As everybody knows, this proposal was successful, since it would keep the traditional and catholic civilization on one side and on the other side obtain a form of confederation, and if really and correctly implemented, it could satisfy all the needs of that time. Gioberti's Neo-Guelphism had an even greater success after the election in 1846 of a Pope, Pious IX, who was in favour of this project and with his reforms became the living symbol (against his will) of the Italian Risorgimento in its first phase.

Portrait of Pope Pious IX

Facing the more and more numerous political concessions made in Rome by Pious IX, Ferdinand was sceptic, although he did not oppose the basic idea of Gioberti's project: also Ferdinand truly loved Italy. But he had almost ruled for twenty years and had learnt also by his grandfather's experience that he had to be suspicious towards liberals and revolutionists (and perhaps in his heart he was also suspicious about the sincerity of some other Italian sovereigns...). However, on 12 January 1848 an autonomist revolt broke out in Sicily. Ferdinand, annoyed that others were implementing reforms and he had to solve the problems related to them, made a brave and challenging action: until then he had had no part in the general reformist movement inaugurated by Pious IX, now he got ahead of all other Italian sovereigns and granted the constitution and in so doing he put the Pope, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, the Dukes of Parma and Modena and Charles Albert in Turin in an awkward situation. All of them, after Ferdinand's action, were forced to grant the constitution one after the other.

At this point, it was clear that the balance and order set in Vienna in 1815 had failed; moreover, a revolt had broken out also in Vienna, and Metternich had left the scene; on 18 March, taking advantage of this, the Milanese had risen up, chased out the Austrians and demanded all Italian sovereigns to take arms against the Hapsburg and in favour of the Italian independence. After hesitating for a while, also Charles Albert had entered Lombardy with his army and was marching towards the Austrian "Quadrilateral". In short, that was the right moment to implement Gioberti’s plan.
Pious IX was ready and sent troops not to attack but to defend Italy; also the Grand Duke of Tuscany sent his troops. Ferdinand, in this situation of real and effective unity of the Italians for independence, did not back out and sent his army. It was the magic moment of Italian history! All united for independence, but according to the purposes of Neo-Guelphism: a federal and Catholic Italy, and therefore a monarchic and legitimist one. The problem, however, was that not everybody supported that plan... First of all the democrats, who everywhere, and especially in Florence, Rome and Naples aimed at the realisation of Mazzini’s project, a republican transformation of the traditional order; and then Charles Albert, who showed every day in a clearer way his real intentions, which were not those of Neo-Guelphism, but simply those of realising the old dream of the Savoy Family: the annexation of Lombardy and if possible Veneto. At this point Ferdinand sensed the danger and changed his approach (in the meanwhile also Pious IX withdrew his troops because it was clear that a golpe was being prepared in Rome by Mazzini’s followers and also because Vienna was threatening the Pope with schism if he hadn’t stopped his fight against the Catholic Empire and, although he loved Italy, Pious IX was first of all the pontiff of all Catholics across the world and then the sovereign of an Italian State): through an action of force, he first withdrew the constitution not to loose completely the power and leave the rule in the hands of Mazzini’s followers (as it was happening in Rome and Florence); it was a real danger, that several local revolts in the southern provinces of the Kingdom were stressing; then he withdrew his soldiers from the front, considering that they were dying to give Lombardy to Charles Albert (and not for the creation of an Italian Federation) and that their death was therefore meaningless; then he conquered Sicily manu militari, and thus put an end to all disorders and revolutionary ambitions and showed he was a man of character as few other ones in the whole Italian history. But he was also generous: he reprieved the condemned men who had rebelled in '48, and the revolutionists repaid his generosity with an attempt to his life (miraculously failed) perpetrated by Agesilao Milano (an officer from Calabria) in 1856: this was the only capital punishment that the King did not reprieve, due to the fanatic ungratefulness showed on that occasion. Also his foreign policy always showed him as an energetic and clear-minded king whose aim was the interests of his people, for which he was ready to say no even to Austria and Great Britain. For example, in the ‘30s, when he was still a young sovereign, he stood up to Palmerston for the famous event of the Sicilian sulphurs. It happened that in 1816 the British Government had convinced Ferdinand to grant them the monopoly of the sulphur exploitation in Sicily for very little, and the Kingdom did not receive any profit. Ferdinand II did not like that; moreover, he had cancelled the tax on flour not to burden the people and therefore needed money. So he decided to give the monopoly to a French company that paid twice as much than England. Palmerston immediately sent a military fleet to the Gulf of Naples and threatened the city with bombing. Ferdinand II revealed his character, held out, and prepared his fleet and army to the war. The situation was settled by the intervention of Louis Philip King of France: the king had to repay both the British and the French (since the monopoly was kept by the British, who never forgot the insult) for the damage caused .