All previous legislation concerning the conclave was codified and renewed by Pius X.’s bull, Vacante Sede Apostolico (Dec. 25, 1904), which abrogates the earlier texts, except Leo XIII.’s constitution Praedecessores Nostri (May 24, 1882), authorizing occasional derogations in circumstances of difficulty, e.g. the death of a pope away from Rome or an attempt to interfere with the liberty of the Sacred College. The bull of Pius X. is rather a codification than a reform, the principal change being the abolition of the scrutiny of accession and the substitution of a second ordinary scrutiny during the same session.
On some occasions exceptional circumstances have given rise to transitory measures. In 1797 and 1798 Pius VI. authorized the cardinals to act contrary to such of the laws concerning the conclave as a majority of them should decide not to observe, as being impossible in practice. Similarly Pius IX., by means of various acts which remained secret up till 1892, had taken the most minute precautions in order to secure a free and rapid election, and to avoid all interference on the part of the secular powers. We know that the conclaves in which Leo XIII. and Pius X. were elected enjoyed the most complete liberty, and the hypothetical measures foreseen by Pius IX. were not applied.
Until after the Great Schism the conclaves were held in various towns outside of Rome; but since then they The conclave at Rome. have all been held in Rome, with the single exception of the conclave of Venice (1800), and in most cases in the Vatican.
There was no place permanently established for the purpose, but removable wooden cells were installed in the various apartments of the palace, grouped around the Sistine chapel, in which the scrutinies took place. The arrangements prepared in the Quirinal in 1823 did duty only three times, and for the most recent conclaves it was necessary to arrange an inner enclosure within the vast but irregular palace of the Vatican. Each cardinal is accompanied by a clerk or secretary, known for this reason as a conclavist, and by one servant only. With the officials of the conclave, this makes about two hundred and fifty persons who enter the conclave and have no further communication with the outer world save by means of turning-boxes. Since 1870 the solemn ceremonies of earlier times have naturally not been seen; for instance the procession which used to celebrate Modern procedure. the entry into conclave; or the daily arrival in procession of the clergy and the brotherhoods to enquire at the “rota” (turning-box) of the auditors of the Rota: “Habemusne Pontificem?” and their return accompanied by the chanting of the “Veni Creator”; or the “Marshal of the Holy Roman Church and perpetual guardian of the conclave” visiting the churches in state. But a crowd still collects morning and evening in the great square of St Peter’s, towards the time of the completion of the vote, to look for the smoke which rises from the burning of the voting-papers after each session; when the election has not been effected, a little straw is burnt with the papers, and the column of smoke then apprises the spectators that they have still no pope. Within the conclave, the cardinals, alone in the common hall, usually the Sistine chapel, proceed morning and evening to their double vote, the direct vote and the “accessit.” Sometimes these sessions have been very numerous; for example, in 1740, Benedict XIV. was only elected after 255 scrutinies; on other occasions, however, and notably in the case of the last few popes, a well-defined majority has soon been evident, and there have been but few scrutinies. Each vote is immediately counted by three scrutators, appointed in rotation, the most minute precautions being taken to ensure that the voting shall be secret and sincere. When one cardinal has at last obtained two-thirds of the votes, the dean of the cardinals formally asks him whether he accepts his election, and what name he wishes to assume. As soon as he has accepted, the first “obedience” or “adoration” takes place, and immediately after the first cardinal deacon goes to the Loggia of St Peter’s and announces the great news to the assembled people. The conclave is dissolved; on the following day take place the two other “obediences,” and the election is officially announced to the various governments. If the pope be not a bishop (Gregory XVI. was not), he is then consecrated; and finally, a few days after his election, takes place the coronation, from which the pontificate is officially dated. The pope then receives the tiara with the triple crown, the sign of his supreme spiritual authority. The ceremony of the coronation goes back to the 9th century, and the tiara, in the form of a high conical cap, is equally ancient (see [Tiara]).
In conclusion, a few words should be said with regard to the right of veto. In the 16th and 17th centuries the character of the conclaves was determined by the influence of what were then known as the “factions,” i.e. the formation The right of veto. of the cardinals into groups according to their nationality or their relations with one of the Catholic courts of Spain, France or the Empire, or again according as they favoured the political policy of the late pope or his predecessor. These groups upheld or opposed certain candidates. The Catholic courts naturally entrusted the cardinals “of the crown,” i.e. those of their nation, with the mission of removing, as far as lay in their power, candidates who were distasteful to their party; the various governments could even make public their desire to exclude certain candidates. But they soon claimed an actual right of formal and direct exclusion, which should be notified in the conclave in their name by a cardinal charged with this mission, and should have a decisive effect; this is what has been called the right of veto. We cannot say precisely at what time during the 16th century this transformation of the practice into a right, tacitly accepted by the Sacred College, took place; it was doubtless felt to be less dangerous formally to recognize the right of the three sovereigns each to object to one candidate, than to face the inconvenience of objections, such as were formulated on several occasions by Philip II., which, though less legal in form, might apply to an indefinite number of candidates. The fact remains, however, that it was a right based on custom, and was not supported by any text or written concession; but the diplomatic right was straightforward and definite, and was better than the intrigues of former days. During the 19th century Austria exercised, or tried to exercise, the right of veto at all the conclaves, except that which elected Leo XIII. (1878); it did so again at the conclave of 1903. On the 2nd of August Cardinal Rampolla had received twenty-nine votes, when Cardinal Kolzielsko Puzina, bishop of Cracow, declared that the Austrian government opposed the election of Cardinal Rampolla; the Sacred College considered that it ought to yield, and on the 4th of August elected Cardinal Sarto, who took the name of Pius X. By the bull Commissum Nobis (January 20, 1904), Pius X. suppressed all right of “veto” or “exclusion” on the part of the secular governments, and forbade, under pain of excommunication reserved to the future pope, any cardinal or conclavist to accept from his government the charge of proposing a “veto,” or to exhibit it to the conclave under any form.
