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THE SECOND REPUBLIC, THE ERA OF LOUIS NAPOLEON, AND THE THIRD REPUBLIC |
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LINK TO... 2ND, 3RD REPUBLICS |
The Second Republic only survived until 1852 when Napoleon Bonaparte's nephew, Louis Napoleon, established another empire that lasted until his humiliating defeat in the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. The forces of the monarchists finally were gone, but the pattern of conflicting extremes (the "swing effect") was not. In 1870, the Paris Commune was founded, and radicals held out for two months until defeated by the conservative French forces. The conflict now was between communist influenced plebiscitarians (populists) and republicans who supported representative government. The conservative forces won, and the Third Republic was founded. The Third Republic was founded in 1871, and a new constitution was written in 1875. Because the constitution was a compromise of left and right points of view, the Third Republic was the longest regime in modern France, lasting under the Nazi takeover of France in 1940. The constitution gave great powers to the National Assembly, and the executive was a virtual figurehead, but the compromise was one that divided the least. Who was this lesser known Napoleon, anyway? 
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