Columbus Day

Today is Columbus Day, one of the few federal holidays I support, marking the day that the intrepid explorer Christopher Columbus “discovered” the New World on his mission to what was supposed to be India or the Far East dispatched by the Catholic Monarchs King Ferdinand of Aragon and Queen Isabella of Castile. Yet, as we have discussed before, this is still a controversial holiday. Native Americans take the opportunity to protest and draw attention to their long history of misfortunes, heaping all of the blame on the head of the late, ambitious navigator. As most readers will know I have a great affinity for the American Indian, a great deal of sympathy for them and share ancestry with a number of them. However, to blame all the evils of European colonialism in the Americas on Christopher Columbus seems quite absurd to me. As I see it, that would be rather like blaming every traffic accident in the history of the world on the man who invented the internal combustion engine. I would prefer Native Americans seize on some other day as a shared holiday of their own, though admittedly I have no idea of when this could be. The various nations have relatively little in common other than their shared history of mistreatment and seizing on some victory by one group or the other, such as the battle of the Little Big Horn for instance, might be seen as being in bad taste to some people.

So, American Indians protest on Columbus Day, an occasion not many other people seem to care a great deal about. In North America much was made of the fact that Columbus was not the first European to “discover” America (though I don’t know why as we have always known that to be the case) and in Latin America whereas once it was considered a pretty ‘big deal’ (it is known as La Dia de la Raza) as the start of Hispanic culture in the New World but these days most would rather emphasize their native ancestry rather than their Spanish blood, partly I think to help in claiming victim status. The Catholic Church in America, particularly the Knights of Columbus were instrumental in getting the holiday on the calendar but, in recent times, even they have slacked off of emphasizing it, preferring to take the symbolic side of the poor, blighted native or, more the case these days, the poor illegal immigrant. So, who is left to celebrate Columbus Day in the United States and to try to counteract the protests? The Italian-American community, both because of their just pride in the historic deed of Columbus and because there is really no other similarly well-known figure Italian-Americans can seize on to celebrate their people. Mexicans have the Fifth of May, Irish-Americans have St Patrick’s Day, German-Americans have Oktoberfest and Italian-Americans have Columbus Day.

When it comes to exploration much praise is given to the Portuguese, and rightly so as they were the trailblazers in the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope and the eastern route to India. Praise is often also given to Spain but the Italian people deserve their share of credit as many of the navigators commanding those Spanish ships were Italians and their ranks include a number of important explorers even if not everyone has heard of them. To start with, obviously, there was Christopher Columbus who, although he was not the first European to “discover” America, it was his discovery, frankly, that mattered. It started the great race of European nations to colonize America and originally this included Spain, Portugal, France, England, the Netherlands, Sweden and others associated with them. Some dispute where Columbus was born but the accepted time and place was 1451 in the Republic of Genoa (one of those pre-revolutionary republics where the Doge wore ermine robes and a crown). I do not see how it is appropriate for anyone to moan and groan about Columbus. Without him, none of us (people in the Americas other than the pure-blood native Indians of which there are precious few) would be here.

Another was Amerigo Vespucci, born in 1454 in the Republic of Florence, who was a navigator, cartographer and who traveled with a number of Portuguese expeditions at the invitation of King Manuel I and to whom we owe the name of “America”. Another was Alessandro Malaspina, a native of Mulazzo, Italy who joined the Royal Spanish Navy and explored and mapped most of the west coast of the Americas from Cape Horn to Alaska. There was Giovanni da Verrazzano who probably came from Florence and who was employed by the King of France and was the first European since the legendary voyages of the Vikings to explore the North Atlantic coasts of New England and Canada. He later made southern voyages of exploration in the Caribbean. Another is one many may know but they may not know he was an Italian and that is John Cabot whose real name was Giovanni Caboto. His birthplace has been speculated as being either Genoa or Gaeta but by nationality he was of the Republic of Venice and is credited with being the first European since the Vikings to set foot on North American soil, at Newfoundland according to Great Britain and Canada. Finally there is one of my favorites, a native of Venice, Marco Polo who opened up trade with China and befriended the great Mongol Emperor Kublai Khan.

So, remain positive I say and a happy Columbus Day to all.
MM

Monarchist Profile: Jean Leroy

One of the unsung heroes of the First Indochina War was Colonel Jean Leroy. Of course, not everyone today would consider him a hero, he had plenty of enemies in his own time. Vietnamese Communists and later Algerian nationalists would certainly consider him a great villain. Was he a monarchist? Strictly speaking, no. However, his service in Indochina, in what was then the State of Vietnam, was on behalf of a government led by the former Vietnamese Emperor and in opposition to communist revolutionaries which is why I include him here. In the aftermath of World War II the French Republic had returned to Indochina to restore their colonial empire but found that such hopes were futile in light of the growing support for the nationalist VietMinh organization which was led, first secretly and later openly, by the Communist Party of the revolutionary Ho Chi Minh. To combat his proclaimed communist republic, based out of Hanoi, the French turned to the former Nguyen Dynasty Emperor Bao Dai.

Emperor Bao Dai had abdicated in 1945 at the height of the August Revolution but had since left the country after becoming disillusioned with the communist domination of the government. He was restored as “Chief of State” for what was called the State of Vietnam based out of Saigon. It was allied to France and anti-communist but beyond that was a bit ambiguous. It was not officially a monarchy and yet the Chief of State, Bao Dai, was chosen because he had been the Emperor and for no other reason (aside from being French-educated and not antagonistic toward France). Monarchial trappings remained to some extent but the State of Vietnam was never really one thing or the other. This would have been a problem but there were plenty of other bigger problems to deal with, such as the on-going communist insurgency. The former Emperor was ill-equipped to handle the crisis and France proved ill-equipped to give him much help. France had no less than fourteen prime ministers during the years of the First Indochina War which did nothing to help the French cause.

The United States, eager to stop the spread of Communism, ended up providing roughly 80% of the French war effort as well as providing war materiel and a few advisors to the hard fighting French forces which were hard pressed. All of these hardships and shortages meant that groups on the ground in Vietnam often had to fend for themselves such as the minority religious groups such as the Hoa Hao (effectively Buddhist fundamentalists), the Cao Dai (a combination of all major religions) and the Vietnamese Catholics. The Catholic community contributed to the war, and though there were some supposed Catholics who joined the Communists in the north, the faithful Catholics knew they could never support a regime based on atheism and hatred of tradition and so determined to resist them, on their own, if they had to. One of my favorites was a particular Vietnamese bishop who formed his own militia and ruled his own little fiefdom in central Vietnam during this period.

The largest concentrations of Catholic forces, however, were in the south in the Ben Tre province of Cochinchina and Phat Diem in Annam (central Vietnam). In Ben Tre it was Colonel Jean Leroy who took charge of protecting his people from the communist insurgents. Jean Leroy was a Franco-Vietnamese officer (born around 1912 I estimate, I don’t know his exact birth date) of the paratroopers and even had he not supported the non-communist regime, even if he had not been a Catholic, he would probably have been killed simply for being of half-French and half-Vietnamese ancestry. Colonel Jean Leroy took it upon himself to form the first “Catholic Brigade” in 1947 on An Hoa Island. These 60-man brigades were merged to form the UMDC or Mobile Christian Defense Units which operated throughout the province in support of the local units called Bao An or “Peace Guardians”. All of this was done in an act of independent self-defense by the Vietnamese Catholics in reaction to what were terrorist attacks by the communists.

