1987 1992 1994 1996 2001 2006 2008 2013 next European elections 1979 1984 1989 1994 1999 2004 2009 2014 Regional elections 1947 1949 1951 1953 1954 1955 1957 1959 1961 1963 1964 1965 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1973 1974 1975 1976 1978 1979 1980 1981 1983 1984 1985 1986 1988 1989 1990 1991 1993 1994 1995 1996 1998 1999 2000 2001 2003 2004 2005 2006 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 Local elections 1946 1951 1956 1960 1964 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 Referendums 1946 1974 1978 1981 1985 1987 1989 1990 1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2000 2001 2003 2005 2006 2009 2011 See also: Elections in Abruzzo Aosta Valley Apulia Basilicata Calabria Campania Emilia–Romagna Friuli-Venezia Giulia Lazio Liguria Lombardy Marche Molise Piedmont Sardinia Sicily Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol Tuscany Umbria Veneto

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