On Papal Conclaves/Chapter 7

by W. C. Cartwright

VII.

AS the Quirinal Palace contains only one chapel, the Paolina, this has to be arranged so as to serve the Cardinals both for mass and voting. The balloting accordingly takes place in the presbytery, in front of the altar, the floor of which, covered with a green carpet, is brought on a level with the base of the pontifical throne, which is removed; while on the Gospel side of the altar a chair is put for the new Pope from which to receive the adoration of the Cardinals immediately after election. Inside the railing of the presbytery are the seats of the Cardinals, each with a canopy of green for those of older date, and of violet for those created by the late Pope. As soon as an election has taken place, these are lowered; the canopy over the new Pope remaining alone aloft. Before each Cardinal is a table, with all the materials required for writing and registering his vote, while in the middle six similar tables stand apart for those Cardinals who may fear being overlooked if they wrote and folded their ballot-papers at their own stalls. On the Gospel side the Cardinal Dean occupies the first seat, being followed by the others in the order of precedence, so that the senior Deacon sits opposite to him on the Epistle side of the altar, in front of which is a large table, with the chalice serving as a ballot-box, while at the back is the fireplace, wherein, after an inconclusive ballot, the papers are burned, whose smoke, issuing through the chimney, is watched for at a set hour by the crowd on the Piazza as the signal that Rome is still without a Sovereign,— the Church still without a Head.

The ingenuity of some ecclesiastical antiquaries has amused itself in fancifully recognising infinite variations in the modes of Papal elections. But even if warranted in fact, these distinctions must be held to be without any living value, for the Bull of Gregory XV., which is the capital statute on the subject, explicitly declares that there are only three modes in which a Pope can be lawfully created: by inspiration, by compromise, and by ballot. The first, which requires that, spontaneously, without any kind of previous conference, all the electors of one accord should simultaneously proclaim the same individual, may be dismissed without further comment as an altogether ideal conception,— in spite of ecclesiastical writers giving a list of Popes created by this process.^[1] Of much greater practical importance are the conditions regulating the second form, which we have seen was invented by the instinct of the Church as a means to put an end to the intolerable state of affairs which weighed upon it in the interminable Conclave held at Viterbo. The expedient of delegating to a small committee of Cardinals the power which the whole body found itself too much torn by dissension to exercise, has been resorted to on several occasions, and is still considered in Rome as not obsolete. The most memorable instance of its application was furnished when the impossibility for the Cardinals assembled in 1304 to agree on a candidate induced them to intrust the election to a delegation out of their own body, which gave to the Church Pope Clement V., who then transferred to Avignon the Holy See. It is affirmed by the Cavaliere Borgia, in the life he wrote of his uncle, Cardinal Borgia,^[2] that when the Conclave held at Venice, after the decease of Pius VI., reached the third month, it was contemplated to invest nine Cardinals, amongst whom was his uncle, with the duty of selecting a Pope, and that the idea was not followed up only because at the nick of time the votes of the College happily concurred in creating Pius VII. It is true that Consalvi's Memoirs fail in speaking to the correctness of this asssertion; but as these Memoirs are avowedly but fragmentary, and even not quite free from suspicion, the absence of such confirmation in this quarter does not seem to us of itself necessarily to invalidate its authenticity. Gregory XV. has closely prescribed the form to be employed for the mode of election, but they are not of his own invention, being only an adaptation of those already contained in an ancient ritual by Cardinal Giacomo Gaetani Stefaneschi, to be found in Mabillon's Museum Italicum.

