Abstract
In the foregoing chapters mention has been made of the law which the Italian parliament enacted after the annexation of the Papal States for the purpose of guaranteeing the liberty and independence of the Holy See. This law is usually known as the Law of Guarantees of May 13, 1871, the day on which it came into force. It had no sooner become law than it was spurned by the Pope. It was never in fact recognized by the successors of Pius IX who refused, among other things, to touch the money set apart by this law for the necessities of the Holy See1.
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The French ambassador de Bourgoing reported on November 21, 1872 that the Italian government had counted upon the financial needs of the Pope to force the Pontiff to come to terms at last with Italy. In this, he said, they were greatly mistaken. „Jamais le trésor pontifical n’a été aussi riche; il n’a plus à payer ni dette, ni armée; les dons qui affluent de toutes les parties du monde dépassent de beaucoup cette somme et des économies sont faites pour parer aux besoins extraordinaires qui pourraient se produire et notamment aux dépenses d’un conclave“.
Thus Joseph Delos, O.P.: „Ce n’est pas parce qu’il constitue un Etat, que le Saint-Siège est souverain. C’est au contraire, la création de l’Etat Pontifical qui est une conséquence de la souveraineté inhérente à la nature de l’Eglise“. (Revue Générale de Droit International Public, XXXVI, 3 série, t. iii, 1929, p. 459, „Le Traité du Latran et la situation juridique nouvelle de la Papauté“.
Earlier, on April 26, 1811, Napoleon had instructed the Archbishop of Tours and the Bishops of Nantes and of Trier, his representatives, in a similar tenor: „Nous consentirons à ce que...les puisssances chrétiennes, qui voudront avoir auprès de lui des chargés d’affaires, résidents ou ministres en soient maîtresses, et que ces chargés d’affaires, résidents ou ministres aient les immunités accordées par le droit public aux agents diplomatiques; qu’il ait les honneurs souverains et la liberté de communiquer avec les églises étrangères“. (Napoléon 1er Correspondance. T. XXII. Doc. 17656.) It appears from this text that, as originally conceived, the Pope would not have been able to receive or send envoys with the rank of ambassador.
Correspondance, op. cit. ib. Doc. 16200. The texts of the drafts cited hereafter are taken from del Giudice, La Questione Romana e i Rapporti ira Stato e Chiesa fino alla Conciliazione, (p. 68–78).
Camera, February 15, 1871, p. 614b.
On January 15, 1810 Napoleon instructed his minister of worship to have the President of the Consulta in Rome to send along to Paris the Ring of the Fisherman, the Seals of the Holy Father, the ornaments of the Tiara and everything else that could serve the Pope in ceremonies. “Enfin, toutes les fois qu’il se montrerait un individu s’annonçant comme tenant du Pape des pouvoirs pour gérer les affaires spirituelles, de le faire partir pour Paris”. (Correspondance, op. cit. T. XX, Doc. n. 16139). For the Emperor the Pope’s spiritual authority was to be an instrument of his own political power.
Camera. December 21, 1870, p. 167a. One more quotation from the foreign minister should suffice to make clear the international status of the Pope following the loss of the Temporal Power, in the mind of the Italian government. Speaking to the question of the right of active and passive legation, Visconti-Venosta told the Senate on April 22, 1871: “Tutti i Governi mantengono presso il Pontefice una rappresentanza diplomatica; questa rappresen-tanza era accreditata e presso il sovrano temporale di Roma e presso il Pontefice; ma certo il carattere del Pontefice primeggiava su quello del Sovrano. E anche nello avvenire i Governi terranno, o sotto una forma o sotto un’altra, dei rappresentanti presso il Pontefice per trattare gli affari religiosi, appunto perchè, indipendentemente dalla sovranità territoriale su Roma i cattolici riconoscono nel Pontefice l’alta so-vranità spirituale. Non ho d’uopo aggiungere che i Governi credono loro interesse che il Pontefice, il quale esercita una giurisdizione sopra tanta parte della loro socie tà, non sia a sua volta sottoposto alla giurisdizione di uno Stato particolare”. (Atti Ufficiali del Parlamento Italiano. Senato del Regno. April 22, 1871, p. 481.)
Cf. Scaduto, Guarentigie Pontificie e Relazioni fra Stato e Chiesa, 1 ed. p. 115–156.
Camera. February 15, 1871, p. 613, b.c.
Camera. February 15, 1871, p. 614.
To exact such a concession from the governments would have been to drive them to recognize formally and explicitly the end of the Temporal Power, a measure which none of them to date despite their non-intervention, had been able to bring themselves to. Scaduto remarks à propos of the Mancini amendment: „Ciò sarebbe equivalso ad obbligare le Potenze a riconoscere in modo esplicito l’annessione della provincia romana e la fine del potere temporale; il che allora non era opportuno e probabilmente neppure possibile: queste sono cose che si accomodano col tempo, come infatti ora si sono accomodate; certo oggi nessuno dei Governi esteri pensa a restaurare il potere temporale“, (op. cit. p. 157.)
One of the first shots fired in the juridical battle was the work of Pietro Esperson (Diritto diplomático e giurisdizione internazionale marittima col commente delia disposi-zione della Legge Italiana del 13 Maggio sulle relazioni delta Santa Sede colle Potenze straniere. Roma-Torino-Firenze. 1872–1876. 3 vols.). With the advent of the Left to power the theses maintained by this author became the gospel in Italy.
A.E.It. r. Launay. 13/3/75, S.P. 615.
The secretary of state for foreign affairs was the father of Bernhard, later Fürst von Biilow, and fourth Chancellor of the Empire, who was at that moment serving on the staff of the German minister to the Quirinal, Robert von Keudell. According to the son, in Rome the scene appears to have been duplicated. Keudell seized the occasion of a court ball to take Visconti-Venosta aside for the purpose of communicating Bismarck’s complaint. The Italian foreign minister, though taken by surprise as de Launay had been when accosted by Bismarck, immediately rejected the protest on the grounds later developed in his letter to Launay. Biilow does not give the exact day of Keudell’s encounter with Visconti-Venosta. Cf. his Denkwürdigkeiten, IV, p 329–330.
Unfortunately too long to cite in full. The text has been published by Salata, p. 273–282.
The thesis defended by the Italian foreign minister reappeared in a letter written to von Treitschke at this time and published by him in the Preussische Jahrbücher (Vol. 37, Heft 1, 1876) in an article of the editor entitled “Italien und der Souverän Papst”, p. 17–33. The unsigned communication is described by von Treitschke as written by a then member of the majority in the Italian parliament. Its author contests the notion that sovereignty is essentially based on territory. „Das Wesen der Souveränität liegt sicherlich nicht in der Fähigkeit, durch andere Mächte erobert zu werden.... Unser Garantiegesetz ist keineswegs ein geniales Werk; es hat nur das bescheidene Verdienst, den wirklichen Verhältnissen zu entsprechen, die gegebene historische Lage zu formulieren“. The survival and even growth of the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See from 1870 to 1929 certainly bears out the contention that the Law of Guarantees was not an artificial invention but corresponded to the real if unique sovereignty exercised by the Roman Pontiffs in the international community. That the Popes never recognized this law was not because of its assertion of the sovereignty of the Roman Pontiff as the supreme head of the Catholic Church.
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Graham, R.A. (1951). The Law of Guarantees and its Contribution to Diplomatic Practice. In: The Rise of the Double Diplomatic Corps in Rome. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-1023-3_8
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