The Last Emperor - Napoléon III

Hello everyone, welcome to Culture En Seine. Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte was both the first president of the French Republic and the last emperor of the French, under the name of Napoleon III, during this period that we call the Second Empire. The first being the one founded by his uncle, Napoleon I, considered as one of the builders of modern France. The Second Empire was going to be the time of majestic receptions, like the series of Compiègne, but also that of an important artistic effort, both musical, literary and pictorial. But above all, it will be the era of industrialization and railways, as well as the remodeling of Paris in its configuration that we still know today. And it is the story of this great forgetter of history that we are going to talk about today. On April 20, 1808, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte was born in Paris. He is the son of Hortense de Beauharnais and Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland. The emperor is, as we said, his uncle. In 1810, he will be baptized in Fontainebleau and will therefore be, in his youth, a contemporary of the glory of the empire, which in 1812 reigns over all of Europe. And at the same time, a privileged spectator of the fall of life. Louis XVIII, freshly dreamed of the throne, decides to draw a line on the past thanks to an amnesty law on January 12, 1816, aiming to forgive up to the former support of the emperor. But only the divine mercy is infinite. That of the king has as a limit the Bonaparte family, which is banished from France. The mother of Louis-Napoléon will go into exile with her son in Switzerland. While Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland, leaves for Rome with his other son, Napoleon Louis Bonaparte. His education will be quickly taken over and he will be fed by the Napoleonic legend. But in 1821, May 5 precisely, on the island of Saint-Helene, the eagle will take flight to never return. In 1824, Louis XVIII dies and his brother Charles X succeeds him. He will be consecrated in 1825, to be overthrown only 5 years later by the Three Glorious. Louis-Philippe I, enthroned on August 9, 1830, puts the house of Orléans on the front of the Seine. Citizen attached to his homeland that he only knows in theory, Louis-Napoléon takes advantage of this political turn to ask King Louis-Philippe to serve as a soldier in the ranks of the French army. Which would allow him, at the same time, to return to the country. But the answer will arrive on September 11 of the same year, by a vote promulgating a new act of banishment. Louis-Napoléon is still young, but cultivated, he is already close to liberal ideas. And still in exile, if he cannot fight for France, then it will be for his ideas. The two princes, Louis-Napoléon and Napoleon Louis, settle in Rome and soon conspire against Austria. Aiming to favor the cause of Italian unity and to deprive the Pope of his states. They participate together in the insurrections in the Pontifical territories of Italy. Before finally having to retreat to Bologna, where he finds himself encircled by the Austrian army and the Pontifical armies. Quickly, the two brothers also have to face an epidemic of measles, which brings many soldiers. Thus, the brother was born Napoleon Louis on March 17, 1831. Napoleon II, Duke of Reichstadt, will die the following year, in 1832. Thus making Louis-Napoléon a designated heir to Napoleon I. Believing that he has the manifest destiny to succeed his uncle, he will schedule his return with the opposition. This is why on October 30, 1836, Louis-Napoléon makes an attempt to raise Strasbourg with a handful of partisans. Strasbourg is a military place and a city of opposition to the regime in place, but also loyal to the League. He hopes to raise the garrison and gather troops and populations on his way, and then march on Paris and overthrow the monarchy in place. His plan is a failure. He will therefore exile to the United States. From there, he will publish a pamphlet, where he exposes the facts that led him to attempt to regain power, but also to his vision of democracy. He will then settle in the United Kingdom. At the same time, his mother's condition deteriorates, and the future emperor ends up arriving on the brink of the latter on October 5, 1837, as a powerless witness to his death. However, unable to escape his fate, he prepares on August 6, 1840, the uprising of the garrison of Boulogne-sur-Mer. Unprepared, the company fails again. Arrested this time, he is sentenced to life in prison and incarcerated for life. But his conditions of detention are quite comfortable, since he does not reside in a jail, but in an apartment. And he will take advantage of this captivity to devote himself to study and advance his cause in public opinion, by the only weapon in his possession, writing. He will also write about the extinction of pauperism, where he will say, poverty will no longer be seditious when opulence is no longer