The ordinary election by ballot is performed by two processes repeated daily, in general,—one in the forenoon, which is a simple ballot; the other in the afternoon, which consists in the process technically called of acceding, whereby an elector, revoking his morning's ballot, transfers his vote to some one whose name had that morning already come out of the ballot-box.^[3] Hence the designation of the supplementary ballot, for in it the faculties of electors are strictly limited to the power of adhering to some Cardinal whose name at the early ballot has been drawn. The voting papers are square and folded down, so as at each end to have a sealed portion, within the upper one of which is written the voter's name, to be opened only under special circumstances; and in the other, sealed with the same seal, some motto from Scripture, which, once adopted, must be the same at all ballots, and serves ordinarily as the means for identification of the vote. In the middle space, which is left open, stands the name of the candidate. Advancing to the altar, after a short prayer in silence, and an oath aloud, wherein the Saviour is called to witness that the vote about to be given is dictated by conscientious convictions alone, each Cardinal drops his paper in the chalice upon the altar. When all have voted, the examination of the papers is made by the scrutators, three Cardinals selected by lot, who successively hand to each other every paper, which the last files on a pin. Should a candidate come out with just a majority of two-thirds, it then becomes necessary to open the upper folded portions of the ballot-papers, with the view of ascertaining that this majority is not due to the candidate's own vote; it being not lawful for a Pope to be the actual instrument of his own creation. In the case of no adequate majority, these papers are preserved, so as to be able to check, through the mottoes, the votes given in the supplementary ballot, it being, of course, unlawful for a Cardinal to repeat a second vote in behalf of the candidate for whom he had already voted in the morning. The form of tendering this second vote is by writing, 'Accedo domino Cardinali,' while those who persist in their morning's choice insert the word 'Nemini.' Should both ballots fail in producing the legal majority, then the papers are burnt, while in all cases the portion containing the voter's name is to he opened by the scrutators only in the event of some suspicion of fraud or of a vote being invalid, through some violation by the elector of the prescribed forms. In the Conclave of 1829 Cardinal Castiglione came out of the ballot with thirty-five votes, against twenty for Cardinal Gregorio, and twelve for Capellari, afterwards Gregory XVI. On examining the papers, the scrutators, however, found two votes dropped into the afternoon ballot with mottoes that did not tally with any amongst the morning's votes. Two Cardinals are named as suspected of having committed this act, probably with the vain hope of defeating Castiglione's election. All it effected was to vitiate the ballot of the day, and on the following morning Castiglione became Pius VIII. by an increased majority. The election of Urban VIII. was put off for a day by a yet more unworthy trick. When the papers were being looked through one was found wanting, and, although the canonical majority had been secured, the election was nevertheless void—as every Cardinal in Conclave must lodge his vote. Suspicion fell on one of the scrutators, who is believed to have abstracted the paper from the chalice, and dropped it into his sleeve, solely to prevent an otherwise inevitable result from being arrived at that morning.