When regular French forces arrived they were surprised to find these Catholic areas already under the protection of these modest but very disciplined and determined independent, local militias. Still, they respected their abilities and when the regular French army was withdrawn from the area in 1949 Colonel Jean Leroy was given command of all UMDC units and responsibility for the whole province. In fact, this was simply official recognition of the situation that already existed. Colonel Leroy, using his military and diplomatic talents, had already taken it upon himself to defend the province and had organized the forces himself which had done just that. It is a testament to the effectiveness of the Catholic Vietnamese soldiers that within one year they had the entire province pacified and totally free of communist harassment. Few other areas could boast of such a record even with far greater resources at their disposal. However, Colonel Leroy had mobilized public support for his forces in these Catholic areas, the people understood the consequences of the conflict and he developed highly advanced rapid-response tactics and from the start had organized his military forces to fit the needs of the unique style of warfare in Vietnam.

It was certainly no easy task, however, eventually Colonel Leroy was to face more trouble from his own side than from the Communists who he had made such short work of. Knowing that the oppressed peasants were the primary base of support for the communists, Leroy lowered their taxes and ordered the wealthier landlords to pay more money to support his own troops as well as social projects to improve the lives of the peasants and so earn their support. Naturally, the landlords resented this and the generals of the National Army of Vietnam, which the French had by then allowed to be formed, were embarrassed by the fact that Colonel Leroy, with about 3,240 troops, was accomplishing more than they were with 5,840 troops. It made them look very bad that one colonel had put together this small motley force and yet was doing more with less and in record time than they were with all of the resources at their disposal. So it was that after earning too many enemies in high places with his record of success, Leroy was promoted or “kicked up-stairs” and his Catholic brigades were disbanded in 1952. The area was handed over to Vietnamese National Army forces which soon proved totally incapable of keeping the province free of Communist activity. For his part, Colonel Leroy went to fight as a counter-terrorism officer in Algeria on orders from President DeGaulle.

MM Video: King James I of Britain

MM Video: Royals of Qatar

Royal News Roundup

Starting, for a change, in the far north, pomp and ceremony were all full display this week with the formal opening of parliament in the Kingdom of Norway. HM King Harald V, flanked by HM the Queen and HRH Crown Prince Haakon, opened the 156th parliament on Monday. The King spoke to the assembly, remembering the attacks in Oslo earlier this year and commending the Norwegian people on their response to the tragedy; by coming together, embracing diversity and strengthening their democracy. He noted that some strengthening of security measures and first response teams would be required. In setting the agenda for the new government the King said his ministers would focus on lowering unemployment, fighting global climate change, increasing accountability and making the Norwegian welfare state a model for the world. Oh, joy. At least the pictures were full of royal grandeur. On Tuesday the new parliament opened in neighboring Denmark with the Royal Family in attendance. The Queen was pretty in pink (yes, I love the 80’s!) and as the royals are only spectators at this event in Denmark they all watched and listened to the politicians bloviating with immense boredom. Doing your duty isn’t always fun.

Over in France the flesh parade known as Paris Fashion Week had a large number of the glamorous gals of the royal world coming to view the latest trends and styles. HSH Princess Charlene of Monaco was the first to appear, and she spoke to the press, you can read her interview here. HRH Princess Beatrice of York showed up wearing an outfit to match her flaming red hair. HRH Princess Clotilde of Venice and Piedmont (who has no business looking that good at 42) was also on hand as was HRH Princess Siriwanwaree Nareera of Thailand, daughter of the Crown Prince. She attended more events than any other but there was a bit of unpleasantness when she happened to get “too close” to Princess Beatrice of York and was rather rudely stopped by her security guards, though Princess Siriwanwaree was not even trying to approach Princess Bea at all. The granddaughter of the “Lord of Life” of Thailand was understandably peeved by such treatment, asking, “Is that the sort of Princess you’ve got?” A rather unfortunate moment for a gathering of such attractive princesses. They didn’t seem to get together much, the only ‘buddy shots’ being of Princess Clotilde and Princess Siriwanwaree (I said “buddy shots” -not “body shots”, though I’m sure that would have got tons of attention…)

Moving across the Pyrenees, as we marked here, Wednesday was a doubly historical day for Portugal, marking the day in 1910 that His Most Faithful Majesty King Manuel II was overthrown and a republic declared and also, more happily, the day in 1143 that the Kingdom of Portugal was formally recognized as an independent nation by the Treaty of Zamora. While republicans celebrated their failed system of government, the man who should be king, Dom Duarte Pio, Duke of Braganza, led monarchists in a more proper commemoration. The Duke and Duchess went to the Monastery of Santa Cruz to pay their respects at the tombs of King Afonso I and King Sancho I and then heard a mass for the founding kings of Portugal. The Duke of Braganza made a very good speech in which he expressed his consternation at celebrating “Republic Day” if for no other reason than that it was an occasion of strife, conflict and Portuguese killing Portuguese. Even the adherents of democracy would have trouble defending it as it was the result of a military coup rather than the democratic process. The founding of Portugal was a much more appropriate occasion to remember and, as the Duke pointed out, whether a republic or not, Portugal today would not exist were it not for the creation of the kingdom in 1143.

And, last but never least, we have another royal visit to the United States by a member of the House of Windsor. HRH Prince Harry of Wales arrived on Friday in southern California, right on the Mexican border, at the Naval Air Facility at El Centro where he and 19 other British army personnel will undergo training to qualify as pilots for the famed Apache attack helicopter. The Prince and his comrades will be in the area for the next two months, dividing their time between El Centro and the Gila Bend Auxiliary Air Force Base in Arizona. They will be pretty far from civilization and much has been made of what the Prince and his fellow pilots will do in their time off, some mentioning a possible trip to Las Vegas (can’t you see what headlines that could set off). It is a fun city, I can attest, but I think the well-known phrase, “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” probably will not apply to Prince Harry. In any event, we wish him all the best in his training and in raising a *reasonable* amount of hell in his time off.

The Victors of Lepanto

On this day The Mad Monarchist remembers the Battle of Lepanto. Seen above are the top commanders of the victorious fleet: (left to right) Don Juan of Austria (overall commander and leader of the ships of Spain), Marcantonio Colonna (commander of the ships of Papal Rome) and Sebastiano Venier (commander of the ships of Venice). We also remember all of those who contributed to the victory: The Kingdom of Spain, The Duchy of Savoy, The Republic of Genoa, The Papal States, the Knights of Malta and the Republic of Venice taking care to note that while the Ottoman Empire was 'down' they were by no means 'out' and remained a force to be reckoned with for some time to come.

Royal Profile: Archduke Karl Stefan of Austria-Hungary

Archduke Charles Stephen of Austria, one of those ‘monarchs who might have been’ of the First World War, was born on September 5, 1860 in what is now the Czech Republic. His parents were the Archduke Charles Ferdinand (son of the famous Duke of Teschen who so bedeviled Napoleon) and Archduchess Elisabeth Franziska, Princess of Hungary and Bohemia. Despite being born in a very land-locked region Archduke Charles Stephen took an early and avid interest in the sea. In 1879 he was commissioned as an officer-cadet in the Imperial-Royal Navy, starting what would be a very long and distinguished naval career. In 1886, at the Hofburg, he married Archduchess Maria Theresia, Princess of Tuscany by whom, over the years, he had six children. In 1896 he retired from active service in the navy but continued to hold rank and undertake special duties for the navy. In 1901 he was raised to the rank of admiral and in 1911 was appointed Grand Admiral and Inspector of the Imperial-Royal Navy, making him the highest ranking naval officer of Austria-Hungary though others held operational command. The Archduke was also a yachting enthusiast, owned several vessels and visiting England a number of times for yachting events.

