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Alfredo Canavero Milan State University – Centre for Foreign Policy and Public Opinion

An International Player without Territory: the Holy See from 1870 to 1929

Holy See Diplomacy has several records. It created one of the first diplomatic roles, sending permanent envoys to the Byzantine emperor (V-VIIth c.); a Pope (Gregory X) theorized the principle of diplomatic immunity; another Pope, Clemens XI, founded the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy (1701), to training priests to embrace diplomatic career, which is the most ancient institution of this type. Holy See had diplomatic relations with almost every State during Medieval and Modern age, sending nuncios (nuntii) and receiving ambassadors. Reports by papal nuncios are among the most accurate and important sources to study the history of Europe in Medieval and Modern age. After the Italian conquest of Rome and the debellatio of Papal States in 1870, the Holy See had no more a territory, but it kept on having diplomacy and a diplomatic corps. Even this is a record, shared with the Sovereign Order of Malta, another State without a territory. The Law of Guarantees, enacted in 1871 by Italian government just for guaranteeing the international position of the pontiff, recognized clearly the right of the Pope to continue to send nuncios and to receive diplomats. The word is important. Italian Government “recognized”, did not “create”, Pontiff’s international rights. According to the juridical doctrine of the time, only a State could have international rights. How could the Holy See maintain a diplomatic activity without a territory? As a jurist put it in 1878: «From the theoretical point of view there is here a flagrant anomaly. The only persons in international law are the states». Holy See was not a State; nevertheless she kept on exercising the right of embassy and negotiations. «Where is the mistake? Is it on the side of theory? Or is it on the side of practice?»1. After the end of Pope’s temporal power some countries were wandering if to maintain a diplomatic representative to a sovereign without a territory was a good idea. Some anti-clerical thinkers wrote that Catholic Church was a mere private association and not a subject of international law. This involved –they thought- practical consequences such as the suppression of diplomatic relations with the Holy See2. But the Holy See still remained a great power, albeit only moral, with a great influence on Catholic public opinion and, let alone bad relations, very few were

1 Cited by R.A. GRAHAM, S.J., Vatican Diplomacy. A Study of Church and State on the International Plane, Princeton University Press, Princeton 1959, p. 199. 2 See R.A. GRAHAM, S.J., Vatican Diplomacy., cit., pp.187-200. Testo provvisorio. Si prega di non citare

the States which interrupted diplomatic relations with papal Rome. It was important to have links with the centre of Catholic Church, even if the State was non-Catholic or inclined to anticlericalism. Holy See’s diplomatic relations are influenced by the personality of the Pope and his policy. Pius’s IX diplomacy, for instance, was not so satisfying. Let alone the Roman Question, which prevented to have normal diplomatic relations with Italy, Pius IX had problems with several States. The enactment of the Syllabus (1864) had already raised protests, particularly in States where Catholics were the majority. The Council Vatican I (1870) was another source of troubles. The Papal bull of convocation of the Council ailed the Orthodox and Protestants, whilst heads of State, breaking an ancient tradition, were not invited. The decision to declare the infallibility of the Pope made relations with States more difficult, deepening the gap between the Church and contemporary society. The Bavarian Prime Minister, prince Chlodwig Karl Victor zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, suggested to find a common line among States against the Council; Italian Government proposed a declaration to reaffirm the rights of the civil power in front of the Church; Austria presented a note of protest to the Holy See. But Pius IX and the majority of the Council fathers approved the dogma of infallibility. Many European chancelleries were concerned by this decision3. Austria had the pretext to denounce the Concordat of 1855, since the Roman partner had become different and declared himself infallible4. When Pious IX died in 1878, Holy See was almost completely diplomatically isolated. In France and Spain Catholic Church had sponsored the losing movements, the Carlist in Spain and the Monarchist in France, and now it had to face anticlericalism and laicism rising in those countries. Austria did not intend to support Pope’s protests for the loss of temporal power. Relations with Switzerland were very low, after it had approved a new Constitution (1874) which forbade the foundation of new convents and entrusted primary school to lay people. Diplomatic relations with Netherlands were closed in 1872 and with Russia in 1877. In Germany Otto von Bismarck had launched the Kulturkampf: discriminatory laws against Catholics and expulsion of religious orders became common. Paradoxically enough, the Holy See had good relations with Great Britain, one of non-Catholic great powers. In September 1870 a British battleship was sent to Civitavecchia to protect British subjects in case of disorders in Rome, but also to bring the Pope to Malta, a catholic territory under British rule, had the Pope wanted to go into exile5. Nevertheless, when Disraeli replaced Gladstone as Prime minister (1874), Great Britain retired its non-official representative to

