Napoleon III

Napoleon III

(Charles-Louis-NapolÈon).

Originally known as Louis-NapolÈon-Bonaparte, Emperor of the French; b. at Paris, 20 April, 1808; d. at Chiselhurst, England, 6 January, 1873; third son of Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland and Hortense de Beauharnais, daughter of the Empress Josephine.

After the fall of the First Empire, Hortense, who had been separated from her husband, took her two sons to Geneva, Aix in Savoy, Augsburg, and then (1824) to the castle of Arenenberg in Switzerland. Louis Napoleon had for tutor the scholar Le Bas, son of a member of the Convention. The "principle of nationalities" attracted him in youth, and with his brother, he took part in an attempted insurrection in the States of the Church, in 1831. He was on the point of setting out for Poland when he heard that the Russians had entered Warsaw. On the death of the Duke of Reichstadt (1832) he regarded himself as the heir of the Napoleonic Empire. The Republican press, engaged in a struggle with Louis Philippe's government, manifested a certain sympathy for Louis Napoleon. Though Casimir PÈrier had expelled him from France in 1831, he and a few officers from Strasburg attempted, but failed in, a coup de main (1836). In his book, "IdÈes NapolÈoniennes", published in 1838, he appears as the testamentary executor of Napoleon I and a bold social reformer. His attempted descent on Boulogne, in August, 1840, resulted in a sentence of life imprisonment, notwithstanding his defence by Berryer. While in prison at Ham, he wrote, among other brochures, one on the "Extinction of Pauperism". He escaped from Ham in 1846. After the Revolution of 1848 he returned to Paris, became a member of the Constituent Assembly, and finally was elected President of the Republic by 5,562,834 votes, on 10 December, 1848.

Presidency of Louis Napoleon

Before his election Louis Napoleon had entered into certain engagements with Montalembert in regard to freedom of teaching and the restoration of Pius IX, who had been driven to Gaeta by the Roman Revolution. When General Oudinot's expedition made its direct attack on the Roman Republic, April, 1849, and the Constituent Assembly passed a resolution of protest (7 May, 1849), a letter from Louis Napoleon to Oudinot requested him to persist in his enterprise and assured him of reinforcements (8 May, 1849); at the same time, however, Louis Napoleon sent Ferdinand de Lesseps to Rome to negotiate with Mazzini, an agreement soon after disavowed. In this way the difficulties of the future emperor reveal themselves from the beginning; he wished to spare the religious susceptibilities of French Catholics and to avoid offending the national susceptibilities of the Italian revolutionists -- a double aim which explains many an inconsistency and many a failure in the religious policy of the empire. "The more we study his character, the more nonplussed we are", writes his historian, de la Gorce. Oudinot's victory (29 June, 1849) having crushed the Roman Republic, Napoleon, ignoring the decided Catholic majority in the Legislative Assembly elected on 18 May, addressed to Colonel Ney, on 18 August, 1849, a sort of manifesto in which he asked of Pius IX a general amnesty, the secularization of his administration, the establishment of the Code NapolÈon, and a Liberal Government. The Legislative Assembly, on Montalemlbert's motion, voted approval of the "Motu Proprio" of 12 September, by which Pius IX promised reforms without yielding to all the president's imperative demands. The president was dissatisfied, and forced the Falloux Cabinet to resign; but he was soon working with all the influence of his position for the passage of the Falloux Law on freedom of teaching -- a law which involved a great triumph for the Catholics -- while, in the course of his journeys through France, his deferential treatment of the bishops was extremely marked. And when, by the Coup d'Etat of 2 December, 1851, Louis Napoleon had dissolved the Assembly, and by the plÈbiscite appealed to the French people as to the justice of that act, many Catholics, following Montalembert and Louis Veuillot, decided in his favour; the prince-president obtained 7,481,231 votes (21 November, 1852). The Dominican Lacordaire, the Jesuit Ravignan, and Bishop Dupanloup were more reserved in their attitude. Lacordaire went so far as to say: "If France becomes accustomed to this order of things, we are moving rapidly towards the Lower Empire".

