The Pope and Mussolini (84 page)

15.
DDF, series 2, vol. 9, n. 125, Rivière, chargé d’affaires de France à Rome Saint-Siège, à Paul-Boncour, 6 avril 1938.

16.
Baudrillart 1996, p. 809 (3 avril 1938). The archbishop of Vienna, following his unpleasant trip to Rome, hurried home in time for the April 10 plebiscite. Unbowed and unrepentant, he led the way to the polls, raising his arm in a Nazi salute as he deposited his ballot in favor of annexing Austria to the German Reich. Whatever control the ailing pope still had over his high prelates in Nazi territory seemed to be slipping away. ASMAE, APSS, b. 39, ministero degli affari esteri a R. Ambasciata S. Sede, “Il plebiscito del 10 aprile,” telespresso n. 217705, 23 maggio 1938. By the end of the month, the new regime—so enthusiastically championed by the cardinal and his bishops—ordered Austria’s Jewish teachers and students thrown out of the schools, Jewish doctors removed from hospitals, Jewish lawyers dropped from the list of those able to practice law, Jewish newspaper directors fired, Jewish factory owners forced out, and Jewish theatrical directors and actors dismissed. Signs reading “Jewish store” were placed in the front windows of Jewish-owned shops. Catholic customers so bold as to ignore the warning were forced to wear a sign on their backs proclaiming: “I am an Aryan pig.” The Italian consul general in Vienna reported all this to Ciano on April 26. DDI, series 8, vol. 9, n. 10.

17.
Mussolini realized that the pope might balk at such a move, worried that anything that undermined the Nazi government might weaken the anti-Communist forces, and he acknowledged that some of the Church’s enemies would be heartened by the excommunication. But, he added, “that does not take anything away from the need for it.”

18.
The only account we have of the conversation came to light when, following the opening of Pius XI’s archives at the Vatican in 2006, Cardinal Pacelli’s handwritten notes of his meetings with the pope were found. ASV, AESS, pos. 430a, fasc. 355, f. 41, 10 aprile 1938.

19.
ASMAE, APSS, b. 39, ministero degli affari esteri, Roma, a R. Ambasciata presso S. Sede, “Contrasti fra Hitler e Vaticano,” telespresso n. 200305, 5 gennaio 1932.

20.
In mid-January, Cardinal Pacelli told the French ambassador that the Vatican had so far received no request from the German government for any meeting. Given the tense relations, he thought it unlikely that it would. In a separate conversation, Monsignor Tardini told Charles-Roux that should Hitler ask for an audience with the pope, he did not see any way the pontiff could refuse to see him. DDF, series 2, vol. 8a, n. 5, Charles-Roux à Delbos, ministre des affaires étrangères, 18 janvier 1938. Later in January Pignatti reiterated this impression: if Hitler asked for a visit with the pope, the Vatican would have no difficulty arranging it. ASMAE, AISS, b. 87, “Riservato,” unsigned typed report, 24 gennaio 1938. Bergen, the German ambassador to the Holy See, reported that Pacelli had made feelers about Hitler visiting the pope, if Hitler would first make “an agreed statement on the treatment of the Catholics and the Catholic Church.” The pope, said Bergen, “had definitely been counting on a visit of the Führer.” But “to various feelers,” he reported, “I expressed myself in accordance with my instructions and left no room for doubt that a visit was out of the question.” DGFP, series D, vol. 1, n. 708, Bergen to Weizsäcker, May 18, 1938 He later reported that the pope had expected Hitler to visit him and “had hoped for that until the last moment.” Ibid., May 23, 1938, n. 710.

21.
ASMAE, AISS, b. 87, Pignatti a Regio Ministero degli Affari Esteri, “Germania e Santa Sede,” 21 gennaio 1938.

22.
In the weeks leading up to the visit, the pope was still regularly calling on the Duce to intercede on the Church’s behalf with the Führer. On March 16, Cardinal Pacelli wrote to Mussolini to tell him of the pope’s gratitude “for your moderating action with the Chancellor of the German Reich, Signor Hitler, and for your intervention against the continuation of the policy of religious persecution in Germany.” The pope, added Pacelli, appreciated Mussolini’s intervention even more given that it came on the eve of Hitler’s visit to Rome. ASMAE, APG, b. 46, Pacelli a Mussolini, 16 marzo 1938. Pacelli’s handwritten draft of this letter, with corrections, is found at ASV, AESG pos. 735, fasc. 353, f. 4r. Tacchi Venturi told Mussolini that the pope had been “
contentissimo
” to hear that Mussolini would do everything possible to ensure that religious persecution—meaning persecution of the Catholic Church—did not begin in Austria. ACS, CR, b. 68, n. 028790, 17 marzo 1938.

