The recollections of friends along with his own letters and writings attest to a constant habit of invoking people and practices from the past to correct present disjunctures, usually without any very obvious awareness of solutions that might emerge through a process of continuity.
This was apparent from his contributions to Il Rinnovamento (loosely "Renewal"), a short-lived Milan-based literary and cultural bi-monthly magazine which he co-founded with Tommaso Gallarati Scotti and Antonio Aiace Alfieri, and which was launched in January 1907.
Despite such fundamental difference, Casati and Croce became life-long friends:[7] abundant evidence for their mutual respect and affection survives in their sometimes combative correspondence that runs for more than forty years.
[1][a] Alessandro Casati was not among those who professed themselves surprised by the outbreak of war at the end of July 1914, and he regarded Italy's military intervention in April 1915 as an inevitable if deplorable development.
He fought at the Battle of Asiago, led the successful attack by the 127th infantry regiment of the Florence Brigade at Monte Kobilek and was badly wounded at Bainsizza, following which he needed an operation.
[2] There are also a number of reports, albeit not formally confirmed, that during 1917 Alessandro Casati became a close associate of his fellow Lombard, General Capello, commander of the Second Army, providing critical advice and practical support, notably in respect of using innovative propaganda techniques to sustain troop morale, both before and after the important Battle of Caporetto.
[1] The murder, in a Lancia Lambda on 10 June 1924, of the anti-fascist politician Giacomo Matteotti was widely blamed on Fascist thugs: it triggered a widespread political and public backlash against the increasingly autocratic Mussolini government.
[10] As the political temperature rose, on 3 January 1925 Benito Mussolini delivered a speech to the lower house of parliament "Camera dei deputati" accepting "moral" but "not material" responsibility for the Matteotti murder.
That indeed proved to be the case: Interior Minister Luigi Federzoni sent out a precise instruction to the Prefects (regional administrators) which had the effect of drastically restricting press freedom and closing down political opposition parties across the country.
During this period Alessandro teamed up with others to prepare for a re-emergence of the "Partito Liberale Italiano" (PLI / "Liberal Party..."...) which by this time had been outlawed for twenty years.
[1] Nevertheless, Mussolini's Grand Council colleagues only actually removed their leader him from power on 25 July 1943: Alessandro Casati's political activity during the first half of that year took place under conditions of considerable secrecy.
[3] As Fighting drew closer to Rome, in November 1943 Casati was one of several leading politically active anti-fascists who took refuge in the pontifical seminary at San Giovanni in Laterano.
While protecting the retreat of Polish and Italian units serving with his platoon, Alfonso Casati was shot dead by a German mortar at Corinaldo on 6 August 1944.
[17] He used this as an opportunity to help build up the strength of the Corpo Italiano di Liberazione (Liberation corps) and implement various military reforms of a technical nature.
These included the (re-)establishment of the "Legnano" and "Cremona" battalions which, along with the "Arma dei Carabinieri", helped allied forces break through the German defensive "Gothic line" in northern central Italy.
[1] After he was succeeded at the ministry by his friend Stefano Jacini in June 1945, Alessandro Casati became president of the "Consiglio supremo di difesa" ("Supreme Defence Council").
[3] Between 1951 and 1954 he was, in addition, a member of the Italian Association of Librarians, and between 1952 and 1955 he resumed his membership of the Lombardy History Society, with which he had already been closely involved during the first two decades of the twentieth century.
Senior senators paid tribute to his scholarship, his generosity and modesty complemented by powerful persuasiveness in argument, his shrewd judgment, his courage as a soldier and politician, and his over-riding patriotism.