An Act

According to L'Idea Nazionale, pro-Fascist Rome journal, the Government --that is Premier Mussolini--is preparing a National Defence Act, the main provisions of which were said to be:

1) All organizations designed to overthrow by force the existing social order are to be declared illegal and all persons founding or joining such organizations may be imprisonel for from five to ten years, in addition to being fined from 50 to 500,000 lire ($2.50 to $25,000).

2) "Persons transporting or otherwise handling explosives for commercial purposes are to be severely dealt with."

3) Heavy penalties are also to be provided for persons conducting verbally, or by writing, subversive propaganda, fomenting insurrection in the civil or military forces of the Nation.

4) Police are to be empowered to seize seditious material and otherwise prevent circulation of seditious publications.

5) The death penalty is to be provided for all persons convicted of destroying military, railway, postal or mining materials, including bridges; and for all persons enrolling in armed bands designed to fight the State, or in any way receiving or giving aid for such organizations.

6) Any person accused under the provisions of this Act is to be deprived of all civil and political rights.

7) Special departmental tribunals, having precedence over all other courts, are to try offenders against the Act.