During World War I, after German and Austrian forces drove the Russians out of Poland, the German and Austrian Kaisers agreed to the creation of a new Kingdom of Poland in 1916. There were many Poles in the Austro-Hungarian forces and some independence activists worked with the Germans and Austrians to see this new state created (others opposed both the Russians and the Central Powers). Exactly who would become the new King of Poland was never finally decided. However, one of the leading candidates was Archduke Charles Stephen. According to some reports he was chosen as regent as a prelude to becoming king but others dispute this. The Germans had plans to make independent or semi-independent monarchies in Finland and the Baltic with German royals leading them. There were also reports that Emperor Charles I of Austria-Hungary wanted to be King of Poland in a sort of personal union with the rest of his dominions but the Germans and many Hungarians opposed this measure. There were also disputes over German desires for territory and questions about whether the new state would include ethnically Polish areas of Austria-Hungary.

Despite these difficulties, Archduke Charles Stephen had many factors in his favor that could have made him a successful King of Poland. He lived in the Polish area of Austria-Hungary (Galicia) and spoke Polish fluently. His daughters had married into the Polish aristocracy and his son, Archduke Charles Albert, was very close to the Polish people and, in later years, would join the Polish army and fight to defend the country during World War II. However, some opposed the idea of a Kingdom of Poland altogether, preferring to partition the former Russian territory between Germany and Austria or simply Germany with members of the Bavarian and Saxon Royal Families expressing an interest in claiming the Polish crown. Yet, Archduke Charles Stephen has been most associated with the idea of a Kingdom of Poland during World War I because probably no other candidate was as close to the Polish people as he was. However, very little progress was made and that was painfully slow. A provisional government was established with a ruling council but Germany and Austria-Hungary never agreed on the details of the Kingdom of Poland and the main Polish exile group in France opposed any effort to establish a monarchy allied with the Central Powers.

Some newspapers of the period spoke of Archduke Charles Stephen as the only serious candidate and that it was only a matter of time before he became King of Poland. However, the German military became increasingly annoyed with the issue and less tolerant of Austrian ideas as the Austro-Hungarian war effort became weaker and weaker. It also did not help that the Archduke’s own in-laws continued to support the cause of Russia or that his son, Archduke Wilhelm, became a champion of the cause of Ukrainian independence as there were long-standing territorial disputes between Poland and the Ukraine. In the end, the efforts came to nothing and would have been in vain in any event as it is unthinkable that the victorious Allies would have allowed a Kingdom of Poland with an Austrian or German monarch to continue to exist.

With Austria-Hungary carved up into successor states and the Hapsburgs sent into exile, Archduke Charles Stephen remained as attached to the Polish people as he always had been. He remained on his home estate, with his wife, in what became the Republic of Poland and he supported the new state even if he did not consider it ideal. He died there in 1933, followed by his wife only a month later.

Mad Motivation

Favorite Royal Images: Prussian Princess

Princess Victoria Louise of Prussia

Republic Day in Portugal

Today is the day that the Portuguese (at least those with whom we are not in sympathy) celebrate “Republic Day”, the day on which the first Portuguese Republic was declared following the unjust overthrow of HM King Manuel II. And yet, never was it more clear that there is nothing at all worth celebrating about the republic. It breaks my heart as I have long been very partial to the nation of Portugal, ever since as a boy I read about the trail of Portuguese culture left around in the world in National Geographic magazine by intrepid Portuguese explorers from Brazil to Africa to India to China and even Japan. It also helped having a cousin (by marriage) who is Portuguese and a very great lady she is. At no time in my lifetime has it been more clear that the Portuguese deserve better than what republicanism has delivered to them and at no time has it been more clear what an abject failure the republic has been in Portugal. The case for monarchy could not be clearer.

It seems so simple. The Kingdom of Portugal was one of the great powers, even more one of the great powers of the world than of Europe. The Kingdom of Portugal was wealthy, prosperous and advanced. The Kingdom of Portugal was on the cutting edge of science, technology, exploration and discovery. Yet, at the same time, it was a country of strong values, proud families and devoted faith. It was with good reason that the Supreme Pontiff awarded the monarchs of Portugal the title of “Most Faithful King”. It was the Kingdom of Portugal that established the first global, maritime empire while it was left to the republic to see this great work of centuries crumble. Even when Portuguese power was on the decline, they still proved to have the potential for resurgence such as in the war against Napoleonic France in which the British military genius the Duke of Wellington, commander of the Allied forces, described the Portuguese troops proudly as his “fighting gamecocks”. Under the monarchy the Portuguese had been explorers, colonizers, merchants, trailblazers, innovators and global leaders in astronomy, cartography and navigation. Under the republic the Portuguese have known only decline.

The Republic has presided over the depths of Portuguese history, seeing the country become one of the poorest in Europe. Their leveling nonsense robbed the productive and hard working to reward the unproductive until the entire nation was brought low and there were fewer and fewer left to rob. Now the robber government is becoming the beggar government, looking for the monstrous European Union to bail them out and keep their corrupt, theft-base government from toppling over and dragging the country down with them. Friends, Romans and compatriots, this should not be so! History has shown what Portugal is capable of and the disaster the republic presides over today is certainly not it! When it comes to greatness and prosperity, the Portuguese nation did it once and they can do it again but we must look to the record to see what were the conditions which allowed that to happen. The conditions of Portugal at the peak of her golden age was a monarchy with a population devoted to their king and country and grounded in the values of a deep and shared faith.

Let not the suffering of the current generation be in vain! Portugal must not repeat the same mistakes and continue the same failed methods that brought this proud country to such a low position. Rather, inspiration should be taken from the golden age of greatness when the country was guided by their “Most Faithful” Kings. Return to what worked and reject what has brought only ruin and discord. Let us resolve that this should be the LAST Republic Day for Portugal and the start of a new era of national rejuvenation, starting with a royal restoration. Death to the Republic! Long live the Duke of Braganza! Dom Duarte III for King!!!

Off Topic Tuesday: Lincoln, O'Reilly and the Unneccessary War

Recently Fox News big-shot Bill O’Reilly has been out promoting “his” new book (co-written with a historian friend of his) about Abraham Lincoln who, O’Reilly says, was the greatest American president of all-time. In a real “meeting of the minds” O’Reilly was going on about how great Lincoln was to Glenn Beck, stating, as part of his greatness, how “everyone” hated him. Is that really supposed to be a sign of greatness for the leader of a democratic republic? I find it rather odd that on so many occasions the people who promote the idea of majority approval as the best way of choosing a head of state also applaud those presidents who most ignore public opinion and the will of the majority. Yet, such is the case. I also find it extremely odd that Lincoln, the man upheld as the “great unifier” and one of the most exemplary statesmen in American history, is the same man who had to resort to the armed force of the largest army in the world and a war that killed hundreds of thousands of people in order to achieve that “unity”.