The narratives of Conclaves are filled with accounts of election manœuvres practised by plotting Cardinals with the view of bringing about, by underhand tactics, some preconcerted result. The whole system of these proceedings bears the visible impress of that cautious and cunning temperament which never operates but under a mask, and never contemplates to work otherwise than by stratagem. Of these tricks the most common—indeed so common as to be an established feature in Papal elections—is the naming of sham candidates by the rival sections.^[4] The general object of this device is to elicit the exercise of the veto vested in certain Catholic sovereigns, and which can be given but once. If it be intended to carry a Cardinal known to be obnoxious to a sovereign possessed of this privilege, then some other Cardinal also known to be distasteful to him, is started and pushed to the very verge of the required majority, in the hope of causing the veto to be pronounced, when no obstacle from that quarter can any longer stand in the way of the concealed candidate, who had all along been the real object of predilection. The origin of this privilege of excluding from the Papacy is involved in mystery, but its existence is formally recognised by the Court of Rome in the Crowns of France, Austria, and Spain.^[5] The privilege is absolute; and its exercise is surrounded with all the accurate formality of a publicly admitted right. On the occurrence of a Conclave, the secret determination to protest against particular Cardinals is confided by each Court to some member of the Sacred College, who is trusted with the duty of making this known at the proper moment; or, in the event of a Court having no Cardinal on whose fidelity it can rely, then this knowledge is deposited with the Cardinal Dean. For a protest to have effect it must, however, be lodged before a canonical majority has been actually obtained; for a Pope, once created according to the prescribed forms, cannot be unmade by the intervention of any power. So it is said that in 1823 Leo XII. owed his election to a surprise—the French Cardinals, Clermont and De la Fare, who were instructed to exclude him, having been outwitted by the stealthy suddenness of the final ballot. The latest instance of actual exclusion was in 1831, when Cardinal Giustiniani was excluded by Spain, at which Court he had been Nuncio. Moroni gives a detailed account of the proceedings observed on this occasion. The Cardinal was visibly on the verge of election; on the day's ballot he counted twenty-one votes, and it wanted only twenty-nine to secure his triumph, when Cardinal Marco-y-catalan informed Cardinal Odescalchi, nephew to Giustiniani, and the Dean Cardinal Pacca, that he was charged to exclude him by order of the King of Spain. The communication was not expected, and doubt was expressed as to the seriousness of this expressed intention. Thereupon Cardinal Marco produced a letter from the Spanish ambassador, Gomez Labrador, dated 24th Decemher 1830, instructing him, 'at the express order of his Catholic Majesty, to exclude his Eminence Cardinal Giustiniani from the pontifical throne.' This despatch the Cardinal Dean then read out to his assembled colleagues before proceeding to the morning ballot on the 9th January, after which Cardinal Giustiniani addressed them, expressing ignorance of what he could have done to make the King of Spain take this step, but professing to thank him for the greatest favour he could have bestowed by keeping him from the Papal throne. In spite of his professions of thankfulness at being freed from an infliction by this royal veto, it is mentioned by the Neapolitan Envoy in Rome, in a despatch written three days after his exclusion, that the effect had been to make the Cardinal take to his bed with an attack of fever.^[6]

There has since been, however, yet another veto levelled, though not actually launched, which, but for the accidental circumstance of a short delay in its transmission, would have materially changed the character of recent political events in Italy, in so far as events of such comprehensive force can really depend on merely individual influences. The Court of Vienna intended to veto Cardinal Mastai-Ferretti at the last Conclave, and the Archbishop of Milan, Cardinal Gaysruck, the Austrian agent, received instructions to lodge the formal exclusion in the name of the Emperor, in the event of this prelate promising to obtain his election. The Cardinal proceeded to Rome, but arrived there the morning following Cardinal Mastai-Ferretti's proclamation as Pius IX., after one of the shortest Conclaves on record.^[7] 'Semel exclusus semper exclusus' is a saying not absolutely true; for Clement VIII. had been excluded in three Conclaves by Spain, and Innocent X. was elected with a French exclusion suspended over him. As for the category of Cardinals who have the best chances of gaining the suffrages of their colleagues, there is a Roman proverb which says that three are the streets leading straight to the Vatican, those of the Coronari (rosary-makers), Argentieri (silver-smiths), and Lungara (long street):^[8] which is taken to mean that much outward show of devotion, expenditure of money, and an industrious swarming up the ladder of ecclesiastical routine, are the three safest means of reaching the Pope's throne.

In canon law there are no limitations restricting the selection of a Pope within the body of Cardinals. It is true that since Urban VI., in 1378, no one below this rank has mounted the chair of St. Peter, but still it is worthy of note that this now established practice exists in virtue of no higher sanction than custom, and that there is nothing in canon law to render invalid the choice even of a layman for the Papacy.^[9] John XIX. and Adrian V. were certainly laymen, and the latter furnishes the conclusive precedent establishing that a Pope acquires all the plenitude of his supreme authority by the simple act of election, for Adrian V. died without taking any orders, and yet be promulgated decrees modifying the whole system of Papal elections, which, by his successors, were held to be invested with all the sacredness of pontifical utterances. Adrian V. ruled but twenty-nine days, in which interval be repealed of his authority the electoral constitution of Gregory X., which remained in abeyance until Celestine V., after six stormy elections, revived it in 1294. Undoubtedly such cases must be set down as obsolete in the concrete, yet at a critical moment like the present, when the Court of Rome is again eminently exposed to transformation, it is well to note remarkable instances of exceptional interventions which have been admitted by it, not to be beyond the pale of its principles. The restriction of a candidate for the Papal See within the circle of the College of Cardinals, has become a matter of received custom. Yet as late as 1758, in the Conclave after Benedict XIV.'s death, at several ballots votes were tendered and registered without objection in favour of the ex-General of the Capuchins, Father Barberini, who was not a member of the Sacred College.^[10]

