Buccia di Banana

The six-month rule of Premier Aldo Moro's coalition government reads like The Perils of Pauline. The experts were certain Moro would be brought down by strikes, growing inflation, the faltering economy or just the incompatibility of his coalition partners--the Socialists and the Christian Democrats. But, just like Pauline, the Moro government survived every major crisis and even began to have a look of permanence. Then, last week, as Italians put it, the coalition slipped on a "buccia di banana"--banana peel. On a minor vote on what had not even been a political issue, Moro's government was toppled.

The collapse came in the Chamber of Deputies over a negligible item in the budget--the provision of $238,000 in aid to private schools, which are mostly Roman Catholic. The Socialists, led by Veteran Pietro Nenni and, as always, anticlerical, abstained. But this time they were joined in their abstention by an odd lot of Communists, Liberals, Monarchists and Neo-Fascists. Even worse for Moro, at least ten of his own Christian Democratic Deputies left the chamber before the roll call. As a result, the government fell four short of a majority.

Understandably annoyed, Moro handed his resignation to President Antonio Segni, who accepted conditionally but asked Moro and his Cabinet to remain in office until a new government could be formed. It may take some doing, since Moro has long been under fire from right-wing members of his Christian Democratic Party, who resent the "opening to the left" through which Moro brought the Socialists into the government. Socialist Nenni has been under equally sharp fire from leftists who charge that he has given in to Moro time after time on what were fundamental Socialist demands.

This has been the trouble all along in the Christian Democrats' weird amalgamation with the Socialists. With one ideology clashing head on with another, there has been simple deadlock. One result: an economy in serious trouble. This might seem a domestic Italian matter, but it inevitably rubbed off on the U.S., for it was the State Department which from the start pressed the Christian Democrats to make their dubious plunge into the apertura a sinistra.

Conceivably, President Segni could call for new national elections. What seems more likely, however, is that Moro's caretaker Cabinet will continue its somewhat bumbling rule until it can rearrange another center-left coalition to continue nursing the inflation-weakened Italian economy, which was recently stabilized by an infusion of $1.2 billion in foreign credits.

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