If Lincoln was such a wise and gifted statesman, shouldn’t he have been able to hold the country together and reach a political solution without resorting to butchering hundreds of thousands of men, starving women and children and burning cities? Preserving the Union was, of course, only part of it. The other issue, and majority opinion says the dominant issue, was slavery. Again though, no other major power had to kill hundreds of thousands of people in order to abolish slavery. The British did it peacefully, the Dutch did it peacefully, Mexico did it peacefully and all long before the United States ever even got serious about the issue. There has also been a lot of confusion (I don’t know why) about the Confederate position on slavery. The Confederate Constitution is not hard to find. Importing slaves was forbidden but slavery was legal. The Confederate government could never abolish slavery but state governments could. There seems to be some confusion about this, again I am not sure why, as there was really no restrictions the government could put on the states for or against slavery since the backbone of the Confederacy was the right to secede and any state could at any point secede over any issue they wished. After some heated debate it was decided that “free” states could join the Confederacy if any would choose to at some point. But, slavery was certainly accepted -no doubt about it.

However, most who find Lincoln objectionable do not do so because of his opposition to slavery. As with any politician, he at times tried to play both sides of the issue and it was the preservation of the Union that was always his paramount issue. That does not mean, of course, that slavery did not matter to him. Although “Honest Abe” was not always honest about it, there should be no doubt that he was against slavery and wanted to see it wiped from the American continent. It is also true that, even as an anti-slavery sympathizer, he certainly did not possess modern attitudes on the subject of race. He did not think races were equal nor did he think that the “Black” and “White” races could live together peacefully. However, by the standards of his time he was certainly not a “racist” and most of those who were against slavery would have held similar views to the President on the subject of race. It would take many years for attitudes to change in the direction of seeing no races at all. Even today, it seems, that point has not been reached by any racial group.

I know of no one who dislikes Lincoln today because he was against slavery. I do know some people who dislike him because of how he went about saving the Union and doing away with slavery -brutal military force. I tend to think that there would not have been such a long and ugly struggle for civil rights and so much turmoil over the issue of race if slavery had been abolished peacefully, even if it took a step-by-step process that took a little longer than the abolitionists would like. I say that because the war Lincoln fought against the south did not make southerners realize that slavery was wrong. If anything, it made many hate the former slaves all the more as the north identified the slaves as the cause of the whole horrific war and all of the suffering the south endured during and after the war. The south did not give up slavery because they realized it was immoral, they did it because someone was holding a gun to their head.

There is also the age old question of whether two wrongs make a right. Was getting rid of the evil of slavery without going through legal means worth the evil of a war that devastated a country, killed 620,000 soldiers and killed 50,000 southern civilians? Lincoln said he opposed the right of secession yet he supported the secession of the pro-union counties of Virginia to create the state of West Virginia which gave his party more support in Congress. When (hopeless) amendments were introduced to abolish slavery when Lincoln was a congressman, Lincoln voted against them. In his inaugural address he supported enshrining slavery in the U.S. Constitution if that would prevent southern states from seceding. In light of other private words of his, I have no doubt about his opposition to slavery yet he was certainly not being honest and purely principled in that regard. He arrested civilians, even elected officials, who opposed his war or who criticized his government or who simply advocated making peace with the south. He condemned the southerners as traitors and yet the U.S. Constitution defined treason as making war against “the states” which is exactly what Lincoln himself was doing. He suspended basic civil liberties, had civilians tried by military courts and his military forces purposely targeted innocent civilians in the south.

Another area which receives scant attention is the decision of the Lincoln administration to suspend the prisoner exchange cartel during the war. I have studied this area in some depth and there is no one on earth, regardless of all circumstances, who could not be horrified by the sickening conditions that prevailed in the overcrowded, notorious prison camp at Andersonville, Georgia. Originally built to hold 8,000 men at the height of the war it had to contain some 33,000 U.S. prisoners at a time when the southerners themselves were starving due to the ravages of the northern armies and the northern blockade of the coast. At the worst period some 100 men died at Andersonville every day from disease and malnutrition. Yet, the Lincoln administration suspended all prisoner exchanges, condemning tens of thousands of their own soldiers to a slow, lingering, excruciating death from starvation, scurvy, dysentery or some other combination of diseases. Apologists then and now say this was done in protest to the Confederates not exchanging Black Union soldiers. Other evidence, however, suggests that this was done because the north knew southern prisoners were breaking their paroles and rejoining the war and that if prisoner exchanges were halted this would weaken the southern war effort whereas northern prisoners could be written off since the population was so much greater in the north, their losses could always be replaced. In short, their men in Andersonville were deemed expendable.

This always struck me as one of the most horrific but often overlooked “crimes” of the Lincoln administration. And, even if it were done on principle, it still seems despicable to me to refuse to at least save those they could. If the White soldiers had refused to be exchanged without their Black comrades that would have been an immensely admirable sacrifice to make but it should have been up to them and not left to the government to simply ‘write off’ tens of thousands of their own soldiers who were left to die in the most slow and excruciating way possible. And yet, this was the same government that took no action against Major General Benjamin “the Beast” Butler who authorized his troops to rape southern women when he was military governor of New Orleans because they were insulting the Union occupation forces. This was the same government that took no action, indeed even encouraged, the pillaging of cities, the burning of private homes and the killing of civilians.

What Lincoln had in his heart is known only to him and God. Ordinarily one might include his spiritual counsel in that but Lincoln was the first (and so far only) U.S. President that was never a member of any church. Based on his actions I have no doubt that he was absolutely opposed to slavery and he may be commended for that. But his record of that being the priority for his prosecution of the war is sketchy to say the least. He dismissed and court-martialed General John C. Fremont in the first year of the war for abolishing slavery in Missouri (Lincoln later pardoned him). And, as many now know, when he issued the famous Emancipation Proclamation it applied only to those areas “in rebellion” against the United States, in other words it applied only to those parts of the country he could not control but not to those slave-holding states he did control. Very few were actually freed by the decree with real emancipation not coming until the passage of the XIII Amendment. Lincoln would have given all sorts of political, military and diplomatic reasons for why this was his decision, but is that really a representation of “the greatest” President of all time?

It also makes me chuckle to see Lincoln being applauded by modern-day “conservatives” and “traditionalists” (Bill O’Reilly doesn’t like to say ‘conservative’ but calls himself a ‘traditionalist’) when you look at Lincoln in a world context. There was no revolution or revolutionary in Europe that the Unionists (especially abolitionists, Freemasons, Protestants and liberal democrats) of the north who supported Lincoln did not celebrate at every opportunity. They cheered the anti-Hapsburg revolutionary Lajos Kossuth, they celebrated the Italian revolutionary Giuseppe Garibaldi who even offered to join the war but refused when Lincoln only offered him the rank of major general rather than total command of all Union forces. “Republican Clubs” were formed in almost every major city, with the full endorsement of Lincoln, to raise money in support of the anti-clerical Mexican revolutionary Benito Juarez. Lincoln gave protection and even high military rank to a number of Irish revolutionaries a number of whom (after Lincoln’s death) led the so-called Fenian Raids into Canada in the absurd hope of holding the dominion hostage in return for Irish independence. The list goes on and on and it is no wonder that someone like Pope Pius IX would write sympathetically to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, certainly not because of any support for slavery (which his papal predecessor had strongly condemned) but because he viewed him as a fellow victim of the liberal nationalist wave that was sweeping the western world.

