View source for Pierre Mendès France

{{short description|French politician (1907–1982)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2014}}
{{Family name hatnote|Mendès France|France}}
{{Infobox officeholder
|name             = Pierre Mendès France
|image            = Mendès-France Harcourt 1948.jpg
|caption          = Pierre Mendès France in 1948
|office           = [[Prime Minister of France]]
|term_start       = 18 June 1954
|term_end         = 23 February 1955
|president        = [[René Coty]]
|predecessor      = [[Joseph Laniel]]
|successor        = [[Edgar Faure]]
|office1          = Minister of Foreign Affairs
|term_start1      = 18 June 1954
|term_end1        = 20 January 1955
|primeminister1   = Himself
|predecessor1     = [[Georges Bidault]]
|successor1       = [[Edgar Faure]]
|office2          = [[Mayor (France)|Mayor]] of [[Louviers]]
|term_start2      = 13 March 1953
|term_end2        = 27 November 1958
|predecessor2     = Marcel Malherbe
|successor2       = André Vincelot
|term_start3      = 17 May 1935
|term_end3        = 20 September 1939
|predecessor3     = Raoul Thorel
|successor3       = Auguste Fromentin
|office4          = President of the General Council of [[Eure]]
|term_start4      = 6 October 1945
|term_end4        = 6 December 1958
|predecessor4     = Office established
|successor4       = Gustave Héon
|office5          = Minister of National Economics
|term_start5      = 4 September 1944
|term_end5        = 6 April 1945
|primeminister5 = [[Charles de Gaulle]]
|predecessor5     = Office established
|successor5       = [[René Pleven]]
|office6          = Commissioner for Finances
|term_start6      = 3 November 1943
|term_end6        = 4 September 1944
|president6       = Charles de Gaulle
|predecessor6     = [[Maurice Couve de Murville]]
|successor6       = [[Aimé Lepercq]]
|birth_name       = Pierre Isaac Isidore Mendès France
|birth_date       = {{birth date|1907|1|11|df=y}}
|birth_place      = [[Paris]], France
|death_date       = {{death date and age|1982|10|18|1907|1|11|df=y}}
|death_place      = Paris, France
|party            = [[Republican, Radical and Radical-Socialist Party|Radical]] (1924–1959)<br>[[Autonomous Socialist Party (France)|Autonomous Socialist]] (1959–1960)<br>[[Unified Socialist Party (France)|Unified Socialist]] (1960–1971)
|spouse           = {{plainlist|
* {{Marriage|Lily Cicurel|1933|1967|end=died}}
* {{Marriage|Marie-Claire Servan-Schreiber|1971}}
}}
|children         = 2
|alma_mater       = [[University of Paris]]
}}

'''Pierre Isaac Isidore Mendès France''' ({{IPA|fr|pjɛʁ mɑ̃dɛs fʁɑ̃s|lang}}; 11 January 1907{{spnd}}18 October 1982) was a French politician who served as [[prime minister of France]] for eight months from 1954 to 1955. As a member of the [[Radical Party (France)|Radical Party]], he headed a government supported by a coalition of Gaullists ([[Rally of the French People|RPF]]), moderate socialists ([[UDSR]]), Christian democrats ([[Popular Republican Movement|MRP]]) and liberal-conservatives ([[CNIP]]). His main priority was ending the [[First Indochina War|Indochina War]], which had already cost 92,000 lives, with 114,000 wounded and 28,000 captured on the French side. Public opinion polls showed that, in February 1954, only 7% of the French people wanted to continue the fight to regain Indochina out of the hands of the Communists, led by [[Ho Chi Minh]] and his [[Viet Minh]] movement.<ref>Maurice Larkin, ''France since the Popular Front: Government and People 1936-1996'' (1997) pp 240-1.</ref> At the 1954 [[Geneva Conference (1954)|Geneva Conference]], Mendès France negotiated a deal that gave the Viet Minh control of Vietnam north of the seventeenth parallel, and allowed him to pull out all French forces.<ref>{{cite book|author=Thomas J. Christensen|title=Worse Than a Monolith: Alliance Politics and Problems of Coercive Diplomacy in Asia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Z1v2pqaOmuEC&pg=PA123|year=2011|publisher=Princeton UP|pages=123–25|isbn=978-1400838813|access-date=21 September 2016|archive-date=27 May 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160527111951/https://books.google.com/books?id=Z1v2pqaOmuEC&pg=PA123|url-status=live}}</ref> He is considered one of the most prominent statesmen of the [[French Fourth Republic]].<ref name=BD/>

