¹ Certain local telephone systems, formerly operated by the government, were, however, given over to private enterprise, the state retaining the long-distancelines.

² The theoretical side of Fascism has recently been well set forth in Mussolini, Arnaldo, Il Fascismo e le Corporazioni (Rome and Milan), 1931 Google Scholar, and in Goad, Harold E., The Making of the Corporate State (London, 1932)Google Scholar.

³ The English word “corporation” is avoided in this paper because of the tendency to use it to translate the Italian term corporazione, meaning guild or association, in Fascist terminology the organic national association of one branch of production.

⁴ Relatively little appears to have been written in the field of present-day Italian public undertakings. The following secondary sources, however, have been consulted by the author: the section on the Italian state monopolies in Dr. Herbert Gross, Die Organisationsformen des Finanzmonopols in Europa; Dr. Benvenuto Griziotti, Die Organisationsformen der öffentlichen Unternehmungen in Italien (both articles contained in 179.3 Band, Schriften des Vereins für Sozialpolitik, Müinchen and Leipzig, 1931 Google Scholar); and the section on the Italian state railways in Dr. jur. Bernhard Witte, Eisenbahn und Staat, ein Vergleich der europaischen und nordamerikanischen Eisenbahnorganisationen in ihrem Verhältnis zum Staat (viertes Ergänzungsheft, Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv, Jena, 1932)Google Scholar.

⁵ Besides frequent specific authorization for the elaboration of legislative provisions by royal or ministerial decree, the government has power under the law of January 31,1926, No. 100, to issue “royal decree-laws” on any subject when in its judgment reasons of urgent and absolute necessity require it, such decree-laws to be submitted to Parliament within two years for conversion into law. While the rejection of the bill of conversion by either house would operate as an immediate veto, the Italian Parliament, as at present constituted, in practice never opposes the policy of the government, though the enactment of the law of conversion is some times found by the government to be a convenient time for the insertion of amendments.

⁶ A summary of the general financial system of the Italian state may here be useful. The expenses of the ordinary governmental services are authorized by Parliament in laws approving, with modifications introduced by legislative action, the tables of estimates submitted by the several ministries through the minister of finance. Besides the income and expense accounts corresponding to the budget, the Italian treasury keeps a patrimonial or property account. In addition, each service maintains a current inventory. The supervision of the raising of revenue, the final verification of expenses, the checking of inventories, and the auditing of all governmental accounts are functions of a central auditing body, the Court of Accounts.

⁷ From 1907, when they were first permanently organized, until their reorganization by the Fascists in 1922, the Italian State Railways possessed a more independent organization under a council of administration having considerable authority.