Dictatorial Period of the Empire, 1852-60

The first acts of the new government were decidedly favourable to the Church. By the "Decree Law" of 31 January, 1852, the congregations of women, which previously could be authorized only by a legislative act, were made authorizable by simple decrees. A great many bishops and parish priests hailed with joy the day on which Louis Napoleon was proclaimed emperor and the day (30 January, 1853) of his marriage with the Spanish EugÈnie de Montijo, which seemed to assure the future of the dynasty. At this very time Dupanloup, less optimistic, published a pastoral letter on the liberty of the Church, while Montalembert began to perceive symptoms which made him fear that the Church would not always have reason to congratulate itself on the new order. For some years the Church enjoyed effective liberty: the bishops held synods at their pleasure; the budget of public worship was forthcoming; cardinals sat in the Senate as of right; the civil authorities appeared in religious processions; missions were given; from 1852-60 the State recognized 982 new communities of women; primary and secondary educational institutions under ecclesiastical control increased in number, while, in 1852, PÈres Petetot and Gratry founded the Oratory as a Catholic centre of science and philosophy. Catholics like SÈgur, Cornudet, Baudon, Cochin, and the Vicomte de Melun founded many charitable institutions under state protection. Napoleon III was anxious that Pius IX should consent to come to crown him at Notre Dame. This request he caused to be preferred by Mgr de SÈgur, auditor of the Rota, and Pius IX explained that, if he crowned Napoleon III, he would also be obliged to go and crown Francis Joseph of Austria, hinting, at the same time, that Napoleon could come to Rome; and he gave it to be understood that, if the emperor were willing to suppress the Organic Articles, he, the pope, might be able to accede to his request at the end of three months. Pius IX also wished Napoleon III to make the Sunday rest obligatory and abrogate the legal necessity of civil marriage previous to the religious ceremony. After two years of negotiations the emperor gave up this idea (1854), but thereafter his relations with the Church seemed to be somewhat less cordial. The Bull in which Pius IX defined the Immaculate Conception was admitted into France grudgingly, and after some very lively opposition on the part of the Council of State (1854). Dreux BrÈzÈ, Bishop of Moulins, was denounced to the Council of State for infringement of the Organic Articles, while the "Correspondant" and the "Univers", having defended the bishop, were rigorously dealt with by the authorities. Lastly, the return to the Cour de Cassation (Court of Appeals) of the former procureur gÈnÈral Dupin, who had resigned in 1852, was looked upon as a victory for Gallican ideas.

The Crimean War (1853-56) was undertaken by Napoleon, in alliance with England, to check Russian aggression in the direction of Turkey. The Fall of Sebastopol (8 September, 1855) compelled Alexander II to sign the Treaty of Paris (1856). In this war Piedmont, thanks to its minister, Cavour, had had a part, both military and diplomatic; for the first time Piedmont was treated as one of the Great Powers. After all, the Italian Question interested the emperor more than any other, and upon this ground difficulties were about to arise between him and the Church. As early as 1856 Napoleon knew, through Cavour, that the Piedmontese programme involved the dismemberment of the Pontifical States; at the promptings of the French Government the Congress of Paris expressed a wish that the pope should carry out liberal reforms, and that the French and Austrian troops should soon leave his territories. The attempt on the emperor's life by the Italian Orsini (14 January, 1858), set in motion a policy of severe repression ("Law of General Security" and proceedings against Proudhon, the socialist). But the letter which Orsini wrote from his prison to Napoleon, beseeching him to give liberty to twenty-five million Italians, made a lively impression upon the emperor's imagination. Pietri, the prefect of police obtained from Orsini another letter, pledging his political friends to renounce all violent methods, with the understanding that the enfranchisement of Italy was the price to be paid for this assurance. From that time, it was Napoleon's active wish to realize Italian unity. On 21 July, 1858, he had an interview with Cavour at PlombiÈres. It was agreed between them that France and Piedmont should drive the Austrians from Italy, and that Italy should become a confederation, under the rule of the King of Sardinia, though the pope was to be its honorary president. The result of this interview was the Italian War. For this war public opinion had been schooled by a series of articles in Liberal and government organs -- the "SiÈcle", "Presse", and "Patrie" -- by Edmond About's articles on the pontifical administration, published in the "Moniteur", and by the anonymous brochure "L'Empereur NapolÈon III et l'Italie" (really the work of Arthur de la GuÈronniÈre), which denounced the spirit of opposition to reform shown by the italian governments. Catholics tried to obtain Napoleon's assurance that he would not aid the enemies of Pius IX. In the House of Representatives (Corps LÈgislatif) the Republican Jules Favre asked: "If the government of the cardinals is overthrown shall we shed the blood of the Romans to restore it?" And the minister, Baroche, made no answer (26 April, 1859). But Napoleon, in the proclamation announcing his departure for Italy (10 May, 1859), declared that he was going to deliver Italy as far as the Adriatic, and that the pope's power would remain intact. The victories of the French troops at Magenta (4 June. 1859) and Solferino (24 June, 1859) coincided with insurrectionary movements against the papal authority. Catholics were alarmed, and so was the emperor; he would not appear as an accomplice of these movements, and on 11 July he signed the treaty of Villafranca. Austria ceded Lombardy to France, and France retroceded it to Sardinia. Venetia was still to belong to Austria, but would form part of the Italian Confederation which would be under the honorary presidency of the pope. The pope would be asked to introduce the indispensable reforms in his state. In November, 1859, at Zurich, these preliminaries were formally embodied in a treaty.

