French Second Republic

The French Second Republic was proclaimed in Paris on 24 February 1848, when the February Revolution forced King Louis-Philippe to abdicate and ended the July Monarchy. A provisional government under Alphonse de Lamartine took office, accepted the right to work, created the National Workshops for the unemployed and introduced direct universal male suffrage, which brought the uneducated masses into the electorate for the first time. The Constituent Assembly elected in April was dominated by moderate republicans, and the socialist challenge was crushed in the June Days of 24 to 26 June, when workers and soldiers fought in the streets of eastern Paris. The constitution promulgated on 4 November 1848 created a single assembly and a president elected for four years and barred from standing again. Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte won that election on 10 December with more than five million votes against 1.4 million for Cavaignac, presenting himself as the defender of order and of his uncle's name. When the assembly refused to revise the constitution, he seized power in the coup of 2 December 1851 and in 1852 had himself proclaimed Emperor Napoleon III. The short republic left a durable legacy in universal male suffrage and the motto Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité, but its slide from social republic to plebiscitary empire set the pattern for French politics for two decades.