At the end of the day, everyone is entitled to their own opinion on Lincoln of course. The book O’Reilly wrote focuses mostly on his assassination and I would fully agree that the assassination of Lincoln was a horrible and tragic crime and as much a disaster for the south as it was for the north. As harsh as he had been at war Lincoln had advocated reconciliation rather than retribution once it was over. However, I cannot go along with anyone claiming he was “the greatest President in American history”. The man killed more Americans than the Kaiser, Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, Kim Il-Sung, Chairman Mao, Ho Chi Minh and Saddam Hussein combined. The greatest American President would have found a way to hold the Union together and abolish slavery without resorting to brute force that left hundreds of thousands of his fellow Americans dead and half the country in ruins (you know, like the British, Dutch, Russian, Brazilian etc monarchs were all able to do). A man hailed as “the Great Unifier” would not have presided over the secession of half the country in the first place and then restored unity only by devastation, starvation and a million bayonets. In his heart he may have been a good man with good intentions, but the “gold standard of leadership” as O’Reilly calls him, he certainly was not.

Monarch Profile: King Vittorio Emanuele II of Italy

The man who would be the last King of Piedmont-Sardinia was known by the people of that late country, even early on, as the “Honest King” for his sincere devotion to their welfare. After going on to become the first King of Italy he became known to subsequent generations of Italians as the “Father of the Fatherland” and be celebrated and memorialized by one of the most immense and grandiose monuments ever to grace the fatal hills of Rome. Yet, this monarch who was so praised by the other courts of Europe was also, to some extent, snubbed by them and this monarch who the Pope remembered as “an honest man” was also dubbed by the Catholic press as “the Robber King”. There are few monarchs who have been simultaneously so praised and vilified as King Victor Emmanuel II. He was born on March 14, 1820 to King Carlo Alberto of Piedmont-Sardinia and Queen Maria Theresa of Austria. Part of his youth he spent in Florence where he gained a love of politics, sports and the military. The military would dominate much of his life as such service was a sacred tradition in the House of Savoy.

Victor Emmanuel II grew up on stories about the past exploits of his family. The Savoy who defended Rhodes as a Knight of Malta, the Savoy who was one of the greatest generals of Emperor Charles V, those who were blessed by the Church, went on Crusade, preserved the Shroud of Turin and so on and so forth. He was also very aware of strong differences in opinion amongst his forebears. Carlo Felice (Charles Felix) had been conservative and very attached to the sacred nature of monarchy. King Charles Albert was more liberal and, unlike his predecessors, despised the Austrians as much as they him, even to the point that they tried to thwart his succession. Victor Emmanuel II inherited many of the same internal conflicts endured by his father, a devout Catholic and firm believer in monarchy yet one whose nationalist and liberal sentiments were echoed by the “Young Italy” movement. Yet that movement ultimately made itself the enemy of the King and became radically republican. In his own time, Victor Emmanuel II would be expected to walk this same tight rope between enemies on both sides.

At the time similar conflicts were playing out all across Italy. A good illustration was when, in 1848, the people were incited to demand a constitution. King Charles Albert agreed to grant it and appeared on the balcony, waving the tricolor flag alongside his sons Victor Emmanuel and Ferdinand to the jubilant cheers of the crowd while all sang the ‘Hymn of Pius IX’ as the “liberal reformer” Pope who spoke openly of the “Italian nation” was at that time the most popular Italian of all. Things would soon change. Piedmont-Sardinia was spared further turmoil by giving in to the liberals but other states would not and when Austria sent troops to prop up their relatives in other of the minor Italian states, Piedmont-Sardinia went to war against Austria in the name of Italian independence (just as the King had earlier offered to do when Austrian troops violated the Papal States). The result was a crushing Austrian victory and King Charles Albert left the battlefield and the throne, abdicating in favor of his son who became King Victor Emmanuel II of Piedmont-Sardinia.

In 1842, as Duke of Savoy, he had married his cousin Adelaide of Austria, daughter of the Viceroy of Lombardy-Venetia, a small and pretty woman, very religious and very charitable. Victor Emmanuel was often far from an ideal husband but before her tragic death in 1855 she gave him eight children, her end coming from childbirth. She had, so to speak, died ‘in the line of duty’. Meanwhile, after becoming King in 1849, following the defeat at Novara, he obtained an armistice from the Austrians but never lost sight of his primary goal; not so much the unification of Italy under his own rule but rather of the independence of Italy from foreign powers so that the day might come when the peninsula was no longer a battlefield for French and Austrian armies. The first effort had ended in failure, due not only to the Austrian army but, truth be told, also to republicans who undermined the effort as it stood to preserve the existing monarchies of Italy. Independence efforts were put off for a decade.

Tensions remained high, especially so when Piedmont-Sardinia was the only constitutional monarchy on the Italian peninsula. They were most hated by local reactionaries for this reason but also by the radical revolutionaries who feared they would cut out their support by delivering the liberties they promised but doing so within the framework of a monarchy rather than a republic. Yet, this was when Victor Emmanuel II became known as the “Honest King” for being alone among his fellows in standing by the promises all had made to ensure constitutional government. As his popularity grew so did the jealousy of his enemies. He was a pleasure-loving man but not an irreligious one and commented that of all the accusations his enemies threw against him the one that hurt most was that he was anti-clerical. Over time he continued to reference God and the Church in official papers and speeches even when the audience did not react favorably to such references. He favored the plan put forward by the philosopher Gioberti that Italian unification should come about by an alliance of Rome and Turin in a confederation of the Italian states. The Prime Minister, Count Camillo Cavour, argued that it was useless to even try to negotiate with the Holy See and after efforts to make concessions failed the King began to sway to his point of view. That view was likely reinforced when the works of Gioberti were condemned and his book placed on the Index of Forbidden Works.

So, finding scant support amongst the princely states, Victor Emmanuel II turned to an alliance with Great Britain and France. He was anxious to restore the lost glory from the defeat by Austria and was assured by Cavour that joining with Britain and France in their war against Russia (on behalf of Turkey) in the Crimea was the way to do it. The British constitutional monarchy had long been a model for Piedmont-Sardinia, providing liberty enough to maintain a content public but with a strong-enough monarchy to ensure security and an orderly society. France was more worrisome but most came to believe that only an alliance with France would enable Piedmont-Sardinia to eject the Austrian army from the Italian peninsula. So it was that the northern Italian kingdom joined a war in southern Russia despite having no tangible reason to do so. Russia had not offended or harmed them in any way but if it would win the favor of Britain and France, off to the Crimea they would go.

In the end, it took even more to secure the friendship of France, including great personal sacrifices for Victor Emmanuel II; Savoy, Nice and most painful of all his daughter in a marriage to a totally unsuitable Bonaparte relative of French Emperor Napoleon III. Freedom “from the Alps to the Adriatic” was what Napoleon promised but when France and Piedmont-Sardinia marched off to war against Austria, with the moral support of much of Europe since Austria had first invaded, the bloodshed soon turned Napoleon III into a fair weather friend. In the resulting treaty only Lombardy came under the Savoy crown with Austria retaining Venetia. Still, this was seen as a victory and deputations arrived from the central Italian duchies and even the Papal States requesting that Piedmont-Sardinia take them under their wing. King Victor Emmanuel II received them politely and was sympathetic but ultimately had to refuse them. He hoped that diplomacy might yet bring about a union of the existing Italian states to the exclusion of all foreign powers.

Toward that end, his hopes rose upon the death of the King of the Two-Sicilies and the accession to the throne of Francesco (Francis) II. The late Ferdinand II had refused an alliance with the Savoy, and was hostile to Sardinia to the bitter end, but with a new king, Victor Emmanuel II hoped things might be different and he offered an alliance again to King Francis II, uniting the Italian states between them with Sardinia responsible for the north and Sicily for the south. However, Francis II, one of those upright men who have often faced disastrous consequences for holding to their principles rather than practicality, refused the offer of friendship. With the Pope now refusing any sort of unity at all and the rejection of Francis II any hope that Italian independence could be achieved by a union of the existing monarchies evaporated. The only remaining choices were a revolutionary republic, as represented by the likes of Giuseppe Mazzini, or a constitutional monarchy as represented by King Victor Emmanuel II.