3 See L.P. WALLACE, The Papacy and European Diplomacy 1869-1878, University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill 1948, pp. 85-115. 4 J. BERENGER, L’Austriche-Hongrie. 1815-1918, Armand Colin, Paris 1998, p. 107. 5 U. CASTAGNINO BERLINGHIERI, Le relazioni tra Santa Sede e Regno Unito dal Venti Settembre allo scoppio della Grande Guerra, in Fede e diplomazia. Le relazioni internazionali della Santa Sede nell’età contemporanea, a cura di M. De Leonardis, EDUCatt, Milano 2014, p.53. Testo provvisorio. Si prega di non citare

the Holy See. The Pope thought Bismarck had influenced the decision. The reason was perhaps another. England thought that the loss of temporal power had caused the loss of importance of an informal presence to a sovereign who had now only a spiritual power. With Leo XIII’s papacy, things started changing. Leo XIII realized that the Holy See should leave the idea of a Catholic Church isolated and under siege, but it had to intervene in international affairs and in the life of the States, taking position on the main issues of the modern world. He did so in different ways: with Encyclicals and Apostolic Letters, mobilizing associations and Catholic political parties, utilizing the press, but also through diplomacy. «Leo restless diplomatic activity has always constituted one of the axes of the historiography on his pontificate»6. He intervened about social (letter In plurimis against slavery; Rerum Novarum about the condition of workers) and political questions (Diuturnum, Immortale Dei, Libertas, Sapientiae Christianae, on the civil power and the Christian constitutions of States). The Pope spoke to the world and intervened into the world affairs to promote peace7. He instructed his diplomats to take every opportunity to include Catholic Church in international life at equal conditions with states. His politics was marked by success, but also by some failure. The most important failure was the impossibility to bring Roman Question to international level. Even Catholic Austria did not want to go too far. The conclusion of Triple Alliance among Germany, Austria and Italy in 1882 was a real setback for Vatican diplomacy, which dreamed of a remake of Franco-Austrian alliance, like that of 1756 against Fredrick the Great, in order to solve the Roman Question8. The alliance between two Catholic great powers was a dream, but it remained in the background for the Eighties and influenced Vatican policy. In other fields, on the contrary, Leo XIII’s policy was very successful. He succeeded in ending the Kulturkampf and re-establishing relations with Germany, or better, with some German States (Bavaria and Prussia). In 1885 Bismarck asked Leo XIII to mediate in the dispute between Spain and Germany about the Caroline Islands9. The Holy See did not waste the opportunity to present it as the recovery of a central role of the papacy in international politics. It seemed to the pope also the occasion to count on Germany in order to reach three strategic objectives: the

6 V. VIAENE, Reality anf Image in the Pontificate of Leo XIII, in V.VAENE (ed.), The Papacy and the New World Order. Vatican Diplomacy, Catholic Opinion and International Politics at the Time of Leo XIII. 1878-1903, Institut Historique Belge de Rome, Bruxelles – Rome 2005, p. 12. 7 J.D. DURAND, Léon XIII, Rome et le monde, in V.VAENE (ed.), The Papacy and the New World Order, cit., p.65. 8 See L. TRINCIA, The Central Government of the Church in the System of European Powers, in V.VAENE (ed.), The Papacy and the New World Order, cit., p. 120. 9 See J.M. TICCHI, Aux frontières de la paix. Bons offices, médiations, arbitrages du Saint-Siège (1878-1922), Ecole Française de Rome, Rome 2002, pp.61-115. Testo provvisorio. Si prega di non citare