==Early life==
Mendès France was born on 11 January 1907 in Paris, the son of a textile merchant from [[Limoges]].<ref name=BD>{{cite book|title=Political Leaders of Contemporary Western Europe: A Biographical Dictionary|year=1995|editor=David Wilsford|publisher=[[Greenwood Publishing Group]]|chapter=PIERRE MENDÈS-FRANCE|isbn=9780313286230 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=B8iJNlWcdIUC}}</ref> He was descended from [[Portuguese Jews]] who settled in France in the 16th century.<ref name=BD/> He studied at the [[École des sciences politiques]] and the [[Faculty of Law of Paris]], graduating with a doctorate in law and becoming the youngest member of the Paris [[bar association]] in 1926, at age 19.<ref name=BD/> In 1924, Mendès France joined the [[Radical Party (France)|Radical Party]], the traditional party of the French middle-class centre-left (not to be confused with the mainstream [[SFIO]], often called the Socialist Party). He married Lili Cicurel, the niece of [[Salvator Cicurel]].<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/.premium-1927-store-owner-killed-in-cairo-1.5328437 |title=1927: Owner of Egypt's Grandest Store Brutally Murdered in Cairo |newspaper=Haaretz |access-date=14 June 2018 |archive-date=14 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180614094400/https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/.premium-1927-store-owner-killed-in-cairo-1.5328437 |url-status=live }}</ref>

==Third Republic and World War II==
[[File:Pierre Mendès-France 1932.jpg|thumb|left|Mendès France in 1932]]
In 1932, Mendès France was elected member of the [[Chamber of Deputies (France)|Chamber of Deputies]] for the [[Eure]] department; he was the Assembly's youngest member.<ref name=BD/> In [[1936 French legislative election|1936]] he came within 700 votes of losing to [[Modeste Legouez]], the president of the radical agrarian group the [[Comités de défense paysanne]] in what he said was his hardest electoral fight.<ref>[https://books.openedition.org/pur/18692 Pierre Mendès France, élu d’un département rural], Pierre Mendès France et la démocratie locale</ref> His ability was soon recognized, and in 1938 the government of [[Léon Blum]] appointed him Under Secretary of State for Finance.<ref name=BD/>

In October 1940, France was put on trial by the [[Vichy regime]] at the [[Hôtel de Ville, Clermont-Ferrand|courthouse in Clermont-Ferrand]] for desertion after he boarded the liner [[SS Massilia|SS ''Massilia'']] for [[Casablanca]] in Morocco to continue the fight against the Nazis.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783110610161-008/pdf|title=The Massilia Affair and the Clermont-Ferrand Desertion Trials|first=James |last=Herbst|publisher=De Gruyter Oldenbourg|year= 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.francebleu.fr/infos/societe/clermont-ferrand-rend-hommage-jean-zay-1432231752|title=Clermont-Ferrand rend hommage à Jean Zay|date=21 May 2015|newspaper=France Bleu|access-date=5 January 2025}}</ref> He was imprisoned for desertion.<ref name=BD/> He escaped and succeeded in reaching Britain, where he joined the [[Free French forces]] led by [[Charles de Gaulle]]. Mendès France later described his trial, conviction and subsequent escape in the celebrated documentary "''[[The Sorrow and the Pity]]''".<ref name=BD/>

During the latter years of the war, Mendès France served in the [[Free French Air Forces]] and flew in a dozen bombing raids.<ref name=BD/> After the [[Liberation of Paris]] in August 1944, he was appointed [[French Ministry for the Economy and Finance|Minister for National Economy]] in the [[Provisional Government of the French Republic|French provisional government]] by de Gaulle.<ref name=BD/> He later headed the French delegation to the 1944 [[United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference]] at [[Bretton Woods, New Hampshire|Bretton Woods]].<ref name=BD/>

Mendès France soon fell out with the Finance Minister, [[René Pleven]].<ref name=BD/> Mendès France supported [[Wage Regulation|state regulation of wages and prices]] to control inflation, while Pleven favoured generally ''[[laissez-faire]]'' policies.<ref name=BD/> When de Gaulle sided with Pleven, Mendès France resigned.<ref name=BD/> Nonetheless, de Gaulle valued Mendès France's abilities, and appointed him as a director of the [[International Bank for Reconstruction and Development]], and as French representative to the [[UN Economic and Social Council|United Nations Economic and Social Council]].