In general practice, the final ballot is a mere formality. As soon as it is perceived that a canonical majority in favour of a candidate is really commanded, the matter is made known to the opposing party, so that, acquiescing in defeat, its members may join in waiting on the future Pope the evening before his actual elevation. The contest therefore ceases habitually on the night before proclamation, and when the Cardinals, on the last morning, proceed to ballot, they do so, as a rule, with the perfect knowledge that they are going through a mere formality. Indeed, the one condition which, by canon law, renders void the election of a Pope who has obtained the suffrages of the Sacred College, brings with it that no election can be forced. It is laid down that no man can be constrained to become Pope at the bidding of the electors; his free acceptance of this dignity is absolutely necessary to render his election legitimate, and therefore it never will happen that all the labour and effort demanded for carrying a Papal election will be expended on a subject of whom it has not been previously ascertained that he is ready to accept the position.

As soon as ever the ballot has furnished a return with a majority of two-thirds,—the scrutators have satisfied themselves, in the event of its being a bare majority, that this is not due to the successful candidate's own vote,—and he himself has accepted the choice fallen on him, the Conclave is declared at an end, the doors are thrown open to the world, and in the chapel, where all the canopies are instantly lowered, except that over the newly elected, the Pope receives the homage of the assembled Cardinals, which is called the first act of adoration. Then, from the re-opened balcony window, which has been walled up, the Cardinal Dean proclaims the new Pope, whose acclamation by the applauding Roman people is formally attested in a deed drawn up then and there by an appointed notary. Since the Quirinal has become the site for Conclaves, it has been customary to postpone the remaining ceremonies till the following day, when the Pope proceeds first to the Sistine Chapel, and afterwards down to St. Peter's, into which he is borne upon the sedes gestatoria to receive the second and third adorations. Seated on a cushion placed upon the high altar, the Pope has his foot and hand kissed in succession by each Cardinal, whom he in return embraces on both cheeks, the Cardinal Dean opening the ceremony and chanting the Te Deum, while his colleagues are performing their parts. This over, the Pope bestows upon the assembled multitude his public benediction; after which he returns to his residence every inch a Pope.^[11] There are, indeed, two other remarkable ceremonies of ancient origin connected with the installation of a Pope which must be noticed; but neither will be found to involve on his part any formula of oath or obligation. At an early day after election, in general on the following Sunday, the Pope is enthroned in St. Peter's, when he is crowned with the celebrated triple crown, the tiara. The ceremonies observed on this occasion are in part marked with a strange symbolism. In the Atrium of St. Peter, opposite the walled-up gate called La Porta Santa, which is opened only in the years of Jubilee, the Pope, sitting on a throne, receives first the homage of the arch-priest and all the clergy attached to the Basilica. This over, he is carried in procession up the church to the Chapel of St. Gregory, which is converted into a robing-room. On issuing from it a Master of the Ceremonies suddenly steps forward, and, arresting the Pope on bent knee, holds up to him a silver rod tipped with a bundle of tow, which a clerk sets on fire from a taper in his hand, the former officer singing aloud 'Sancte Pater, sic transit gloria mundi.' This curious bit of symbolism is repeated twice. At the high altar the Pope is clothed with the Pallium; and on the termination of mass during which occurs the homage of clergy of all ranks, the Pope is borne in procession up to the balcony overlooking the piazza of St. Peter, where, in presence of the assembled people, the mitre having been first removed, there is placed on his head the renowned triregnum by the second senior Cardinal Deacon, who pronounces the words 'Accipe tiaram tribus coronis ornatam et scias te esse patrem principum et regum, rectorem orbis, in terrâ vicarium Salvatoris nostri Jesu Christi, cui est honos et gloria in sæcula sæculorum.' And with this ends the coronation, after the giving of the benediction, which always follows every Papal appearance in public.^[12] The other ceremony is the taking possession by the new Pope of the Lateran Basilica, the Metropolitan Church not merely of Rome, but the Universe, as stands written upon the inscription on its front. On this occasion, the Pope traverses the whole city of Rome in solemn procession, accompanied by all the Cardinals and the representatives of all the ecclesiastical hierarchy connected with the Court of Rome. Down to a very recent time it was customary for the Pope to ride a white steed, and to be escorted by the Sacred College on horseback. When Pius IX. made his progress to the Lateran, he expressed his desire to revive the practice, but the idea was abandoned owing to the remonstrances of the many very aged Cardinals, who protested their incapacity to sit on their horses for so long a ride. It was also the custom for the Jews to line the portion of the way between the Arch of Titus and the Colosseum, and there to present in sign of homage a copy of their law to the Pope; but since Pius VI.'s time they have been dispensed from this service. The ceremony in the church itself offers nothing that calls for special observation. It is simply an act of taking possession, unaccompanied by anything which implies a conditional tenure dependent on the observance of certain specified and defined vows.

