François-Xavier Joseph de Casabianca (27 June 1796 – 24 May 1881) was a French aristocrat, lawyer and politician who served as Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, Minister of Finance and then President of the Council of State in the government of

Louis Napoleon Napoleon III (Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was the first President of France (as Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte) from 1848 to 1852 and the last monarch of France as Emperor of the French from 1852 to 1870. A nephew ...

Early years

François-Xavier Joseph de Casabianca was born in

Nice Nice ( , ; Niçard dialect, Niçard: , classical norm, or , nonstandard, ; it, Nizza ; lij, Nissa; grc, Νίκαια; la, Nicaea) is the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes departments of France, department in France. The Nice urban unit, agg ...

, Alpes-Maritimes, on 27 June 1796. His parents were François-Louis-Camille-Giocante de Casabianca (1776-1837) and Maria-Ilaria (1773-1835). He came from an old noble family of Corsica that had contributed to the annexation of that island to France. He was the nephew of General Raphaël, Comte de Casabianca. His uncle had been created a Count of the Empire in 1806. Joseph de Casabianca obtained good grades at the lycée Napoléon, then studied law at the

University of Paris , image_name = Coat of arms of the University of Paris.svg , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of Arms , latin_name = Universitas magistrorum et scholarium Parisiensis , motto = ''Hic et ubique terrarum'' (Latin) , mottoeng = Here and a ...

. In 1820 he became a member of the bar of

Bastia Bastia (, , , ; co, Bastìa ) is a commune in the department of Haute-Corse, Corsica, France. It is located in the northeast of the island of Corsica at the base of Cap Corse. It also has the second-highest population of any commune on the is ...

, in Corsica, and practiced as a lawyer until 1848. Since he was a Bonapartist, the government of King

Louis Philippe I Louis Philippe (6 October 1773 – 26 August 1850) was King of the French from 1830 to 1848, and the penultimate monarch of France. As Louis Philippe, Duke of Chartres, he distinguished himself commanding troops during the Revolutionary Wa ...

kept him away from public office.

Representative and Minister

After the February Revolution, on 23 April 1848 de Casabianca was elected to the constituent assembly as representative of Corsica. He joined the majority and generally voted with the right. After the presidential election of 10 December 1848 he became one of the most zealous supporters of the President, Prince

. He was reelected on 13 May 1849 as representative of Corsica in the legislative assembly. He continued to support the president, while joining the monarchist majority in votes. However, he abandoned the majority when conflict broke out with Louis Napoleon. On 26 October 1851 de Casabianca joined the cabinet as Minister of Agriculture and Commerce after the retirement of

Léon Faucher Léonard Joseph (Léon) Faucher (; 8 September 1803 – 14 December 1854) was a French politician and economist. Biography Faucher was born at Limoges, Haute-Vienne. When he was nine years old the family moved to Toulouse, where the boy was se ...

. In the new cabinet General de Saint-Arnaud became minister of war. After a few weeks he became Minister of Finance, where he was at the time of the coup of 2 December 1851. When told by Louis-Napoleon of the planned coup the day before it took place, he refused on principle to participate and was temporarily relieved of office. On 22 January 1852 Casabianca was charged with organizing the new Ministry of State. He left office on 28 July 1852 and entered the senate, where he voted for the establishment of the

Second French Empire The Second French Empire (; officially the French Empire, ), was the 18-year Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 14 January 1852 to 27 October 1870, between the Second and the Third Republic of France. Historians in the 1930 ...

, and continued to vote with the majority.

Later years

By a decree of 5 March 1864 de Casabianca was named Attorney General at the Court of Accounts. During the Franco-Prussian War (19 July 1870 – 10 May 1871), on 4 September 1870 he returned to private life. He briefly returned to politics when he was elected on 14 May 1876 as deputy for the Bastia district. He sat on the right with the Appel au peuple party. He did not stand in the 1877 elections. Joseph de Casabianca was named a Grand Officer of the

Legion of Honour The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...

in 1858. He died in Paris on 24 May 1881.

References

Citations Sources * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Casabianca, Francois-Xavier Joseph de 1796 births 1881 deaths People from Nice Politicians from Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Party of Order politicians Appel au peuple French Ministers of Agriculture and Commerce French Ministers of Finance Members of the 1848 Constituent Assembly Members of the National Legislative Assembly of the French Second Republic French Senators of the Second Empire Members of the 1st Chamber of Deputies of the French Third Republic 19th-century French lawyers Francois