==Fourth Republic==
{{more citations needed section|date=December 2014}}
In 1947, after democratic French politics resumed under the [[French Fourth Republic|Fourth Republic]], Mendès France was re-elected to the National Assembly. He first tried to form a government in June 1953, but was unable to gain the numbers in the Assembly. From 1950 he had been a consistent opponent of [[French colonial empires|French colonialism]], and by 1954 France was becoming hopelessly embroiled in major colonial conflicts: the [[First Indochina War]] and the [[Algerian War of Independence]]. When French forces were defeated by the [[Vietnam]]ese Communists at [[Battle of Dien Bien Phu|Dien Bien Phu]] in June 1954, the government of [[Joseph Laniel]] resigned, and Mendès France formed a government with support from the centre-right.

Mendès France immediately negotiated an agreement with [[Ho Chi Minh]], the Vietnamese Communist leader. There was, he said, no choice but total withdrawal from [[French Indochina|Indochina]], and the Assembly supported him by 471 votes to 14. Nevertheless, nationalist opinion was shocked, and Roman Catholic opinion opposed abandoning the Vietnamese believers to Communism. A tirade of abuse, much of it [[Antisemitism|anti-Semitic]], was directed at Mendès France. [[Jean-Marie Le Pen]], then a [[Poujadist]] member of the Assembly, described his "patriotic, almost physical repulsion" for Mendès France.

Undeterred, Mendès France next came to an agreement with [[Habib Bourguiba]], the nationalist leader in [[Tunisia]], for the independence of that colony by 1956, and began discussions with the nationalist leaders in [[Morocco]] for a French withdrawal. He also favoured concessions to the nationalists in [[Algeria]]; but the presence of a million ''[[Pied-noir]]s'' there left the colonial power no easy way to extricate itself from that situation. The future [[mercenary]] [[Bob Denard]] was convicted in 1954 and sentenced to fourteen months in prison for an assassination attempt against Mendès France.<ref name=BBC_Denard>[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7044019.stm Obituary: Bob Denard] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171223070355/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7044019.stm |date=23 December 2017 }}, [[BBC]], 14 October 2007</ref>

Mendès France hoped that the Radical Party would become the party of modernization and renewal in French politics, replacing the SFIO. An advocate of greater [[European integration]], he helped bring about the formation of the [[Western European Union]], and proposed far-reaching economic reform. He also favoured defence co-operation with other European countries, but the National Assembly rejected the proposal for a [[European Defence Community]], mainly because of misgivings about Germany's participation.

His cabinet fell in February 1955. In 1956 he served as Minister of State in the cabinet headed by the SFIO leader [[Guy Mollet]], but resigned over Mollet's handling of the Algerian War,<ref name=BD/> which was coming to dominate French politics. His split over Algeria with [[Edgar Faure]], leader of the conservative wing of the Radical Party, led to Mendès France resigning as party leader in 1957.

==Fifth Republic==
{{more citations needed section|date=December 2014}}
[[File:20.01.1962. Mendes France et Raymond Badiou. (1962) - 53Fi3369.jpg|thumb|Mendès France, against the [[Algerian War]] during a [[Unified Socialist Party (France)|PSU]] meeting in January 1962.]]
Like most of the French left, Mendès France opposed de Gaulle's seizure of power in [[May 1958 crisis (France)|May 1958]], when the mounting crisis in Algeria brought about a breakdown in the Fourth Republic system and the creation of a [[French Fifth Republic|Fifth Republic]].<ref name=BD/> He led the ''Union of Democratic Forces'', an anti-[[Gaullism|Gaullist]] group, but in the November 1958 elections he lost his seat in the Assembly. After being expelled from the Radical Party, whose majority faction supported de Gaulle, in late 1959 he joined the [[Autonomous Socialist Party (France)|Autonomous Socialist Party]] (PSA), a breakaway group from the SFIO.<ref name=BD/>

In April 1960, the PSA merged with several other groups to form the [[Unified Socialist Party (France)|Unified Socialist Party]] (PSU).<ref name=BD/> He made an unsuccessful bid to regain his seat in the National Assembly representing [[Eure]] in the 1962 election.<ref>[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=154oAAAAIBAJ&sjid=J1IDAAAAIBAJ&pg=7338,4987380&dq=mendes+france+eure&hl=en De Gaulle Wins In France] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171108140138/https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=154oAAAAIBAJ&sjid=J1IDAAAAIBAJ&pg=7338,4987380&dq=mendes+france+eure&hl=en |date=8 November 2017 }}. St. Petersburg Times. 19 November 1962</ref>

