Umberto Elia Terracini (27 July 1895 – 6 December 1983) was an Italian politician.

Biography

Early years

Terracini was born in

Genoa Genoa ( ; ; ) is a city in and the capital of the Italian region of Liguria, and the sixth-largest city in Italy. As of 2025, 563,947 people live within the city's administrative limits. While its metropolitan city has 818,651 inhabitan ...

on 27 July 1895 to a

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

family originally from

Piedmont Piedmont ( ; ; ) is one of the 20 regions of Italy, located in the northwest Italy, Northwest of the country. It borders the Liguria region to the south, the Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna regions to the east, and the Aosta Valley region to the ...

. After completing his elementary education, Umberto attended a Jewish school, whose programs corresponded to the ministerial ones, except for the addition of the study of the language and the history of

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

; he did not derive any religious interest from his family or school, even though he regularly attended the synagogue. In those years, he began to attend the Civic Library, reading popular novels of authors like

Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo, vicomte Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romanticism, Romantic author, poet, essayist, playwright, journalist, human rights activist and politician. His most famous works are the novels ''The Hunchbac ...

, Edmondo De Amicis,

Émile Zola Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (, ; ; 2 April 184029 September 1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of Naturalism (literature), naturalism, and an important contributor to ...

and

Eugène Sue Marie-Joseph "Eugène" Sue (; 26 January 18043 August 1857) was a French novelist. He was one of several authors who popularized the genre of the serial novel in France with his very popular and widely imitated '' The Mysteries of Paris'', whi ...

. Before the beginning of

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, he approached the

Italian Socialist Party The Italian Socialist Party (, PSI) was a Social democracy, social democratic and Democratic socialism, democratic socialist political party in Italy, whose history stretched for longer than a century, making it one of the longest-living parti ...

and in 1913 he was enrolled in the Faculty of Law of the

University of Turin The University of Turin (Italian language, Italian: ''Università degli Studi di Torino'', UNITO) is a public university, public research university in the city of Turin, in the Piedmont (Italy), Piedmont region of Italy. It is one of the List ...

. Terracini immediately expressed his opposition to Italy's entry into the war. After a pacifist rally he held on 15 September 1916 he was arrested and sentenced to a month in prison. After release he was drafted and sent to the front in 1917 near

Montebelluna Montebelluna is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, Italy, approximately northwest of Venice. It has an estimated population of 31,000. Montebelluna borders the following municipalities: Altivole, Caerano di San Marco, Cornuda, Crocetta del Montello ...

. After the war, Terracini resumed his studies graduating in 1919 and began his career as a lawyer. He also befriended

Antonio Gramsci Antonio Francesco Gramsci ( , ; ; 22 January 1891 – 27 April 1937) was an Italian Marxist philosophy, Marxist philosopher, Linguistics, linguist, journalist, writer, and politician. He wrote on philosophy, Political philosophy, political the ...

and

Palmiro Togliatti Palmiro Michele Nicola Togliatti (; 26 March 1893 – 21 August 1964) was an Italian politician and statesman, leader of Italy's Italian Communist Party, Communist party for nearly forty years, from 1927 until his death. Born into a middle-clas ...

, whom he worked as an aide for; the three of them would found ''

L'Ordine Nuovo ''L'Ordine Nuovo'' (Italian for "The New Order") was a weekly newspaper established on 1 May 1919, in Turin, Italy, by a group, including Antonio Gramsci, Angelo Tasca and Palmiro Togliatti, within the Italian Socialist Party. The paper was the ...

'' in 1919''.'' In 1921 Terracini, under Gramsci and Togliatti, contributed to the foundation of the

Communist Party of Italy The Italian Communist Party (, PCI) was a communist and democratic socialist political party in Italy. It was established in Livorno as the Communist Party of Italy (, PCd'I) on 21 January 1921, when it seceded from the Italian Socialist Part ...

. In September 1926, Terracini was arrested as an opponent of the

fascist regime Fascism ( ) is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement. It is characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hie ...

and sentenced to 22 years of prison: he spent 11 years in jail and subsequently was held in confinement in

Ponza Ponza (Italian: ''isola di Ponza'' ) is the largest island of the Italy, Italian Pontine Islands archipelago, located south of Cape Circeo in the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is also the name of the commune of the island, a part of the province of Latina ...

and on Santo Stefano Island. He was freed by the partisans in 1943. In those years he expressed his opposition to the

Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, officially the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and also known as the Hitler–Stalin Pact and the Nazi–Soviet Pact, was a non-aggression pact between Nazi Ge ...

