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Italian Democratic Party of Monarchist Unity Partito Democratico Italiano di Unità Monarchica | |
|---|---|
| Secretary | Alfredo Covelli |
| President | Achille Lauro |
| Founded | 11 April 1959 (1959-04-11) |
| Dissolved | 11 July 1972; 53 years ago (1972-07-11) |
| Merger of | People's Monarchist Party National Monarchist Party |
| Merged into | Italian Social Movement Monarchist Alliance |
| Newspaper | Italia Monarchica |
| Membership(1961) | 50,000 |
| Ideology | Monarchism[1] |
| Political position | Right-wing |
| International affiliation | None |
| Colours | Blue |
| Part ofa series on |
| Conservatism in Italy |
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Literature |
TheItalian Democratic Party of Monarchist Unity (Italian:Partito Democratico Italiano di Unità Monarchica,PDIUM) was anItalianmonarchistpolitical party.
The PDIUM was founded in 1959 as theItalian Democratic Party (Partito Democratico Italiano), a merger of thePeople's Monarchist Party and theNational Monarchist Party. It became the PDIUM in 1961.
The new party, like its predecessors, was hampered by provisions in theItalian Constitution of 1946 making it all but impossible to restore the monarchy short of adopting a new constitution. The document specifically forbade a referendum on changing the republican form of government, and (until 2002) barred male members of theHouse of Savoy from returning to Italy. It was never able to repeat the results of its predecessors: electoral support for its monarchist cause shrank in the1963 general election (1.8%) and in those of1968 (1.3%), due to the successes of theItalian Liberal Party (respectively 7.0 and 5.8%).
In 1970, the party formed an alliance with the neo-fascistItalian Social Movement (MSI) known as theNational Right(Italian:Destra Nazionale). In 1972, PDIUM fully merged into the MSI.Alfredo Covelli, long-time monarchist leader, was elected president of MSI. In 1976 Covelli led a moderate split of MSI and establishedNational Democracy.
A small part of the party, more tied to liberal and Risorgimento inspiration, however, refused the alliance with the political heirs of fascism and gave life to theMonarchist Alliance.
| Chamber of Deputies | |||||
| Election year | Votes | % | Seats | +/– | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1963 | 536,948 (7th) | 1.75 | 8 / 630 |  3 | |
| 1968 | 414,507 (8th) | 1.30 | 6 / 630 | 2 | |
| Senate of the Republic | |||||
| Election year | Votes | % | Seats | +/– | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1963 | 689,708 (7th) | 2.51 | 3 / 315 |  1 | |
| 1968 | 605,051 (7th) | 2.58 | 2 / 315 | 1 | |
