Word: scelba
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...gleaming pastry shops deserted. In Milan's Cathedral Square, 25,000 Communist partisans staged a demonstration (despite a government ban) ; they were dispersed by police, who fired machine guns into the air, and by a timely rainstorm. One policeman was killed. But beaming Minister of the Interior Mario Scelba was sure that his security forces could maintain order...
...army's apparent vigor surprised the wildly cheering crowds and the Communists. Said Defense Minister Cipriano Facchinetti: "Rehabilitation of our armed forces has been achieved silently but efficiently in the past few months." Interior Minister Mario Scelba announced that the government had 330,000 men under arms, including a special shock force of 150,000 ready to take on the Communists if they tried to make trouble on election day. When the parade reached the end of the Via dell Impero, it suddenly swung left and marched through the Via delle Botteghe Oscure, where Communist headquarters are located. From...
...battle was won. At next day's cabinet meeting in Rome's Viminale Palace, Mario Scelba was dominant. The ministers approved a decree which would: 1) outlaw all armed formations; 2) allow uniforms to be worn only with police permission; 3) provide for imprisonment up to ten years for having arms illegally...
Communist reaction flared at first. Partisan General Luigi Longo sneered: What about the Boy Scouts and the uniformed Catholic girls of the Children of Mary organization? But next day the partisans executed a disciplined about-face. They promised compliance. Except when the police (i.e., Scelba) permitted, the uniforms would stay in the trunk...
Pudgy, bald Mario Scelba, Christian Democrat Minister of the Interior, had already thought about it a good deal. Italians would elect a Parliament on April 18. The last thing Scelba wanted was swaggering, uniformed, intimidating bands of Communists and left-wing Socialists marching the streets of Italy. Scelba wanted a law forbidding all private armed organizations. But his cabinet colleagues needed convincing. They feared a row. With a shrewd twinkle in his black eyes, Mario Scelba let scrappy Il Tempo take up the cudgels...