François Judith Paul Grévy (15 August 1807 – 9 September 1891), known as Jules Grévy (), was a French lawyer and politician who served as

President of France The president of France, officially the president of the French Republic (), is the executive head of state of France, and the commander-in-chief of the French Armed Forces. As the presidency is the supreme magistracy of the country, the po ...

from 1879 to 1887. He was a leader of the Moderate Republicans, and given that his predecessors were

monarchists Monarchism is the advocacy of the system of monarchy or monarchical rule. A monarchist is an individual who supports this form of government independently of any specific monarch, whereas one who supports a particular monarch is a royalist. C ...

who tried without success to restore the French monarchy, Grévy is considered the first real republican president of France. During Grévy's presidency from 1879 to 1887, according to David Bell, there was a disunity among his cabinets. Only one survived more than a year. Grévy paid attention chiefly to defense, internal order, and foreign relations. Critics argue that Grévy's confusing approach to appointments set a bad precedent for handling crises. Grévy's son-in-law was implicated in a corruption scandal in 1887, and Grévy had to resign after exhausting the pool of willing politicians to form a fresh government. Born in a small town in the Jura department, Grévy moved to Paris where he initially followed a career in law before becoming a republican activist. He began his political career after the

French Revolution of 1848 The French Revolution of 1848 (), also known as the February Revolution (), was a period of civil unrest in France, in February 1848, that led to the collapse of the July Monarchy and the foundation of the French Second Republic. It sparked t ...

, as a member of the

National Assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the repr ...

of the

French Second Republic The French Second Republic ( or ), officially the French Republic (), was the second republican government of France. It existed from 1848 until its dissolution in 1852. Following the final defeat of Napoleon, Napoleon Bonaparte at the Battle ...

, where he became known for his opposition to Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte and as a supporter of lesser authority for the

executive branch The executive branch is the part of government which executes or enforces the law. Function The scope of executive power varies greatly depending on the political context in which it emerges, and it can change over time in a given country. In ...

. During the 1851 coup d'état by Louis-Napoléon he was briefly imprisoned, and afterwards retired from political life. With the downfall of the

Second French Empire The Second French Empire, officially the French Empire, was the government of France from 1852 to 1870. It was established on 2 December 1852 by Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, president of France under the French Second Republic, who proclaimed hi ...

and the reestablishment of the Republic in 1870, Grévy returned to prominence in national politics. After occupying high offices in the National Assembly and the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourb ...

, he was elected president of France in 1879. During his presidency Grévy confirmed his longtime stance by diminishing his own executive authority in favor of the

Parliament In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

, and in foreign policy strove for peaceful relations and opposed

colonialism Colonialism is the control of another territory, natural resources and people by a foreign group. Colonizers control the political and tribal power of the colonised territory. While frequently an Imperialism, imperialist project, colonialism c ...

. He was reelected in 1885, but two years later was compelled to resign due to a political scandal involving his son-in-law, although Grévy himself was not implicated. His nearly nine years as president of France are seen as the consolidation of the

French Third Republic The French Third Republic (, sometimes written as ) was the system of government adopted in France from 4 September 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed during the Franco-Prussian War, until 10 July 1940, after the Fall of France durin ...

Early life and career

Grévy was born on 15 August 1807 in Mont-sous-Vaudrey, in the department of Jura, into a republican family. His paternal grandfather, Nicolas Grévy (1736–1812), the son of farmers from Aumont, moved to Mont-sous-Vaudrey during the French Revolution, where he bought the property of ''la Grangerie''. He was a justice of the peace. Grévy's parents were François Hyacinthe Grevy (1773–1857) and Jeanne Gabrielle Planet (1782–1855). His father, who had joined the

French Revolutionary Army The French Revolutionary Army () was the French land force that fought the French Revolutionary Wars from 1792 to 1802. In the beginning, the French armies were characterised by their revolutionary fervour, their poor equipment and their great nu ...

as a volunteer in 1792, rose to become a battalion commander and fought in the Revolutionary Wars until retiring to Mont-sous-Vaudrey under the

Consulate A consulate is the office of a consul. A type of mission, it is usually subordinate to the state's main representation in the capital of that foreign country (host state), usually an embassy (or, only between two Commonwealth countries, a ...

