He founded La Plebe in Lodi in 1868 to promote Giuseppe Mazzini's ideas, financing the paper from his import business.

It gave continuity from the left wing of the Risorgimento to the post-unification labour movement and the later elaboration of socialist ideology in northern Italy.

[3] However La Plebe was critical of the institutions ruling the new state of Italy, which it saw as opposed to the ideals of the Risorgimento.

[2] He helped to found a number of worker's leagues in the years that followed, and in 1876 was one of the founders of the North Italy Federation of the International.

[2] La Plebe played a central role in the formation of the Italian Workers Party (POI) in Milan in 1882.