1. Gregory VII., Clement VII., Paul III., Julius III., Marcellus II., Paul IV., Pius IV., Pius V., figure on this list, which confounds acclamation, such as might follow discussion, with the little short of miraculously spontaneous unanimity exacted by canonical prescriptions, for an election by inspiration. The following will show, for instance, what kind of inspiration was at work in the case of Clement VII.:—'At last Cardinal Colonna was won over by the united efforts of the Duke of Sessa and of the Cardinal di Medicis. After having arranged his tactics with some of his friends, he suddenly rose on the night of the 18th of November, and exclaimed in a loud voice, "All who wish to have Julius for Pope, and to preserve the unity of the Christian Republic intact, follow me!" The Cardinals, surprised by this appeal, discontinued their disputes, and, after a short deliberation, the Cardinal di Medicis was elected Pope "by the inspiration of God." That God had inspired his election,' the author of the protocol of the proceedings in the Conclave observed, 'was clear, as neither the Emperor nor the King of France had been able to influence even such Cardinals as had their bishoprics in their States.'—Bergenroth, Calendar of Neg. between England and Spain, Introduction.
2. Notizie Biografiche del Card. St. Borgia, del Cav. Constantino Borgia, 1843.
3. There is no law fixing that only one ballot of each kind be held the same day. This is a point left to the discretion of the Cardinals, who regulate their decision according as procrastination or expedition may suit best their humours. In the last centuries the prevailing practice was as stated above, but in the very latest Conclave it happened that both parties thought expedition the best move, so that on this occasion the innovation was practised by general consent of holding a double set of ballots on the two days which the Conclave lasted.
4. It has been gravely discussed by canonists whether, with the oath sworn by each Cardinal, it can be lawful thus from strategy to give votes in behalf of one who in conscience is not deemed worthiest—secundum Deum eligi debere. At the end of the article 'Elezione' in Moroni's Encyclopædia, will be found the opinion of an anonymous divine that it is not lawful to give a vote at a Papal election for one of whom it is not inwardly believed that he is worthiest, unless it be for the sake of promoting harmony in the case where it is positive that a candidate of this inferior kind is actually sure of election. A vote given under such circumstances, it is laid down, would be a peace-offering on the part of him who recorded it.
5. The Crown of Portugal claims the same right of veto, but the claim is contested by Rome.
6. Memorie dei Conclavi da Pio VII. a Pio IX. (da E. Cipolletta, Milano, 1863),—a little book with curious documents found in the Neapolitan Foreign Office.
7. At the Conclave of 1823 Austria excluded Cardinal Severoli through the agency of Cardinal Albani. A despatch of the Sardinian representative in Rome, published in the valuable appendix to the second volume of Bianchi's Storia della Diplomazia Europea in Italia, gives very curious details of the incidents that marked this proceeding. The veto was so unpopular, that it was sought to be set aside on the plea of Cardinal Albani's not having been duly invested with the formal authority to exercise this privilege on its behalf by the Court of Vienna; so that Severoli continued to poll votes after the protest had been lodged, until Count Apponyi, then Austrian ambassador, handed in a note, the