D'Annunzio's Union

Ever since Mussolini seized power, Gabriele d'Annunzio has been engaged in a canny campaign to entrench his own popularity with the working classes, which were disgruntled by the brusque labor policy of the black shirted Dictator.

During the Fascist repression, most of the carefully integrated labor movement in Italy, the Chambers of Labor, the Cooeperatives, the Unions, were broken up. D'Annunzio's first stroke was to intercede with the Government for the striking Marine workers. His last move is the founding of a d'Annunzian Chamber of Work at Florence. The charter of the Chamber is based on his Constitution of the Quarnaro, adopted in his Fiume venture. This Constitution bases society on a system of guilds, both of workmen and employers, and is a self-conscious endeavor to re-establish the spirit of medieval society. The Chamber is distinct from both Socialist and Fascist Syndicalism. Its formation is considered to mark a new period of political ambitions on the part of the poet.