Pietro Secchia 1948
Written: By Pietro Secchia, 1948;
Source: For a Lasting Peace, for a People's Democracy! Vol. 2, no. 12; June 15, 1948;
Transcribed: David Adams, March 2022.
The result of the April general election did not demoralise the mass of the working people of Italy. If anything, the May strikes and discontent, which involved hundreds of thousands of workers and peasants, demonstrated the strength and fighting spirit of the forward elements of the Italian people. The election struggle was but a phase, a very important phase, it is true, in the life of the working people. And those who had calculated on burying the Communist Party, the Popular Democratic front and eight million Italians under the piles of voting papers, appear ludicrous indeed. The press of the Italian plutocracy and of American imperialism were somewhat rash in proclaiming victory. The battle which the Popular Front withstood during the election campaign, is being fought out in the form of the democratic struggle and actions of the people. In this struggle for its vital demands and wider political and social aims, the working class is displaying its growing strength.
The experience of the struggle during the recent weeks and months is making it increasingly clear to millions of working people that recovery cannot be brought about merely by parliamentary action and by struggles of an economic character. The election campaign helped shatter certain illusions about quick and easy victories without struggle and casualties—illusions of which the Party had warned Communists and all the democratic forces. The draconic repressions and blackmail which the Government and ruling classes applied to achieve their victory revealed to the broad masses of Italy the true colours of bourgeois pseudo- democracy.
It has been said that in the course of a conversation with his colleagues, the Minister of Police, Scelba, made this valuable admission: “A ruling party which decides to hold an election and then proves incapable of winning, is not a party but a gathering of fools”. In this “Christian” fashion Scelba admitted the colossal fraud practiced according to the American prescription.
But constitutional and pacifist illusions have suffered yet another blow. The police and military are being used in the growing struggle between labour and capital.
With the intention of cashing in on their election “victory” the big industrialists and landowners, supported by the Government, have launched an offensive against the working people.
This offensive aims to abolish or, at any rate, drastically to curtail the gains won by the people since July 1943, to isolate the working class, break working-class unity and split the trade unions; it aims to secure additional profits at the expense of the people and to force them to bear the brunt of foreign imperialism. The recent strikes showed how vigorously the working people are combating the offensive of reaction and how they are preparing for the battle ahead.
As enumeration of the more important strikes and actions that have taken place since polling day, April 18, reveals on the one hand, the tense nature of the struggle and the militant spirit of the workers.
April 25—Notwithstanding the attempt of the Government to prohibit all celebrations on the anniversary of the national liberation, partisans and the people held big demonstrations. In Milan, squads of police armoured cars and tanks failed to disperse the demonstrators. Twenty workers were wounded by the police.
April 30—Discontent and lockouts at the Falc works in Milan.
May 1—For the first time since the overthrow of fascism. May Day was a day of celebration and struggle and nation-wide stoppage of work. Monster demonstrations were held throughout the country against the Government’s policy and in support of trade union unity.
May 9, 10—Demonstrations in Naples and Genoa, Questions in the Senate, The General Confederation of Labour and the Popular Front insist on the right of asylum for 35 Greek patriots who had arrived from the Argentine and whom Scelba wanted to hand over to Tsaldaris.
May 10—General strike in Turin in protest against police raids on local Communist Party organisations. The beginning of the big agricultural labourers’ strike in the Rome province, which lasted several days and ended in complete victory.
May 11—Strike of 50,000 agricultural labourers in Mantua Province.
May 12—Strike spreads to the Rovigo, Udine and Modena provinces embracing 120,000 agricultural labourers who struck work because of the violation of agreements by landowners and Government, and who insisted on new collective agreements.
May 16—2,000 workers in the Upper Flumendosa Basin (Sardinia) go on strike. Strike continued for more than a fortnight.
May 17—Gas workers win their demands. Strike of municipal employees in Taranto.
May 19—University students in Palermo protest against increased fees and occupy the university premises.
May 20—Workers of the SIMA works in Iesi (Ancona) occupy premises to prevent dismantling equipment.
May 21—After a 16-day strike the agricultural labourers of Polesini win complete victory after smashing combined front of the landlords. Thousands of spinners in Cremona province go on strike, demanding observance of labour agreement and payment of deferred earnings. Many mills occupied by women operatives. After several days, strike ends in complete victory.
May 22—General protest strike declared in the provinces of Venezia, Padua and Rovigo in reply to the police murder of a strikers in Trecenta. Agricultural labourers’ strike in Pisa province. General strike of agricultural labourers in Bologna. Strike lasts 15 days.
May 23—Students strike at Bari.
May 24—Big demonstration in Milan in solidarity with the people of Greece. General strike in Modena province against police violation of democratic liberties.
May 25—General strike of auto-transport workers to win their demands and recognition of their factory committees.
May 26—Strike of 25,000 agricultural labourers in Cremona.
May 27—Discontent among 60,000 tobacco workers in Salento (Apulia). The factory committees decide to continue the struggle until complete victory.
May 28—Agricultural labourers in Milan area join the general strike which has been in progress for several days already in the Mantua, Bologna, Reggio Emilia, and Cremona provinces and in different parts of Venezia. Total of 300,000 peasants on strike. On the same day general protest strike is declared in Cosenza province against police persecution and in defence of democratic liberties. Workers declare a strike in the Ducati plant in Bazzano (Bologna).
May 29—General strike in Placenza.
