Joseph Caillaux

France state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1863–1944 ○ Natural causes

Radical premier who championed the income tax and settled the 1911 Moroccan crisis by negotiating with Germany

Born in Le Mans in 1863, he entered the civil service in 1888 as an inspector of finance, was elected deputy for the Sarthe in 1898 and was finance minister from 1899 and again in 1906. As President of the Council from June 1911 he settled the Second Moroccan Crisis by negotiating with Germany, but resigned in January 1912 when his secret talks behind the President's back came out. Elected president of the Radical Party in 1912, he championed an income tax, and in March 1914 resigned as finance minister after his wife shot dead Gaston Calmette, editor of Le Figaro. His wartime advocacy of a compromise peace led to his arrest for treason and a three-year sentence in 1920. Amnestied in 1925, he returned as senator and finance minister.