dissolution of Triple Alliance, alignment of France and Germany and isolation of Italy10. This plan asked for the acceptance of the French republic, leaving every hope of a restoration of the monarchy. The encyclical Au milieu des solicitudes (February, 16th 1892) invited French Catholics to accept «without reservation» the republican democratic regime of Paris. France was indeed interested in having the support of Catholic Church for its colonial policy, but internal policy was another question, as we will see later. Better chance had the relations with Orthodox Russia. In 1894, a Russian chargé d’affaires was appointed to the Vatican and when the Czar Nicholas II took the initiative to convene a Conference of peace in The Hague in 1898, he asked for the support of Leo XIII. Italy feared that the presence of the Holy See at the Conference would undermine its internal stability and, consequently, the Triple Alliance. Italian Government, supported by Germany, declared that it would not attend the Conference, were the Holy See invited. «The Italian intimidation tactics paid off» and the Holy See was not invited (and neither at the second Peace Conference of 1907). It was a real disaster for Vatican diplomacy. «Most then twenty years of careful preparation had been undone in a few month’s time: the self-proclaimed central role of the Holy See in international mediation was to be taken over by a “lay” court, while at the same time the Vatican’s lack of real and absolute sovereignty had been publicly demonstrated»11. Actually, the position of the Holy See during the pontificate of Leo XIII took place on two fronts: on the one hand there was a tentative to resolve the Roman Question by diplomatic relations with the great powers, in the vain hope of their pressures on Italy. On the other, there was the great policy of Leo XIII, intended to bring again the Catholic Church in the center of the great issues of the moment and to promote a more just international order. The first issue negatively influenced the second. Leo XIII, despite the value of the Vatican diplomats, could not reach the first goal, but, notwithstanding the setback of the Peace Conference, he brought back the Church to a considerable international prestige. Between 1889 and 1898 almost ten times the pope was requested to intervene to resolve disputes between two States12. On the death of Leo XIII, Italy feared Cardinal Rampolla, Secretary of State, exponent of the French wing of the Holy See, was elected as his successor. In agreement with Wilhelm II and Francis Joseph, Vittorio Emanuele III obtained that the cardinal archbishop of Krakow, Msgr. Puzyna, opposed the veto of the Emperor of Austria to the appointment of Rampolla. The veto was an ancient privilege, granted in past centuries to the kings of Austria, France, Spain and Portugal.

10 See G. RUMI, Austria e Santa Sede. Da Leone XIII a Benedetto XV, nella crisi dell’impero, in F. CITTERIO – F. VACCARO, (eds.), Storia religiosa dell’Austria, Centro Ambrosiano, Milano 1977, p. 499. 11 H. DE VALK, A Diplomatic Disaster. The Exclusion of the Holy See from the 1899 Hague Peace Conference, in The Papacy and the New World Order, cit., p.444. 12 See. J.M. TICCHI, Aux frontières de la paix, cit., pp. 117-200. Testo provvisorio. Si prega di non citare

