View source for Albert Lebrun

{{short description|President of France from 1932 to 1940}}
{{Expand French|topic=bio|date=January 2022}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2020}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name                = Albert Lebrun
| image               = Albert Lebrun 1932 (2) (cropped 2).jpg
| caption             = Lebrun in 1932
| office              = 15th [[President of France]]
| term_start          = 10 May 1932
| term_end            = 11 July 1940
| predecessor         = [[Paul Doumer]]<br />(as President)<br>[[André Tardieu]] (Acting President)
| primeminister       = [[André Tardieu]]<br>[[Édouard Herriot]]<br>[[Joseph Paul-Boncour]]<br>[[Édouard Daladier]]<br>[[Albert Sarraut]]<br>[[Camille Chautemps]]<br>[[Gaston Doumergue]]<br>[[Pierre-Étienne Flandin]]<br>[[Fernand Bouisson]]<br>[[Pierre Laval]]<br>[[Léon Blum]]<br>[[Paul Reynaud]]<br>[[Philippe Pétain]]
| successor           = [[Philippe Pétain]]<br />(Chief of the French State)<br>[[Vincent Auriol]] (as President)
| office1             = [[President of the Senate (France)|President of the Senate]]
| term_start1         = 11 June 1931
| term_end1           = 10 May 1932
| predecessor1        = [[Paul Doumer]]
| successor1          = [[Jules Jeanneney]]
| office2             = [[Minister of the Liberated Regions (France)|Minister of the Liberated Regions]]
| term_start2         = 23 November 1917
| term_end2           = 6 November 1919
| primeminister2      = [[Georges Clemenceau]]
| predecessor2        = [[Charles Jonnart]]
| successor2          = André Tardieu
| office3             = [[Minister of the Overseas (France)|Minister of the Colonies]]
| term_start3         = 9 December 1913
| term_end3           = 3 June 1914
| primeminister3      = Gaston Doumergue
| predecessor3        = [[Jean Morel (politician)|Jean Morel]]
| successor3          = [[Maurice Maunoury]]
| term_start4         = 27 June 1911
| term_end4           = 12 January 1913
| primeminister4      = [[Joseph Caillaux]]<br />[[Raymond Poincaré]]
| predecessor4        = [[Adolphe Messimy]]
| successor4          = [[René Besnard]]
| office5             = [[Ministry of the Armed Forces (France)|Minister of War]]
| term_start5         = 12 January 1913
| term_end5           = 20 January 1913
| primeminister5      = Raymond Poincaré
| predecessor5        = [[Alexandre Millerand]]
| successor5          = [[Eugène Étienne]]
| office6             = President of the [[Departmental council (France)|General Council]] of [[Meurthe-et-Moselle]]
| term_start6         = 20 August 1906
| term_end6           = 10 May 1932
| predecessor6        = [[Alfred Mézières]]
| successor6          = Albert Tourtel
| birth_date          = {{birth date|1871|8|29|df=y}}
| birth_place         = [[Mercy-le-Haut]], France
| death_date          = {{death date and age|1950|3|6|1871|8|29|df=y}}
| death_place         = Paris, France
| death_cause         = [[Pneumonia]]
| party               = [[Democratic Republican Alliance]]
| spouse              = [[Marguerite Lebrun|Marguerite Nivoit]]
| children            = 2
| signature           = Signature d'Albert Lebrun - Archives nationales (France).png
| alma_mater          = [[École polytechnique]]<br />[[École des mines de Paris]]
}}

'''Albert François Lebrun''' ({{IPA|fr|albɛʁ ləbʁœ̃|lang}}; 29 August 1871 – 6 March 1950)<!--Per MOS, full dates in infobox need not be repeated in lede--> was a French politician who served as [[President of France]] from 1932 to 1940. He was the last president of the [[French Third Republic|Third Republic]]. He was a member of the centre-right [[Democratic Republican Alliance]] (ARD).

