The rising is of some importance to Switzerland itself, as
it has revived the old bitterness of Ultramontane feeling. Seven of the Cantons are under Ultramontane Governments, and they, with the whole Conservative Party, insist that under the Constitution the old Government of Ticino ought to have been restored. That is doubtful, as the discretion of an officer in command of an "army of occupation" is necessarily very wide ; but the argument will be the cause of bitter debates in the Federal Assembly, and possibly of a revival of the old religious quarrel, the Catholic Cantons already talking of a separate Bund. The Assembly, however, is usually sensible, and avoids bloodshed, and the Conservatives are greatly impeded by the fact that the Referendum is legal, and that it does not do in a democracy to shoot electors because they agree to abide by the result of a plebiscite. The Ticinese, too, who are thorough Southerners, are always giving trouble, and the Central Government has been repeatedly compelled to inter- fere in their internal quarrels, a line of action which in most Cantons it carefully avoids. Nevertheless, the debates will be fierce, for technical right is on the Conservative side. We should add that the reported murder of an Ultramontane Councillor named Rossi has been ascertained to have been the result of a vendetta, Rossi having caused the brother of his assassin to be shot some years ago.
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