Raymond Poincaré, President of the French Republic during the Great War.

Raymond Poincaré (August 20, 1860 - October 15, 1934) was a French statesman who served as Prime Minister of France on five separate occasions and as President of France from 1913 to 1920.

Born in Bar-le-duc, Lorraine, France, the son of Nicolas Antoinin Hélène Poincaré, a distinguished civil servant and meteorologist. Educated at the university of Paris, Raymond was called to the Paris bar, and was for some time law editor of the Voltaire. He had served for over a year in the department of agriculture when in 1887 he was elected deputy for the Meuse. He made a great reputation in the Chamber as an economist, and sat on the budget commissions of 1890–1891 and 1892. He was minister of education, fine arts and religion in the first cabinet (April – November 1893) of Charles Dupuy, and minister of finance in the second and third (May 1894 – January 1895).

In Alexandre Ribot's cabinet Poincaré became minister of public instruction. Although he was excluded from the Radical cabinet which followed, the revised scheme of death duties proposed by the new ministry was based upon his proposals of the previous year. He became vice-president of the chamber in the autumn of 1895, and in spite of the bitter hostility of the Radicals retained his position in 1896 and 1897. In 1906 he returned to the ministry of finance in the short-lived Sarrien ministry. Poincaré had retained his practice at the bar during his political career, and he published several volumes of essays on literary and political subjects.

Poincaré became Prime Minister in January of 1912, and began to pursue a hard-line anti-German policy, noted for restoring close ties with France's Russian ally. He was elected President of the Republic in 1913, in succession to Armand Fallières and attempted to make that office into a site of power for the first time since MacMahon in the 1870s. He generally managed to continue to dominate foreign policy, in particular, and his anti-German sentiments were blamed by some for the outbreak of the First World War. He became increasingly sidelined after the accession to power of Georges Clemenceau as Prime Minister in 1917.

In 1920, Poincaré's term as President came to an end, and two years later he returned to office as Prime Minister. Once again, his tenure was noted for its strong anti-German policies, especially the Ruhr Occupation of 1923–1924, which was carried out in response to the Cuno government's failure to pay reparations. Eventually, the increasing cost of the occupation led to a defeat for Poincaré's conservative coalition in the 1924 parliamentary elections, and his government fell. Financial crisis, however, brought him back to power in 1926, and he once again became Prime Minister and Finance Minister until his retirement in 1929. He died in Paris in 1934.

His brother, Lucien Poincaré (b. 1862), famous as a physicist, became inspector-general of public instruction in 1902. He is the author of La Physique moderne (1906) and L'Electricité (1907). Jules Henri Poincaré (b. 1854), also a distinguished physicist and mathematician, belonged to another branch of the same family.

Contents

1 Poincaré's First Ministry, 14 January 1912 – 21 January 1913

2 Poincaré's Second Ministry, 15 January 1922 – 29 March 1924

3 Poincaré's Third Ministry, 29 March – 9 June 1924

4 Poincaré's Fourth Ministry, 23 July 1926 – 11 November 1928

5 Poincaré's Fifth Ministry, 11 November 1928 – 29 July 1929

Poincaré's First Ministry, 14 January 1912 – 21 January 1913

Raymond Poincaré - President of the Council and Minister of Foreign Affairs
Alexandre Millerand - Minister of War
Théodore Steeg - Minister of the Interior
Louis Lucien Klotz - Minister of Finance
Léon Bourgeois - Minister of Labour and Social Security Provisions
Aristide Briand - Minister of Justice
Théophile Delcassé - Minister of Marine
Gabriel Guist'hau - Minister of Public Instruction and Fine Arts
Jules Pams - Minister of Agriculture
Albert Lebrun - Minister of Colonies
Jean Dupuy - Minister of Public Works, Posts, and Telegraphs
Fernand David - Minister of Commerce and Industry

Changes

12 January 1913 - Albert Lebrun succeeds Millerand as Minister of War. René Besnard succeeds Lebrun as Minister of Colonies.

Poincaré's Second Ministry, 15 January 1922 – 29 March 1924

Raymond Poincaré - President of the Council and Minister of Foreign Affairs
André Maginot - Minister of War
Maurice Maunoury - Minister of the Interior
Charles de Lasteyrie - Minister of Finance
Albert Peyronnet - Minister of Labour
Louis Barthou - Minister of Justice
Flaminius Raiberti - Minister of Marine
Léon Bérard - Minister of Public Instruction and Fine Arts
Henry Chéron - Minister of Agriculture
Albert Sarraut - Minister of Colonies
Yves Le Trocquer - Minister of Public Works
Paul Strauss - Minister of Hygiene, Welfare Work, and Social Security Provisions
Lucien Dior - Minister of Commerce and Industry
Charles Reibel - Minister of Liberated Regions

Changes

5 October 1922 - Maurice Colrat succeeds Barthou as Minister of Justice.

Poincaré's Third Ministry, 29 March – 9 June 1924

Raymond Poincaré - President of the Council and Minister of Foreign Affairs
André Maginot - Minister of War
Justin de Selves - Minister of the Interior
Frédéric François-Marsal - Minister of Finance
Charles Daniel-Vincent - Minister of Labour and Hygiene
Edmond Lefebvre du Prey - Minister of Justice
Maurice Bokanowski - Minister of Marine
Henry de Jouvenel - Minister of Public Instruction, Fine Arts, and Technical Education
Joseph Capus - Minister of Agriculture
Jean Fabry - Minister of Colonies
Yves Le Trocquer - Minister of Public Works, Ports, and Marine
Louis Loucheur - Minister of Commerce, Industry, Posts, and Telegraphs
Louis Marin - Minister of Liberated Regions

Poincaré's Fourth Ministry, 23 July 1926 – 11 November 1928

Raymond Poincaré - President of the Council and Minister of Finance
Aristide Briand - Minister of Foreign Affairs
Paul Painlevé - Minister of War
Albert Sarraut - Minister of the Interior
André Fallières - Minister of Labour, Hygiene, Welfare Work, and Social Security Provisions
Louis Barthou - Minister of Justice
Georges Leygues - Minister of Marine
Édouard Herriot - Minister of Public Instruction and Fine Arts
Louis Marin - Minister of Pensions
Henri Queuille - Minister of Agriculture
Léon Perrier - Minister of Colonies
André Tardieu - Minister of Public Works
Maurice Bokanowski - Minister of Commerce and Industry

Changes

1 June 1928 - Louis Loucheur succeeds Fallières as Minister of Labour, Hygiene, Welfare Work, and Social Security Provisions
14 September 1928 - Laurent Eynac enters the ministry as Minister of Air. Henry Chéron succeeds Bokanowski as Minister of Commerce and Industry, and also becomes Minister of Posts and Telegraphs.

Poincaré's Fifth Ministry, 11 November 1928 – 29 July 1929

Raymond Poincaré - President of the Council
Aristide Briand - Minister of Foreign Affairs
Paul Painlevé - Minister of War
André Tardieu - Minister of the Interior
Henry Chéron - Minister of Finance
Louis Loucheur - Minister of Labour, Hygiene, Welfare Work, and Social Security Provisions
Louis Barthou - Minister of Justice
Georges Leygues - Minister of Marine
Laurent Eynac - Minister of Air
Pierre Marraud - Minister of Public Instruction and Fine Arts
Louis Antériou - Minister of Pensions
Jean Hennessy - Minister of Agriculture
André Maginot - Minister of Colonies
Pierre Forgeot - Minister of Public Works
Georges Bonnefous - Minister of Commerce and Industry