23.
The French ambassador was convinced that if Hitler wanted to come, the pope would receive him. “One consideration dominates all others for the Holy See,” he observed, “that of not doing anything to worsen the situation by giving the National Socialist government the pretext that the extremists there seem to be seeking.” DDF, series 2, vol. 8, n. 41, Charles-Roux à Delbos, ministère des affaires étrangères, 26 janvier 1938. Although Mussolini wanted to have Hitler visit Pius XI—if he could be sure it would go smoothly—the Führer found the prospect distasteful. The German foreign ministry was in an awkward spot in explaining why Hitler would not follow custom and see the pope. In mid-February, the new German foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, suggested a possible excuse to use. Hitler was going to Rome on the invitation of the King of Italy, he argued, “and has no reason for visiting other sovereigns on non-Italian territory on this occasion.” He advised that, in providing this as their explanation, they not use what others were suggesting they give as a rationale: the fact that they had received no invitation from the pope. “To point out that, after all, no invitation has hitherto been forthcoming seemed to us inadvisable as it involves the risk that the Vatican might then extend such an invitation.” DGFP, series D, vol. 1d, n. 691, “Memorandum,” signed by Mackensen, based on his conversation with Ribbentrop, February 14, 1938.

24.
ASMAE, APSS, b. 39, Ciano a Pignatti, “Viaggio in Italia di S.E. il Cancelliere Hitler,” 26 marzo 1938, and Pignatti a Ciano, “Viaggio in Italia del Fuehrer,” 2 aprile 1938.

25.
ASMAE, APSS, b. 39, Pignatti a Ciano, telegramma n. 2022, 7 aprile 1938. The pope and his secretary of state were eager to let Italy’s cardinals know that if Hitler failed to visit the pope while in Rome, it would not be because the pope had refused to see him but because Hitler had never requested the meeting. On the day of Hitler’s arrival in Rome, Cardinal Pacelli sent a message to this effect to the cardinals and enclosed a copy of Borgongini’s report of his early May meeting with Buffarini, reporting the pope’s willingness to meet Hitler. ASV, AESG, pos. 735, fasc. 353, ff. 26r–27r, “Circa l’omissione di una visita del Cancelliere del Reich Germanico al Santo Padre,” marked “Sub secreto pontificio,” 3 maggio 1937. While the pope was willing to receive Hitler, he made clear he would do so only if Hitler signaled his intention to observe the terms of the concordat he had signed.

26.
Pacelli notes of meeting with Pignatti, March 25, 1938, in Casella 2010, pp. 210–11.

27.
ASMAE, AISS, b. 87, Pignatti a Ciano, 28 aprile 1938; CC 1938 II, p. 368.

28.
Confalonieri 1957, p. 372.

29.
Rauscher 2004, p. 241.

30.
Milza 2000, p. 759; Gallagher 2008, p. 71; Cerruti 1953, p. 240. The American ambassador to Italy had described Victor Emmanuel III only slightly more generously, as “a thin little man with too short legs, a screwed-up face and a bristling mustache, but with a certain dignity in spite of his insignificant appearance.” Phillips 1952, p. 192. It was Ciano (2002, pp. 86, 88–89) who, in his diary, related the private views of the king about Hitler. Ciano complained that the king was “useless and troublesome” during the Führer’s visit. The American ambassador later repeated—and vouched for the accuracy of—the story going around Rome that when Hitler first arrived at the Quirinal Palace and saw his room, he asked if a male or female attendant had made his bed. On hearing it had been a man, he insisted that a woman be found to make it again for him. He would not sleep in a bed made by a man. Phillips 1952, p. 214.

31.
DDI, series 8, vol. 9, n. 53, Pignatti a Ciano, 5 maggio 1938.

32.
The triumphal mood of Hitler’s visit was magnified by the recent victories of Franco’s forces in Spain, which the previous month had cut Republican Spain in two. Strikingly, it was while Hitler was in Rome that the Holy See formally announced it was appointing a nuncio to the new Nationalist government in Spain, with Franco sending an ambassador to the Vatican shortly thereafter. Kent 1986, p. 457. Mussolini’s decision to send troops to fight for Franco cost Italy close to four thousand dead. De Felice 1981, p. 465.

