MAGLIONE, LUIGI. — Cardinal, b. at Casoria (Naples), 2 March 1877, d. there 22 Aug. 1944. After completing ecclesiastical studies and being ordained priest (1901), he carried out an intense ministry on the outskirts of Rome.
In 1908 he entered the Secretariat of State. In 1918 he was sent to Berne as the Holy See’s representative to the Swiss Confederation, and at that critical moment he displayed outstanding diplomatic qualities, so that Benedict XV, in 1920, raised him to the titular archbishopric of Caesarea in Palestine and appointed him Apostolic Nuncio to Switzerland. Six years later Pius XI called him to succeed Cardinal Cerretti in the nunciature to France, where he won immense prestige and widespread popularity. The same Pontiff, in the Consistory of 16 Dec. 1935, created him Cardinal of S. Pudenziana. Prefect of the Congregation of the Council in 1938, the following year Pius XII, upon his election as Pope, named him Secretary of State, and he was among the Pope’s principal collaborators during the tragic years of war.