Pierre-Édouard Deldique receives in Ideas, under the theme of Napoleon III: Xavier Mauduit, associate professor, doctor of history, specialist in the Second Empire, author of “Napoleon IIIto PUFs.
From his birth in 1808 to his death in 1873, the life of Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte is an epic. Son of King Louis and nephew of Emperor Napoleon, his future looks bright. Exiled at the fall of the Empire, he fights for freedom in Italy then tries twice to take power in France, but he is sentenced to life imprisonment. He escapes and joins London where he leads the life of a dandy, without losing his political ambitions. After the revolution of 1848, elected by universal male suffrage, he became President of the Republic. It was a military defeat against Prussia that marked the end of an essential reign in our history, by the image given to power, the “imperial feast”, and by the original political proposal, Caesarism, even if it was long decried.