Pierre Ernest Pinard (10 October 1822 – 12 September 1909) was a French prosecutor and Minister of the Interior.
He is known for his indictments against
Gustave Flaubert's ''
Madame Bovary'' and
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poetry, French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticis ...
's ''
Les Fleurs du mal''.
Early years
Pierre Ernest Pinard was born in
Autun, Saône-et-Loire, on 10 October 1822.
His father, who belonged to the judiciary, died in 1830, leaving a widow and three children. Ernest was the eldest.
He was a brilliant and very pious student at the ''Petit-Séminaire'' of Autun.
He went on to the
Collège Stanislas de Paris
The Collège Stanislas de Paris (), colloquially known as Stan, is a highly selective private Catholic school in Paris, situated on " Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs" in the 6th arrondissement. It has more than 3,000 students, from preschool to '' clas ...
. He studied law in Paris and became an advocate.
Pinard decided to join the judiciary, and on 1 May 1849 was named deputy prosecutor at
Tonnerre.
On 12 December 1851 he became deputy prosecutor at
Troyes
Troyes () is a commune and the capital of the department of Aube in the Grand Est region of north-central France. It is located on the Seine river about south-east of Paris. Troyes is situated within the Champagne wine region and is near to ...
, and then on 30 December 1852 at
Reims
Reims ( , , ; also spelled Rheims in English) is the most populous city in the French department of Marne, and the 12th most populous city in France. The city lies northeast of Paris on the Vesle river, a tributary of the Aisne.
Founded by ...
. On 30 October 1853 he was appointed deputy prosecutor at the Tribunal of the Seine in Paris, where he showed his remarkable talent as an orator.
In January 1857 Pinard prosecuted Gustave Flaubert for "offense to public and religious morality and to good morals" for his 1856 novel ''Madame Bovary'', which deals with adultery.
He said that "Art that observes no rule is no longer art; it is like a woman who disrobes completely.
To impose the one rule of public decency on art is not to subjugate it but to honor it".
Pinard failed to win a conviction, although Flaubert was reprimanded by the court. In August 1857 Pinard prosecuted Charles Baudelaire for his 1857 collection of poems, ''Les Fleurs du Mal''. Seven of the poems were banned due to their lesbian or sadomasochistic themes, a ban that technically remained in place until 1948.
In April 1859 Pinard was named deputy prosecutor at the imperial court, and on 3 October 1861 he was promoted to the grade of advocate-general, and appointed procureur general in
Douai.
Minister of the Interior
Pinard was appointed to the
Conseil d'Etat (Council of State) in 1866, aged 44, seen as one of the new men who could rejuvenate the
empire.
He was appointed Minister of the Interior on 13 November 1867, replacing
Charles de La Valette
Charles-Jean-Marie-Félix, ''marquis'' de La Valette (25 November 1806 – 2 May 1881) was a French politician and diplomat.
Career
Charles de La Valette was Minister of the Interior and of Foreign Affairs in the government of Emperor Napoleon I ...
.
Pinard was not well liked by
Eugène Rouher, the principal minister of the regime.
Although attached to the
Catholic Church, Pinard saw that the empire needed to become more liberal. He was in favor of a broad union between
ultramontane Catholics who disagreed with imperial policy towards Rome and Bonapartists who supported reform, a combination that was opposed by Rouher.
Pinard drafted a new press law in which prison sentences were replaced by fines, and pushed it through against opposition from Rouher.
However, Pinard remained authoritarian in temperament.
He demanded firm action in a case against the journal ''La Lanterne''. He made a clumsy attempt to use force to suppress a demonstration commemorating the death of
Jean-Baptiste Baudin
Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Baudin Victor (23 October 1811 Nantua - 3 December 1851 Paris) was a French physician and deputy to the Assembly in 1849 famous for having been killed on a barricade.
Career
He studied medicine in Lyon and Paris.
He serv ...
, which destroyed his authority. Pinard left office on 17 December 1868.
Later career
Pinard would not accept a Senate seat.
In 1869 he was elected deputy for the 7th ''circonscription'' of the Nord department.
He was one of the small minority that protested the deposition of the emperor
Napoleon III after the French lost the
Battle of Sedan.
He was imprisoned in 1871 for his Bonapartist activities. Pinard returned to the bar of Paris.
In 1876 he ran unsuccessfully for election as a deputy.
He died on 12 September 1909 in
Bourg-en-Bresse, Ain, aged 86.
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Pinard, Pierre Ernest
1822 births
1909 deaths
20th-century French lawyers
French politicians
People from Autun