The first prescribed phase of the long process was solemnly concluded in Rome on Friday, as announced by the Vicariate of Rome.
At the meeting in the Lateran Palace, the Roman episcopal see of the Pope, Cardinal Baldassare Reina honoured Italy's long-time prime minister as a role model for today's politics.
For De Gasperi, politics was a service and not a search for personal advantage.
The goals of justice, the common good and European unification that he pursued are still relevant, said Reina.
As a so-called cardinal vicar, he heads the diocese of Rome on behalf of Pope Francis, the bishop.
De Gasperi was Prime Minister in the first years of the Italian Republic after the Second World War. A Catholic from the Trentino region, he was initially a citizen of Austria-Hungary and as a young man a member of the Viennese parliament, where he campaigned for cultural autonomy for Trentino.
Beatification process opened in 1993
When he was persecuted under Mussolini, De Gasperi found refuge as an employee of the Vatican Library from 1929 until the end of the war, from where he prepared the foundation of the Italian Christian Democrats.
After the war, they replaced the Catholic Partito Popolare party and became the strongest political force in democratic Italy.
As Prime Minister, De Gasperi pushed through Italy's ties to the West in NATO and, together with Konrad Adenauer and Robert Schuman, prepared the foundation of the European Coal and Steel Community, which later developed into the forerunners of today's EU.
De Gasperi was considered a devout Catholic. The part of the beatification process that has now been completed in Rome, where he worked for many years, was opened in 1993 in his home archdiocese of Trento.
The Vatican authority for beatifications and canonisations decides on the next steps in the process.
Among other things, it will be necessary to recognise a miracle that occurred through De Gasperi's intercession.