Books with an anti-fascist license? Nordio recalls: "Our Penal Code is signed by Mussolini"

There is still controversy surrounding the institution of ‘anti-fascist license’as it was renamed, proposed by the organizers of the national small and medium publishing fair ‘More Books, More Free’scheduled every year in December at the Nuvola dell’Eur in Rome. Today the Minister of Justice had his say, Carlo Nordio, who in a note stated: “Perhaps the organizers do not know that the most important book for our justice, that is, the Penal Code, bears the signature of Mussolini”. It’s the known one ‘Rocco code’which takes its name from Alfredo Rocco, Minister of Justice during the Mussolini government, who mainly took care of its extension and promulgation. The text came into force on 1 July 1931 with Royal Decree 19 October 1930, n. 1398, signed by King Victor Emmanuel IIIby the Head of Government Benito Mussolini and by Rocco himself. “It’s really a paradox that they expect each other declarations of anti-fascism by those who do not want to change a code signed by Mussolini”, Nordio then underlined.

The Prime Minister’s speech

Yesterday, the initiative was stigmatised Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni who had denounced on social media: “To participate in the small and medium publishing fair ‘More books, more free’, publishing houses will have to obtain the ‘anti-fascist license’ this year by signing a specific declaration. This is how the left conceives freedom of thought: you are free, but only if you say what they allow you to say, if you think what they think, if you read what they consider appropriate. The cancellation of non-left-wing ideas, disguised as a struggle anti-fascist, it is an old vice of the left, but it is a story that no one believes anymore. It is called, banally,. censorship. And censorship is incompatible with any democratic society.”

The publishers’ response

Harsh words that provoked a reply from theAie (Italian Publishers Association), and a reflection: “The decision to ask participants to sign a declaration on the sharing of constitutional, democratic and mandatory principles is not censorship at all, but a need for clarity and unity between the various actors present at the Fair. It is a document based on institutional and universal references, devoid of partisan views, without political overtones and even less party ties. It is clear that it was not interpreted in this way”.

“We regret – added the organizers – what is happening: the speech of the Prime Minister and the general debate that arose obviously lead us to a further careful study out of institutional respect”.

Parrini (Pd), “Absurd Nordic”

“In FdI’s rush to chase Vannacci to the right, the grossest and most ridiculous slide is made by Minister Nordio, a true champion of absurd declarations. Today Nordio says that it is wrong to ask for a declaration of adherence to the anti-fascist values ​​of the Constitution for participation in editorial fairs because, listen, the penal code still in force in Italy bears the signature of Mussolini”. To say it is Dario Parrini, Democratic Party vice-president of the Constitutional Affairs commission in the Senate. “This statement is baffling and ridiculous for at least three reasons. The first: what does the Rocco Code have to do with the ‘More books, more free’ affair? Nothing. The second reason is that Nordio’s words imply a obscene praise revisionist of Mussolini. The third is that the Minister of Justice claims it is false: despite never having been formally replaced by another global text, the Rocco Code of 1930 has been progressively emptied of its authoritarian, illiberal and anti-democratic elements”, he adds. “It is rimasted as a shell. Its ideological substance has disappeared. The minister once again seems to have missed a gigantic opportunity to remain silent”, concludes the Dem representative.