Page:Giuseppe Bianchini - The Work of the Fascist Government and the Economic Reconstruction of Italy - tr. Luigi Villari.pdf/17

 matter up. It was this same Government which amnestied deserters wholesale, advised officers not to go about in uniform, recognized the right to strike in the public services, which is tantamount to the right to starve and ruin the citizens. If Ministers could go so far, it is easy to imagine how far the zeal of officials anxious for successful careers went. A judge, holding high rank, maintained in a juridical review that, as the right to strike was recognized, those who dissented from the strike, that is to say those who wished to work, should be punished because they endangered the public peace. In other words, from the right to strike we had reached the duty to strike.

A mob of maniacs went about the streets of Milan shouting «Down with the Army, hurrah for Caporetto!», and forced their way into private houses to remove the flags from from the windows and tear them to pieces. This disgraceful cortège was preceeded and flanked by Royal Guards and soldiers, who escorted it as it were to protect it. But when in Rome a group of students organized a patriotic demonstration, then the police and troops in-