ABOTA.ORG - Education - Courageous Advocacy Award

All were killed because they refused to give in to terror even though they knew that their names were at the very top of the list of intended victims. All of them died violent deaths because they stood fast against terror and in absolute, blood spilling, life giving support for the rule of law.

Their deaths ranged from 1971 to 1992 and so we are remembering a quarter century of ultimate professional sacrifice. We ask for a moment of silence as I say each name, as on our Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C., in the order in which they died. Please Stand:

Please be seated.

Dottore Mario Cicala, Judge of the City of Rome and Secretary General of The National Association of Magistrates of Justice of Italy, would you please come forward.

[Dottore Cicala received the COURAGEOUS ADVOCACY PROCLAMATION from President Thomas V. Girardi]

Though he does not read or write or understand English, Dottore Cicala demonstrates his deep gratitude and his sincere intention to honor America and ABOTA, by reading his son's English language translation of the remarks which he had carefully prepared in Italian. His son, Dottore Carlo Cicala, who accompanies his father this evening, is a recent graduate of the University of Rome School of Law. He has just started the practice of law while he awaits final licensure and thus we welcome him to our proud profession.

Dottore Cicala, may this proclamation and memorial hang on a wall of honor in the offices of the National Association of Magistrates of Justice which is located in the City of Rome on the Piazza Cavour, the square dedicated to the memory of that other great Risorgimento hero, Camillo de Cavour.

HONORING THE SURVIVING LOVED ONES.

I spoke earlier of Giuseppe Garibaldi and the unification of Italy. That wonderful genius from this Region of Tuscany, from Lucca and Torre del Lago, composer, Giacamo Puccini, recalled those days of glory with his magnificent artistry. His opera, Tosca, is set in the Rome of the Risorgimento, just before the victory over Rome and ultimate unification of all Italy. The beautiful Tosca, who loves the Risorgimento - committed painter, Cavaradosi, sings an aria of exquisite pain, of total despair. About to be defiled by the anti-revolutionary spy, Scarpia, Tosca sings her prayer of utter hopelessness:

Vissi D'Arte, Vissi D'Amore [I have lived for art, I have lived for love.] I brought flowers to your altar, O Lord, I have dressed your tabernacle in splendor
Perque, Perque, Signor [Why, O Why, O Lord, do you abandon me cosi (like this)?]

The widows and the children and the grandchildren of these murdered Judges & Advocates certainly have every right to say, Perque, Perque, O Lord - Why him, why her, why us.

But they have an answer to their Perque - It is in the glory of the deed, in the meaning of the sacrifice. If husband and father and grandfather, if wife and mother and grandmother did not know and love the law, did not stand up to terrorism, then the law, the glory of ancient Rome, La Legge uguale per tutti, [equal justice under law] would have been pulverized, would have collapsed in ruin.

Seated here today along with Mayor Primicerio & Vice President Marcucci and President Girardi, at this table where the elected of Florence have been sitting for the past 700 years, are the loved ones of one of those heroes whose name was just read, Dottore Guido Galli. May I present to you:

Signora Bianca Berrizi in Galli, the widow of Dottore Guido Galli,
Dottoresa Alessandra Galli, Magistrato di Justitia, like her father before her,
Francesca Spada, age 12, and Laura Spada, age 10, grandaughters of Dottore Guido Galli

Would the four of you come forward, please, to receive the Proclamation in representation of and on behalf of all of the families and loved ones of all of these martyrs.

In 1980, at the age of 47, having just been appointed to the highest court, the Magistrati di Cassazione, (the Supreme Court of Italy), Dottore Guido Galli, Judge and Scholar, Professor of Law, was shot and killed by the Brigate Rosse, the Red Brigade. A newspaper photograph was taken of him in his fallen state on the floor in a corridor of the University. Italian Law has the Codex Civile and the Codex Penale. Beside his body lay the open Codex which he had been reading as he walked into his sudden, violent death.

The first born of Dottore Guido Galli & Bianca Berizzi in Galli, was Alessandra, now Judge Alessandra Galli, who stands here before you this evening. When she was 9 years old, she was a fledgling journalist who conducted an interview of her father. She asked him the Where and the What and the When and the Why of his work. As to the WHERE, He responded to his child/interviewer that he worked sometimes at the Palazzo di Justitia and sometimes at the Office of the Coroner and sometimes at the prison. And to the WHAT, he told her that his job was to make clear what happened by taking evidence and by questioning witnesses. And to the WHEN, he said that he did not have a fixed time, that he sometimes worked through the night. And to the WHY, he said because I love my work, because I can make society safe, because we must not be afraid.

[ABOTA President, Thomas V. Girardi, now presents the Proclamation to Dottore Galli's widow and to one of his children, Alessandra and to two of his grandchildren, Francesca & Laura Spada]

This wonderful building is the place of honor for the Sindaco, the Mayor of Firenze. His private office, just outside this room and across the hall, was one of the guest rooms when his house was converted into the 16th Century Palace of the Medicis. The paintings in his chambers are in memory of Pope Clement VII, the second Medici to ascend the Papal throne. Because Clement VII's office took him away from Florence and to Rome, he called upon his trusted advisor and counselor, Francesco Guicciardini to be his eyes and ears here in Florence. Guicciardini is remembered as a great historian, not only of Florence and the Medicis of his time, but also as the author of The History of Italy, the seminal scholarly work which all historians must turn to even today. In the middle of the 1500s he wrote:

"Past things shed light on future ones; the world was always of a kind. What is and will be, was at some other time; the same things come back, but under different names and colours; not everybody recognizes them, but only he who is wise and considers them diligently."

To FRANCESCA SPADA and to LAURA SPADA, The American Board of Trial Advocates honors you, you who never knew your Nonno. We say to you that because your grandpa was a martyr to the rule of law in Italy, he was and is a hero to the whole world.

Non Dimentichiamici - We shall not forget

May GUIDO GALLI and his heroic colleagues rest in peace and in the knowledge that they and their lives made a difference to us all. May their light be a perpetual light shining upon us all and may they rest in peace and in glory.