In 1967 he returned to the Assembly as a PSU member for the [[Isère]], but again lost his seat in the 1968 landslide election victory of the Gaullist party [[Union of Democrats for the Republic|UDR]]. Mendès France and the PSU expressed sympathy for the sentiments and actions of the student rioters during the [[May 1968 in France|events of May 1968]],<ref name=BD/> a position unusual for a politician of his age and status. One year later, Pompidou's socialist opponent in the [[1969 French presidential election|presidential election of 1969]], [[Gaston Defferre]] of the SFIO, designated him his preferred Prime Minister prior to the election. The two campaigned together in what was the first – and so far only – dual "ticket" in a French presidential election. Defferre gained only 5% of the vote and was eliminated in the election's first round. When [[François Mitterrand]] formed a new [[French Socialist Party|Socialist Party]] in 1971, Mendès France supported him, but did not attempt another political comeback. He lived long enough to see Mitterrand elected president.

==Political career==
;Governmental function
*President of the Council of Ministers : 1954–1955.
*Minister of Foreign Affairs : 1954–1955.
*Minister of State : January–May 1956 (Resignation).

;Electoral mandates
'''''National Assembly of France'''''
*Member of the [[National Assembly of France]] for [[Eure]] : 1932–1942 (Deposition by Philippe Pétain) / 1946–1958. Elected in 1932, reelected in 1936, 1946, 1951, 1956.
*Member of the [[National Assembly of France]] for [[Isère]] (2nd constituency) : 1967–1968. Elected in 1968.

'''''General Council'''''
*President of the General Council of [[Eure]] : 1951–1958. Reelected in 1955. 
*General councillor of [[Eure]] : 1937–1958. Reelected in 1945, 1951.

'''''Municipal council'''''
*Mayor of [[Louviers]] : 1935–1939 (Resignation) / 1953–1958 (Resignation). Reelected in 1953.
*Municipal councillor of [[Louviers]] : 1935–1939 (Resignation) / 1953–1958 (Resignation). Reelected in 1953.

== Mendès France's first Ministry, 19 June 1954 – 20 January 1955 ==
{{div col}}
* Pierre Mendès France – President of the Council and Minister of Foreign Affairs
* [[Marie Pierre Koenig]] – Minister of National Defense and Armed Forces
* [[François Mitterrand]] – Minister of the Interior
* [[Edgar Faure]] – Minister of Finance, Economic Affairs, and Planning
* [[Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury]] – Minister of Commerce and Industry
* [[Eugène Claudius-Petit]] – Minister of Labour and Social Security
* [[Émile Hugues]] – Minister of Justice
* [[Jean Berthoin]] – Minister of National Education
*Emmanuel Temple – Minister of Veterans and War Victims
* [[Roger Houdet]] – Minister of Agriculture
* [[Robert Buron]] – Minister of Overseas France
* [[Jacques Chaban-Delmas]] – Minister of Public Works, Transport, and Tourism
* [[Louis Aujoulat]] – Minister of Public Health and Population
*[[Maurice Lemaire]] – Minister of Reconstruction and Housing
* [[Christian Fouchet]] – Minister of Moroccan and Tunisian Affairs
* [[Guy La Chambre]] – Minister of Relations with Partner States
{{div col end}}
'''Changes'''
*14 August 1954 – [[Emmanuel Temple]] succeeds Koenig as Minister of National Defense and Armed Forces. [[Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury]] succeeds Chaban-Delmas as interim Minister of Public Works, Transport, and Tourism. [[Eugène Claudius-Petit]] succeeds Lemaire as interim Minister of Reconstruction and Housing.
*3 September 1954 – [[Jean Masson]] succeeds Temple as Minister of Veterans and War Victims. [[Jean-Michel Guérin de Beaumont]] succeeds Hugues as Minister of Justice. [[Henri Ulver]] succeeds Bourgès-Maunoury as Minister of Commerce and Industry. [[Jacques Chaban-Delmas]] succeeds Bourgès-Maunoury as Minister of Public Works, Transport, and Tourism and Claudius-Petit as Minister of Reconstruction and Housing. [[Louis Aujoulat]] succeeds Claudius-Petit as Minister of Labour and Social Security. [[André Monteil]] succeeds Aujoulat as Minister of Public Health and Population.
*12 November 1954 – [[Maurice Lemaire]] succeeds Chaban-Delmas as Minister of Reconstruction and Housing.