The moderates clung to him, in the words of the celebrated poet Alessandro Manzoni, “I see in the character of the king the intervention of Providence. He is exactly the sovereign that circumstances require to accomplish the resurrection of Italy”. And this was no rabid revolutionary but a man who had renounced his youthful rebelliousness for an austere Catholicism and who devoted much of his literary talents to writing, with religious guidance, on Catholic morality. Yet, whether the King liked it or not, events were unfolding rapidly and there was little he could do to control them for long. Immediately after the war, the professional revolutionary and ardent republican Giuseppe Garibaldi was preparing to march on Rome, overthrow the Papal States and force the area to join the slowly uniting Italy. Turin was in an uproar and the King summoned Garibaldi to order him to desist from such brash aggression. Garibaldi, though an ardent republican who had no use for kings, admired Victor Emmanuel II as a man and agreed to stand down. The King had also had a falling out with Cavour but still felt compelled to appoint him as his representative to a congress of the European nations gathering to deal with all the turmoil in Italy in early 1860. The King thought Cavour too rash and Cavour thought his monarch too deliberate. Nonetheless, an accord was reached and Cavour was back in power as head of the government.

The congress was never called as no country was willing to go out on a limb to restore the central Italian princes who had abandoned their thrones. Even the Church garnered little but moral support. Austria was under threat from France and Prussia, the anti-clerical party in France was strong and growing in anger over Papal support for the royalist cause. Belgium was divided on the issue and Spain and Portugal were both ruled by monarchs the Church had recently opposed, even if never officially. The issue of the Papal States soon dominated the “problem” of Italy. The liberals who had once applauded Pope Pius IX now vilified him and after being driven from Rome by a short-lived republic, the Pope had become an ardent reactionary. Only a tiny minority in Italy ever questioned the goodness and piety of the Pontiff but, given his shifting record, many were increasingly willing to question his ability as a monarch. The King and Pontiff exchanged many eloquent letters, each extremely polite and respectful toward the other but neither achieving any progress. The King professed that he took his duties seriously as a Catholic prince but that he also had a duty to safeguard the independence of Italy and, as he pointed out in one such letter, he did so, “following the impulse given from the Vatican” which was a thinly-veiled reference to the rather contradictory policy of the Holy See concerning Italy.

The Pope had righteous principle on his side but little else and it did not present a pleasant picture to the world that so saintly a man as Pius IX was only able to maintain his rule by the presence of, first, Austrian and later French bayonets. The Pope replied, politely and with great refinement, that the annexation of those parts of the Papal States outside Rome were beneath the dignity of so great a king and son of so august and ancient a Catholic royal house as the Savoy. His greatest concern, the Pontiff said, was for the soul of the King which would surely be lost if he persisted in challenging the temporal rule of the Church over central Italy. In short, there could be absolutely no compromise on the subject. Either Italian unity and independence would be abandoned or the theocracy must be destroyed. There could be no other option. Both men were convinced that right was on their side and neither could be moved from their positions even an inch. Conflict was inevitable.

The central Italian states were annexed by Piedmont-Sardinia after referendums which the nationalists hailed as positive proof of popular support and which the Church condemned as totally fraudulent. In truth, and this would continue for a long time in Church-State relations in Italy, the nationalists were probably correct since the Church, which was not about to abide by the referendum, forbid anyone from participating. Today this seems harsh but the Papal position was perfectly understandable. In the Papal States, moral law was secular law. To work on Sunday, miss monthly confession or get too friendly before marriage was not only immoral but illegal; in fact it was illegal *because* it was immoral. Things like moral law, right and wrong, or the legitimacy of papal rule could not be subject to popular opinion. It would have negated what the Papal States stood for (the beginning of an issue that remains problematic for the Church even today). So, the Pope could not recognize the results of the referendum which were unanimously in favor of union with Italy because all of those loyal to the Pope obediently refrained from voting.

King Victor Emmanuel II immediately wrote to the Pope, defending his position and asking the Pope to accept his religious sincerity and to work with him to reconcile their differences. Six days later the Pope publicly excommunicated the King, while still, in his written reply, asking God to bless the King. Such was Pius IX. The King was, naturally, deeply troubled by all this, as were all Italians who were, despite political differences, overwhelmingly Catholic. None could fail to admire the courage of the Pontiff and yet, when he claimed it as his sacred duty to uphold the temporal power, they remembered how he had once granted a constitution and the laity in government and other liberal reforms only to revoke them all later. This lack of consistency allowed the nationalists to pick the version of Pius IX that most pleased them and blame the harsher version on wicked advisors from whom the Pontiff must be rescued and so also be relieved of the “burdens” of temporal rule. There were also plenty of priests and bishops throughout Italy who continued to administer the sacraments despite the blanket excommunication on the King, his government, his army and any who cooperated with him, obeyed him or recognized his authority. Italy was not only split by being forced to choose between “nation” and “religion” but the Church was as well.

The King continued to go to mass, be given communion and so on. He also continued to write to the Pope explaining to him that his position would be unchanged, his authority and inviolability would be guaranteed and that the only difference would be that Italian troops would protect him instead of Austrian or French ones. Each time the Pope responded with two words, “not possible”. Meanwhile the King, who never liked being away from Piedmont, toured his new domain to a rapturous welcome with his record of success having won over most of the liberals as well as the moderates. Only the clerical faction and the most ardent republican revolutionaries remained opposed to the idea of a united Kingdom of Italy under Victor Emmanuel II. The clerical faction was mostly powerless as they refused to participate in the political process and the republicans had diverted their attention southward to the Kingdom of the Two-Sicilies where Garibaldi turned his attentions after being dissuaded from attacking Rome by Victor Emmanuel II.

The southern Bourbon bastion was gripped by crisis. The Swiss mercenaries who made up the backbone of the military had mutinied and been bloodily suppressed. The uncle of King Francis II had even joined the nationalists after his nephew had refused to go along with the liberal movement and turned down two offers of friendship from Piedmont-Sardinia. There had even been an effort, talked about in Naples, Rome and Vienna to form a ‘Holy League’ to oppose Piedmont-Sardinia by bringing in Spanish troops (the only other monarchy where the Bourbon dynasty still ruled). However, Spain refused on the grounds that such an effort would be too unpopular and dangerous. This is not surprising given that the Church had backed the Carlist faction in trying to overthrow Queen Isabella II and bitter divisions remained in Spanish society. Those loyal to the Queen were sympathetic to the liberals, not Francis II or the Pope and the Queen would not dare weaken her army at home and risk being overthrown herself by the Carlists who remained a force to be reckoned with no matter how religious and reactionary (both good things) she herself was seen as being by the liberals in Spain.

Thus Naples was already rife with revolutionary conspiracies when Garibaldi and his red-shirt republicans invaded Sicily and quickly overran the island. Count Cavour supported the expedition which brought down a storm of outrage on Turin. The King had been reluctant to have Cavour back and when he did, made it clear that Cavour would be responsible for his own actions. Cavour refused to back down. They had twice offered Naples an alliance and been twice refused so they felt no great guilt in viewing King Francis II as their unofficial enemy. The King had and would continue to have stringent disagreements with Garibaldi (who certainly felt no great loyalty toward him) yet he could not help but admire the man who showed such audacity, devotion to his nation and strict adherence to his principles -even if those principles made him opposed to the very concept of monarchy. In Naples King Francis II belatedly offered a constitutional government but it was too little, too late. His ministers resigned, most of his military forces melted away and with Sardinian ships looking on, Garibaldi crossed to the mainland (despite the King asking him not to) and occupied Naples, proclaiming a provisional government.