May 30—Strike of marker gardeners and horticulturists in the Naples province.
May 31—Monster demonstration of building workers, unemployed and homeless in Bologna. Strikes of iron and steel workers in Naples, electrical workers in the province of Reggio Calabria and agricultural workers in the province of Cagliari. The miners of Aragona (Sicily) occupy the pits in Enna and remain underground for four days with little food or water.
June 1—Mineworkers’ strike in Carbonia (Sardinia).
June 2—Big demonstrations in all cities celebrate the anniversary of the Republic. The demonstrations take the form of protests against the Government’s violation of the Republican Constitution. Sharecroppers in Pesaro province demand more favourable distribution of the harvest.
June 3—Mineworkers declare a general strike in protest against the closing down of industry miners in Valdarno, Ragusa, Foggia, Aragona (Sicily). Shipbuilding workers in Palermo who a month ago seized shipyards declare a general strike in support of the iron and steel workers.
June 4—General strike in Bologna province in protest against the arrest of four trade union officials and against police persecution.
The above list refers only to the principal actions of Italy since election day, April 18.
While these actions were, in the main, of an economic character, they are important politically, from the point of view of character, scale and duration, and because in the present situation, they take on an altogether new aspect.
Special note should be made of the action taken by the Palermo shipbuilding workers. When the owners of the shipyard decided to get rid of 78 workers, the other shipyard men protested. The management of the shipyard walked out and the workers took over and continued to run the yard. The significance of this incident goes beyond the framework of ordinary class solidarity.
Behind these events in the Palermo shipyard stood the Marshall Plan, threatening Italy’s industry and the lives of her people. In his message to Congress on December 20, last year, on the Marshall Plan legislation, Truman said that United States interests would be safeguarded better if commercial shipping built during the war was leased or sold to Marshall countries. Due to the steel shortage, the sale or leasing of these ships would be related to the cutting of shipbuilding programmes in the participating countries.
This explains why the Palermo shipyard was closed down. The same thing applies to the unrest among mineworkers, the first to feel the effects of the Marshall Plan. In Terni, Grosseto and Sicily, they took action against the mines being closed. Like the Palermo shipyard men, the mine-workers are fighting not only for bread and work, but also to save Italy’s baste industry and for the country’s economic and political independence. Once again they show that the interests of the working class are identical with the interests of the nation as a whole.
The students’ strikes are a new and important factor. Undoubtedly they indicate a democratic and progressive awakening of Italian students. The students are beginning to protest at the clerical attacks against education and culture and see for themselves that the Popular Democratic Front is capable of breaking this reactionary onslaught.
The open interference by the government and the armed forces on the side of the big industrialists and landowners are changing the situation. The struggle of the working class is taking on a new and sharper character.
All over the country the police are violating the people’s rights. The fierce attacks on strikers, the atrocities of the carabinieri, the arrests of strikers and trade union leaders are becoming the order of the day.
Carabinieri and police continually open fire on demonstrators. Today the police are doing the same job that the fascist mobs did in 1921-22. In rural districts the and carabinieri are acting as strike-breakers. In the south, police are actually besieging towns and are conducting hundreds of unauthorised searches and arrests.
The police state which has been created by de Gasperi, supported by, Saragat’s “third force”, is turning the Italian Republic—which, according to the Constitution, should be “based on labour”—into a clerical republic based on machine- guns and Scelba’s police clubs.
Because of the interference of the Government and the armed forces, each strike becomes a pitched battle and each demonstration a street fight. This year there is the danger that even the fields may become battlefields.
However, the big capitalists, landowners and the gentlemen of the Government are making a mistake if they think they can smash the working class organisations with machine-guns. Violence is encountering the vigorous resistance of the masses. Every attack on the workers’ liberties, on their right to strike and to organise, every violation of democratic liberties, will only sharpen the struggle; economic strikes will develop into political strikes, into the struggle for freedom and democracy. The task of the Communists is to strengthen and consolidate the Popular Democratic Front which should become even more strongly the leading force in the broad mass movement.
For this it is necessary to maintain unity of action with the Socialist Party, the basis on which the Popular Democratic Front can, be strengthened and extended. We must prevent the vanguard forces of the working class from becoming isolated. The struggle for radical reforms, for freedom, peace and independence can be successful only if the broad masses of the people, and not just the vanguard, take part in this struggle. The strikes must not be restricted to isolated actions, not even to mass actions of a defensive and economic character. The task of the Communist Party, of the trade unions and of the Popular Democratic Front is to coordinate and lead these actions, and to combine the struggle for day to day demands with the struggle for structural and social reforms, to develop economic strikes into political ones.
Our task is to guide the struggle throughout the country, advance correct economic and political aims, take into account the new character of the struggle, so that the solidarity and alliance of the vanguard with the working people is strengthened and ever broader sections of the population are brought into the struggle.
There must be no concessions to illusions, to the hopes of any “miracle” and to revolutionary phrase-mongering; no concessions to those who advocate that “the worse things get, the better it will be for us”, but a resolute struggle against the opportunist influences of Social-Democracy. The entire party must be mobilised to strengthen the unity and improve the work of the trade unions!
Today not only the day to day interests of the workers, agricultural labourers and peasants but also freedom, peace and the future of the Italian people are menaced.
The working people of Italy, rallied around the Popular Democratic Front, will be able to remove this threat and win a better future for themselves. In this struggle for progress and democracy the Communists will remain in the forefront.