Giuseppe Ciancabilla was one of the important figures of the

anarchist Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not neces ...

movement who immigrated to the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

in the late 19th century, along with F. Saverio Merlino, Pietro Gori,

Carlo Tresca Carlo Tresca (March 9, 1879 – January 11, 1943) was an Italian-American newspaper editor, orator, and labor organizer who was a leader of the Industrial Workers of the World during the 1910s. He is remembered as a leading public opponent of fas ...

, and

Luigi Galleani Luigi Galleani (; 1861–1931) was an Italian anarchist active in the United States from 1901 to 1919. He is best known for his enthusiastic advocacy of "propaganda of the deed", i.e. the use of violence to eliminate those he viewed as tyrants ...

Life

According to historian

Paul Avrich Paul Avrich (August 4, 1931 – February 16, 2006) was a historian of the 19th and early 20th century anarchist movement in Russia and the United States. He taught at Queens College, City University of New York, for his entire career, from 1961 ...

, Ciancabilla was one of the most impressive (now one of the least well known) of the anarchist speakers and writers. Giuseppe Ciancabilla was born in Rome in 1872. At the age of 18, he went to Greece to join in the battle against Turkish oppression there. He acted as a correspondent for the Italian socialist paper, Avanti!, but rather than fighting with the Italian volunteers he joined a group of anarchist combatants from Cyprian Amalcare who sought to encourage a popular insurrection through partisan guerrilla war. In October 1897, he met

Errico Malatesta Errico Malatesta (4 December 1853 – 22 July 1932) was an Italian anarchist propagandist and revolutionary socialist. He edited several radical newspapers and spent much of his life exiled and imprisoned, having been jailed and expelled from ...

to do interview for Avanti!. This meeting and the response of the PSI (Italian Socialist Party) leadership to the discussion led Ciancabilla to leave the socialist party in disgust and declare himself an anarchist. This "Declaration" appeared in Malatesta's paper, "L'Agitazione" on November 4, 1897. The choice of becoming an anarchist forced Ciacabilla and his companion,

Ersilia Cavedagni Ersilia Cavedagni (April 2, 1862after 1941) was an Italian-American anarcha-feminist activist, writer, and editor. Biography Cavedagni was born in Northern Italy to Francesco and Enrica Amadei. At a young age she married the Bolognese anarchis ...

, to flee Italy. After a short time in Switzerland and Brussels, Ciancabilla moved to France where he collaborated with

Jean Grave Jean Grave (; October 16, 1854, Le Breuil-sur-Couze – December 8, 1939, Vienne-en-Val) was an important activist in the French anarchist and the international anarchist communism movements. He was the editor of three major anarchist periodica ...

on the paper, '' Les Temps Nouveaux'', though the editors felt the need to occasionally point out their differences with his perspectives. In 1898, when the Italian authorities pointed him out as a "dangerous anarchist", Ciancabilla was expelled from France. He returned to Switzerland where he attempted to bring together Italian revolutionary refugees. He was expelled from Switzerland for writing the article "A Strike of the file" in defense of Luigi Lucheni e stabbed the Empress Elizabeth of Austria —ed.for the anarchist-communist paper "L'Agitatore" that he had started himself in Neuchatel. Giuseppe Ciancabilla moved to The United States in 1898 and settled in Paterson, New Jersey, a major stronghold of Italian anarchism. He became the editor of La Questione Sociale (The Social Question), a paper which Pietro Gori helped establish in 1895, and one of the leading organs of Italian anarchism in the US. However, due to changes in his ideas, he quickly found himself in conflict with the editorial group of the paper who supported Malatesta's organizational ideas and methods. In August 1899, Malatesta moved to the US and was entrusted with directing "La Questione Sociale". This led Ciancabilla and other collaborators to leave that magazine and to start the journal "L'Aurora" in West Hoboken. Besides spreading anarchist ideas and propaganda in L'Aurora, Ciancabilla used it for translation including works by

and Kropotkin. His Italian translation of Kropotkin's The Conquest of Bread even managed to make its way into Italy despite legal hardships. Ciancabilla eventually moved westward, settling among the Italian miners of

Spring Valley, Illinois Spring Valley is a city situated on the Illinois River in Bureau County, Illinois, United States. The population was 5,582 at the 2020 census, up from 5,558 in 2010. It is part of the Ottawa Micropolitan Statistical Area. Geography Spring Vall ...

. After the assassination of President McKinley in 1901, the anarchist groups were raided by the police, and Ciancabilla was driven from pillar to post, arrested, manhandled, and evicted. Driven out of Spring Valley, driven in turn out of

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

, Ciancabilla wound up in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

, editing the journal ''

La Protesta Umana LA most frequently refers to Los Angeles, the second largest city in the United States. La, LA, or L.A. may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Music * La (musical note), or A, the sixth note * "L.A.", a song by Elliott Smith on ''Figure ...

'' when he suddenly took ill and died in 1904 at the age of 32.

Thought

Ciancabilla adhered to

insurrectionary anarchist Insurrectionary anarchism is a revolutionary theory and tendency within the anarchist movement that emphasizes insurrection as a revolutionary practice. It is critical of formal organizations such as labor unions and federations that are based o ...

views and as such in "Against organization" he writes: He ends "Against organization" by saying:

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ciancabilla, Giuseppe Italian anarchists Insurrectionary anarchists Politicians from Rome Anarchist theorists American anarchists Anarcho-communists Italian emigrants to the United States People from Spring Valley, Illinois 1872 births 1904 deaths