Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1914-09-14
WIDESPREAD UNREST
THROUGHOUT ITALY
Frequency of Disorders at Home
Causes Acknowledgements
of War Heavy on Budget.

strong light Is thrown upon the
present condition of affairs in Italy,
and upon the decision of the Italian
Government to maintain neutrality, in
letter to the New York Evening Post
from its Naples correspondent Of
which the following Is part:
Cerlgnola Is a little city in Apulia, in
the south of Italy, between the Appe-
mines and the Adriatic. Yesterday, as
certain orators of the Liberal party
were speaking in the public square, a
bomb burst under the platform of the
orators. The news of the event is not
as yet precise, but 1t appears that a
poor young man was killed. It Is hardly
known how. We read already that
Cerignola Is nest of anarchists the
Intervention of the Government is al
ready invoked for making arrests in
mass or, IL necessary, setting up some
new Kind Of gallows in the public square,
In large proportions the same
thing occurred In the tumuts of Ro-
magma and during the days of the gen.
eral strike and of the threatened rail-
way strike q month ago.
l was not in Italy when there took
place. on the 7th of last June, the dis
orders of Ancona, which have been dis
Cussed largely by the national and inter-
national press. After a private political
meeting, about 200 persons, Socialists and
Republicans together, in small groups,
directed themselves toward one of the
city squares, the Piazza Roma. A cor
don of police had been already placed
to bar the way to the crowd. A conflict
ensued between the crowd and the po-
lice. The policemen say they were hit
by stones and by a few shots fired,
which last they have not been able to
prove: the demonstrators deny 1t. 1t Is
easy to believe that the carabineers were
maltreated by the crowd, just as 1t is also
believable that nothing terrible would
have happened II 200 or more persons
had been allowed to walk about freely
in Piazza Roma, in Ancona. and to shout
a few hurrahs and the reverse. ."
l came back to Italy from a long jour-
ney in Greece. and first to Rome, where
the general strike had already begun,
and the most varied and sensational
events were in progress. The Conserva-
tive and Liberal papers were full OF
catastrophe accounts: they spoke openly
of anti-monarchical plots and of organ
lied revolution. Thus a great panic
spread through all Italy.
Italy can be ruled only by either
tyrannical Government, like that of the
Popes or of the medieval mobiles, or by
d strOnS ana laDOTlOuS democracy con-
scious that faith in ideas and in the men
not less necessary than the perfect or
ganiZation of the administration and of
the Government.
Certainly, this crisis Of growth and this
initial distrust in a form of government
insuficiently active and operative ac-
cording to what most people believe to
be the material and spiritual necessities
of italian life, have had their share in
the recent disorders.
They here continued to consider and to
treat the peasant a 8 they did 80 years
ago; they have dominated the local ad-
ministrations, and have had the Govern
ment at their service; law and justice
have been almost entirely on their side
Thus, between proprietors and laborers
there has risen a barrier over which is
sometimes stretched the hand of a mad
man, armed by criminal, to fire the
fuse of a bomb.
The consequences of the war weigh and
must continue to weigh heavily on our
budget. Italy. having shown herself
strong and great in the presence of the
whole world. has created new difficulties
for herself abroad. and this is another
reason for not illuding ourselves about
her internal conditions and for not falsi-
flying their origin and cause -
The Italian Government has chosen
the direct road of neutrality In the ex-
plosion OF this homicidal madness of con-
quest. 1t is not enough to say that the
road chosen is the most loyal. by reason
of the honest Interpretation of the treaty
which binds Italy to Germany and Aus
trla. 1t must be recognized that this is
a duty toward the nation at this moment.