Giuseppe Vacca

After graduating in law, in 1848 Giuseppe Vacca became a magistrate and attorney general of the Grand Criminal Court of Naples; he was then appointed Undersecretary of the Interior and subsequently of Justice in the Troya government.[3] He drafted the government's protest note addressed to King Ferdinand II on the parlous conditions of the kingdom. After the fall of the liberal ministry and the king’s abrogation of the Constitution, Vacca was first arrested and then, in 1850, condemned to exile. In 1859 King Francis II pardoned him and invited him to serve as Minister of Justice, but he refused. In 1860 he was general secretary of the southern action committee which advocated Garibaldi's entry into Naples.[1][3]

After the unification of Italy, Vacca was attorney general of the Court of Cassation of Naples, and in 1861 he was appointed senator by Victor Emmanuel II. He also served as Minister of Justice in the second La Marmora government, from 28 September 1864 to 10 August 1865.[3]

His role in the government in 1864 was important, as he presented a bill to Parliament for legislative unification, asking Parliament to delegate its right to discuss the draft civil code directly to the government. A commission was therefore created, chaired by him, which drew up a new civil code and another of civil procedure, both of which came into force on 1 January 1866. The situation was different with the Penal Code, which was developed from the Savoy Penal Code and extended to all of Italy, except Tuscany (due to Tuscan rejection of the death penalty); only in 1889 did Keeper of the Seals Giuseppe Zanardelli succeed in extending a new penal code to the entire kingdom.[4]