oppressive. He then places himself as a man concerned with the working condition, and sees liberalization as a vector of social progress and improvement of the human condition. It is Saint-Simonism. On May 25, 1846, after 6 years of captivity, he escapes from his prison, and it is again exile in London. Quickly, the 1848 revolution burns France on February 22 and 23 in a context of misery, epidemics, social and economic crises, where the powerful oppress the people, as under the old regime. On February 25, the Second Republic is proclaimed and puts an end, once and for all, to the monarchy of July. This time, he knows it, his time has come. And the prince takes the opportunity, and at the end of February, he sees his candidacy presented by his supporters, and he is elected deputy to the Constituent Assembly in 4 departments. He, who had only experienced failures, finally sees the chance to smile at him. And this legitimate election, at the same time, his position, worries the other members of the Assembly. Louis-Napoléon knows it, he is not welcome. Because, although the law that prohibited the stay in France of the Bonaparte family has not been ratified, despite the efforts of Delamartine, the Assembly remains hostile to him. This is why the young elected, renounces his mandate, and in September 1848, he presents himself again, but this time the legislative election. He will be elected again, in 5 departments this time. Which sounds his return to Paris, and his right to sit as elected of the people. Following the proclamation of the Constitution of the Second Republic, the elections are organized. Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte is candidate for the presidential election, the first with universal suffrage. Finally, universal means at the time, masculine. Appearing as the man of reconciliation, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte is supported both by the notables, and by the population of the province, where his name is not unknown. However, he has no party behind him. This is why he will make an alliance with the Order Party, which, on their side, is looking for a patronymic seller for the elections. The party representative, Adolphe Thiers, will also say of Louis-Napoléon, this dindon who thinks he is an eagle, this moron that we will lead. It is clear that the Order Party uses the name of Bonaparte, which is a much more selling name than that of its opponents, which are Louis-Eugène Cavaniac and Alexandre Ledru-Rolin. The bet is good, since Louis-Napoléon is elected in December 1848 for 4 years, and decides to settle in the Elysée. Moreover, his representation as president by Cabanel will give the tone of the following presidential portals. The same year, the Republic of Rome will want to take the power of the Pope. France will send a corps of soldiers to crush the revolt of Giuseppe Garibaldi and restore the pontifical power. The president, however, disagrees with the assembly, since he is a fervent defender of Italian liberal nationalists, and he will therefore back the majority of the parliament, which is represented by the party that supported him in the election, the Order Party. The prince-president, as he is called, will gradually build his conquest of power. He asks for a new constitution in order to be able to represent himself in 1852 and reject it, and pushes him to prepare it with his half-brother and trusted man, Charles de Morny, Operation Rubicon. And he sets the symbolic date of the coup on December 2, 1851. And it is during the night from the 1st to December 2 that the opponents are arrested. The printing houses are requisitioned, and the president placards everywhere on the walls of Paris a call to the people. Abrogating the law of May 31, 1850, called the Law of Burgrave, which restrained the electoral body, and announcing at the same time his desire to write a new constitution. The appeals to the revolt issued by the elected representatives and the former support of the president, Victor Hugo, will lead on December 4 to a repression killing hundreds of people. On December 5, the calm has returned, and it is this time around the campaigns of San Brasil. In 5 days, the resistance will be mated, and the calm will settle again on December 10. Louis Napoleon, a true democrat, will ask that these reforms be validated by plebiscite with the people. And with a majority of yes, the constitution will be promulgated on January 14, 1852. And entrust the reigns of the executive power to a president elected for 10 years. Only responsible before the French people, to whom he still has the right to appeal. After this triumph, Louis Napoleon will say, France understood that I had only left legality to enter the law. Adding, more than 7 million suffrages come from Mabsoudran. He here refers to the absolution against the violence he had to employ to restore the natural right of the people to dispose of itself. He is certainly elected for 10 years, but did not give up his dream of conquest and the restoration