Neither the pope nor the Italians were pleased with the emperor. On the one hand the pope did not thank Napoleon for his hints on the way to govern the Romagna, and an eloquent brochure from the pen of Dupanloup denounced the schemes which menaced the pope. On the other hand it was plain to the Italians that the emperor had halted before enfranchising Italy as far as the Adriatic. Napoleon then dreamed of settling the affairs of Italy by means of a congress, and Arthur de la GuÈronniÈre's pamphlet, "Le pape et le congrÈs", demanded of Pius IX, in advance, the surrender of his temporal power. On 1 January, 1860, Pius IX denounced this pamphlet as a "monument of hypocrisy", and on 9 January he answered with a formal refusal a letter from Napoleon advising him to give up the Legations. A few months later, the Legations themselves joined Piedmont, while Napoleon, by making Thouvenel his minister of foreign affairs and by negotiating with Cavour the annexation of Nice and Savoy to France, proved that he was decidedly more devoted to the aspirations of Piedmont than to the temporal power of the pope. Meanwhile the Catholics in France commenced violent press campaigns under the leadership of the "Univers" and the "Correspondant". On 24 January, 1869, the "Univers" was suppressed. The minister of state, Billaut, prosecuted the Catholic publications and pulpit utterances deemed seditious. To be sure Baroche, on 2 April, announced in the Corps LÈgislatif, that the French troops would not leave Rome so long as the pope was unable to defend himself. But Napoleon, only too anxious to withdraw his troops, at one moment thought of having them replaced by Neapolitan troops, and then proposed to Pius IX, though in vain, that the Powers of the second order should be induced to organize a body of papal troops, to be paid by all the Catholic states jointly. Pius IX, on the other hand, allowed Mgr de MÈrode to make an appeal to the aristocracy of France and Belgium for the formation of a special corps of pontifical troops, which should enable the pope to do without the emperor's soldiers. Among these soldiers of the pope were a large number of French Legitimists; LamericiÈre, their commander, had always been a foe of the imperial regime. Napoleon III was annoyed, and ordered his ambassador at Rome to enter into negotiations for the withdrawal of the French troops: on 11 May, 1860, it was decided that within three months the soldiers given to the pope by Napoleon III should return to France.

