III

The advantage such legislative provisions would bring about are obvious, gentlemen, and I do not want to dwell on them any longer. It is equally obvious that laws are not enough to heal the wounds of our emigration, because some of these wounds are part and parcel of emigration itself, while others stem from remote causes that escape the action of the law. Hence, even the best laws in the world, together with many perfect law enforcement officers, would not be able to eradicate those evils. Besides, governments and their agents are so bound by tradition and international propriety that either they cannot implement certain provisions or, if they do, they make those evils worse.

Here is where the work of leaders must start, here where the task of the government and the law ends. How? By discouraging or guiding emigration, protecting it from ambushes, surrounding it with all the religious and civil help that will make emigration strong and united and, I would dare say, invincible against enemies, because, then, the security of one person means the security of all.

Gentlemen, what an immense field of activity lies open to the clergy and laity. It is embodied in these two words: to direct and protect emigration! To direct and protect it by making the intervention of government and law more forceful and by making up for the inevitable inadequacies of government and law.

Now, to say that nothing has been accomplished in the last ten years would not be true, just as it would not be true to say that we have done what we could and should have done.

Societies for religious and social assistance that arose and, by natural selection, subdivided this field are not lacking, thank God.

During recent years, different kinds of societies have been started up in the economic field, societies that unite private interests and the general good of emigration. Among others, I am pleased to single out the Society of Free Investors (Società di Capitalisti) established in Milan specifically for foreign colonization to be carried out by our emigrants. With joy I salute such efforts as indications of a reawakening of our colonizing activities. The investment of capital in the field of emigration is

as indispensable as a good law, and eventually it will bring large returns to the emigrants and to the investors themselves.

The National Association for Assistance to Italian Missionaries (Associazione Nazionale Assistenza ai Missionari Italiani), which is spearheaded by your Professor Ernesto Schiapparelli, the Dante Aligheiri Society, which in another field keeps alive our native tongue among the Italians, the Society of Assistance to Italian Emigration (Società di Patronato per l’Emigrazione Italiana), with headquarters in my beloved Piacenza, the Istituto Cristoforo Colombo, the motherhouse of the Congregation of the Missionaries of St. Charles, are all recent foundations. They all aim, more or less directly, at the religious, social and moral care of our brothers and sisters abroad. These are consoling beginnings, seeds of hope. It is up to us and to all people of good will to nurture their development and growth, so that they may blossom and yield a plentiful harvest.

It is not true that our country is apathetic or, worse, skeptical. It only needs to be enlightened, informed, given hope, because everyone is tired of continuous disillusionment. The societies just mentioned are proof of that.

Let me offer you some statistics and data on two institutions which I founded and which have received such a prompt and generous response from the clergy and the laity.

Ten years of existence; 19 committees in various parts of Italy where the exodus of emigrants is massive, the Motherhouse in Piacenza with a seminary for future candidates to the missions; the Mission at the Port of Genoa to help the emigrants, under the direction of my tireless Don Pietro Maldotti.

Missions in North America, with churches exclusively for Italians: two in New York, one each in Cincinnati, New Haven, Providence, Boston, Mass., Cleveland, Kansas City, Meriden, Conn., Buffalo, Syracuse, and Detroit.

In South America: a central mission in São Paulo, Encantado, Nova Bassano, Cappueras, all in the Diocese of Porto Alegre; Santa Felicitade in the Diocese of Curityba; Nova Mantova and Santa Teresa in the Diocese of Spirito Santo; finally, another one in Nuova Helvezia in Argentina. Together with the Missions there are several schools with hospitals and two orphanages.

The missionaries living at all the above mentioned places are helping the surrounding Italian settlements through periodic visits.

The beginnings of our orphanage of São Paulo are almost miraculous. Aboard the ship on which one of my missionaries, Father Giuseppe Marchetti (a former professor at the Seminary of Lucca), was traveling, a young mother died leaving a child at the breast and the husband alone, in despair. To calm the desperate man, who was threatening to jump overboard, the missionary promised to care for the baby himself; and he kept his promise. Once in Rio de Janeiro, carrying the innocent baby in his arms, he went to see the distinguished Count Pio di Savoia, then Consul General in that city. The consul could only give the young missionary words of encouragement. However, that was enough for him: he went from door to door until he was able to place the poor orphan with the doorman of a religious convent. From that incident came the idea of founding in Sao Paulo, where he was heading, an orphanage for children of Italian emigrants; and with immense sacrifices he was in fact able to find it. It has now been in existence for four years and houses 160 little orphans and a martyr who prays for them in heaven, because fatigue and work cost the life of the pious and zealous missionary. May peace and glory be upon him.

All I have been telling you, gentlemen, is a proof of what religion together with love of country can do.

Religion and country! These are the two great loves God has implanted in the heart of humanity, the motto written in glowing characters on the banners of nations civilized by Christianity. Under the shadow of this immortal banner our fathers have fought and conquered. Under the shadow of this banner our faces are raised high and serene, resentments vanish, divisions disappear, hands are shaken in brotherhood, families find peace, nations flourish.

Religion and country! Gentlemen, let us rally around this noble ideal which, as it were, takes shape and form in this saving work on behalf of our emigrants. And then we will have reason to hope that a brighter future will dawn on our beloved Italy and that, in the not-too-distant future, God’s plans for her will be fulfilled.

One more word and then I shall finish. Not long ago, tremendous efforts were made in the United States to Americanize, if I may use this word, the emigrants from the various countries of Europe. Religion and country wept over the loss of millions of her children. Only one group of people had the courage to resist that violent attempt of assimilation, the one that has this motto on its flag: “Our Church, our School, our Language.”

Gentlemen, we must not forget this piece of history. Each of us, according to his abilities, must see to it that all Italians abroad may share the same mind, the same determination, the same courage: for religion and country.