II.

The Revolutionary Phase

Before 1848, a desire for the unity, or even the independence, of Italy was limited to a small section of the aristocracy and the middle class. Among the latter were many retired army officers who had fought with Napoleon. By 1820 these groups had formed secret societies, the largest of which was the Carbonari. They were perhaps more concerned with securing constitutions from their absolutist sovereigns than with any national aim, but some of them certainly wrote of a single country they called Italy. In 1820 the Carbonari spearheaded revolutions in the Kingdom of the two Sicilies and in the Kingdom of Sardinia. More serious revolutions broke out in Bologna in 1831 against Pope Gregory XVI, and in the small duchies of Parma and Modena. All of these uprisings were put down by Austrian armed intervention.

The revolutionary movement acquired its nationalist character through the work of the Italian patriot Giuseppe Mazzini. He believed that Italy should be not only independent, but also an integrated republic. In 1831 he organized Young Italy to spread the ideals of nationalism and republicanism to the Italian people. Its goals were education and insurrection, and revolutionary cells were formed all over the peninsula. In the Papal States, a liberal Pope, Pius IX, was elected in 1846. He immediately began an extensive program of reforms. An amnesty was proclaimed for political offenders, political exiles were permitted to return, freedom of the press was introduced, the highest government offices were opened to laypeople, and a consultative chamber was created to suggest new reforms. The pope's example was followed by the rulers of Lucca, Tuscany, and the Kingdom of Sardinia. Instead of slowing the revolutionary movement, however, the reforms of 1846 and 1847 only intensified it, culminating in the Revolutions of 1848, a series of uprisings in France, Germany, the Austrian Empire, and parts of northern Italy. These revolutions were generally attempts either to establish constitutional government or to gain independence for a particular nationality.

The first of these revolutions on Italian soil took place in the Kingdom of the two Sicilies, where the King was forced to grant a constitution for the whole of his kingdom. In the Papal States, Pius IX was denounced by radicals for failing to join the war of national liberation. A popular insurrection in Rome caused the pope to flee the city in November 1848. In his absence, the temporal power of the pontiff was abolished and a republic was proclaimed. In the Kingdom of Sardinia the nationalists called for a war of liberation to drive the Austrians from Italian soil. After some hesitation, King Charles Albert of Sardinia mobilized his army and marched to the assistance of Lombardy, which he entered on March 26.

In the spring of 1848 it looked as if the independence, if not the unity, of Italy was an immediate possibility. However, the Piedmontese were defeated by the Austrians, and Charles Albert abdicated; he was succeeded by his son, Victor Emmanuel II, in 1849. In spite of a heroic defense by the Italian nationalist revolutionary leader Giuseppe Garibaldi, the new republic in Rome was destroyed by French intervention in July 1849. Only in Sardinia did constitutional government survive the pressures in the region to restore monarchical governments. In 1852 Count Camillo di Cavour became prime minister of the Kingdom of Sardinia. His subtle, opportunistic, and flexible policy led to the unification of Italy in little more than a decade.