Constituent Assembly

Terracini was elected Deputy and vice-president of the

Constituent Assembly A constituent assembly (also known as a constitutional convention, constitutional congress, or constitutional assembly) is a body assembled for the purpose of drafting or revising a constitution. Members of a constituent assembly may be elected b ...

in 1946 and became president after the resignation of

Giuseppe Saragat Giuseppe Saragat (; 19 September 1898 – 11 June 1988) was an Italian politician and statesman who served as President of Italy from 1964 to 1971. Early life Saragat was born on 19 September 1898 in Turin, Piedmont, Kingdom of Italy, to Sard ...

the following year. He signed the

Italian Constitution The Constitution of the Italian Republic () was ratified on 22 December 1947 by the Constituent Assembly, with 453 votes in favour and 62 against, before coming into force on 1 January 1948, one century after the previous Constitution of the Ki ...

along with the

Head of State A head of state is the public persona of a sovereign state.#Foakes, Foakes, pp. 110–11 "

he head of state He or HE may refer to: Language * He (letter), the fifth letter of the Semitic abjads * He (pronoun), a pronoun in Modern English * He (kana), one of the Japanese kana (へ in hiragana and ヘ in katakana) * Ge (Cyrillic), a Cyrillic letter cal ...

being an embodiment of the State itself or representative of its international persona." The name given to the office of head of sta ...

Enrico De Nicola and the Prime Minister

Alcide De Gasperi Alcide Amedeo Francesco De Gasperi (; 3 April 1881 – 19 August 1954) was an Italian politician and statesman who founded the Christian Democracy party and served as prime minister of Italy in eight successive coalition governments from 1945 t ...

President Enrico De Nicola sign the Italian Constitution 1947

Later years

Terracini was favourable to the alliance with the

socialists Socialism is an economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes the economic, political, and socia ...

in the Popular Democratic Front, and after the shooting on Togliatti in July 1948, he presented a no-confidence motion to the government led by the

Christian Democracy Christian democracy is an ideology inspired by Christian social teaching to respond to the challenges of contemporary society and politics. Christian democracy has drawn mainly from Catholic social teaching and neo-scholasticism, as well ...

, which he believes has the moral and political responsibility on the attack to the Communist leader. Terracini was very critical with

Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and the Premier of the Soviet Union, Chai ...

for his report on the war crimes committed by

Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...

, which he argued the secretary of the

CPSU The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU),. Abbreviated in Russian as КПСС, ''KPSS''. at some points known as the Russian Communist Party (RCP), All-Union Communist Party and Bolshevik Party, and sometimes referred to as the Soviet ...

was too soft with his predecessor. He supported the intervention of Soviet troops against the

Hungarian Revolution of 1956 The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 (23 October – 4 November 1956; ), also known as the Hungarian Uprising, was an attempted countrywide revolution against the government of the Hungarian People's Republic (1949–1989) and the policies caused by ...

.''

L'Unità (; English: "the Unity") is an Italian newspaper, founded as the official newspaper of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) in 1924. It was supportive of that party's successor parties, the Democratic Party of the Left, Democrats of the Left, a ...

'', 5 November 1956, page 7. Terracini confirmed his seat in the Senate of the Republic from 1948 until his death. He became the party's candidate for

President of Italy The president of Italy, officially titled President of the Italian Republic (), is the head of state of Italy. In that role, the president represents national unity and guarantees that Politics of Italy, Italian politics comply with the Consti ...

at the

1962 elections The following elections occurred in 1962. Africa * 1962 Algerian independence referendum, Algerian independence referendum * 1962 Chadian parliamentary election * 1962 Gambian legislative election, Gambian legislative election * 1962 Northern ...

and the 1964 elections, but was defeated by Antonio Segni first and then by

. During the 1970s he was very critical of the Historic Compromise between the Communist Party and the

. Terracini died in Rome on 6 December 1983, at the age of 88.

Electoral history

References

External links