Background
Camillo Benso was born in Turin during Napoleonic rule, into a family that had gained a fair amount of land during the French occupation. He was the second of two sons of Michele Giuseppe Francesco Antonio Benso, 4th Marquess of Cavour and Count of Isolabella, Baron of the French Empire (1781–1850) and his wife Adélaïde (Adèle) Suzanne, Marchioness of Sellon (1780–1846), herself of French origin. His godparents were Napoleon's sister Pauline, and her husband, Prince Camille Borghese, after whom Camillo was named.
Education
Camillo and his older brother Gustavo were initially educated at home. He was sent to the Turin Military Academy when he was only ten years old. In July 1824 he was named a page to Charles Albert, the king of Piedmont (1831–1849). Cavour frequently ran afoul of the authorities in the academy, as he was too headstrong to deal with the rigid military discipline. He was once forced to live three days on bread and water because he had been caught with books that the academy had banned. He was found to be apt at the mathematical disciplines, and was therefore enlisted in the Engineer Corps in the Piedmontese-Sardinian army in 1827. While in the army, he studied the English language as well as the works of Jeremy Bentham and Benjamin Constant, developing liberal tendencies which made him suspect to police forces at the time. He resigned his commission in the army in November 1831, both because of boredom with military life and because of his dislike of the reactionary policies of King Charles Albert. He administered the family estate at Grinzane, some forty kilometers outside the capital, serving as mayor there from 1832 to the revolutionary upheaval of 1848.
Career
In 1847, with the reforms of Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, Cavour founded the newspaper, Il Risorgimento, and urged the king to grant a constitution. He assisted in drafting the suffrage decree-law which accompanied the Statuto. He passionately advocated war against Austria when the first hostilities, lasting from March 23 to Aug. 9, 1848, broke out. However, he was dismayed by Charles Albert's uncertain strategy and dilatory tactics and regarded the direct exercise of command by the king as unsound and contrary to constitutional practice. Cavour was defeated in the first election to the Chamber in April 1848 but won a seat in the supplementary election of June. He was cautious regarding the resumption of hostilities demanded by the Democrats and lost his seat when the chamber was dissolved in January 1849. After the disastrous defeat at Novara on March 23, 1849, he favored making peace with Austria and, on returning to parliament in July of the same year, supported D'Azeglio's policy of ratification of the Treaty of Milan.
Cavour entered the D'Azeglio cabinet in 1850 as Minister of Agriculture and in 1851 also held the Ministry of Finance. In 1852, as a result of an arrangement with Urbano Rattazzi, leader of the Left Center, a "concubine" (marriage) was made with the Right Center, giving a parliamentary majority to Cavour, who became prime minister. He was continuously in power from Nov. 3, 1852, to July 12, 1859, and effected a series of extensive reforms in tariffs, finance, the army, and relations with the Church. Constitutional Piedmont prepared for the resumption of the struggle against Austria, but Cavour, recognizing the need for French and British support, first brought Piedmont into the Crimean War on their side in 1855. At the Congress of Paris in 1856, which terminated that war, he was unable to secure any territorial changes in Italy, but placed the Italian question on the agenda and publicly denounced Austrian misrule in the peninsula. In 1858, Cavour secretly met Napoleon III at PlombièresPlombieres and the verbal agreement was made for a Franco-Sardinian alliance to drive Austria completely out of Italy. A definite treaty, signed the following January, proposed annexation of Parma, Modena, Lombardy, and Venetia to Piedmont, and promised Italian independence if not unity through the projected Italian federation, dominated by the constitutional Kingdom of North Italy. To make sure of the alliance, Cavour persuaded the King to offer his daughter, Clotilde, in marriage to Prince Jerome Napoleon of France. Cavour guaranteed to provoke Austria to attack and thereby enable Napoleon III to maintain his diplomatic understanding with Alexander II of Russia. Nice and Savoy were promised as compensation to France, which would furnish 200,000 troops. Through the National Society, Cavour was able to draw many nationalists away from Mazzini to the banner of the monarchy. British diplomatic efforts to avert the conflict were an obstacle to Cavour, but an Austrian ultimatum precipitated the war. Napoleon III, however, faltered in his pledged course after the bloody battle of Solferino and on July 11, 1859, arranged the preliminary peace of Villafranca, which left Venetia an Austrian province, proposed restoration of the princes in Modena and Tuscany, and would have made the Austrian emperor a member of an Italian federation. As a result, Cavour burst into a violent rage and resigned.