. He operated a tile factory on his property. At age 10, Grévy started attending school at the nearby town of Poligny, and continued his studies in

Besançon Besançon (, ; , ; archaic ; ) is the capital of the Departments of France, department of Doubs in the region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté. The city is located in Eastern France, close to the Jura Mountains and the border with Switzerland. Capi ...

, Dole, and finally at the

Faculty of Law of Paris The Faculty of Law of Paris (), called from the late 1950s to 1970 the Faculty of Law and Economics of Paris, is the second-oldest faculty of law in the world and one of the four and eventually five faculties of the University of Paris ("the S ...

. He became a lawyer at the Paris bar in 1837, distinguishing himself at the Conférence du barreau de Paris. Having steadily maintained republican principles under the

July Monarchy The July Monarchy (), officially the ''Kingdom of France'' (), was a liberalism, liberal constitutional monarchy in France under , starting on 9 August 1830, after the revolutionary victory of the July Revolution of 1830, and ending 26 Februar ...

, he started his political activity as a defense attorney in the trial of Philippet and Quignot, two accomplies of Armand Barbès in a failed republican insurrection on 12 May 1839.

Second Republic

In 1848, a revolution in France abolished the July Monarchy and led to the creation of the Second Republic, and with it Grévy was appointed Commissioner of the Republic for the department of Jura. In April 1848 he was elected by that department for a seat in the constituent

. On the signed declaration for his candidacy, Grévy demanded a "strong and liberal Republic, that makes itself loved for its wisdom and moderation". Foreseeing the rise of Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte in that year's

presidential election A presidential election is the election of any head of state whose official title is President. Elections by country Albania The president of Albania is elected by the Assembly of Albania who are elected by the Albanian public. Chile The p ...

he began to advocate a weak

, and became famous during the debates on the drafting of the

Constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed. When these pri ...

for his opposition to electing the president by

universal suffrage Universal suffrage or universal franchise ensures the right to vote for as many people bound by a government's laws as possible, as supported by the " one person, one vote" principle. For many, the term universal suffrage assumes the exclusion ...

, instead proposing that the executive power should be vested on a "President of the Council of Ministers", who would be appointed and dismissed by the directly elected National Assembly. The "Grévy Amendment", as it became known, was rejected, and in December 1848 Bonaparte was elected president of France. Grévy was elected vice-president of the National Assembly in April 1849. The same month he protested against the president's decision to launch an expedition against the revolutionary

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( ) was the era of Ancient Rome, classical Roman civilisation beginning with Overthrow of the Roman monarchy, the overthrow of the Roman Kingdom (traditionally dated to 509 BC) and ending in 27 BC with the establis ...

, created as part of the

First Italian War of Independence The First Italian War of Independence (), part of the ''Risorgimento'' or unification of Italy, was fought by the Kingdom of Sardinia (1720–1861), Kingdom of Sardinia (Piedmont) and Italian volunteers against the Austrian Empire and other conse ...

, but the invasion proceeded and succeeded in restoring

Papal The pope is the bishop of Rome and the visible head of the worldwide Catholic Church. He is also known as the supreme pontiff, Roman pontiff, or sovereign pontiff. From the 8th century until 1870, the pope was the sovereign or head of sta ...

rule. In 1851, his fear that Louis-Napoléon intended to perpetuate himself in power was proven true, when the president seized dictatorial power with a coup d'état on 2 December, in which Grévy was arrested and imprisoned in Mazas Prison. He was released shortly after but retired from politics in the subsequent French Empire, under now emperor Napoleon III, and returned to his law practice.

Third Republic

Grévy resumed his political career in the last years of the Empire. In 1868 he was elected to the

Corps législatif The was a part of the French legislature during the French Revolution and beyond. It is also the generic French term used to refer to any legislative body. History Under Napoleon's Consulate, the Constitution of the Year VIII (1799) set up ...

