On 1 February 1945, Italian women were granted the right to vote: after years of struggles, universal suffrage was extended to the entire female population – at least 21 years of age – thanks to the Lieutenant legislative decree n. 23. 81 years separate us from that moment, a very short period of time if we stop to think for a moment: the young people who today go to the polls to freely express their vote represent only the fourth generation of Italian women to enjoy this right. To give you an idea, Italian men were granted the right to vote in 1912, 33 years earlier.
The flood equality from the point of view of political rights However, it was achieved only the following year: universal female suffrage was approved in 1945, but women had to wait until 1946 to be able to exercise the vote. At the same time, the passive voting right (i.e. the possibility of standing for election and to be voted) was only extended to the female population on 10 March 1946.
How universal women’s suffrage was achieved in Italy
But how did we reach this important goal? As we know, later the armistice of 8 September 1943, Italy was divided into two distinct political entities: in the North the Italian Social Republicsupported by fascists and Germans, and in the South the Southern Kingdomwith monarchical government and military support from the Anglo-Americans.
The date that marks a watershed in the history of Italy, however, is 1 February 1945: while the country was still split in half, the government of the Southern Kingdom presided over by Bonomi issued the lieutenant legislative decree no. 23, which extended the right to vote to all women who were at least 21 years of age (which at the time indicated the age threshold).
The decisive push came from the awareness that, after the crucial role played by women during the Resistanceit was no longer possible to exclude the female population from political life. According to historical reconstruction, the formal proposal to extend the universal suffrage it was put forward on 30 January 1945 during a meeting of the Council of Ministers. The initiative was promoted by two key figures in Italian history: Palmiro Togliattimember of the Communist Party, e Alcide De Gasperimember of the Christian Democrats.
With the entry into force of the Decree on 21 February 1945, a small number of women (14 out of a total of 430 members) became part of the National council, an assembly created to support the government in the post-fascist transition period, the first state body in which female representatives also sat.
The gap on the right to passive vote and the question of eligibility
The Bonomi decree of 1 February 1945, however, had a non-negligible gap: the provision, in fact, sanctioned theactive electorate, i.e. the right to vote, but it did not regulate in any way the passive voting rightor the right to stand as a candidate and be voted for. Even today it is not clear whether it was a specific political will to slow down the rise of women in institutions, even if most historical reconstructions agree that it was a “forgetfulness”, probably due to the rush to issue the decree in a context of war emergency.
To gain full eligibility, women had to wait until March 10, 1946, when the electoral law for the Constituent Assembly (Legislative Decree no. 74 of 10 March 1946) declared “Italian citizens who, on election day, have reached the age of 25” are eligible. The June 2, 1946in addition to voting for the monarchy-republic referendum, Italian men and women were also called to vote for the members of theConstituent Assembly: 21 women also sat on the benches of the body responsible for drafting the new Constitution of the Italian Republic.
