Giacomo Matteotti

Unitary Socialist Party (Italy, 1922–1930) Social Democrats 1885–1924 ✕ Murdered by Fascists

Reformist socialist and Unitary Socialist Party secretary murdered in 1924 after denouncing Fascist electoral fraud

Born in Fratta Polesine in Veneto, he joined the youth wing of the Italian Socialist Party in 1898 and studied law at Bologna. A gradualist follower of Filippo Turati active in local councils, he opposed the First World War and was interned in Sicily. He entered the Chamber of Deputies in 1919. When Turati's wing was expelled at the PSI congress in Rome in 1922, he co-founded the Unitary Socialist Party and became its secretary, critical of Bolshevik violence and authoritarianism. On 30 May 1924 he denounced the electoral fraud and violence of the National Fascist Party in parliament; eleven days later a Fascist squad led by Amerigo Dumini kidnapped and killed him, a turning point toward Fascist dictatorship.