On the occasion of his first visit to Milan after assuming the Premiership of the Council, the city where he had lived and the centre of his victorious political strife, Mussolini was urgently summoned to the works of the Lombard Iron Foundries (Acciaierie Lombarde), where he was welcomed with enthusiastic demonstrations of support and appreciation. During the stormy years of 1919–20 these very works were the scene of extraordinary events. I am particularly glad to have seen these works, already known to me by what has been accomplished in them in the last five strenuous years. I am not going to make a speech, but, as has always been—and always will be—my way, I shall tell you things clearly as they are, things that will interest you. The Government over which I have the honour of presiding is not, cannot and does not wish to be anti-proletariat. The workmen are a vital part of the nation; they are Italians and, like all Italians, when they work, when they produce and when they live orderly lives, must be protected, respected and defended. My Government is very strong and does not need to seek a great deal of outside support; it neither asks for it nor refuses it. If the workmen’s organisations choose to give me support, I shall not reject it. But we shall have to come to a clear understanding and to make definite agreements in order to avoid dissension later. I was deeply moved just now while I was visiting the factory, and seemed for an instant to be living again the bygone days of my youth. Because I do not come of an aristocratic and illustrious family. My ancestors were peasants who tilled the earth, and my father was a blacksmith who bent red-hot iron on the anvil. Sometimes, when I was a boy, I helped my father in his hard and humble work, and now I have the infinitely harder task of bending souls. At twenty I worked with my hands—I repeat, with my hands—first as a mason’s lad and afterwards as a mason. And I do not tell you this in order to arouse your sympathy, but to show you how impossible it is for me to be against the working class. I am, however, the enemy of those who, in the name of false and ridiculous ideologies, try to dupe the workmen and drive them towards ruin. You will have the opportunity of realising that more valuable than my words will be the acts of my Government, which, in all that it does, will be inspired by and keep before it these three fundamental principles: First: The NATION, which is an undeniable reality. Secondly: The necessity of PRODUCTION, because greater and better production is not only the interest of the capitalist but also of the workman; since the workman, together with the capitalist, loses his livelihood and falls into poverty if the productions of the nation do not find a market in the trade-centres of the world. Thirdly: THE PROTECTION OF THE LEGITIMATE RIGHTS OF THE WORKING CLASSES.