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SUMMARY:The French Army and the Plebiscite of 1870 - Neil Rogachevsky (Sid
 ney Sussex)
DTSTART:20120529T163000Z
DTEND:20120529T180000Z
UID:TALK37756@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Ilya Berkovich
DESCRIPTION:In May of 1870 the beleaguered French Emperor Napoleon III cal
 led Frenchmen by universal suffrage to ratify the liberal changes effected
  in the imperial constitution and inaugurate the liberal empire. After muc
 h internal debate\, the emperor decided that army personnel would vote as 
 well\, (this for the first time in the Second Empire)\, and their dual rol
 e as participants in the election and guarantors of public order became a 
 subject of great controversy. My paper will consider specifically how the 
 French army behaved in this plebiscite campaign\, and argue that the army 
 was torn between rival impulses. On one hand there was strong antipathy to
  the liberal empire and voting in the army. But\, the army\, out of choice
  as well as necessity\, could not completely keep itself apart from the 
 ‘liberal drift’ of the regime. In everything from punishing insubordin
 ation and keeping the peace during the plebiscite campaign\, the army ulti
 mately went along with the new liberal approach.
LOCATION:Seminar Room N7\, Pembroke College
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