Member of the Italian Liberal Party, he served as Minister of Justice in Alcide De Gasperi's fourth and fifth cabinets between 1947 and 1950.

[1] Giuseppe Grassi was born of noble origins: Grassi was an ancient family of 1100 AD derived from William VI, Duke of Aquitaine (descendant of one of the twelve sons of Tancred of Hauteville) and was a feudal lord of Alessano under King William II of Sicily.

Giuseppe was adopted by his uncle Prince Sebastiano (brother of his mother who died very young) and added to his surname that of Apostolico Orsini Ducas.

[2] His cultural training originated in the Argento college of Lecce, where he studied within the Society of Jesus, following in the footsteps of the Apostolic family.

Son of the evolutionary process of Lecce's political Catholicism, his intellectual maturation was of a liberal type.