At the end of the year King Victor Emmanuel II decided to intervene directly and Piedmontese troops began investing the port city of Gaeta on November 6. The French had guarded Gaeta by sea but finally their support was withdrawn, yet King Francis II and his lovely Bavarian Queen resisted with great heroism that inspired everyone, friend and foe alike, at the last stand of the Bourbons in Italy. On February 13, 1861 the fortress city finally surrendered. The Two-Sicilies were annexed and, after the usual plebiscites, on March 17, 1861 Victor Emmanuel II was declared the first King of Italy by the first national government based in Turin. However, one final step remained toward full unification and, in some ways, it would be the most difficult. That was the Eternal City of Rome, all that remained of the Papal States and that held up only by the presence of French troops. Napoleon III had shifted positions again, fearing a potential rival rather than a strong ally and was being influenced by his devout and virtuous Spanish wife the Empress Eugenie. Despite their many differences, the French had actually given military support to the House of Savoy in the past and King Victor Emmanuel II wanted no conflict with them. As long as the French army remained in Rome the city every Italian looked to as their capital would remain out of reach of the new kingdom.

Garibaldi felt no such hesitation and tried twice to conquer the city only to be defeated by the French and the Papal army of international volunteers who had made their way to Rome to defend the theocracy, cheering Pius IX as the ‘Pope-King’. In the meantime, in 1866 King Victor Emmanuel II allied with Prussia in another war against Austria. The Prussians effectively used the Italians as a red flag to arouse Austria and then claim self-defense and drive the Austrians from their place of preeminence in Germany. It was not a pleasant affair for Italy but, in the end, Veneto was at long last added to the Italian nation. All that remained was Rome and, in a way, it would be Prussia that proved instrumental in removing that obstacle as well. In 1870 the Prussians provoked France into launching a foolhardy attack and used that to rally the German states in a war against Napoleon III that would result in the creation of the modern Germany.

The French troops were hurriedly pulled out of Rome at this crisis at which point Italy moved to take the city, claiming (rather lamely) to be responding to ‘riots and disorder’. As he had done before, the Pope deployed his army but then tried to prevent them from actually fighting. He knew it was hopeless, yet he wanted some symbolic shots to be fired to show that he was being conquered and not going along with the takeover willingly. However, some of his forces resisted anyway but the poorly maintained force of volunteers from around the world were brushed aside by the Italian army with little difficulty. Rome was taken and, after a brief stay in Florence, the Italian government moved there to make the Eternal City their capital. The Pope withdrew behind the walls of the Vatican, declaring himself a prisoner and refusing to recognize the Kingdom of Italy in any way. It was the start of a stand-off that would last well into the next century.

King Victor Emmanuel II was undoubtedly an ambitious man, yet he was reticent to be seen as a conqueror and had held back at almost every step on the road to unification. He was, however, willing to take advantage of opportunities that presented themselves even while he was troubled about it. For instance, once Rome had fallen the King was reluctant to even visit the city and the first time he did, informally, was after the Tiber flooded, causing great suffering, and he came with a few courtiers to survey the damage and help in any way he could. Later, when he made his formal entry into Rome, he did not want to take up residence in the Quirinal Palace which had formerly belonged to the Pope. He finally did some time after it became clear that no accommodation would be reached. The King felt the offer of his government had been more than generous; guarantees of independence for the Church, exclusive use of Church property, control over all of Rome within the Leonine Wall and a substantial annual pension. When the Pope refused this offer, many admired his principled stand but others, especially in the increasingly anti-clerical government, saw the Pope as unreasonable and lost interest in even trying to come to any agreement and adopted the attitude that the radicals had been right all along about the Church being on the side of their foreign enemies.

When the King came to open the first national parliament in Rome his speech was largely dominated by assurances to the Church, a “free Church in a free State” was the catch phrase of the time. Other than that, he remarked on the historic nature of their meeting that, for the first time since the era of the Roman Empire, the people of Italy were united under one monarch, led by one government in Rome and that no foreign armies stood on Italian soil. They had fought long and hard to see this accomplished and the King wished to embark on a period of rejuvenation after this ordeal and having made Italy united to focus on making Italy prosperous and a member of the community of great European powers. It was a period of seemingly limitless possibilities for Italy and her new Royal Family. In 1870, with some difficulty, the King persuaded his son to accept the offer of the throne of Spain from the provisional government there. To rescue Spain from disorder and anarchy and restore her to benevolent power seemed, to Victor Emmanuel II, a glorious and worthy undertaking for a Savoy prince. He would have been wiser to have listened to his advisors who all warned against it. Queen Isabella II had been overthrown for being too conservative for the liberals and too liberal for the conservatives. Spain was torn by more factions and more pretenders to the throne than any country in Europe. The liberal moderates called for a Savoy but the conservatives supported the line of Isabella II, the Carlists supported the line of her uncle and there were republicans who wanted a President. However, the Duke of Aosta was accepted as King Amadeus I of Spain though it would prove to be a doomed enterprise.

As King of Italy, Victor Emmanuel II toured the country, noting improvements and infrastructure projects that would have to be made. He also accepted friendly visits from princes from Great Britain, Prussia and even Austria. To the surprise of many he was invited to Vienna to be the special guest of Emperor Francis Joseph. The two former enemies met and embraced as friends in a touching moment of reconciliation between two ancient royal houses that had once been the closest of allies. Going on to Prussia the public gave him a rousing welcome and he won over the princes and people alike with his simple manners, good humor and friendly nature. When he told the Kaiser that, were he not bound to follow the advice of his ministers, he would have made war on Germany at the side of his old ally France but was of course now glad to be good friends, Kaiser Wilhelm I thanked him for his honesty. When these monarchs returned the visit of the King there was another touching moment on the part of the gentlemanly Emperor Francis Joseph. He could not come to Rome for fear of offending the Pope, nor could he meet the King at Florence or Naples for fear of offending his relatives so he decided on Venice, which had been his own domain but which showed the bigger man he was in putting the past behind him.

Even toward the end of his life the King kept up his formidable schedule. Some eyebrows were raised in 1869 when he married a commoner-turned-countess named Rosa Vercellana. According to some, he did this while in a fever and later regretted it but nonetheless continued to regard her as his wife for the rest of his years and had two children by her. He was famously punctual, familiar and informal though he could manage proper regal dignity when the occasion demanded. His good nature made him generous with the endless petitioners who came to him for help, despite his very meager allowance, and he was often taken advantage of by fraudsters, but it never dissuaded him. He left debts rather than a fortune behind him which his son, King Umberto I, insisted on paying himself though a grateful nation offered to cover it. The King never refused a favor and even the Pope once asked him for one though he continued to officially refuse to recognize the King or the new country. Victor Emmanuel II had even offered to abdicate if it would spare the Pontiff pain but the Pope, unlike many others then or since, was not so petty a man as to hold a grudge.

