KING OF ITALY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 244, 15 October 1935, Page 6

KING OF ITALY.

VICTOR EMANUEL 111. SHORN OF HIS POWERS. "What has bocomo of the King of Italy ? Yon hear very little about him nowadays." This is a remark which is frequently passed now that people, when they think of Italy, think also of Mussolini. For the past twelve or thirteen years little has been heard or seen of the Italian King, Victor Emanuel" 111., who succeeded to the throne in 1000 after his father, Umberto, had been murdered. The coming of the Fascist regime seems to have overwhelmed the Boyal family in a tumult from which the dominating figure of II Duce emerges while that of Victor Emanuel remains concealed. From this it might be assumed that the King had ceased to have any significance whatever in Italy, and, in one limited sense, this would be true. Small and insignificant in stature, of a retiring nature, wearied and worn by the cares of a kingdom which, before and during the war, was in imminent danger of decay or revolution, Victor Emanuel has worn a burdensome crown. Time after time he was called upon to make difficult and momentous decisions during the pre-war period. At the height of the Great War he threw himself on the side of that party which was for throwing in its lot with the Allies, and then there came what must have seemed to him to be the final disaster of Caporetto, when the Italian armies were broken and in retreat. Tradition of His House. It was at this terrible crisis that Victor Emanuel was seen at his best. Led by the King, whose example, courage and self-sacrifice elicited unbounded admiration from such divergent characters as Lloyd (.ieorge and Lord l'lumer, the defence of the Piavo and the stand against the advancing German and Austrian armies was organised before the Allied troojis came into action. This new lino of resistance was stabilised by the broken fragments of the Italian armies, led by the King in person, who again showed the truth of the famous tradition of the House of Savoy—that it has never known fear.

J A still greater crisis faced him after the war when, owing to the breakdown of the party system and the imminent fear of civil strife and dissension, the Prime Minister, Facta, intended to proclaim martial law [ throughout Italy. lie actually prepared the ■ decree and communicated it to the mayors and the Press. In this emergency the King acted with extraordinary decision and firmness. Realising that martial law would mean civil war, he refused to sign the decree, demanded its withdrr.-.val, rejected Facta, and ' sent for Mussolini, who had just then ended his victorious march on Rome. The advent of Fascism undoubtedly strengthened the prestige of the Crown, which had been seriously undermined by years of internal dissension. By accepting the inevitable in the form of Fascism, the King, by a curious paradox, succeeded in stabilising his own position while at the same time yielding to one who was to prove himself greater than a king. From thenceforward the Royal Family, safe under the blanket of Fascism, was almost obscured by the blanket. True, Italy remained a kingdom, the Government was the Royal Italian Government, the State was the "Regno -d'ltalia," and the King reigned he did not rule. In the Background. With the progress of Fascism an entirely new and complex form of Government was built up. and the Kingdom of Italy became the Fascist syndieal-corporative State. The power passed to the Grand Council, and II Duce was the creator of the council, which is supreme in all matters of a constitutional nature, including the prerogative of the Crown and the succession to the throne. Victor Emanuel and his heir apparent thus receded into the background, vague, shadowy figures which emerge from time to time at a review of troops or similar ceremony, only to retire 1 into the shades again. II Duce is legally Prime Minister and head of the Government; the King is King, for wltat that is worth. The greater part of the Royal palaces have been surrendered to the State; the King and Queen receive 10,000.000 lire as an allowance, while the Crown Prince, now aged 30, receives 2.000.000 lire, equivalent at par to about £20,000 per annum.

There have been rumours that in the present crisis the King and the Crown Prince have nnt altogether seen eye to eye with II Duce. For 35 years Victor Emanuel has been King, and has seen his country pass through trouble after troubt*-. Now, "shorn of all his kindly powers, lie perhaps sees her hastening to destruction and ruin. What should a King do in such circumstances? He was King of Italy when the blacksmith's son, Benito Mussolini, was a boy at school; he inherited a united Italy, the accomplishment of the House of Savoy, of which he is tlie retelling head. But a united Italy under the House of Savoy is inadequate to' the boundless ambitions of his Prime Minister, who has conceived the idea of a great Fascist Roman I'jinpire. Perhaps Victor Emanuel may sometimes permit himself to ask who is to be the Emperor.