Bibliography.—The best and most complete work is Lucius Lector, Le Conclave, origine, histoire, organisation, législation ancienne et moderne (Paris, 1894). See also Ferraris, Prompta Bibliotheca, s. v. Papa, art. i.; Moroni, Dizionario di erudizione storico-ecclesiastica, s. v. Conclave, Conclavisti, Cella, Elezione, Esclusiva; Bouix, De Curia Romana, part i. c. x.; De Papa, part vii. (Paris, 1859, 1870); Barbier de Montault, Le Conclave (Paris, 1878). On the conclave of Leo XIII., R. de Cesare, Conclave di Leone XIII. (Rome, 1888). On the conclave of Pius X.: an eye-witness (Card. Mathieu), Les Derniers Jours de Léon XIII et le conclave (Paris, 1904). See further, for the right of veto: Phillips, Kirchenrecht, t. v. p. 138; Sägmüller, Die Papstwahlen und die Staate (Tübingen, 1890); Die Papstwahlbullen und das staatliche Recht des Exclusive (Tübingen, 1892); Wahrmund, Ausschliessungsrecht der katholischen Staaten (Vienna, 1888).
(A. Bo.*)
CONCORD, a township of Middlesex county, Massachusetts, U.S.A., about 20 m. N.W. of Boston. Pop. (1900) 5652; (1910, U.S. census) 6421. Area 25 sq. m. It is traversed by the Boston & Maine railway. Where the Sudbury and Assabet unite to form the beautiful little Concord river, celebrated by Thoreau, is the village of Concord, straggling, placid and beautiful, full of associations with the opening of the War of Independence and with American literature. Of particular interest is the “Old Manse,” built in 1765 for Rev. William Emerson, in which his grandson R. W. Emerson wrote Nature, and Hawthorne his Mosses from an Old Manse, containing a charming description of the building and its associations. At Concord there is a state reformatory, whose inmates, about 800 in number, are employed in manufacturing various articles, but otherwise the town has only minor business and industrial interests. The introduction of the “Concord” grape, first produced here by Ephraim Bull in 1853, is said to have marked the beginning of the profitable commercial cultivation of table grapes in the United States. Concord was settled and incorporated as a township in 1635, and was (with Dedham) the first settlement in Massachusetts back from the sea-coast. A county convention at Concord village in August 1774 recommended the calling of the first Provincial Congress of Massachusetts—one of the first independent legislatures of America—which assembled here on the 11th of October 1774, and again in March and April 1775. The village became thereafter a storehouse of provisions and munitions of war, and hence became the objective of the British expedition that on the 19th of April 1775 opened with the armed conflict at Lexington (q.v.) the American War of Independence. As the British proceeded to Concord the whole country was rising, and at Concord about 500 minute-men confronted the British regulars who were holding the village and searching for arms and stores. Volleys were exchanged, the British retreated, the minute-men hung on their flanks and from the hillsides shot them down, driving their columns on Lexington. A granite obelisk, erected in 1837, when Emerson wrote his ode on the battle, marks the spot where the first British soldiers fell; while across the stream a fine bionze “Minute-Man” (1875) by D. C. French (a native of Concord) marks the spot where once “the embattled farmers stood and fired the shot heard round the world” (Emerson). Concord was long one of the shire-townships of Middlesex county, losing this honour in 1867. The village is famous as the home of R. W. Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry D. Thoreau, Louisa M. Alcott and her father, A. Bronson Alcott, who maintained here from 1879 to 1888 (in a building still standing) the Concord school of philosophy, which counted Benjamin Peirce, W. T. Harris, Mrs J. W. Howe, T. W. Higginson, Professor William James and Emerson among its lecturers. Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau and the Alcotts are buried here in the beautiful Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. Of the various orations (among others one by Edward Everett in 1825) that have been delivered at Concord anniversaries perhaps the finest is that of George William Curtis, delivered in 1875.
See A. S. Hudson, The History of Concord, vol. i. (Concord, 1904); G. B. Bartlett, Concord: Historic, Literary and Picturesque (Boston, 1885); and Mrs J. L. Swayne, Story of Concord (Boston, 1907).