Editing Christian Democracy (Italy) (section)

===Early years===
The party was founded as the revival of the [[Italian People's Party (1919)|Italian People's Party]] (PPI), a political party created in 1919 by [[Luigi Sturzo]], a [[Catholic Church|Catholic]] priest.<ref name="Padovani2007">{{cite book|author=Cinzia Padovani|title=A Fatal Attraction: Public Television and Politics in Italy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aMsiP1HibrkC&pg=PA259|year=2007|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=978-0-7425-1950-3|page=259}}</ref> The PPI won over 20% of the votes in the [[1919 Italian general election|1919]] and [[1921 Italian general election|1921 general elections]], but was declared illegal by the [[Italian Fascism|Fascist]] dictatorship in 1926 despite the presence of some ''Popolari'' in [[Benito Mussolini]]'s first government.

As [[World War II]] was ending, the Christian Democrats started organising post-Fascist Italy in coalition with all the other mainstream parties, including the [[Italian Communist Party]] (PCI), the [[Italian Socialist Party]] (PSI), the [[Italian Liberal Party]] (PLI), the [[Italian Republican Party]] (PRI), the [[Action Party (Italy)|Action Party]] (Pd'A) and the [[Labour Democratic Party]] (PDL). In December 1945 Christian Democrat [[Alcide De Gasperi]] was appointed [[Prime Minister of Italy]].

The Christian Democracy party was opposed to both Fascism and Communism. In elections Italians were voting based on a way of life, not just a political party.<ref name="reviewofpolitics">{{Cite journal|last=Einaudi|first=Mario|date=1947|title=Christian Democracy in Italy|journal=The Review of Politics|volume=9|issue=1|pages= 16–33|jstor=1404299|doi=10.1017/S003467050003792X|s2cid=144078864 }}</ref> Christian ideals were usually paired with the idea of freedom.<ref name="foreignaffairs">{{Cite journal|last=Ivella|first=Vittorio|date=1948|title=Favorable Omens in Italy|journal=Foreign Affairs|volume=26|issue=4|pages= 701–708|jstor=20030148|doi=10.2307/20030148}}</ref><ref name="ItalianAmericana">{{Cite journal|last=Murphy|first=Francis J.|date=1981|title=Don Sturzo and the Triumph of Christian Democracy|journal=Italian Americana|volume=7|issue=1|pages= 89–98|jstor=29776027}}</ref>

In the [[1946 Italian general election|1946 general election]] the DC won 35.2% of the vote.