, where he quickly emerged as a leader of the liberal opposition. Along with

Adolphe Thiers Marie Joseph Louis Adolphe Thiers ( ; ; 15 April 17973 September 1877) was a French statesman and historian who served as President of France from 1871 to 1873. He was the second elected president and the first of the Third French Republic. Thi ...

and

Léon Gambetta Léon Gambetta (; 2 April 1838 – 31 December 1882) was a French lawyer and republican politician who proclaimed the French Third Republic in 1870 and played a prominent role in its early government. Early life and education Born in Cahors, ...

he opposed the declaration of the

Franco-Prussian War The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the War of 1870, was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia. Lasting from 19 July 1870 to 28 Janua ...

, in 1870, and condemned the socialist insurrection of the

Paris Commune The Paris Commune (, ) was a French revolutionary government that seized power in Paris on 18 March 1871 and controlled parts of the city until 28 May 1871. During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, the French National Guard (France), Nation ...

. Upon the death of Thiers years later, in 1877, Grévy would become the head of the Republican Party. After the collapse of the Empire in the Franco-Prussian War, Grévy was elected as representative of Jura and

Bouches-du-Rhône Bouches-du-Rhône ( ; , ; ; "the Mouths of the Rhône") is a Departments of France, department in southern France. It borders Vaucluse to the north, Gard to the west and Var (department), Var to the east. The Mediterranean Sea lies to the sout ...

to the National Assembly of the new Third Republic, in 1871. He served as president of the Assembly from February 1871 to April 1873, when he resigned on account of the opposition from the Right, which blamed him for having called one of its members to order in the session of the previous day. On 8 March 1876 Grévy was named president of the

, a post which he filled with such efficiency that upon the resignation of

Legitimist The Legitimists () are royalists who adhere to the rights of dynastic succession to the French crown of the descendants of the eldest branch of the Bourbon dynasty, which was overthrown in the 1830 July Revolution. They reject the claim of t ...

president Marshal de MacMahon he seemed to step naturally into the Presidency of the Republic, and on 30 January 1879 was elected without opposition by the republican parties.

Presidency

Throughout his presidency, Grévy sought to minimize his powers and instead favored a strong legislature. On 6 February 1879, shortly after taking office, he made a speech before the Chambers where he explained his vision of the role of President: "Subject with sincerity to the great law of the parliamentary regime, I will never enter into battle against national wishes expressed by its institutional bodies". This interpretation of the office's limited power influenced most of the later presidents of the Third Republic. In foreign policy he strove for peaceful relations, particularly with the

German Empire The German Empire (),; ; World Book, Inc. ''The World Book dictionary, Volume 1''. World Book, Inc., 2003. p. 572. States that Deutsches Reich translates as "German Realm" and was a former official name of Germany. also referred to as Imperia ...

, resisting revanchist demands for a retribution over the disastrous defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, and opposed colonial expansion. Among internal policies his presidency was marked by

anti-clerical Anti-clericalism is opposition to religious authority, typically in social or political matters. Historically, anti-clericalism in Christian traditions has been opposed to the influence of Catholicism. Anti-clericalism is related to secularism, ...

reforms, particularly under the government of prime minister

Charles de Freycinet Charles Louis de Saulces de Freycinet (; 14 November 1828 – 14 May 1923) was a French statesman who served four times as Prime Minister during the Third Republic. He also served an important term as Minister of War (1888–1893). He belonged ...

. In 1880, he passed an

amnesty law An amnesty law is any legislative, constitutional or executive arrangement that retroactively exempts a select group of people, usually military leaders and government leaders, from criminal liability for the crimes that they committed. More speci ...

in favor of the

communards The Communards () were members and supporters of the short-lived 1871 Paris Commune formed in the wake of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War. After the suppression of the Commune by the French Army in May 1871, 43,000 Communards we ...

. On 28 December 1885, Grévy was elected for another seven years as president of the Republic. Two years later however, in December 1887, he was compelled to resign due to a

political scandal In politics, a political scandal is an action or event regarded as morally or legally wrong and causing general public outrage. Politicians, government officials, Political party, party officials and Lobbying, lobbyists can be accused of various ...

that started after his son-in-law, Daniel Wilson, was found to be selling awards of the

Legion of Honour The National Order of the Legion of Honour ( ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (), is the highest and most prestigious French national order of merit, both military and Civil society, civil. Currently consisting of five cl ...

