The overreaction of the military led to the demise of Antonio Di Rudinì and his government in July 1898 and created a constitutional crisis, strengthening the opposition.

[1] In an attempt to halt or slow down the steadily rising prices the government of Di Rudinì was urged to abolish the duties placed on imported wheat.

The first blood was shed that day at Pavia, when the son of Giuseppe Mussi, a deputy from Milan, was killed by the police in an attempt to control the crowd.

The troops were mainly conscripts from rural and alpine areas, considered to be more reliable in a time of civil unrest than those from urban districts.

The streets were cleared and on 9 May 1898 the troops used their artillery to breach the walls of a monastery outside Porta Monforte, but instead of protestors they found a group of beggars who were there to receive alms from the friars.

[7] On 27 July 1898, the trial against the deputies Luigi De Andreis (Republican) (it), Filippo Turati and Oddino Morgari (Socialists) started.

Despite sitting in Parliament and thus supposedly being immune from prosecution, they were all arrested during the siege and the Chamber of Deputies granted authorisation to proceed with the trial.

[1][7] On 29 July 1900, the king was assassinated in Monza by the anarchist Gaetano Bresci, who claimed he had come directly from the United States to avenge the victims of the repression, and the insult of the decoration awarded to Bava Beccaris.

The law made strikes by state employees illegal; gave the executive wider powers to ban public meetings and dissolve subversive organisations; revived the penalties of banishment and preventive arrest for political offences; and tightened control of the press by making authors responsible for their articles and declaring incitement to violence a crime.

[15] The artist Quinto Cenni prepared a series of 34 eyewitness paintings showing various scenes of the disturbances in the city and of the actions taken to suppress them.

[16] These generally favoured the government version of events, showing soldiers behaving with restraint under provocation and being welcomed by ordinary citizens.