After his successors had marked time for six months, Cavour was called back to power Jan. 20, 1860, somewhat against the wishes of Victor Emmanuel II. He recognized the opportunity in the uncertain situation which found Parma, Modena, Tuscany, and the Romagna under provisional governments barring the restoration of the former régimesregimes and demanding union with the House of Savoy. Since Napoleon III did not dare permit a situation which would restore Austrian predominance, Cavour secretly negotiated the treaties of March 1860, which promised the transfer of Nice and Savoy to France. The emperor acquiesced in the annexation of the central states to Piedmont. Plebiscites accompanied all of the changes of sovereignty. Cavour gave little opportunity to the opponents of change on either side of the Alps, with the result that the pro-French vote in Nice was believed the suspect and provoked Garibaldi's indignation.
When Garibaldi undertook his expedition of "The Thousand Redshirts" against the Kingdom of Naples, Cavour maintained a diplomatic position, secretly giving some encouragement and aid, but ready to disavow the expedition if necessary. After Garibaldi had conquered Sicily and crossed to the mainland, Cavour felt that intervention by the regular army was necessary. Napoleon III was consulted at ChambéryChambery on Aug. 28, 1860, and the royal army was sent south to complete the defeat of Francis II and to occupy Naples. On its way under Cialdini, it shattered the papal army at Castelfidardo, with the result that Umbria and the Marches were annexed along with Sicily and Naples. In March 1861, Cavour saw Victor Emmanuel II proclaimed King of Italy. Only Venetia, still an Austrian province, and Rome, the last remnant of papal territory, remained unredeemed. Cavour, favoring a free church in a free state, attempted to negotiate with the Vatican on that basis but failed. He had Rome almost within his grasp at the time of his death, for Napoleon III had promised the withdrawal of the French garrison at the Vatican.
Religion
Count Camillo Benso di Cavour was anxious that the church should preserve the fullest liberty, and he believed in the principle of " a free church in a free state. "
Politics
Cavour's political ideas were gready influenced by the July revolution of 1830 in France, which proved that an historic monarchy was not incompatible with Liberal principles, and he became more than ever convinced of the benefits of a constitutional monarchy as opposed both to despotism and to republicanism.
But he was not affected by the doctrinaire Liberalism of the time, and his views were strengthened by his studies of the British constitution, of which he was a great admirer; he was even nicknamed " Milord Camillo. "
Views
Quotations:
After deliberately weighing each word, " he wrote, " we are bound in conscience to declare that only one path is open to the nation, the government, and the king: war, immediate war!"
In an article in the Risorgimento he declared that, while he never believed that material help was to be expected from England, he was convinced that she would not actively help Austria to crush the revolution, but that if she did " she would have against her a coalition not of princes, but of peoples. "
His speech on the 7th of March 1850, in which he said that, Piedmont, gathering to itself all the living forces of Italy, would be soon in a position to lead our mother-country to the high destinies to which she is called, " made a deep impression, for it struck the first note of encouragement after the dark days of the preceding year.
On quitting the chamber that day he said to a friend: " I am leaving the last sitting' of the last Piedmontese parliament "-the next would represent united Italy.
Every day the situation grew more critical, and on the 10th of January 1859 the king in his speech from the throne pronounced the memorable words " that he could not remain deaf to the cry of pain (il grido di dolore) that reached him from all parts of Italy "-words which, although actually suggested by Napoleon, rang like a trumpet-call throughout the land.
But Victor Emmanuel saw that nothing was to be gained by a refusal, and much against his own inclination, signed the peace preliminaries at Villafranca, adding the phrase, " pour ce qui me concerne, " which meant that he was not responsible for what the people of other parts of Italy might do (July 12).
Membership
Count Camillo Benso di Cavour was a member of the Sardinian Chamber of Deputies