In the meantime, however, Garibaldi's campaign in Sicily and Calabria opened. Farini and Cialdini, sent by Cavour to Napoleon, represented to him (28 August) the urgent necessity of checking the Italian revolution, that Garibaldi was about to march on Rome, and that France ought to leave to Piedmont the task of preserving order in Italy, for which purpose the Piedmontese must be allowed to cross the pontiffcal territories so as to reach the Neapolitan frontier. "Faites vite (act quickly)", said the emperor, and himself left France, travelling in Corsica and Algeria, while the Piedmontese troops invaded Umbria and the Marches, defeated the troops of LamoriciÈre at Castelfidardo, captured Ancona, and occupied all the States of the Church except Rome and the province of Viterbo. Napoleon publicly warned Victor Emmanuel that, if he attacked the pope without legitimate provocation, France would be obliged to oppose him; he withdrew his minister from Turin, leaving instead only a chargÈ d'affaires, and was a mere spectator of that series of events which, in February, 1861, ended in Victor Emmanuel's being proclaimed King of Italy. The expedition to Syria (1859), in which 80,000 French troops went to the relief of the Maronite Christians, who were being massacred by the Druses with the connivance of the Turks, the two expeditions to China (1857 and 1860), in co-operation with England, which resulted, among other things, in the restoration to the Christians of their religious establishments, and the joint expedition of France and Spain (1858-62) against the Annamese Empire, which avenged the persecution of Christians on Annam and ended in the conquest of Cochin China by France, merited for the armies of France the gratitude of the Church. Still the attitude of Napoleon III in regard to Italian affairs caused great pain to Catholics. Falloux in an article entitled "AntÈcÈdents et consÈquences de la situation actuelle", published in the "Correspondant", implied that Napoleon was an accomplice in the Italian revolution. The Catholic associations formed to collect subscriptions for the pope's benefit were suppressed, and Pius IX, in the consistorial allocution of 17 December, 1860, accused the emperor of having "feigned" to protect him.

Liberal Period of the Empire, 1860-70

It was just at this time that the emperor, by the decree of 24 November, 1860, made his first concession to the Opposition, and to Liberal ideas, by granting more independence and power of initiative to the Legislature. But the Liberal opposition was not disarmed, and the Catholic discontent was aggravated by his Italian policy, The emperor replied to Pius IX by publishing la GuÈronniÈre's book, "La France, Rome et l'Italie", a violent arraignment of Rome. Then Bishop Pie of Poitiers published his pastoral charge in which the words, "Lavetes mains, O Pilate" (Wash thy hands, O Pilate), were addressed to Napoleon III. In the Senate, an amendment in favour of the temporal power of the pope was lost by only a very small majority; in the Corps LÈgislatif, one-third of the deputies declared themselves for the pontifical cause. The emperor asserted his Italian sympathies more and more clearly: in June, 1862, he recognized the new kingdom; he sent an ambassador to Turin, and to Rome two partisans of Italian unity; and he used his influence with Russia and Prussia to procure their recognition of the Kingdom of Italy. One striking symptom of the emperor's changed feelings towards the Church was the circular of January, 1862, by which Persigny declared all the St. Vincent de Paul societies dissolved. Following upon Garibaldi's blow at the Pontifical States, which had been stopped by his defeat at Aspramonte (29 August, 1862), General Durando, minister of foreign affairs in Ratazzi's cabinet, declared in a circular that "the whole Italian nation demanded its capital". Thus were the Italians proclaiming their eagerness to be installed at Rome. Fearing that at the forthcoming legislative elections the Catholics would revolt from the imperial party, Napoleon suddenly manifested a much colder feeling for Italy. The Catholic influence of the empress gained the upper hand of Prince Napoleon's anti-religious influence. Thouvenel was supplanted by Drouin de Lhuys (15 October, 1862), who was made to give out a curt statement that the French Government had no present intention of taking any action in consequence of the Durando circular, thus bringing about the fall of the Ratazzi cabinet in Italy. A great many Catholics recovered their confidence in Napoleon; but a political alliance between a certain number of Liberal Catholics, devoted to the Royalist cause and members of the Republican party resulted, in June, 1863, in the return of thirty-five Opposition members to the Chamber, mostly men of great ability. Republicans and Monarchists, Freethinkers and Catholics, they grouped themselves around Thiers, who had been Louis Philippe's minister, and who won the confidence of Catholics by pronouncing unequivocally in favour of the temporal power, But the alliance between Republicans who wanted Napoleon to desist from protecting the temporal power and Catholics who thought he did not protect it enough, could not be very stable. From 1862 to 1864 the emperor did nothing in regard to Italy that could cause Pins IX any uneasiness. He was at that period busy with the early stages of the Mexican War, in which he had very imprudently allowed himself to become involved. Four years of fighting against President Juarez were destined to end in the evacuation of Mexico by the French troops, early in 1867, and the execution of Maximilian, brother of the Emperor of Austria, whom France had caused to be proclaimed Emperor of Mexico. The impression created by this disaster notably increased the strength of the Opposition in France.

