Jules Basdevant (April 15, 1877 – March 17, 1968 in Anost) was a French law professor. He was born in

Anost Anost () is a rural commune in the Saône-et-Loire department in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region in central-east France. It is located on the departmental border with Nièvre, northeast of the Haut-Folin summit and southwest of Ménessaire, a ...

Saône-et-Loire Saône-et-Loire (; Arpitan: ''Sona-et-Lêre'') is a department in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region in France. It is named after the rivers Saône and Loire, between which it lies, in the country's central-eastern part. Saône-et-Loire is Bo ...

, a village in the Parc naturel régional du Morvan about halfway between Paris and Lyon in eastern France. After obtaining his Ph.D. in law, he began teaching at the law faculty in Paris, in February 1903, as an '' agrégé''. He was later transferred to the law faculty of

Rennes Rennes (; br, Roazhon ; Gallo: ''Resnn''; ) is a city in the east of Brittany in northwestern France at the confluence of the Ille and the Vilaine. Rennes is the prefecture of the region of Brittany, as well as the Ille-et-Vilaine department ...

where he lectured from 1903 to 1907. He then went to Grenoble, where he was a professor until 1918, when he went back to Paris. Basdevant was promoted several times; in 1922 as professor of international law and historical treaties, in 1924 as professor of people's law and also became a technical expert for the French delegation at the Peace preliminary conference of 1919. He worked for the

Foreign Affairs ''Foreign Affairs'' is an American magazine of international relations and U.S. foreign policy published by the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonprofit, nonpartisan, membership organization and think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and ...

Department from 1930 to 1941 as a law consultant. He was elected a member of the Academy of Political and Moral Sciences in 1944. In 1946 took up an inaugural seat on the International Court of Justice, a position he held until 1964. He served as the Court's first Vice President, from 1946 to 1949 and as President from 1949 to 1952. Jules Basdevant is the father of Suzanne Bastid.

References

* * Académie de Droit International de La Haye. (1968) ''Recueil Des Cours, Collected Courses 1936'', Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. p. 473. . {{DEFAULTSORT:Basdevant, Jules 1877 births 1968 deaths People from Saône-et-Loire International law scholars French legal scholars Presidents of the International Court of Justice 20th-century French judges Members of the Académie des sciences morales et politiques French judges of United Nations courts and tribunals