Salt Lake Tribune | 1907-11-11 | Page 1 | Anti-Clericals Gain Great Victory Rome

ANTI-CLERICALS GAIN GREAT VICTORY IN ROME ROME. Nov. 10. General municipal elections were held in this city today and it Is being declared throughout Rome tonight to-night that the Anti-Clericals have gained their greatest victory slnre rhe fall of tho church from temporal power. Only municipal mu-nicipal offices were tilled, but the election elec-tion assumed a distinct political character. charac-ter. Their importance was not only local, lo-cal, but extended all through Italy. The contest came as a conclusion to the Anticlerical Anti-clerical oampalgn. which had Its beginning begin-ning principally wllh the present pontificate, pon-tificate, for the Clericals wen then allowed al-lowed lor Ihe first time to participate in the political llfn of the country. There va a reactionary movement among the Anil-Clerical element: some of them swung over from the Conservatives to the Socialists and Hie municipal election in Rome was chosen as the battlefield. Defeat being inevitable, t life. Clericals for the first time since 1870 withdrew from tho field, and as a result the Antl-Clerl-cal victory was complete and without precedent. , Tho Vatican organs maintain that the abstention of the Clerical voters was nothing more than a matter of tactics.