Negotiations between Napoleon III and Italy recommenced in 1864, the Italian Government beseeching the emperor to put an end to the French occupation of the Pontifical States. The Convention of 15 September, 1864, obliged Italy to refrain from attacking the actual possessions of the Holy See and, on the contrary, to defend them, while France promised to withdraw her troops within a period of not more than two years, pari passu, with the organization of the pope's army. This arrangement caused profound sorrow at the Vatican; Pius IX drew the conclusion that Napoleon was preparing to leave the States of the Church at the mercy of the Italians. The diplomatic remonstrances with which the emperors government replied to the Syllabus, its prohibition against the circulation of that document, and Duruy's project to organize primary education without the concurrence of the Church, were causes of dissatisfaction to Rome and to the Catholics. The speech of Thiers against Italian unity, denouncing the imprudence of the Imperial policy, was loudly applauded by the faithful supporters of the HoIy See. Napoleon III, always a prey to indecision, no doubt asked himself from time to time whether his policy was a wise one, but the circumstances which he himself had created carried him along. Late in 1864 he thought of negotiating an alliance between the Courts of Berlin and Turin against Austria, so as to allow Italy to get possession of Venetia. Having paved the way for Italian unity, he was inaugurating a policy by means of which Prussia was to achieve German unity. He did nothing to prevent the conquest of Austria by Prussia at Sadowa (1866), and when he made a vain attempt to have Luxemburg ceded to him, Bismarck exploited the proceedings to convince public opinion in Germany of the danger of French ambition and the serious necessity of arming against France. By the end of 1866 the withdrawal of the French troops which had guarded the pope was complete. But Napoleon at the very time when he was thus carrying out the Convention of 15 September was organizing at Antibes a legion to be placed at the disposal of the pope; he once more exacted of Italy a pledge not to invade the Papal States; he conceived a plan to obtain from the Powers a collective guarantee of the pope's temporal sovereignty. On 3 November, 1866, he wrote to his friend Francesco Arese: "People must know that I will yield nothing on the Roman question, and that my mind is made up, while carrying out the Convention of 15 September, to support the temporal power of the pope by all possible means". But the season of ill-luck and of blundering was setting in for the Imperial diplomacy. None of the Powers responded to Napoleon's appeal. Italy, displeased at the organization of the Antibes Legion and the confidence reposed by the emperor in Rouher, a devoted champion of Catholic interests, complained bitterly: Napoleon answered by complaining of the Garibaldian musters that threatened the pope's territories. When the Garibaldians made an actual incursion, on 25 October, 1867, the French troops which had for some weeks been concentrated at Toulon, embarked for Civitià Vecchia and helped the papal troops defeat the invaders at Mentana. Cardinal Antonelli asked that the French forces should be directed against those of Victor Emmanuel, but the emperor refused. Menabrea, Victor Emmanuel's minister, though he gave orders for the arrest of the Garibaldians, published in spite of Napoleon, a circular affirming Italy's right to possess Rome. Napoleon found it increasingly difficult to extricate himself from the coils of the Roman Question; he was still thinking of a European congress, but Europe declined. At the close of 1867, Thier's speech in support of the temporal power gave Rouher occasion to say, amid the applause of the majority, "We declare it in the name of the French government, Italy shall not take possession of Rome. Never, never will France tolerate such an assault upon her honour and her Catholicity". That never was extremely unpleasant to the Italian patriots. The emperor had offended both the pope and Italy at the same time. When the Vatican Council was convoked the imperial government manifested no antagonism. M. Emile Ollivier, president of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, opined, on 2 January, 1870, that the States ought not to interfere in the deliberations of the council. His colleague Daru instructed Banneville, the French ambassador to Rome, on 20 February, to protest in the name of French Constitutional law against the programme of enactments "De ecclesia", and tried to bring about concerted action of the Powers; but, after Antonelli's demurrer of 10 March, Daru confined himself to reiterating his objections in a memorandum (5 April) which Pius IX declined to submit to the council. M. Ollivier, against the requests of certain anti-infallibilist prelates, directed Banneville not to try to meddle in the proceedings of the council. In 1870 Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern's claim to the crown of Spain brought on a conflict between France and King William of Prussia. A dispatch relating to a conversation which took place at Ems, between WilIiam and Napoleon's ambassador, Benedetti, was, as Bismarck himself afterwards confessed, tampered with in such a way as to make war inevitable. Bismarck's own "Recollections" thus supply the refutation of the charge made by him in the Reichstag (5 December, 1874), that the empress and the Jesuits had desired the war and driven him into it. The German historian Sybel has formally cleared the empress and the Jesuits of this accusation. (On this point, which has provoked numerous polemics, see Dühr, "Jesuitenfabeln", 4th ed., Freiburg, 1904, pp. 877-79). Pius IX wrote to Emperor William offering his good offices as mediator (22 July, 1870), but to no purpose. As for the Italian government, on 16 July, 1870, it refused an alliance with France because Napoleon had refused it Rome. On 20 July Napoleon promised that the imperial troops should be recalled from Rome, but no more, and so, as usual, he offended both the pope, whom he was about to leave defenceless, and Italy, whose highest ambitions he was balking. The negotiations between France and Italy were continued in August, by Prince Napoleon, who made a visit to Florence. Italy absolutely insisted upon being allowed to take Rome, and, on 29 August, Visconti Venosta, minister of foreign affairs, affirmed the right of the Italians to have Rome for their capital. The anti-Catholic controversialists of France have often made use of these facts to support their allegation that the emperor would have had the Italian alliance in the War of 1870 if he had not persisted in his demand that the pope should remain master of Rome, and that Italy's abstention entailed that of Austria, which would have helped France if Italy had. M. Welschinger has proved that in 1870 these two powers were in no condition to be of material assistance to France. After the surrender of Sedan (2 September, 1870), Napoleon was sent, a prisoner, to Wilhelmshöhe, where he learned that the Republic had been proclaimed at Paris, 4 September, and that the Piedmontese had occupied Rome (20 September). The National Assembly of Bordeaux, on 28 February, 1871, confirmed the emperor's dethronement. After the Peace of Frankfort he went to reside at Chiselburst, where he died. His only son, Eugène-Louis-Jean-Joseph,NapolÈon, born 16 March, 1856, was killed by the Zulus, 23 June, 1879. Napoleon III left unfinished a "Vie de CÈsar", begun in 1865, with the assistance of the historian Duruy, and of which only three volumes were published. His history still affords occasion for numerous polemics animated by party feeling. The portrait of him drawn by Victor Hugo in "Les Châtiments" is extremely unfair. Napoleon was a tender-hearted dreamer, kindness was one of his most evident qualities. As regards his personal practice of religion, he was faithful to his Easter duties. Much of the censure which his foreign policy has merited is equally applicable to the anticlericals and the Republicans of his time, whose press organs were clamouring for French aid towards the speedy realization of Italian unity, while their systematic opposition, in 1868, to the Government programme for strengthening the army was partly responsible for the military weakness of France in 1870.

