Luigi Galleani was an Italian insurrectionary anarchist best known for his advocacy of "propaganda of the deed", a strategy of political assassinations and violent attacks.
27 Facts About Luigi Galleani
2.
Luigi Galleani subsequently moved to Vermont and Massachusetts, where he launched the radical newspaper Cronaca Sovversiva.
3.
Luigi Galleani gained many dedicated followers among Italian American anarchists, known as the Galleanisti, who carried out a series of bombing attacks throughout the United States.
4.
Luigi Galleani rejected reformism, in favor of "continuous attack" against institutions of capitalism and the state, and even opposed any form of formal organization, which he saw as inherently corrupting and hierarchical.
5.
Luigi Galleani first became interested in anarchism while studying law at the University of Turin, eventually renouncing law in favour of anarchist propaganda against capitalism and the state.
6.
In 1887, Luigi Galleani spearheaded the Piedmontese anarchist movement's reorientation towards the labor movement and its rapprochment with the POI.
7.
Nevertheless, Luigi Galleani continued to pursue the anarchist infiltration of the POI, in order to attempt to bring it towards revolutionary socialism.
8.
Luigi Galleani continued to advocate for a conciliatory approach between the reformists and revolutionaries, resulting in the POI both continuing its electoral participation while endorsing class conflict.
9.
Luigi Galleani was scheduled to attend the Italian anarchist movement's Capolago congress, but en route to the congress from Geneva, he was arrested by the Swiss authorities and expelled back to Italy.
10.
Back in Italy, Luigi Galleani immediately continued his radical activities, embarking on a speaking tour of Tuscany, with the aim of fomenting an uprising on International Workers' Day of 1891.
11.
In 1892, together with Pietro Gori and Giovanni Domanico, Luigi Galleani was delegated to represent the anarchists at the Genoa Workers' Congress, with the intention of obstructing the motions of the dominant reformist faction.
12.
Luigi Galleani himself was swiftly arrested, convicted for conspiracy, and exiled to the Sicilian island of Pantelleria.
13.
Luigi and Maria Galleani eventually had four children of their own.
14.
Luigi Galleani settled in Paterson, New Jersey, a hub for Piedmontese immigrant silk weavers and dyers, where he took up editing the Italian anarchist newspaper La Questione Sociale.
15.
Luigi Galleani escaped to Canada and recovered from his wounds, before covertly returning over the border and hiding out in Barre, Vermont, where he stayed with Tuscan stonemasons from Carrara.
16.
Luigi Galleani returned to Barre, where he resumed giving fiery speeches and writing hundreds of articles for his newspaper, quickly becoming a leading voice in the Italian American anarchist movement.
17.
In late 1907, in response to Francesco Saverio Merlino's public renunciation of anarchism in favour of reformist labor unionism, Luigi Galleani published a series of articles in defense of anarchism.
18.
On June 17,1917, federal agents raided the offices of the Cronaca Sovversiva in Lynn, Massachusetts, arresting Luigi Galleani and shutting down the newspaper.
19.
Luigi Galleani attempted to continue publishing Cronaca Sovversiva upon arrival in Turin, but it was quickly suppressed by the Italian authorities.
20.
Luigi Galleani spent time in the cell he had been kept in for months in 1892, before being banished to Lipari and later Messina, where he was imprisoned for 6 months.
21.
In February 1930, Luigi Galleani was granted compassionate release due to his failing health.
22.
Luigi Galleani retired to Caprigliola, where he was kept under close and constant police surveillance.
23.
Luigi Galleani defended the principles of revolutionary spontaneity, autonomy, diversity, self-determination and direct action, and advocated for the violent overthrow of the state and capitalism through propaganda of the deed.
24.
Luigi Galleani rejected all forms of formal organization, including anarchist federations and labor unions, and opposed participating in the labor movement, as he believed it was inherently reformist and susceptible to corruption.
25.
From his rejection of reformism, Luigi Galleani concluded that social change could only be brought about through violent attacks against institutions, which he believed could build towards a popular insurrection.
26.
Luigi Galleani defended both the assassination of William McKinley by Leon Czolgosz and the assassination of Umberto I of Italy by Gaetano Bresci.
27.
In 2006, more English translations of Luigi Galleani's work were published in a compilation by AK Press.