Giuseppe Sarto (Pius X) was then elected. He was favorable to Austria-Hungary, which he considered the only truly Catholic State among major powers. Actually, Holy See could not count on France. The president of French Republic, Émile Loubet, was the first head of a Catholic State to visit the king of Italy in Rome (1904). The pope protested against the act, which offended the dignity and the rights of the Holy See13. The French ambassador was recalled and diplomatic relations interrupted. One year later the French Chamber of Deputies approved the law of separation of church and state. Pius X protested again because the law was against the freedom of the Church. Even if only in 1921 the relations between France and Holy See were restored, France retained the right to protect Catholics in the Near East and in China and its consuls continued to occupy places of honor in religious ceremonies14. In general, the loss of France marked a sharp increase in the influence of Austria on the Holy See, to the point that the Vatican, in some occasions, could seem subordinate (or dependent) to Vienna15. In 1914, at the end of the pontificate of Pius X and at the outbreak of the First World War the Holy See had relations with Austria-Hungary, Spain, Bavaria, Belgium, Brazil, Argentina and Chile. Prussia and Russia had Envoys Extraordinary and Ministers Plenipotentiary to the Holy See, but without reciprocation. The Great War was a real test for the Law of Guarantees. In the past Italy had respected all the customary privileges and immunities of diplomats accredited to the Holy See and it was not willing to change behavior at the outbreak of war in Europe, suspending article 11 of the Law of Guarantees. But things changed when Italy itself entered to war in May 1915. Some Italians were for the suspension of the diplomatic immunities, at least for the diplomats of countries at war with Italy. The same diplomats of these countries (Prussia, Bavaria and Austria-Hungary) solved the question leaving Rome at the outbreak of the war. In any case, Italian Government decided not to suspend article 11. Polemics aroused: Central Powers underlined the fact that the Pope was cut off from direct contacts with one of the belligerent blocs. The Allies were ready to accuse the Vatican as a center of espionage. In 1917 a German prelate belonging to the Vatican Secretariat of State was accused of espionage and found guilty by an Italian military tribunal, but the Holy See was declared «absolutely not involved in the criminal acts»16. Italy was concerned that the Holy See could take advantage of the war to relaunch internationally the Roman Question. In the Treaty of London (April 26th 1915), the secret pact with

13 U. CASTAGNINO BERLINGHIERI, Diplomazia senza Stato: Santa Sede e Potenze europee. Le relazioni con la Duplice Monarchia austro-ungarica e con la Terza Repubblica francese (1870-1914), Vita e Pensiero, Milano 2013, p. 163. 14 U. CASTAGNINO BERLINGHIERI, Diplomazia senza Stato, cit., p. 172. 15 G. RUMI, Austria e Santa Sede, cit., pp. 500-504. 16 R.A. GRAHAM, S.J., Vatican Diplomacy, cit., pp. 311-312. Testo provvisorio. Si prega di non citare

the Entente Powers with the aim to make Italy enter to war against the Central Powers, Italy got a clause which excluded the Holy See from peace talks, whilst Germany elaborated some projects to solve the Roman Question, had the Central Powers won the war. By far more important was the intervention of the Holy See during the war to pray for the peace, to get a peace without winners and losers17. The new Pope, Benedict XV, choose the way of impartiality. Catholics were fighting against Catholics and the head of Christianity could not take a different position. Immediately after his election, Benedict XV invited to seek a peaceful solution and to put an end to the fratricidal struggle18. He tried to call on a truce for Christmas 1914, but without success19. He promoted exchanges of wounded soldiers and other prisoners of war who were unable to continue fighting. Many were the pontiff’s initiatives to alleviate the hardships of war and convey information of prisoners20. One year after the outbreak of the war he invoked again: “We conjure You, whom Divine Providence has placed over the Nations at war, to put an end at last to this horrible slaughter, which for a whole year has dishonored Europe” 21. His most known act during this period is the Note (as a matter of fact an Apostolic Exhortation) to the heads of belligerent peoples (August, 1st 1917). The note is well known especially for the definition of the war as a “useless slaughter”, but it was also a real peace plan in seven points, many of which were replicate, one year later, by President Wilson’s Fourteen points. The main principles, in fact, were arms reduction, freedom of the seas, the restoration of Belgium, and an association of nations to guarantee future peace. The acceptance of the powers was not favorable: The Entente powers accused the pope to favor Central Powers and to weaken the morale of fighters. All sides questioned his impartiality and very few realized the foresight of his position. Even some clerics blamed his intervention. The Holy See could not take part in the Peace Conference of Paris (1919), owing to the opposition of Italy, but its moral power was greatly increased for the position taken during the war. Vatican became a major force in international affairs. Many heads of States paid a visit to Benedict XV22. Great Britain, which had sent a special representative to the Holy See in November 1914, in

