Chapter Nine - Women's Rights, Human Rights (1947–1961)

Summary

“I have not written, but we all have thought about you constantly,” wrote Croce to Ada in August 1947. While on a visit to her family in Piedmont, Croce's wife, Adele (Adelina), had provided some information about Ada's recovery from the accident she suffered in London. Croce said he hoped Ada was home from the hospital and asked that Paolo or Ettore write and let him know how she was doing. By the following October, Croce had seen Ada while he was in Pollone and was “very happy” to have found her “in such good spirits.” He returned the proofs of her revision of the Fisher, which he called “a beautiful translation” that Ada had “corrected and improved with such diligence.”

At the end of the letter, Croce added, “Let's hope for the best, because times are getting more and more dangerous.” What did he mean? Perhaps he was referring to the intensifying Cold War between the USSR and the United States and the impending threat the nuclear bomb presented. Or he may have been alluding to a danger of a moral or political nature at home in Italy, specifically the debates that were taking place in the Constituent Assembly, of which he was a member. Croce was not happy when Palmiro Togliatti and the Communists, in exchange for concessions such as a living wage, free education, and free health treatment, had allowed the Christian Democrats to renew the 1929 concordat with the Vatican that named Catholicism the official state religion and reaffirmed the stance against divorce. Croce called the inclusion of the Lateran Accords in the new constitution a “juridical monstrosity” and a “legal scandal.” Finally, he may have been commenting on his own futile efforts within the Constituent Assembly to obtain single-member constituencies. The resultant system of proportional representation meant that it would be difficult for leaders to form a stable majority in the years to come and that the Christian Democrats would be able to maintain their control of the government for the rest of Ada's life, even when they received only one-third of the popular vote.