. Although Grévy himself was not implicated in the scheme, he was indirectly responsible for the misuse Wilson had made of the access to the Élysée. Under pressure from the Chamber of Deputies and the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

, Grévy resigned on 2 December and addressed a last message to the two chambers, in which he stated "my duty and my right would be to resist, wisdom and patriotism command me to yield". This political matter was the first to feed anti-Masonic opinion in France.Dictionnaire universel de la Franc-Maçonnerie (Marc de Jode, Monique Cara and Jean-Marc Cara, ed. Larousse, 2011) Grévy wrote a two-volume ''Discours politiques et judiciaires'' ("Political and Judicial Speeches") in 1888.

Personal life

Grévy married in 1848 to Coralie Frassie, the daughter of a tanner from

Narbonne Narbonne ( , , ; ; ; Late Latin:) is a commune in Southern France in the Occitanie region. It lies from Paris in the Aude department, of which it is a sub-prefecture. It is located about from the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and was ...

. They had one daughter, Alice (1849–1938), who married Daniel Wilson in 1881. He died in his hometown of Mont-sous-Vaudrey on 9 September 1891, following a

pulmonary edema Pulmonary edema (British English: oedema), also known as pulmonary congestion, is excessive fluid accumulation in the tissue or air spaces (usually alveoli) of the lungs. This leads to impaired gas exchange, most often leading to shortness ...

. His

state funeral A state funeral is a public funeral ceremony, observing the strict rules of protocol, held to honour people of national significance. State funerals usually include much pomp and ceremony as well as religious overtones and distinctive elements o ...

was held on 14 September. Initiated at the

masonic lodge A Masonic lodge (also called Freemasons' lodge, or private lodge or constituent lodge) is the basic organisational unit of Freemasonry. It is also a commonly used term for a building where Freemasons meet and hold their meetings. Every new l ...

"La Constante Amitié" in

Arras Arras ( , ; ; historical ) is the prefecture of the Pas-de-Calais department, which forms part of the region of Hauts-de-France; before the reorganization of 2014 it was in Nord-Pas-de-Calais. The historic centre of the Artois region, with a ...

, his masonic activity was inseparable from his policies, especially in the ensuing struggle for

separation of church and state The separation of church and state is a philosophical and Jurisprudence, jurisprudential concept for defining political distance in the relationship between religious organizations and the State (polity), state. Conceptually, the term refers to ...

that marked the beginning of the Third Republic and MacMahon's resignation. In private life, Grévy was an ardent

billiards Cue sports are a wide variety of games of skill played with a cue stick, which is used to strike billiard balls and thereby cause them to move around a cloth-covered table bounded by elastic bumpers known as . Cue sports, a category of stic ...

player, and was featured as one in a portrait published in the '' Vanity Fair'' magazine in 1879. He is referred to as one of Swann's dinner hosts in

Proust Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust ( ; ; 10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist, literary critic, and essayist who wrote the novel (in French language, French – translated in English as ''Remembrance of Things Pas ...

's ''

In Search of Lost Time ''In Search of Lost Time'' (), first translated into English as ''Remembrance of Things Past'', and sometimes referred to in French as ''La Recherche'' (''The Search''), is a novel in seven volumes by French author Marcel Proust. This early twen ...

''. There is a type of

lilac ''Syringa'' is a genus of 12 currently recognized species of flowering woody plants in the olive family or Oleaceae called lilacs. These lilacs are native to woodland and scrub from southeastern Europe to eastern Asia, and widely and commonly ...

, ''Syringa vulgaris'' 'President Grévy', named after him.

Grévy's zebra Grévy's zebra (''Equus grevyi)'', also known commonly as the imperial zebra, is the largest living species of wild equid and the most threatened of the three species of zebras, the other two being the plains zebra and the mountain zebra. Name ...

is named after him.

Early life and career

Second Republic

Third Republic

Presidency

Personal life

References

Further reading