==Biography==
{{More citations needed|section|date=August 2022}}

===Early life===
Born to a farming family in [[Mercy-le-Haut]], Meurthe-et-Moselle, he attended the [[École Polytechnique]] and the [[École des Mines de Paris]], graduating from both at the top of his class. He then became a mining engineer in [[Vesoul]] and [[Nancy, France|Nancy]], but left that profession at the age of 29 to enter politics.
<!--[[File:Albert Lebrun 1937.jpg|thumb|Lebrun in 1937]]-->

===Politics===
[[File:Albert Lebrun - Henri Manuel (1911).jpg|thumb|Albert Lebrun, 1911]]
Lebrun won a seat in the Chamber of Deputies in 1900 as a member of the Left Republican Party, later serving on the cabinet as Minister for the Colonies from 1912 to 1914, Minister of War in 1913 and [[Minister of Liberated Regions (France)|Minister for Liberated Regions]] from 1917 to 1919. Joining the Democratic Alliance, he was elected to the French senate from [[Meurthe-et-Moselle]] in 1920, and served as Vice President of the Senate from 1925 through 1929. He was president of that body from 1931 to 1932.

===President===
Lebrun was elected President of France by the newly elected Chamber of Deputies following the assassination of President [[Paul Doumer]] by [[Paul Gorguloff]] on 6 May 1932. Re-elected in 1939, largely because of his record of accommodating all political sides, he exercised little power as president.

In June 1940, with the [[Fall Rot#Battle|military collapse of France]] imminent, Lebrun wrote "the uselessness of the struggle was demonstrated. An end must be made."<ref>Lebrun, Albert, ''Témoignage'', p.80, cited by Spears, 1957, p.277n.</ref> With the Cabinet wanting to ask for an armistice, on 17 June 1940 Prime Minister [[Paul Reynaud]] resigned, recommending to President Lebrun that he appoint Marechal [[Philippe Pétain]] in his place, which he did that day.<ref>Werth, Alexander, ''France 1940-1955'', London, 1957, p.30.</ref> British General Sir [[Edward Spears]], who was present with the French cabinet during this crisis wrote "it is clear that the President had made up his mind that France was free of her obligations to Britain, and was at liberty to ask for [[Armistice of 22 June 1940|an armistice]] [with Germany] if she deemed it to be in her interests to do so."<ref>Spears, Major-General Sir Edward, ''Assignment to Catastrophe - The Fall of France June 1940'', London, 1954, vol.ii, p.302/304.</ref>

On 10 July 1940, Lebrun enacted the [[French Constitutional Law of 1940|Constitutional Law of 10 July 1940]], which the National Assembly had voted for by 569 votes to 80,<ref>Werth, 1957, p.31.</ref> allowing Prime Minister Philippe Pétain to promulgate a new constitution.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www2.assemblee-nationale.fr/decouvrir-l-assemblee/histoire/le-suffrage-universel |title=Le suffrage universel |work=[[National Assembly (France)|Assemblée nationale]] |language=fr |access-date=1 November 2021}}</ref> On 11 July, Lebrun was replaced by Pétain as head of state.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://mjp.univ-perp.fr/france/co1940.htm#1 |last=Maury |first=jean-Pierre |date=11 July 1949 |title=Acte constitutionnel n° 1 du 11 juillet 1940. |website=Digithèque MJP – France |language=fr |access-date=1 November 2021}}</ref>

Lebrun fled to [[Vizille]] (Isère) on 15 July, but was captured on 27 August 1943, when the Germans moved into the region. He was then sent into captivity at the [[Itter Castle]] in [[Tyrol (state)|Tyrol]]. On 10 October 1943 he was allowed to return to Vizille due to illness, but was kept under constant surveillance.<ref>https://www.annales.org/archives/x/lebrun.html (''Les Nazis l'autorisèrent à rentrer à Vizille (Isère) sous surveillance en octobre 1943.'')</ref> 

On 15 August 1944, [[Operation Dragoon]] began. One week later, [[Grenoble]], Vizille and other cities<!--- and L>ebrun---> were freed. The German [[19th Army (Wehrmacht)|19th Army]] withdrew quickly.