33.
Hitler took out his anger over his embarrassment on Ribbentrop, who fired the Nazi head of protocol. Kershaw 2000, p. 98.

34.
The American consul added that invitations to the gala dinner were withdrawn from four women because of their “Jewish antecedents or connections.” One of them however, “made such a strong protest, proving she was not a jew [sic], that the request not to attend the dinner was withdrawn in her case.” NARA, LM192, reel 5, John Putnam, U.S. consul general, Florence, to William Phillips, May 21, 1938.

35.
Mussolini was not much of a museumgoer, having remarked in 1922 that he had never visited a museum in his life. Boswell 2011, p. 201.

36.
Ciano 2002, p. 89.

37.
NARA, LM192, reel 5, William Phillips, U.S. ambassador, Rome, to U.S. secretary of state, Rome, “Hitler’s Visit to Italy,” 12 page report plus attachments, May 13, 1938. The Florence festivities are described in U.S. consul in Florence, “Memorandum of Visit of Their Excellencies Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, May 9, 1938,” May 18, 1938, appendix to report of John Putnam, consul general, cited in note 34 above. The British diplomatic assessment came to the same conclusion: FCRSE, pt. 14, R 4789/43/22, p. 93, Earl of Perth to Viscount Halifax, May 9, 1938.

38.
DDF, series 2, vol. 9, n. 346, Charles-Roux à Georges Bonnet, 15 mai 1938.

39.
CC 1938 II, pp. 376–77.

40.
ASV, AESG, pos. 735, fasc. 353, ff. 59r–60r, Il delegato vescovile, Curia ecclesiastica generale di Orte, alla segreteria di stato, Vaticano, 15 maggio 1938.

CHAPTER 22: A SURPRISING MISSION

1.
Probably through a
Civiltà cattolica
article that discussed it: M. Barbera, “Giustizia tra le ‘razze,’ ” CC 1937 IV, pp. 531–38. LaFarge had been featured in a 1932 article published in
L’Osservatore romano
, reporting a piece he had written for
America
on Communist attempts to woo African-Americans: “Diventeranno comunisti i Negri?” OR, 5 giugno 1932, p. 4. Details on his family can be found in Eisner 2013.

2.
We have learned of the superior general’s reaction from a document, found in the uninventoried archives of
La Civiltà cattolica
, quoted in Sale 2009, p. 37.

3.
The first type of anti-Semitism, he wrote, was not Christian, being based on ideas of racial difference. By contrast, “the second type of anti-Semitism is permissible when it combats, by moral and legal means, a truly harmful influence of the Jewish segment of the population in the areas of economy, politics, theater, cinema, the press, science, and art.” Most dangerous were the liberal, more assimilated Jews, Gundlach argued, for “being for the most part given to moral nihilism and without any national or religious ties, they operate within the camp of world plutocracy as well as within that of international Bolshevism, thus unleashing the darker traits of the soul of the Jewish people expelled from its fatherland.” The Church, in its charity, had always opposed the unjust persecution of Jews but had long supported measures designed to protect European society from Jews’ harmful economic and intellectual influence. The English translation is in Passelecq and Suchecky 1997, pp. 47–49. My account of LaFarge’s encounters with the pope and Ledóchowski is based on Passelecq and Suchecky’s excellent study. See also Eisner 2013.

4.
Quoted in Starr 1939, p. 118. On May 27 Turin’s
La Stampa
quoted the same lines from Belloc’s book, in a prominent anti-Semitic article warning of the Jewish danger. “Il numero e il denaro,”
La Stampa
, 27 maggio 1937, p. 1. It was clipped and saved by the Vatican secretary of state office. ASV, AESI, b. 1031, fasc. 717, f. 88r.

5.
The Jesuit journal then discussed a significant recent book,
Israel, son passé, son avenir,
by a distinguished Dutch Catholic, Herrmann De Vries. After their exile, De Vries wrote, the Jews had historically passed through five periods that were continually repeated as they were thrown out of one country and fled to another. First the Jews were welcomed; then they were tolerated. In the third period they got richer, causing others to grow envious. This resulted in a popular reaction against them, which led to the fifth stage, an attempt to exterminate them or drive them out.