L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, JULY 25, 2019 www.italoamericano.org 16 L'Italo-Americano HERITAGE HISTORY IDENTITY TRADITIONS O n the night of July 16, 1846, a crowd at the Quirinal Palace acclaimed Pius IX for pardon- ing four hundred political prison- ers, jailed by his detested prede- cessor, Gregory XVI. As the pope blessed the faithful, men threw their caps in the air, but women blew kisses. The fifty-four year old pontiff, the former Cardinal Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti, whose election last month had shocked church conservatives, was as handsome as a matinee idol. Whenever he smiled, girls in summer dresses swooned and sighed, "Ah, che bello!" For the next two evenings, thousands of torchbearers packed the Piazza del Quirinale to cele- brate the amnesty with cheers, speeches, and music. Pius came to the balcony several times to address the crowd and to banter with urchins who had climbed the Obelisk of Castor and Pollux to gawk at him. On the third day, when his carriage left the Quirinal for the Vatican, some lads un- hitched the horses and pulled the buggy themselves. Romans adored their new pope. Despite an aristocratic up- bringing, a puritanical chamber- lain, and an austere physician, he enjoyed coarse jokes, strong cig- ars, and fried foods. Better still, he was open to new ideas. He formed a council to regulate the papal administration and to re- view proposals for moderniza- tion. He appointed commissions on railways and civil and penal reform. He planned to introduce gas lighting in the streets and lay- men in the government. Pius became the hope of the Italian unification movement. Demonstrations occurred in Rome. During a performance of Verdi's Ernani at the Teatro Ar- gentina, the words to the Act III finale "O sommo Carlo!" ("O supreme Charles!") became "O sommo Pio!" ("O supreme Pius!"). When the baritone cried "Perdono a tutti!" ("I pardon all!"), the theater rang with shouts of joy. The chorus encored the number three times as the audi- ence sang, "A Pio Nono sia gloria e onor!" Glory and honor to Pius IX! This was not music to the ears of a pope who was willing to di- alogue with liberals but who dis- agreed with their ideas and be- lieved that representative democracy was irreconcilable with papal authority. However much he craved popularity, he was neither capable nor willing to support a national movement, much less lead one. "They want to make a Napoleon out of me," he complained, "when I'm noth- ing but a priest." Pius lacked the strength and character to fulfill the dreams and control the desires of the applaud- ing fans who followed him through the streets, shouting hosannas and waving scarves and handkerchiefs dyed in his colors. Their hysterical cries threatened to trigger his epilepsy: "Viva Pio Nono, solo! Solo!" He enjoyed the adulation, but dreaded the consequences. At the beginning of 1848, rev- olutions broke out in Palermo and Naples and spread to Florence, Venice, and Milan. The news of these uprisings exhilarated Rome, and liberals pressured Pius to ac- cept a new constitution in March. However, when nationalists clamored for a war of liberation against Austria, Pius finally balked. On April 29, he delivered an allocution separating himself from the Risorgimento. A violent backlash followed, culminating on November 15 with the assassination of the pope's Minister of the Interior, Pellegrino Rossi. Radicals seized power, abolished the Papal States, and established a secular repub- lic. Disguised as a country priest in a floppy hat and tinted glasses, Pius fled to Gaeta in the Kingdom of Naples. The exiled pope excommuni- cated the rebels and asked Eu- rope's Catholic monarchs to in- tervene. Eventually, Napoleon III responded to his call and besieged Rome until it fell on July 3, 1849. Nine months later, Pius returned in state through the Lateran Gate, escorted by French troops, and cracked down. He repealed all re- forms, muzzled the press, and re- built the Jewish ghetto. He also banished dissidents, jailed critics, and executed agitators. His Holiness was baffled when the world objected. "How is it," he asked the British am- bassador, "that the English can hang two thousand Negroes to put down an uprising in Jamaica, and receive only universal praise for it, while I cannot hang a single man in the Papal States without provoking universal condemna- tion?" The pope laughed heartily and, to render the comparison more ab- surd, held up one finger and re- peated the last sentence. Pio Nono, the apostle of progress, had become an ogre of reaction. Rome was heartbroken. At the Teatro Apollo, the cho- rus moped during rehearsals for the premiere of Il Trovatore. Some members, who had sung at the Argentina six years earlier, wept when they recalled a line from the finale of Ernani: "Virtù augusta è la pietà." Pity is an au- gust virtue. Life, however, is never as satisfying as Verdi, the impresario reminded them. If it were, nobody would go to the opera. Pasquino's secretary is An- thony Di Renzo, professor of writing at Ithaca College. You may reach him at direnzo@ithaca.edu. ANTHONY DI RENZO O Sommo Pio Pasquino laments Pius IX An etching of Pius IX, who was Pope between 1846 and 1878

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