17 See J. POLLARD, The Papacy in the Age of Totalitarianism. 1914-1958, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2014, pp. 29-74. 18 BENEDICT XV, Apostolic Exhortation Ubi Primum, September, 8th 1914. 19 “Oh! the sweet illusion that we had to give back to the world at least a taste of the peaceful quiet that it has ignored now for many months! Unfortunately Our Christian initiative was not crowned with success. But not discouraged, we intend to continue every effort to hasten the end of the unprecedented disaster, or at least to alleviate the sad consequences”. BENEDICT XV, Speech to the College of Cardinals, December, 24th 1914. 20 See G.B. VARNIER, La Santa Sede e le ipotesi di un ritorno del potere temporale durante la Grande Guerra, in Fede e diplomazia, cit., pp.77-78. 21 BENEDICT XV, Apostolic Exhortation To The Peoples Now At War And To Their Rulers, July, 28th 1915. 22 A list in J. POLLARD, The Papacy in the Age of Totalitarianism, p. 103. Testo provvisorio. Si prega di non citare

February 1923 established a Legation. In the same year, king George V and queen Mary paid a visit to Pius XI. Benedict XV had succeeded in making Holy See escape from the isolation in which it was at the beginning of the war. Benedict XV took position on the results of the Peace Conference, underlining that in Paris only a formal peace was reached. For a real peace, he wrote, it was necessary “a return of mutual charity to appease hate and banish enmity”23. He was also concerned with the deterioration of life conditions in Germany and in other won countries. The Holy See was in favor of an organization of States and Benedict XV followed with deep interest the building of the League of Nations. “It is much to be desired […] –wrote Benedict XV- that all states, putting aside mutual suspicion, should unite in one league, or rather a sort of family of peoples, calculated both to maintain their own independence and safeguard the order of human society”24. Pius XI, however, modified the position of Benedict XV. The new pope considered the real League of Nations too tied to Masonic and Protestant circles. “No merely human institution of today can be as successful in devising a set of international laws which will be in harmony with world conditions as the Middle Ages were in the possession of that true League of Nations, Christianity”25 Only the Church could “safeguard the sanctity of the law of nations”26. To the League of Nations Pius XI opposed the ideal of medieval Christian society. The church, not a human institution, recovered its former authority, could ensure the peace between nations. “Peace- Daniele Menozzi has written- could have been found only within an order of collective life which he [the pope] defined as the ‘social reign of Christ’, namely the organization of a human society that recognized the supreme sovereignty of the Savior and therefore of his vicar on earth, the pope”27. However, a large part of Catholic intellectuals showed himself favorable to the League of Nations. Thanks to the efforts of people like Yves de la Brière and associations such as the Union Catholique d'études internationales (UCEI), also in the Vatican's attitude towards the League of Nations became more favorable. The end of the war seemed to bring to the solution of the Roman Question. During the Peace Conference in Paris there were meetings between the Italian prime minister Orlando and Msgr. Bonaventura Cerretti. The intransigence of the king, Vittorio Emanuele III, closed any possibility of agreement. The coming to power of fascism, aware of the weight of Catholic public opinion, allowed the start of new negotiations. Between 1926 and 1929, private and reserved meetings

23 BENEDICT XV, Pacem Dei munus pulcherrimum, Encyclical, May, 23rd 1920. 24 Ibidem. 25 Pius XI, Ubi arcano, Encyclical, December, 23rd 1922. 26 Ibidem 27 D. MENOZZI, Chiesa, pace e guerra nel Novecento. Verso una delegittimazione religiosa dei conflitti, Il Mulino, Bologna 2008, p. 53. Testo provvisorio. Si prega di non citare

between representatives of the Italian state and the Holy See led to the conclusion of the Lateran Pacts. With the treaty, Italy recognized “the sovereignty of the Holy See in the international realm as an attribute inherent in its nature” (art.2) and the full property and the exclusive and absolute power and sovereign jurisdiction over the Vatican to the Holy See (art. 3). The Holy See had again a territory. The anomaly of an international player without territory was over.