of the empire. Hesitating to reestablish it, he will make a speech the same year, in which he will affirm that the empire is peace. Then, the Senate Consult of November 7, 1852 is accepted in favor of the restoration of imperial dignity in the person of Louis Napoleon. Approved by plebiscite, the empire is proclaimed on December 2, 1852. Louis Napoleon Bonaparte becomes Napoleon III, Emperor of the French. From then on, he no longer cares about the mandate, and will strive to relaunch economic growth, create new infrastructures, and improve the comfort of life of the workers. And this comes first by making the capital of his empire a modern and new city. With Baron Haussmann, he imagines a new organization of the city, with large boulevards, a new cutting, in 20 rounds, against 12 before. For the workers, he will build cities, social housing, but also squares, as well as parks, such as that of Buttes-Chaumont and Montsouris, but also woods, including that of Vincennes and Boulogne. Paris becomes a giant construction site, which will only end well after the end of the Second Empire, at the height of the 1900s. Paris, a modern city, will be verified during the Universal Exhibition of May 15, 1855, then that of 1867, where the whole world can admire the French Chemin de Sable, the canals that allow better circulation along the Seine, as well as the road network and technical mastery that France has via the Palace of Industry. In 1853, the emperor will find his empress in the person of Eugénie de Montireau. The civil marriage takes place at the Palais des Tuileries on January 29, 1853, followed the next day by the religious marriage at the Church of Notre-Dame. In 1856, the series of compiègnes begin, which take place every autumn. These series consist of a series of invitations launched to various guests of Marc, which can count a hundred guests. Gathered for a week, a train is specially borrowed from the North Station to pick up the guests and drive them to Compiègne in the Oise. The guests are then taken to apartments that are reserved for them, and for almost a week, they will share the daily life of the imperial couple. The days are rhythmized around different hobbies, such as theater or hunting. However, the main objective is not to laugh but to make the influencers of the time adhere to the imperial institution, which are, in the world of art, the architects Hittorff, known for his majestic achievements such as the town hall of the 1st and 5th arrondissements, or Garnier, known for his opera of the same name. For sculptors, we can mention Dubois, Bartholdi. The painters will also be very present, including Jérôme, Couture, Fromantin and the still-alive legend of the cross. We will also meet, during these series, musicians, men of letters, scholars, including Pasteur. Napoleon III is certainly a friendly host, a defender of the workers, but also a war leader. This is why he will pact with Victor Emmanuel II, King of Piémont-Sardaigne, to whom he promises to help in the Italian unity in exchange for the Savoy and the county of Nice. However, in the face of their common will of unity, the Empire of Austria of François-Joseph I is established. It is then the campaign of Italy that begins and will be based on a victory of the Franco-Sarban alliance at the Battle of Solferino on June 24, 1859. Decided to expand the influence of the Empire, on December 31, 1861, he will take advantage of the war of secession in the United States to launch the expedition of Mexico. The goal is multiple, geostrategic, political and economic. Geostrategic first because Europe, rightly, began to feel threatened by the expansionist ambition of the United States which had imposed in 1848 in Mexico by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo the end of the war and the cession of a large part of the Mexican territory in exchange for 15 million dollars. And the islands of the Antilles, being strategic positions both commercially and militarily, they were the target of open annexationist from the United States. Politically, it turned out that France was a creditor of the debt accumulated for many years by the Republican government of Mexico. Finally, from an economic point of view, the time was at the Saint-Simonism. This doctrine, both economic and humanist, was a real hymn to development. Thanks to the progress of machines, means of transport and exchanges. The United States has a reputation of having gold and silver mines, fertile territories conducive to culture. However, three years later, in 1865, the war of secession ends. The United States will support the Republicans which will force the emperor to go back not being able to easily hold a war so far from the old continent. In 1862, the emperor will continue in his social policy with the creation of the Society of the Imperial Prince which lends money to the workers, but it will go further by recognizing the right to strike and trade unions. This will lead to the creation of a pension system and an insurance