Return To France
Louis-Napoléon lived in Great Britain until the revolution of February 1848 in France deposed Louis-Philippe and established a Republic. He was now free to return to France, which he immediately did. The provisional government, however, judged him an unnecessary distraction and requested his departure. Back in England, he volunteered to be a special constable in the event of Chartist rioting. In the same month, April, he ran for, and won a seat in the Constituent Assembly elected to draft a new constitution. He did not make a great contribution and, as a mediocre public orator, failed to impress his fellow members. Some even thought that, having lived outside of France almost all his life, he spoke French with a slight German accent. His temporary exile in 1848 proved to be a blessing in disguise for the December presidential election, as it meant he played no part in the June Days, and was able to enhance his image as "all things to all men" against his main opponent, Louis-Eugène Cavaignac, who had led the repression against the working-class of Paris.
Read more about this topic: Napoleon III
Famous quotes containing the words return to, return and/or france:
“I find very reasonable the Celtic belief that the souls of our dearly departed are trapped in some inferior being, in an animal, a plant, an inanimate object, indeed lost to us until the day, which for some never arrives, when we find that we pass near the tree, or come to possess the object which is their prison. Then they quiver, call us, and as soon as we have recognized them, the spell is broken. Freed by us, they have vanquished death and return to live with us.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“I find very reasonable the Celtic belief that the souls of our dearly departed are trapped in some inferior being, in an animal, a plant, an inanimate object, indeed lost to us until the day, which for some never arrives, when we find that we pass near the tree, or come to possess the object which is their prison. Then they quiver, call us, and as soon as we have recognized them, the spell is broken. Freed by us, they have vanquished death and return to live with us.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“It is not enough that France should be regarded as a country which enjoys the remains of a freedom acquired long ago. If she is still to count in the world—and if she does not intend to, she may as well perish—she must be seen by her own citizens and by all men as an ever-flowing source of liberty. There must not be a single genuine lover of freedom in the whole world who can have a valid reason for hating France.”
—Simone Weil (1909–1943)