Chapter One: Introduction

CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF IL DUCE TRACING POLITICAL TRENDS IN THE ITALIAN-AMERICAN MEDIA DURING THE EARLY YEARS OF FASCISM by Ryan J. Antonucci Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in the History Program YOUNGSTOWN STATE UNIVERSITY August, 2013 Changing Perceptions of il Duce Tracing Political Trends in the Italian-American Media during the Early Years of Fascism Ryan J. Antonucci I hereby release this thesis to the public. I understand that this thesis will be made available from the OhioLINK ETD Center and the Maag Library Circulation Desk for public access. I also authorize the University or other individuals to make copies of this thesis as needed for scholarly research. Signature: Ryan J. Antonucci, Student Date Approvals: Dr. David Simonelli, Thesis Advisor Date Dr. Brian Bonhomme, Committee Member Date Dr. Martha Pallante, Committee Member Date Dr. Carla Simonini, Committee Member Date Dr. Salvatore A. Sanders, Associate Dean of Graduate Studies Date Ryan J. Antonucci © 2013 iii ABSTRACT Scholars of Italian-American history have traditionally asserted that the ethnic community’s media during the 1920s and 1930s was pro-Fascist leaning. This thesis challenges that narrative by proving that moderate, and often ambivalent, opinions existed at one time, and the shift to a philo-Fascist position was an active process. Using a survey of six Italian-language sources from diverse cities during the inauguration of Benito Mussolini’s regime, research shows that interpretations varied significantly. One of the newspapers, Il Cittadino Italo-Americano (Youngstown, Ohio) is then used as a case study to better understand why events in Italy were interpreted in certain ways. The thesis concludes with methods used by the Italian Fascist government to alter the journalistic atmosphere in the United States, thus leading to an environment only conducive to a philo-Fascist stance. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………..…1 2. The Italian Connection: The Relationship between Italian-Americans, Italy, and Their Ethnic Press…………………………………………………………………………….11 3. Shattering Conformity: A Case of Italian-American Press Moderation during the March on Rome………………………………………………………………………...22 A Period View of the Situation by the Italian-American Press………………...26 Evaluation, Trends, and Observations …………………………………………52 4. Tracing Moderation: Il Cittadino between Turning Points, March on Rome to the Matteotti Crisis………………………………………………………………………….57 Il Cittadino: An Integral Part of the Community……………………………….58 A Deeper Look: Il Cittadino and the Early Days of Fascism…………………...63 Back to the Beginning: Moderation and Matteotti……………………………...70 Trend Reaffirmed……………………………………………………………….77 5. Motions for Change: Hegemonic Factors Contribute to a New Pro-Fascist Bias……79 Il Duce’s Concern……………………………………………………………….80 Mussolini’s Backdoor Influence: The Italy-America Society…………………..83 Other Channels for Hegemony………………………………………………….96 A Tainted Atmosphere…………………………………………………………102 6. Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………...104 Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………....108 1 Chapter One: Introduction Throughout the interwar period, Benito Mussolini’s Fascism weighed heavily in the thoughts and minds of the Italian-American people. Although no longer physically connected to their or their forebears’ state of birth, many still felt an affinity to the nation. Most had family that resided in Italy, and even for those attached only ethnically, the advancement and prestige of their ancestral country translated directly to an improved status within the eyes of the native, white American society. Yet, the Fascist system was dualist in nature. Mussolini spoke with concern for the average Italian, while coupling that concern with militancy and a developing totalitarian system. The question for Italian-Americans thus became whether the positives of the regime outweighed the negatives, and whether ambivalence could give way to consensus. For Jerre Mangione, this debate was all too real. Coming of age in 1920s and 1930s Rochester, New York, Mangione experienced an immigrant community in flux; one that was Americanizing but still felt connected to Italy, and interested in its affairs. In 1936, he travelled to his ancestral land to search for the truth, and published his thoughts in the well-received Mount Allegro: In my years of becoming an American I had come to understand the evil of Fascism and hate it with all my soul. One or two of my relatives argued with me on the subject because they had a great love for their native land and, like some men in love, they could see nothing wrong. Fascism was only a word to them; Mussolini a patriotic Italian putting his country on its feet. Why did I insist on finding fault with Fascism, they asked, when all the American newspapers were 1 admitting Mussolini was a great man who made the trains run on time? 1 Jerre Mangione, Mount Allegro: A Memoir of Italian American Life (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1943; New York: Columbia University Press, 1981), 239-240. 