In the rich Po Valley and on the sunlit Roman plains, a strike call went out last week to 400,000 braccianti (landless farmhands). They wanted a nationwide contract, with better pay and job security, between their unions and the landowners. Months of collective bargaining had ended in deadlockÂand Italy's most disturbing disorders since the Red riots of early 1948.
In some areas Communist agitators armed with guns and clubs rode out of cities in trucks to patrol country roads, force the braccianti into the strike. At Molinella, northeast of Bologna, they ambushed farmhands...
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