ABSTRACT: The Radical Congress which took place in Turin (November 1, 2 3, 1972) concluded itself with a positive result, both for what concerns the achievement of the target of 1,000 militant members, and for the campaign for conscientious objection and the liberation of Valpreda. A wide-ranging motion now opens the new front of the Radical struggle: the campaign for the referendums to abrogate the Concordat, the authoritarian norms contained in the penal codes, the military codes, the law for the public funding of political parties. This represents the basis for the project of a refoundation of the Radical Party and an alternative to the regime.

(RADICAL NEWS n.174, 10 November 1972)

Not one day, not one companion have been subtracted to the struggle against the regime for civil rights, for freedom, for the liberation of our companions conscientious objectors and our imprisoned companions Valpreda, Gargamelli and Borghese. The days of the Congress have been a complete success on the two fronts of our struggle: the "internal" front concerning the debate on the Party itself, and the other front, concerning the continuation of the liberation action we had engaged in head on, without a moment's (justified) pause or distraction.

We must admit it: in this Congress a fervent, quasi-religious tension has stripped talks about a lay religion of freedom of any mystifying and rhetoric ring, and it's too bad for the elegant cynicism and worldly detachment that would, instead, be the evidence of the degree of "civilization" of our good and powerful non-anticlerical, non-antiauthoritarian and above all non-militant lay politicians.

Thus, with a truly memorable coincidence, exactly two years after that 1st of December 1970, in which we obtained the bill institutionalizing divorce, after hunger strikes and target actions, and a long, difficult and accurately planned political campaign, the Senate of the Republic will forward a bill to the Chamber of Deputies for the acknowledgment of conscientious objection, which should become a State law before Christmas, on the basis of the commitments assumed toward us, and us only, before Christmas. On paper at least, the State will lose the right to capture its heretics as war prisoners, and to legally persecute those who object to the authority in the name of their conscience.

This will be the last battle of the good "old" Radical party, the Radical Party of the sixties; which must now die, or rather, is already dead. A victorious battle, but this only thanks to the new party, which has come to life thanks to the fraternal and strong help given by the companions who have rushed to found the new Radical Party, the party that has come to life at the Turin Congress. The evidence of the fact that it was time to bury the old party, the party "represented" by a handful - less than one hundred - companions for ten years is the fact that, with its characteristics and structures, it necessarily required of us that excessive, dangerous and even painful trial of strength which we have been forced to sustain with Alberto Gardin and dozens of other companions who fasted for over twenty days.

It must be clear to all that no party, no cause, must involve such a supreme effort, for no one; if this happens, it means this party, this cause, have nothing to do with the libertarian hope for a radical liberation.

The "Radical project" was passed by the Congress, as was to be expected. Thus, there are 1300 people in Italy in 1972, a sort of foreign legion or cours des miracles which, along with our companions municipal councillors in Catania and Palermo, Cosenza and Rome, Milan and Aosta, include Angelo Quattrocchi and Alma Sabatini, but also liberals, communists, anarchists, republicans, extraparliamentary groups belonging to "Lotta Continua" (1), priests and convicts, manufacturers and soldiers, judges and previous offenders, plagiarists and homosexuals, workers and writers, non-violents and angry young men, fourteen year olds and ninety year olds, foreigners and stateless people, and a couple of spies for each of the regime's several police forces; 1300 people, therefore, and of such variety, a fourth of which belonging also to other parties, get together to launch a political offensive at an institutional level, which implies billions of money, dozens of thousands of militants, the juxtaposition (dangerous and of

ten reactionary!) between legal country and real country, an unprecedented earthquake in a climate of non-violent and democratic struggle. A hail of at least a dozen simultaneous popular referendums, which, according to the law in force, would among other things would call for the regime to release from seizure at least 200 hours of radio and TV programs over a period of 50 days!

It is unquestionable that the leadership would unanimously fly to arms to stop this plan, which will be immediately labeled as "insane", "irresponsible" and worthy only of sarcasms and mockery.

It would be a great achievement indeed to wipe out, with a single move, the concordat, the fascist laws, the clerical laws, the context and the juridical-constitutional support to the corporative and class authority in Italy, the military power...

We can therefore say that there is a continuity between the old and the new Radical Party: in 1961, a handful of us, faced with the prestige of the old-generation, respectable radicals, stated that the Radical Party was not dead, and that it had an irreplaceable function to carry out; another time, a group of twenty companions decided, with Mauro Mellini, to create the LID (2); another time, Fortuna, alone, presented a bill which was immediately labeled pointless and troublesome (3); together with Gigi De Marchi, we advocated the introduction of the birth control pill, we supported sexual freedom, and "political and collective" conscientious objection; barely a handful, we called Mattei's successor, Cefis (4), a dangerous prevaricator, and we accused the entire staff of the ENI (5) of carrying out corruption and a mixture of degenerate politics and degenerate economics; we denounced the ONMI and Petrucci...

There is, therefore, a method in our folly, and even goodness, joy, clarity and force in our whole. We know no one who has been harmed by the Radical party, if not perhaps out of omission; but we do know people who have benefited from it. This is why we must consider this a good result, a good omen for the future; without ideologies or vast and global certainties, without a fixed Weltanschauung, we have reasons enough to carry on, to fulfil our task, to "be part" and party.

To all, companions, brothers and sisters, friends, and first of all to our companions conscientious objectors, to Pietro Valpreda, Roberto Gargamelli, Emilio Borghese, we wish to say "Merry Christmas!", after having shouted, for two whole months, and with good results, "Christmas at home, for conscientious objectors and for Valpreda!"

Until the New Year, and forever for those who are not members or supporters of the Radical Party or subscribers of Radical News, this is the last issue they will receive.

To those who believe that the Radical party must, on the eve of 1973, engage in the battles decided by the Turin Congress, we add an invitation to mobilize immediately to achieve the target of 2000 members as soon as possible, in the coming weeks, and to encourage a first step in that direction through the membership and "subscription" campaign. We wish you all a profitable work.

Translator's notes

(1) Lotta Continua: extreme left Italian political movement founded in Turin in 1969; in 1971 it created a homonymous newspaper.

(2) LID: Italian Divorce League.

(3) The bill introducing divorce in Italy.

(4) Eugenio Cefis (1921): President of ENI from 1967 to 1971.

(5) ENI: National Hydrocarbon Corporation. Established in 1953 to coordinate Italian energy policy.