SALA, GIUSEPPE ANTONIO. — Cardinal, born in Rome on 27 October 1762, died there on 23 June 1839.
He distinguished himself during the period of the French occupation and the Jacobin Republic of Rome (1799) through his work in the apostolic delegation left by Pius VI. In 1801 he followed Cardinal Caprara to Paris, serving as his collaborator and secretary, particularly in the negotiations with Napoleon concerning the Concordat. He nevertheless declared himself opposed to the Concordat signed by Consalvi, judging it excessively yielding to the demands of the First Consul.
Upon returning to Rome, he became secretary of the new apostolic delegation during the second French occupation; having withdrawn to Cascia, he kept Pius VI, exiled at Savona, informed of events and drafted a plan of reform. With the Restoration, he began publishing the Piano di riforma, in which he proposed the secularization of public offices as the principal remedy; but Cardinal Consalvi, papal legate to the Congress of Vienna, had its publication suspended.
From 1815 S. was secretary of the S. Congreg. of Reform, of Ecclesiastical Affairs, of Rites, and of the Council. He took part in the negotiations for the new Concordat with France and for the regularization of ecclesiastical affairs with Piedmont. He was created cardinal by Gregory XVI (30 September 1831) and appointed prefect of the S. Congr. of the Index, and subsequently of Bishops and Regulars.
Apostolic visitor of the hospitals of Rome (1824) and subsequently president of the single Deputation for those hospitals, through his energy and munificence he secured more prudent administration and more efficient technical and medical equipment, and provided for careful religious and nursing care through the direction and expansion of the Institute of the Hospitaller Sisters of Rome, or Sisters of Mercy. As president of the Commission for Public Safety, he successfully confronted the cholera morbus epidemic of 1837 and defended the Roman population against II.
Among his unpublished writings he left a valuable and objective diary of the years 1798–99, as well as a copy of the Piano di riforma annotated and glossed by the young Gioacchino Pecci (Leo XIII), preserved in cod. Vat. lat. 1072.