== Mendès France's second Ministry, 20 January 1955 – 23 February 1955 ==
{{div col}}
* Pierre Mendès France – President of the Council and Minister of Foreign Affairs
* [[Edgar Faure]] – Minister of Foreign Affairs
* [[Jacques Chevallier (politician)|Jacques Chevallier]] – Minister of National Defense
* [[Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury]] – Minister of Armed Forces
* [[François Mitterrand]] – Minister of the Interior
* [[Robert Buron]] – Minister of Finance, Economic Affairs, and Planning
* Henri Ulver – Minister of Commerce and Industry
* [[Louis Aujoulat]] – Minister of Labor and Social Security
* Emmanuel Temple – Minister of Justice
* Raymond Schmittlein – Minister of Merchant Marine
* [[Jean Berthoin]] – Minister of National Education
* [[Jean Masson]] – Minister of Veterans and War Victims
* [[Roger Houdet]] – Minister of Agriculture
* [[Jean-Jacques Juglas]] – Minister of Overseas France
* [[Jacques Chaban-Delmas]] – Minister of Public Works, Transport, and Tourism
* André Monteil – Minister of Public Health and Population
* [[Maurice Lemaire]] – Minister of Reconstruction and Housing
* [[Christian Fouchet]] – Minister of Moroccan and Tunisian Affairs
* [[Guy La Chambre]] – Minister of Relations with Partner States
{{div col end}}

==Honours==
===National honours ===
* Commander of the [[Legion of Honour]]
* [[Croix de Guerre 1939–1945]]
* [[Resistance Medal]]

===Foreign honours===

* {{Flag|Belgium}}: Grand Officer of the [[Order of Leopold (Belgium)]]
* {{Flag|Morocco}}: Grand Cordon of the [[Order of Ouissam Alaouite]]
* {{Flag|Monaco}}: Gran Cross of the [[Order of Saint-Charles]]
* {{Flag|Tunisia}}: Grand Cordon of the [[Order of Glory (Tunisia)]]

== See also ==

* [[Tristan Mendès France]]

== References ==
{{reflist}}

==Further reading==
{{Commons category|Pierre Mendès-France}}
*Aussaresses, Paul. ''The Battle of the Casbah: Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism in Algeria, 1955–1957''. (New York: Enigma Books, 2010) {{ISBN|978-1-929631-30-8}}.
* De Tarr, Francis. ''The French Radical Party: From Herriot to Mendès-France'' (Greenwood, 1980).
* Lacouture, Jean. ''Pierre Mendes France'' (English ed. 1984), scholarly biography. [https://www.questia.com/library/98221331/pierre-mendes-france online]
*[[Alexander Werth]], ''The Strange History of Pierre Mendès France and the Great Conflict over French North Africa.'' Barrie. London 1957  [https://www.questia.com/library/7255624/lost-statesman-the-strange-story-of-pierre-mend-s-france online]
* Wilsford, David, ed. ''Political leaders of contemporary Western Europe: a biographical dictionary'' (Greenwood, 1995) pp.&nbsp;313–18

==External links==
* {{PM20|FID=pe/012089}}

{{wikiquote}}

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{{succession box|title=[[Minister of Finance (France)|Free French Commissioner for Finance]]|before=[[Maurice Couve de Murville]]|after=–|years=1943–1944}}
{{succession box|title=[[Minister of National Economy (France)|Minister of National Economy]]|before=[[Pierre Cathala]]|after= [[René Pleven]]|years=1944–1945}}
{{succession box|title=[[Prime Minister of France]]|before=[[Joseph Laniel]]|after=[[Edgar Faure]]|years=1954–1955}}
{{succession box|title=[[Minister of Foreign Affairs (France)|Minister of Foreign Affairs]]|before=[[Georges Bidault]]|after=[[Edgar Faure]]|years=1954–1955}}
{{succession box|title=[[Minister of State]]|before=—|after=—|years=1956}}
{{s-end}}

{{Heads of government of France}}
{{Foreign Ministers of France}}
{{Finance Ministers of France}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mendes-France, Pierre}}
[[Category:1907 births]]
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[[Category:French people of the First Indochina War]]
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