Carlo Casini (Florence, 4 March 1935 – Rome, 23 March 2020) was an Italian magistrate and politician, one of the leading figures in the national Catholic movement.
After graduating in law, he entered the judiciary in 1961: from 1963 to 1966 he was a magistrate in Empoli, while from 1966 to 1979 he was a deputy prosecutor in Florence.
Formerly a member of the Democrazia Cristiana party, he was a member of the Chamber of Deputies from 1979 to 1992. In 1981, he was the main proponent of the referendum on abortion, which aimed to restrict the law allowing the termination of pregnancy (the yes vote for repeal obtained 32% of the vote).
He was elected Member of the European Parliament in the elections of 1984, 1989 and 1994. After the dissolution of the Christian Democrats, he joined the PPI, then moved to the Christian Democratic Centre (CCD), for which he ran for a seat in the European Parliament but was not elected, and subsequently to the UDC.
He was a lecturer in human rights and bioethics at the Pontifical Athenaeum Regina Apostolorum and a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life.
He returned to the European Parliament in May 2006, replacing Armando Dionisi, who had been elected to the Italian Chamber of Deputies. Casini, who had the same surname as the leader of the UDC, Pier Ferdinando (although there was no family connection between the two), was a Member of the European Parliament for the Central constituency and received 54,000 votes in the 2004 European elections. He joined the parliamentary group of the European People’s Party.
He was re-elected to the European Parliament in the 2009 elections as a member of the UDC. He was Chairman of the Committee on Constitutional Affairs from 20 July 2009 until the end of his term in May 2014. He also stood for re-election in the European elections that year on the New Centre-Right – Union of the Centre list, but was not elected.
He was president of the Italian Movimento per la Vita (Pro-Life Movement) for several years; from 22 March 2015 until his death, he was also its honorary president.
He died on 23 March 2020 in Rome at the age of 85 from complications of ALS, from which he had suffered for years.
On the morning of 1 October 2025, the edict was published on the notice board of the Palazzo del Vicariato in Rome, announcing that the Diocesan Tribunal of the Vicariate of Rome was initiating the cause for the beatification of Carlo Casini.
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