Émile Ollivier
Émile Ollivier | |
|---|---|
Napoleon III | |
| Preceded by | Personal rule of Napoleon III between 1852 and 1869. Previous Prime Minister: Léon Faucher (1852) |
| Succeeded by | Charles Cousin-Montauban, Comte de Palikao |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Olivier Émile Ollivier 2 July 1825 ] (1867-1870) |
| Spouses | Blandine Liszt
(m. 1857; died 1862)Marie-Thérèse Gravier
(m. 1869) |
| Children | 4 |
| Signature |  |
Olivier Émile Ollivier (French: [emil ɔlivje]; 2 July 1825 – 20 August 1913) was a French statesman. Starting as an avid republican opposed to Emperor Napoleon III, he pushed the Emperor toward liberal reforms and in turn came increasingly into Napoleon's grip. He entered the cabinet and was the prime minister when Napoleon fell.
Biography
Émile Ollivier was born in
With the establishment of the
Calls for a Liberal Empire
He re-entered political life in 1857 as deputy for the 3rd circumscription of the
Although still a republican, Ollivier was a moderate who was prepared to accept the Empire in return for civil liberties even if it was a step-by-step process.
The imperial decree of 24 November, permitting the insertion of parliamentary reports in the Moniteur, and an address from the Corps Législatif in reply to the speech from the throne, were welcomed by him as an initial piece of reform. This marked a considerable change of attitude, for only a year previously he attacked the imperial government, in the course of a defence of Étienne Vacherot, brought to trial for the publication of La Démocratie. This resulted in his suspension from the bar for three months.[1]
He gradually separated from his old associates, who grouped themselves around Jules Favre, and during the session of 1866–1867, Ollivier formed a third party, which supported the principle of a Liberal Empire.[1]
On the last day of December 1866,
Politics
On the eve of the general election of 1869, he published a manifesto, Le 19 janvier, on his policy. The sénatus-consulte of 8 September 1869 gave the two chambers ordinary parliamentary rights, and was followed by the dismissal of Eugène Rouher and the formation in the last week of that year of a ministry of which Ollivier was really premier, although that office was not nominally recognized by the constitution.[2]
The new cabinet, known as the ministry of 2 January, had a hard task before it, complicated a week after its formation by the shooting of
The violent press campaign against the emperor, to whom he had promised a happy old age, was broken by the prosecution of
On 8 May, however, the amended constitution was submitted, on Rouher's advice, to a
The most distinguished members of the Left in the cabinet –
Franco-Prussian War 1870/71
The revival of the candidature of Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen for the Spanish throne early in 1870 disconcerted Ollivier's plans. The French government, following Gramont's advice, instructed their ambassador to Prussia, Benedetti, to demand from the Prussian king a formal disavowal of the Hohenzollern candidature. Ollivier allowed himself to be won over by the war party.[citation needed] It is unlikely that he could have prevented the eventual outbreak of war, maybe he might have postponed it if he had heard Benedetti's account of the incident. He was outmanoeuvered by Otto von Bismarck, and on 15 July he made a hasty declaration in the Chamber that the Prussian government had issued to the powers a note announcing the rebuff received by Benedetti, the Ems Dispatch. He obtained a war vote of 500,000,000 francs, and said that he accepted the responsibility of the war "with a light heart," saying that the war had been forced on France.[3]
By 9 August, the French Army had lost three battles in three days (
Private life
He had many connections with the literary and artistic world, being one of the early Parisian champions of Richard Wagner. Elected to the academy in 1870, he did not take his seat. His first wife, Blandine Rachel Liszt, was the daughter of Franz Liszt and Marie d'Agoult.[3] They had one son, Daniel. She died in 1862, and in September 1869 Ollivier married Marie-Thérèse Gravier, then 19 years old. They had three children.[4]
Literary works
During his retirement he employed himself in writing a history of L'Empire libéral, the first volume of which appeared in 1895. The work really dealt with the remote and immediate causes of the war, and was the author's apology for his blunder. The 13th volume showed that the immediate blame could not justly be placed entirely on his shoulders. L'Empire libéral can be considered as an important document for the history of his time.[3]
- Vol. 1 (1895): le principe des Nationalités (online)
- Vol. 2 (1897): Louis-Napoléon et le coup d' état (online)
- Vol. 3 (1898): Napoléon III (online)
- Vol. 4 (1899): Napoléon III et Cavour (online)
- Vol. 5 (1900): L'Inauguration de l'Empire libérale roi Guillaume (online)
- Vol. 6: La Pologne; les élections de 1863, la loi des coalitions (online)
- Vol. 7 (1903): Le démembrement du Danemark; Le syllabus; La mort de Morny; L'entrevue de Biarritz (online)
- Vol. 8 (1903): L' Année fatale – Sadowa (1866) (online)
- Vol. 9 (1904): Le Désarroi (online)
- Vol. 10 (1905): l' Agonie de l' Empire autoritaire (online)
- Vol. 11 (1907): La veillée des armes. L'affaire Baudin. Préparation militaire prussienne. Le plan de Moltke. Réorganisation de l'armée française par l'empereur et le maréchal Niel. Les élections en 1869. L'origine du complot Hohenzollern (online)
- Vol. 12 (1908): Le ministère du 2 janvier. Formation du ministère. L'affaire Victor Noir. Suite du complot Hohenzollern. (online)
- Vol. 13 (1909): Le guet-apens Hohenzollern. Le concile œcuménique. Le plébiscite (online)
- Vol. 14 (1909): La guerre. Explosion du complot Hohenzollern. Déclaration du 6 juillet. Retrait de la candidature Hohenzollern. Demande de garantie. Soufflet de Bismarck. Notre réponse au soufflet de Bismarck. La déclaration de guerre (online)
- Vol. 15 (1911): Étions-nous prêts? Préparation. Mobilisation. Sarrebruck. Alliances (online)
- Vol. 16 (1912): Le suicide. Premier acte: Woerth. Forbach. Renversement du ministère (online)
- Vol. 17 (1915): La fin (online)
- Vol. 18 (1918): Table générale et analytique (online)
- The Franco-Prussian War and its hidden causes (1913, online)
His other works include:
- Démocratie et liberté (1867, online)
- Le Ministère du 2 janvier, mes discours (1875)
- Principes et conduite (1875)
- L'Eglise et l'Etat au concile du Vatican (2 vols., 1879)
- Solutions politiques et sociales (1893)
- Nouveau Manuel du droit ecclésiastique français (1885).
References
- ^ a b c d e f Chisholm 1911, p. 89.
- ^ Chisholm 1911, pp. 89–90.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Chisholm 1911, p. 90.
- ^ "Family tree of Emile OLLIVIER". Geneanet. Retrieved 30 October 2020.
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Ollivier, Olivier Émile". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 20 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 89–90.
Further reading
- Houston, Douglas W. "Émile Ollivier and the Hohenzollern Candidacy," French Historical Studies (1965) 4#2 pp 125–49.
- Williams, Roger L. The World of Napoleon III 1851-1870 (1962); also published as Gaslight and Shadow: The World of Napoleon III, 1851-1870 (1957); ch 10 on Olliver
- Zeldin, Theodore. Émile Ollivier and the Liberal Empire of Napoleon III (1963)
