May 1958 crisis in France
May 1958 crisis | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||
Belligerents | |||||||
French Government |
Units of French Air Force | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
René Coty Pierre Pflimlin |
Général d'Armée Aérienne Edmond Jouhaud Admiral Philippe Auboyneau Jacques Soustelle Pierre Lagaillarde | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
Government-loyal armed force | Counter force armed force | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
None |
The May 1958 crisis, also known as the Algiers putsch or the coup of 13 May, was a political crisis in
The coup had as its aim to oppose the formation of Pierre Pflimlin's new government and to impose a change of policies in favor of the right-wing partisans of French Algeria.
Context
Recurrent cabinet crises focused attention on the inherent instability of the Fourth Republic and increased the misgivings of the
The coup
After his tour as Governor General,
At a 19 May press conference, de Gaulle asserted again that he was at the disposal of the country. When a journalist expressed the concerns of some who feared that he would violate civil liberties, de Gaulle retorted vehemently:
Have I ever done that? Quite the opposite, I have reestablished them when they had disappeared. Who honestly believes that, at age 67, I would start a career as a dictator?[2]
On 24 May, French
Political leaders on many sides agreed to support the General's return to power with the notable exceptions of
De Gaulle's return to power (29 May 1958)
On 29 May President René Coty told parliament that the nation was on the brink of civil war, so he was "turning towards the most illustrious of Frenchmen, towards the man who, in the darkest years of our history, was our chief for the reconquest of freedom and who refused dictatorship in order to re-establish the Republic. I ask General de Gaulle to confer with the head of state and to examine with him what, in the framework of Republican legality, is necessary for the immediate formation of a government of national safety and what can be done, in a fairly short time, for a deep reform of our institutions."[8] De Gaulle accepted Coty's proposal under the precondition that a new constitution would be introduced creating a powerful presidency in which a sole executive, the first of which was to be himself, ruled for seven-year periods. Another condition was that he be granted extraordinary powers for a period of six months.[9]
De Gaulle's newly formed cabinet was approved by the National Assembly on 1 June 1958, by 329 votes against 224, while he was granted the power to govern by
The May 1958 crisis indicated that the Fourth Republic by 1958 no longer had any support from the French army in Algeria, and was at its mercy even in civilian political matters. This decisive shift in the balance of power in civil-military relations in France in 1958 and the threat of force was the main immediate factor in the return of de Gaulle to power in France.[citation needed]
The new constitution
De Gaulle blamed the institutions of the Fourth Republic for France's political weakness – a Gaullist reading still popular today. As he commissioned the
Although most politicians supported de Gaulle, Mitterrand, who opposed the new Constitution, famously denounced "a permanent coup d'état" in 1964.
De Gaulle was elected President of the French Republic and of the African and Malagasy Community on 21 December 1958 by indirect suffrage. He was inaugurated on 8 January 1959. In the meanwhile, de Gaulle had met the German chancellor Konrad Adenauer on 14 September 1958 at his home in Colombey-les-Deux-Églises; he had sent a memorandum to US President Dwight D. Eisenhower on 17 September 1958, recalling his will of national independence; he also took financial measures on 27 December 1958 to reduce the state deficit, and, in Algeria, called for the "peace of the brave" (paix des braves) in October 1958.[citation needed]
See also
- Algiers putsch of 1961
- 16 May 1877 crisis (establishing the pre-eminency of Parliament over the President in the French Third Republic)
- 28th of February process, a process in which the Turkish Armed Forces forced the Islamist prime minister out of office
References
- ^ "Dien Bien Phu: Did the US offer France an A-bomb?". BBC news magazine. 5 May 2014. Retrieved 5 May 2014.
- ^ ISBN 9781847394101.
- Robespierres.
- ^ French: « prêt à assumer les pouvoirs de la République »
- S2CID 153591784.
- ^ Daniel Gagnon, "Algeria, De Gaulle, and the Birth of the French Fifth Republic." (Providence College History Student Papers. Paper 15. 2014) online.
- ^ Philip Thody, The Fifth French Republic: Presidents, Politics and Personalities (1998).
- ISBN 9781620878057.
- ^ ISBN 9780313303289.
- ^ Charles De Gaulle (June 16, 1946). "Discours de Bayeux [Speech of Bayeux]" (in French). charles-de-gaulle.org. Archived from the original on May 17, 2011.
- ^ See the debates during the July Monarchy and the Bourbon Restoration concerning the role of the King and the role of the President of the Council
- ^ François Mitterrand, Le Coup d'Etat permanent, 1964
Further reading
- Alexander, Martin S. and John FV Keiger, eds. France and the Algerian War, 1954–1962: Strategy, Operations and Diplomacy (Routledge, 2013)
- Fenby, Jonathan. The General: Charles de Gaulle and the France He Saved (2010)
- Jackson, Julian. De Gaulle (2005) pp. 70–79
- Sowerwine, Charles. France since 1870: Culture, Society and the Making of the Republic (2009) ch. 21