against work accidents. Primary education is mandatory and free, and it opens the secondary to girls. School programs are enriched by many courses such as drawing, philosophy or history. But the imperial building will soon oppose the Confederation of Northern Germany of Chancellor Bismarck, which is becoming more and more and seems to be ready for the inevitable confrontation. On June 21, 1870, the throne of Spain was proposed to Prince Leopold II became vacant in September 1868 after a revolution forced Queen Isabel II of Spain to take refuge in France. Napoleon III is in favor of a regency until the majority of the son of Isabel II aged 10 years. Spanish deputies work for a candidacy of Leopold but the latter refused in March 1870. But the abdication of Isabel II in June relaunches the proposal that this time Leopold accepts. On July 2, 1870, Bismarck makes a public statement in which he announces again the candidacy of Prince Leopold. This news arouses a real tolerance in France and the whole press is enraged. On July 9, on the order of the ambassador of the French Empire in Prussia, diplomat Vincent Benedetti is sent to Ems where is the king of Prussia, William I. At the end of the hearing, the king officially accepts to withdraw the candidacy of his cousin, Prince Leopold. But the story will take a dramatic turn when in the evening of the interview with Benedetti, William I writes a telegram to his minister Bismarck to report to him the new demands of France. Flinging the opportunity to push France to make a heavy mistake of consequences, Bismarck takes the pleasure to rephrase the haste, in a provocative and outrageous way, where all the parties concerning the renunciation of the crown are voluntarily omitted. Despite the virulent opposition of some parliamentarians, Adolphe takes the lead, arguing that the armies are not ready to enter into a direct conflict with Prussia and its allies. On July 19, the war is declared. However, Napoleon is not really for this war, because the army is aging and the strategy is not really established. However, the emperor will let himself be trained. But the confrontation quickly turns into a nightmare and on September 2, 1870, at Sedan, the emperor is taken prisoner. Two days later, the Republic is proclaimed and a provisional government is created, ordering the French to resist the Prussian army. This will not be enough and on January 18, 1871, William I is proclaimed Emperor of Germany at the Palace of Versailles. On May 10 of the same year, the Treaty of Frankfurt ends the war and France gives Alsace and Lorraine to the new German nation. The emperor is released on March 19, 1871 and will join his wife in England. He died on January 9, 1873 following an operation at the age of 64. The Franco-German war took place in the troubled context of the 19th century, where the national aspirations of the people were expressed several times without ever leading to the creation of a nation state. Italy, for example, succeeded thanks to the military intervention of France against Austria. In any case, posterity, wrongly, will only keep in mind the disaster of Sedan. However, under the Second Empire and the impulse of Napoleon III, French society transformed faster than in any other period of its history. Because Napoleon III is a man who makes a picture of luxury and censorship emerge from his reign, but he is nevertheless no less than someone to turn to the future. In the arts, for example, he will allow a recognition of modern painters by authorizing in 1863 to let the public judge by himself the works that were refused at the Salon. It is the first Salon des Refusés. It is also by the scandal that the Salon des Refusés is made known, in particular with the canvas of Manet, Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe. On the other hand, the sovereign feeds a curiosity to the scientific and technical world. Pasteur will say that the great interest that the emperor has in science and its application is not a secret to anyone. And it was in 1859, thanks to a giant fundraising at the Paris Stock Exchange, under the direction of the French diplomat Ferdinand de Leceps, that the Suez Canal was drilled, which allows ships to go from Europe to Asia without having to bypass Africa. In 1867, he will make the provisional inauguration of the Opéra Garnier, which will only be completed in 1874. In a style, not Greek, or Louis XV, as the Empress asked the architect Charles Garnier, who replied to him that these styles had made their time and that this new style was none other than Napoleon III. Napoleon also allowed the development of the railway and therefore facilitated the circulation of the French within their country. And finally, during these two decades, France will open up to the industrial revolution and equip itself with infrastructure and urbanism still in use today. That's it, it's over for this video, I hope you enjoyed it, if so, don't hesitate to like and share it, and don't forget to subscribe to the channel. Ciao!