1897 Italian general election

none Kingdom of Italy legislative 1895 Italian general election 1895 1900 Italian general election 1900 All 508 seats in the Chamber of Deputies255 seats needed for a majority 21 March 1897 (first round)28 March 1897 (second round) 130x130px Giovanni Giolitti 2.jpg Giovanni Giolitti Historical Left 327 7 Rudini.jpg Antonio Starabba di Rudinì Historical Right 99 5 Felice Cavallotti.jpg Felice Cavallotti Historical Far Left 42 5 Giovanni Bovio (1837-1903).jpg Giovanni Bovio Italian Republican Party 25 New Filippo Turati 3.jpg Filippo Turati Italian Socialist Party 15 Prime Minister Elected Prime Minister Antonio Starabba, Marchese di Rudinì Antonio Starabba, Marchese di Rudinì Historical Right Historical Right General elections were held in Italy on 21 March 1897, with a second round of voting on 28 March.Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p1047 978-3-8329-5609-7 The "Ministerial" left-wing bloc, led by Giovanni Giolitti remained the largest in Parliament, winning 327 of the 508 seats.Nohlen & Stöver, p1083 Background The humiliating defeat of the Italian army at Adwa in March 1896 in Ethiopia during First Italo-Ethiopian War, brought about Francesco Crispi's resignation after riots broke out in several Italian towns.Vandervort, Wars of Imperial Conquest in Africa, 1830–1914, pp. 162-64Italy’s African Fiasco, The New York Times, July 5, 1896 The ensuing Antonio di Rudini cabinet lent itself to Cavallotti's campaign, and at the end of 1897 the judicial authorities applied to the Chamber of Deputies for permission to prosecute Crispi for embezzlement. A parliamentary commission of inquiry discovered only that Crispi, on assuming office in 1893, had found the secret service coffers empty, and had borrowed money from a state bank to fund it, repaying it with the monthly installments granted in regular course by the treasury. The commission, considering this proceeding irregular, proposed, and the Chamber adopted, a vote of censure, but refused to authorize a prosecution. The crisis consequent upon the disaster of Adowa enabled Rudinì to return to power as premier and minister of the interior in a cabinet formed by the veteran Conservative, General Ricotti. He signed the Treaty of Addis Ababa that formally ended the First Italo–Ethiopian War recognizing Ethiopia as an independent country.Harold Marcus, The Life and Times of Menelik II: Ethiopia 1844-1913 (Lawrenceville: Red Sea Press, 1995), pp. 174-177 He endangered relations with Great Britain by the unauthorized publication of confidential diplomatic correspondence in a Green-book on Abyssinian affairs. Di Rudinì recognized the excessive brutality of the repression of the Fasci Siciliani under his predecessor Crispi. Many Fasci members were pardoned and released from jail.Pardon for Italian Socialists, The New York Times, 14 March 1896 A new party participated to the election, the Italian Republican Party (PRI), led by Carlo Sforza. The PRI traces its origins from the time of Italian unification and, more specifically, to the democratic-republican wing represented by figures such as Giuseppe Mazzini, Carlo Cattaneo and Carlo Pisacane. Parties and leaders PartyIdeologyLeaderHistorical LeftLiberalismGiovanni GiolittiHistorical RightConservatismAntonio Starabba di RudinìHistorical Far LeftRadicalismFelice CavallottiItalian Republican PartyRepublicanismGiovanni BovioItalian Socialist PartySocialismFilippo Turati Results File:Italian Parliament 1897.svg Historical Left 327 −7 Historical Right 99 −5 Historical Far Left 42 −5 Italian Republican Party 25 New Italian Socialist Party 15 0 1199575 41911 0 2120909 Nohlen & Stöver References Category:General elections in Italy General Italy