"Sardinia-Piedmont, Kingdom of, 1848-1849" Topic

"Under the leadership of the House of Savoy and its ministers, Piedmont-Sardinia played a key role in the Risorgimento and the first war of Italian independence, 1848-1849. Forged by the dukes of Savoy who in 1720 acquired the island of Sardinia and the title of king, their capital Turin, at the opening of the nineteenth century was more French than Italian. Nonetheless in the quest for national leadership this northwestern kingdom enjoyed some advantages. Its monarchs were ambitious, exercising a greater degree of independence than any other Italian rulers, and their influence extended by a strong army, a long military tradition, and an efficient bureaucracy. Following the restoration of 1814 and the Congress of Vienna, it was enlarged by absorbing Genoa. By 1815 this kingdom of three and a half million people was both a maritime and Italian power.

Charles Albert, who assumed the throne in 1831, entertained expansionist if not patriotic ideas. He moved the state toward free trade and his ministers concluded twenty-six navigation and commercial treaties between 1832 and 1846. In 1843 the Piedmontese priest Vincenzo Gioberti, who had fled an earlier repression at home, wrote On the Moral and Civil Primacy of the Italians, proposing that Italy regain its national greatness under the leadership of the pope and the military support of Piedmont. The neo-Guelph program maintained that the pope could simultaneously serve as the temporal ruler of Italians and spiritual head of the church. The Piedmontese Cesare Balbo disagreed, and in his On the Hopes of Italy (1844) stressed that Piedmont rather than the papacy had to provide the leadership for the new Italy. His position was supported by two fellow Piedmontese, Massimo D'Azeglio and Camillo di Cavour. Charles Albert confided to Massimo D'Azeglio that when the opportunity arose he would commit his life, his children's life, his treasury, and his army to the Italian cause…"
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