2 Mount Allegro was written as a quasi-autobiographical account. Mangione changed the names of the characters and, given his background as a writer, undoubtedly added a little flair to otherwise ordinary events; however, even if the preceding passage was slightly sensationalized, it only shows the writer’s concern more deeply. In Mangione’s opinion, Fascism was a divisive subject and newspapers published in the United States carried only one side of the story. This generalization of a pro-Fascist American press is not unique to Mangione, and many other period writers have pushed the same idea. The famed historian and exiled anti-Fascist Gaetano Salvemini believed that ethnics were “accustomed to their daily dose of propaganda in Italian” from domestic papers and radio prior to the Second World War.2 Writing about the same time, Chicago high-school teacher Pearl B. Drubeck assigned her Italian class to analyze some foreign-language newspapers. Using Il Progresso and Corriere d’America – the two most circulated in her district – as sources, the class discovered that both had “a definite fascist propaganda program” full of “editorials, news items and letters from contributors deriding [American] democratic institutions and [the students] realized that the exaltation of Il Duce and the fascist policies was quite deliberate”.3 Historians have continued the pro-Fascist press argument. John P. Diggins asserted in Mussolini and Fascism that “[i]n the United States Mussolini’s popularity was 4 to a great extent a product of the press”, both English-language and Italian. The ethnic 2 Gaetano Salvemini, Italian Fascist Activities in the United States, ed. Philip V. Cannistraro (New York: Center for Migration Studies, 1977), 248. 3 Pearl B. Drubeck, “Propaganda and Foreign Language Study”, The Modern Language Journal 25, no. 11 (December 1941): 882. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/317139 (accessed 27 November 2011). 4 John P. Diggins, Mussolini and Fascism: The View from America (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1972), 24. 3 papers in particular were quite fond of il Duce, and Diggins estimated that they were “almost 90 percent pro-Mussolini”.5 In more recent work, Italian-historian Matteo Pretelli agreed with Diggins, and concluded that “[t]he Italian ethnic press in the United States was particularly successful in promoting the myth of Il Duce. …[T]he ethnic newspapers sided [with] the regime by publishing enthusiastic reports of immigrants visiting Italy, letters of Italians to relatives in America that hailed the Fascist ‘achievements’, and the alleged unity of [the] Italian people around its leader”.6 According to such historians, opposition was the work of a very small minority. Diggins in particular noted that the majority of “anti-Fascist publications represented the opinion of Italian-American labor”.7 Criticism of Mussolini and his regime thus came from leftist papers, often Marxist or anarchist, which were viewed already as radical to many in the ethnic community. The staunchly anti-Fascist Il Martello, for example, was published by Carlo Tresca. A well-known labor leader and revolutionary, Tresca organized strikes, was briefly associated with the Industrial Workers of the World, and toiled for the defense party in the Sacco-Vanzetti murder trial. Considering that American officials habitually watched both him and his paper, coupled with his well- publicized four-month prison stint in 1925, it is no surprise why scholars have insisted that anti-Fascist news resided outside of mainstream reporting. Unfortunately, this paints a very sterile picture of the Italian-American press during the interwar period. This is not to say that at one time the ethnic media may have approached a ninety percent pro-Fascist ratio. Salvemini estimated from his personal 5 Ibid, 107. 6 Matteo Pretelli, "The Myth of Mussolini in U.S. 'Little Italies'", in Przewroty –Rewolucje – Wojny: Studia Historica Gedanensia, vol. II (Gdańsk, Poland: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego, 2011), 280. Academia.edu, http://www.academia.edu/777192 (accessed 2 July 2013). 7 Diggins, Mussolini and Fascism, 83. 4 experiences in the 1930s that only ten percent of the Italian-American population was anti-Fascist. Half considered their own affairs primary to any foreign concerns and generally stayed out of politics, allowing the community to follow whichever side it pleased. Although less than five percent were openly supportive of Mussolini,

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