The “flexibility” of the Albertine Statute and the Fascist Regime

Abstract

The Statuto of the Kingdom of Sardinia, granted in 1848, did not provide for any procedure for its reform. Hence, it is usually maintained that ordinary legislative proceedings were sufficient in order to modify the original text. Nevertheless, innovations of the utmost importance took place without any formal act of approval. Sometimes they went far beyond the provisions of the Statuto. At other times they actually went so far as to contradict some of them, affecting essential issues. Therefore, the original text became part of a fuzzy, yielding and moldable de facto constitutional order. This generated many remarkable and undesirable consequences. When fascism seized power in the 1920s, the Italian political system experienced a deep shock. However, this was deemed compatible with the de facto constitution, as previously modelled and applied by the relevant Italian political actors, above all the monarchy. Then the fascist rulers aimed at further alterations, which proved devastating for liberal principles and representative institutions, but they were keen to enact them through formal acts of legislation. By doing so, they were paying token allegiance to the Statuto. Had the fascist era lasted more than it actually did, according to the intentions it professed maybe it might have managed to turn the Italian political system into a totalitarian regime. The way the Statuto and its reform had been conceived in pre-fascist Italy and the role played by the monarchy during the fascist era are also relevant in this regard.