Giuseppe Pisanelli

During the Sicilian revolution of 1848 he served in the Sicilian Parliament as a representative of the province of Terra d'Otranto and later fled into exile in Turin, Paris, and London. He was Minister of Justice in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in the government of Giuseppe Garibaldi in 1860.^[1]

After Italian unification, he was a deputy of the Kingdom of Italy in the IX, X, XI, XII and XIIIth legislatures.^[3] Together with senator it:Cataldo Nitti he fought for construction of the Naval Arsenal of Taranto as a key development in building the naval power of the country. He also served as Minister of Justice in the Farini government and the first Minghetti government.^[1]

He contributed to the drafting of the Italian Civil Code of 1865^[4] and drafted a draft Code of Civil Procedure, the first to come into force in the newly formed kingdom.^[5][2]

From the last part of the IXth legislature (December 1866) to the end of the XIth (September 1874) he was vice-president of the Chamber and president of the elections board. In 1867–69 he was president of the parliamentary commission of inquiry into the conditions of the province of Palermo, established following the Palermo revolt of 1866. He was, finally, president of the parliamentary commission of inquiry into the operations of the Tobacco Registry, established in summer of 1869, investigating corruption among parliamentarians in the contracting of the tobacco monopoly to a consortium of financiers, decided by the government led by Luigi Federico Menabrea in 1868. The final report of the commission exonerated the deputy involved, Giuseppe Civinini.^[2]

In 1869 he married the widow Florentine Bianca Naldini, already a widow, informally adopting her son, it:Alfredo Codacci Pisanelli,^[2] later a jurist and deputy of the Kingdom of Italy. Alfredo’ sister Elisa Codacci Pisanelli married Vito Sansonetti, university professor and jurist.