The works of Napoleon III, including those written before he became emperor, his speeches as president, and his military works were published in 5 vols., Paris, 1854-57, and 1869; Thirria, NapolÈon III avant L'Empire (2 vols., Paris, 1896); de la Gorce, Histoire du second Empire (7 vols., Paris, 1895-1902); Blanchard Jerrold, Life of Napoleon III (4 vols., London, 1882); Forbes, The Life of Napoleon the Third (London, 1898); Woeste Le règne de NapolÈon III(Brussels, 1907); Ollivier, L' Empire libÈral (14 vols., Paris, 1895-1910); Giraudeau, Napoleon III intime (Paris, 1895); Welschinger, La Guerre de 1870, causes et responsabilitÈs (2 vols., Paris, 1910). On Napoleon III and the Italian question, see bibliographies to Falloux, Montalembert, Dupanloup, Pius IX, Veuillot; also Giacometti, La question italienne (Paris, 1893)', Idem, L'unitÈ italienne (2 vols., Paris, 1896-98); Thouvenel, Le secret de l'empereur (2 vols., Paris, 1889); Chiala, Politica segreta di Napoleone III e di Cavour in Italia e in Ungheria (Turin, 1895); Bourgeois and Clermont Rome et NapolÈon III (Paris, 1907); Bonfadini, Vita di Francesco Arese (Turin, 1894); Cauvière, Un Portrait inÈdit de Napoleon III in Revue de l' Institutut Catholique de Paris (1910), attributed to Falloux, characterizing the attitude of Napoleon III in Italian affairs.

GEORGES GOYAU