On 11 October 1944, Lebrun met with [[Charles de Gaulle]] and acknowledged the General's leadership. Conveniently forgetting the new Constitutional Law he had enacted in 1940, Lebrun said that he had not formally resigned as president because the dissolution of the National Assembly had left nobody to accept his resignation.{{Citation needed|date=March 2021}} Whether or not de Gaulle accepted this lie is unknown. During the post-war Petain trial "all the available celebrities of the Third Republic testified, including Lebrun, all whitewashing themselves".<ref>Werth, 1957, p.260,</ref> Lebrun argued again that he had never officially resigned. De Gaulle made no mystery of his low opinion of Lebrun, and wrote of him in his memoirs: "As a head of state he lacked two things: there was no state, and he wasn't a head."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=S. |first1=A. |last2=Gaulle |first2=Charles De |date=June 1960 |title=Memoires de guerre. T. III: Le salut (1944-1946) |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1527338 |journal=Population (French Edition) |volume=15 |issue=3 |pages=565 |doi=10.2307/1527338 |jstor=1527338 |issn=0032-4663|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

===Personal life===
Lebrun was married to [[Marguerite Lebrun]] (née Nivoit). Together they had two children: a son, Jean, and a daughter, Marie.<ref name="Taylor">{{cite news|last=Taylor|first=Edmund|title=France Gains A President And Loses A Premier|url=http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1932/05/11/page/6/article/france-gains-a-president-and-loses-a-premier|access-date=16 July 2017|publisher=Chicago Tribune|date=11 May 1932}}</ref>

===Later life===
After the war, Lebrun lived in retirement. He died of [[pneumonia]] in Paris on 6 March 1950 after a protracted illness.<ref>{{cite news |title=Albert Lebrun Taken by Death |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=M5EpAAAAIBAJ&pg=6191,3090619&dq=albert+lebrun&hl=en |agency=Associated Press |date=6 March 1950 |access-date=15 March 2011}}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Albert François Lebrun}}
* {{PM20|FID=pe/011087}}

{{s-start}}
{{s-off}}
{{S-bef|before=[[Adolphe Messimy]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Minister of the Overseas (France)|Minister of the Colonies]]|years=1911–1913}}
{{S-aft|after=[[René Besnard]]}}
|-
{{S-bef|before=[[Alexandre Millerand]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Minister of War (France)|Minister of War]]|years=1913}}
{{S-aft|after=[[Eugène Étienne]]}}
|-
{{S-bef|before=[[Jean Morel (politician)|Jean Morel]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Minister of the Overseas (France)|Minister of the Colonies]]|years=1913–1914}}
{{S-aft|after=[[Maurice Maunoury]]}}
|-
{{S-bef|before=[[Charles Jonnart]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Minister of Liberated Regions (France)|Minister of Liberated Regions]]|years=1917–1919}}
{{S-aft|after=[[André Tardieu]]}}
|-
{{S-bef|before=[[Paul Doumer]]|rows=2}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[List of presidents of the Senate of France|President of the Senate]]|years=1931–1932}}
{{S-aft|after=[[Jules Jeanneney]]}}
|-
{{s-ttl|title=[[President of France]]|years=1932–1940}}
{{S-vac|next=[[Vincent Auriol]]}}
{{S-reg}}
{{S-bef|before=[[Paul Doumer]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[List of co-princes of Andorra|Co-Prince of Andorra]]|years=1932–1940|alongside=<br>[[Justí Guitart i Vilardebó]]}}
{{S-aft|after=[[Philippe Pétain]]}}
{{S-end}}

{{Heads of state of France}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lebrun, Albert}}
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[[Category:École Polytechnique alumni]]
[[Category:Mines Paris - PSL alumni]]
[[Category:Corps des mines]]
[[Category:Deaths from pneumonia in France]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland)]]
[[Category:Grand Crosses of the Order of Saint-Charles]]
[[Category:Commanders Grand Cross of the Order of the Polar Star]]
[[Category:20th-century presidents in Europe]]