Luigi Einaudi

Personal history

He had studied with the Liceo D' Azeglio of Turin and he had obtained his diploma in Jurisprudence with the Université of Turin. Before the Great War it was against Giovanni Giolitti; he collaborated with the daily newspaper Stampa of Turin until in 1900 and with the Corriere beyond of the 1900 with the 1925 Will be; in the 1900 he is writer of the Social Réforme and director of the 1908. When it became Senator of the Kingdom in 1919 he fought against the saving in war and against all the forms of socialism born with the war; he saw in these ideologies the reason of the beginning of the Inflation and the crisis of the post-war period. He was against the Fascism of the moment in which he saw especially the nonliberal facet of the mode (at the beginning he had seen in Fascism a force against socialism and Communism, like the majority of the Italian liberals): during the crisis which followed the assassination of the socialist politician Giacomo Matteotti it, thanks to a team of fascists, had tried without success to strike alliance in slides between Fascism and the Italian industrialists and it left the Corriere beyond Will be after the replacement of sound Directeur in favor of the Fascisme 1925. Although Fascism was shown for what it was, Einaudi brought back in Italy fight of it the ideology of the Régime, even if it preferred to give the Jurament of the professors to Fascism with the majority of university professors (his/her colleague of party, Benedetto Croce on the contrary did not sign it).

Ideas

In the political laboratory of saving in Cognetti de Martis he had learned the economic scene based on the rigorous analysis from the facts. He occupied himself after the science of are engaged ( STUDI SUGLI EFFETTI DELL' IMPOSTA , 1902) in which there were even the studies on the finance of the Royaume of Savoy at the beginning of the 18th century. He supported the exemption of the saving by the tax in the book INTORNO Al CONCETTO DI REDDITO IMPONIBILE E DI a SISTEMA DI TRANSOM SUL REDDITO CONSUMATO , 1912 and it defended the system of the Cadastre in the book the TERRA E the IMPOSTA . Contrary to more important Liberal Philosopher Italian of the period, the hégélien Benedetto Croce, Einaudi thought that only liberalism could create in the economic life the germs of liberalism against the Fascisme and the Communisme. In the science of the economy tax it was against the progressiveness of the Impôt develop the traditional institutions of the Italian tributary system of them ( MITI E PARADOSSI BEYOND GIUSTIZIA TRIBUTARIA , 1935). It was even against the ideas of John Maynard Keynes and the New deal of the president of the the United States Roosevelt. Its Libéralisme was founded on:

the example of the Anglo-Saxon world;
fidelity with the best traditions of the Piedmont;
lessons of the classical economists;
admiration for Camillo Benso Count de Cavour;
concrete approach;
the idea that the life is fight and sacrifice against each form of life on the results of the other without giving its contribution;

He judged very well the formation of associations and he thought that the public authority was to never form part of the relationship between the organized labor and employers'. Its battles for liberalism were born for an ethical approach before still that economic. Its enemies were:

sectors of the Italian productive world (like the sector of the Agriculture or the Sidérurgie that their lacks of efficiency made pay) on the consumers with their force on the Politique;
the State that in agent on the economy many useless problems and occasions of Corruption gave him;
the Trade union and the Labor movement in the measurement in which they fled by the manner of acting of Trades Union Congress English.

After the Second world war

Little time after being elected Vice-chancellor of the University of Turin, Einaudi was constrained to take refuge in Suisse because of its opposition to the Fascisme. It is there that he writes the Lezioni di politica social , a work in which he explained the role of the legislation of the State, concerned about support the equal opportunity by gumming the differences in starting points, without to sacrifice the principles of the market economy.

In Switzerland, it also thinks of the idea of the the United States d' Europe (which it had already imagined in its youth, in 1887): for him, it appeared as an obviousness that the union of the people de' Europe was the single chance of survival of Europe after the Second world war. It was thus an important support of the European federalism ( Guerra E the unità of Europa ).

On its return in Italy, it was named Gouverneur Banque of Italy. At the time of the referendum of the June 2nd 1945 on the political shape of Italy (Republic or Monarchy) he was the more important politician of the Italian Liberal party - with Edgardo Sogno, in favor liberal - in favor of the monarchy of the Maison of Savoy (the other strong man of the party - Benedetto Croce - was in favor of the branch of the duke of Aoste). Whereas the liberal party was shared for monarchy, one noted with irony that Luigi Einaudi, intended to become the May 11th 1948 President of the Republic, invited to vote in favor of the Monarchie! The May 24th 1946, it made publish in the daily newspaper Opionione a leading article in this direction, heading Because I will vote for monarchy .

In 1946, it is elected with the Constituent Assembly like in the May as a Minister of Finances; in these functions, he manages to stop the Inflation, by imposing a strong credit restriction and by pushing back the contractors who misused the economic aid of the State.

The May 11th 1948 Einaudi becomes president of the Italian Republic, with the fourth turn of Scrutin, with 518 votes out of 871 voters; it succeeded lawyer of Naples Enrico Of Nicola; its experiment with the Quirinal is described in the book Lo Scrittoio LED President . When it gave up the public life, it continued to be confronted with the most important arguments of the Libéralisme in Prediche inutili .

Luigi Einaudi was the friend of the liberal economist Ludwig von Mises and it had belonged to the association of liberals Société of the Mount Pilgrim with von Mises, Karl Popper, Friedrich von Hayek.

Some month before its death it had received at his place much Italian liberal politicians to speak about the Libéralisme; there were even the lawyer Bruno Leoni and the economist Sergio Ricossa.

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