text whereof is given by the Sardinian diplomatist confirming Albani's authority. The Cardinal's exclusion was conveyed in the following terms: 'In my capacity of Extraordinary Ambassador to the Sacred College met in Conclave, … I fulfil the displeasing duty of declaring that the Imperial Court of Vienna is unable to accept his Eminence Severoli as Supreme Pontiff, and gives him a formal exclusion (gli da una formale esclusiva).' The party supporting Cardinal Severoli consisted of the opposition to Consalvi, the influential Secretary of State during the previous reign. His enemies were numerous and resolute. Their candidate having been checkmated by this veto, the party avenged itself by asking Severoli to indicate the man of his choice. He named Cardinal Della Genga, who was then elected and reigned as Leo XII.—the type of stupid reaction, and, as against Consalvi, the expression of unmitigated spite. Consalvi was not a statesman of a high order, but he was possessed of certain qualities of affability and knowledge of the world which raised him above the level of the dull narrow-mindedness of this bigot.
8. There are three streets in Rome with these names.
9. There is indeed a decree by Stephen III., 769, against the election to the Papacy of anyone not an ordained Cardinal, but this decree, which was levelled against the anti-Pope Constantine, who happened to be a layman, has never been invoked on occasions when the choice of the Sacred College fell on an individual not of their body, nor is there any other pontifical utterance on record in the same sense. Moroni himself admits that John XIX. was a layman when elected, but preserves an ambiguous language in regard to the case of Adrian V.
10. See Novaes, Storia dei Pontifici. vol. xiv. p. 8. He quotes as his authority the register of each day's voting kept by Cardinal Guadagni, and which, forming three volumes, Novaes examined in the library of the Collegio Romano.
11. The question as to when the creation of a Pope is consummated has been accurately discussed by Catholic writers, and it has been distinctly laid down by the highest authorities that election of itself invests a Pope with plenary powers. 'Qui eligitur Rom. Pontifex,' says Bellarmine, De Rom. Pont. lib. ii. cap. 2, 'eo ipso sit Pont. summus Ecclesiæ totius, etsi forte id non exprimant electores.' Clement V. excommunicated those who 'asserere non verentur quod summus Pontifex ante sure coronation is insignia se non debet intromittere de provisionibus, reservationibus, dispensationibus et aliis gratiis faciendis;' and Moroni, who enters at length upon the question, and must be considered the organ of the Court of Rome, declares that a Pope must necessarily he in possession of all his power from the instant of election, although he admits that this opinion has prevailed in the Church only since the days of Adrian V., the Pope who died a layman.
12. A widely accredited error is that the benediction by the Pope from the balcony of St. Peter at Easter is given urbi et orbi. The phrase does not occur in the ritual, and has no authority whatever. Another popular error, to be found especially in the travels of the last century, is that at the coronation service there is chanted an anthem with the words 'Non videbis annos Petri.' A curious and little known form was, however, observed on that day until very recent times. When the Pope rose in the morning a bronze cock was carried to him in procession, to call to his mind, at that solemn moment of elevation, the frailty of which Peter was guilty, and to which human nature is exposed.