When the King, for whom it was always a sacrifice being away from his beloved Piedmont, fell deathly ill in the damp climate of Rome, the Pope lifted his excommunication and sent a priest to administer the last rites, saying his first thought had been to go himself. Few knew that the King and the Pontiff had resumed their secret correspondence in their final years. When word reached the Vatican Palace that the King had died, the Pope was heard to say, “He died like a Christian, a Sovereign and an honest man”. He died on January 9, 1878 surrounded by such of his family as could arrive in time, after being confessed and given the Sacrament by his chaplain, with permission from the Vatican. A great monument was built in his honor and praise poured in from all quarters. There was a great deal of exaggeration at times, to be expected from a nation still young and exuberant but his status as the first King of Italy and “Father of the Fatherland” cannot be denied. All patriotic Italians, not only the monarchists, should remember that and reflect on the man and monarch who brought about the necessary unity and guiding hand to create their country.

MM Video: Catholic Monarchy

A short video response to the Catholic bashers of monarchy. Know your faith and the history of your own Church. The Catholic Church has always supported monarchy, endorsed monarchy and been on the side of the monarchists. From Europe to the Americas the Church has always opposed revolutionary republicans and numerous popes and saints have openly endorsed monarchism. Catholics who think the Church opposes monarchy need to get past the post-60's hippie movement and read into the history and traditions of the Church for centuries back.

MM Video: Baudouin of the Belgians

Royal News Roundup

Taking our usual ‘east-to-west’ route the week got off to a controversial start on Sunday when HM King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud of Saudi Arabia announced that henceforth women will be allowed to vote in his very traditional Muslim kingdom as well as to stand for election and sit on the Shura Council, the highest body of advisors to the King. However, these changes will not take effect until the next elections in 2015. Needless to say, this has caused a great deal of controversy with the more fundamentalist Muslims opposing any involvement for women in politics and with liberals bemoaning the fact that women cannot participate right away. Yet, one thing none of the liberals can deny is that if Saudi Arabia were not an absolute monarchy these changes would almost certainly not be happening at all. The King has long been known as a reformer, by Saudi standards anyway, and the influence of the hard-line clericals has been decreasing during his reign. However, some think that may change as the King is old and has been ailing for some time and those coming after him appear at least to be more in line with the Wahhabi clerics. There is also the danger that if these fundamentalists see themselves becoming more marginalized it may only increase their extremism. Time will tell.

Northward to the Caucasus there is happy news to announce. TRH Prince David and Princess Anna welcomed their first child, a boy, into the world on Tuesday. Named Prince Giorgi Bagration Bagrationi it is hoped that his tiny person will heal the long-standing family feud between rival royal branches that has kept Georgian monarchists divided up to this point. I particularly want to mention this to salute Prince David and Princess Anna for accomplishing this. While not wanting to believe gossip, it was widely reported that the couple did not get along well from the start of their marriage and even separated for a time. However, it was a marriage arranged for the purpose of ending this feud which has hampered the monarchist cause in a country where it otherwise has at least a fair chance of gaining traction. Georgia is very Orthodox, nostalgia for royal history is fairly widespread and the current political system is still new enough to not be considered hopelessly entrenched. So kudos to this royal couple for sucking it up, putting their differences aside and ‘doing their duty’ to bring unity to the monarchist movement in Georgia. I wish some other non-reigning royals in the world would follow their example in that regard and, of course, The Mad Monarchist sends congratulations on the birth of the new prince.

Moving over to southern Europe there is some hopeful news to report in Italy (with a tip of the hat to Monarchist Alliance - Star and Crown) where a conference was held in Rome of all the politically active Italian monarchist groups including the Italian Monarchist Movement, Italian Monarchist Alliance and others to lay the foundation for unified action and cooperation by all parties supporting the end of the republic and the restoration of the Kingdom of Italy. The Mad Monarchist salutes the loyal souls of Italy on this occasion, for remaining active, maintaining a presence on the political scene (amidst ups and downs in terms of popular support) and for putting aside their minor differences in this effort to unite on the overall, primary, ultimate goal they all agree on: restoring the monarchy. Participant (and MM blog member) Alberto Conterio recognized that the road ahead was a long and difficult one but that the beginning represented by this conference was a necessary one for the long-term success of their campaign. There are reasons for hope, one being the aforementioned years of dedication shown by the monarchist groups who have refused to fade away into the background. Public respect for the political class that currently rules is at an all time low amongst the Italian population and with the current economic crisis the evidence is mounting of what a complete failure the republican experiment has been. The coalition of monarchists is planning other events, the next on Saturday the fifteenth and, of course, we wish them every success and offer our full support for their efforts.

Also in Rome, there was a special distinction to the celebration of the Feast of St Michael the Archangel, patron saint of the Papal police force on Thursday. Italian Prince Sforza Ruspoli handed over to the Vatican the 144-year old papal flag which flew at the Porta Pia city gate when Rome was taken by Italian national forces on September 20, 1870. The flag, tattered, faded and scarred by bullet holes, was saved by the Ruspoli family (part of the ‘Black Nobility’ of Rome) at that time and has been in their possession until the flag was handed over on the feast of St Michael. The Papal police forces paraded, showing off some new elements, motorcycles, eco-friendly mini-cars and their lone fire truck and ambulance. On video coverage I caught a glimpse of at least some figures wearing the old traditional uniform of the Papal gendarme, tall bearskin and all, but I have not found anything else to do with that. Of course, I would be thrilled to pieces if they would revert back to their old, elaborate uniform style and give the Swiss Guards a run for their money in the ‘best dressed’ department. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be happening. The Pope did not attend the event but a message from the Pontiff was read out on the occasion. The Cardinal Secretary of State accepted the flag on his behalf.

Moving from the extreme south to the extreme north, on Thursday one of the royals I have a soft spot for celebrated her fortieth birthday. That would be HRH Princess Martha Louise of Norway, that independent gal who gets so much criticism for talking to angels. A special party was held at the palace attended by about 225 well-wishers, including, of course, the King and Queen, the Crown Prince (sans Mette-Marit) as well as Prince Constantijn and Prince Laurentien of the Netherlands, Hereditary Grand Duke Guillaume of Luxembourg and others. Husband of the birthday girl Ari Behn (who will hit the big 4-0 next year) and his parents were also there, of course. I will not go into all the issues again but, I have always liked Princess Martha Louise and probably always will. I would not agree with all of her ‘spiritual’ beliefs but I think she is often treated quite unfairly, often by people who don’t really believe in anything and think anyone that does is off their rocker. So, The Mad Monarchist joins all Norwegians and all her fans in wishing her a happy birthday with many more to come and congratulations on looking so good at 40!

On the Commonwealth front, the ever-popular Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were winning more hearts at the Royal Marsden Hospital in Surrey, England where they opened a new children’s cancer center. The hospital was very important to the late Lady Diana and Prince William was determined to attend this event even though he was rescuing a couple of people in distress just before and had not slept in nearly twenty-four hours. Still, the Duke was his usual impressive but informal self and Duchess Catherine, as always, turned plenty of heads (because she’s *gorgeous*!) and asked a lot of questions. She is reportedly gathering information to help her decide which charitable causes she will particularly devote herself to as part of the “job” of the Royal Family; being good-deed doers. Also, let there be joy and elation in the “land down under” for the Queen of Australia is coming home next month. This will be the first time HM Queen Elizabeth II of Australia has returned since 2006, though of course the land of Oz has not been neglected all that time as there have been other royal visitors but, it is always something special when it is the Queen who is coming. Given what I know of the weather in London I am sure the Queen must be tempted at times to have a “winter” palace in Australia so as to enjoy the local summers and avoid the cold and damp of southeast England. In any event, we all hope she has a great trip. God Save the Queen of Australia!