People of the Revolution and the USSR

France state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1841–1929 ○ Died

Radical French prime minister at the end of the First World War who pressed harsh terms on Hungary at the Paris Peace Conference

A physician turned journalist from the Vendée, he became mayor of the 18th arrondissement of Paris in 1870 and the next year tried to broker a compromise between the Paris Commune and the government. A key figure of the Independent Radicals, he advocated the separation of church and state. As interior minister in 1906 he ordered repressive policies toward the workers’ movement and was nicknamed “the Tiger”, and he was prime minister in 1906–1909 and 1917–1920. Appointed in November 1917 at one of the darkest hours of the war, he demanded total victory over Germany and achieved the Treaty of Versailles at the Paris Peace Conference. Seeking to weaken Hungary as Germany was weakened, he brought about the stringent terms of the Treaty of Trianon. He died in 1929.

United States state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1856–1924 ○ Natural death

US president whose Fourteen Points and League of Nations failed to win the Senate’s ratification

Born in Virginia, he was president of Princeton University and governor of New Jersey before winning the presidency in 1912, and in his first year imposed racial segregation across the federal bureaucracy. In April 1917 he asked Congress to declare war over unrestricted submarine warfare, and in January 1918 set out the Fourteen Points, with a League of Nations and self-determination. At the Paris Peace Conference he presided over the drafting of the League Covenant but conceded much to the other powers to get it. A stroke in October 1919 incapacitated him, and his refusal of a compromise sank the Senate’s ratification of the treaty. The Palmer Raids of the Red Scare came in the same years. He received the 1919 Nobel Peace Prize and died in 1924.

Italy state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1860–1952 ○ Natural death

Italian prime minister who led the country to victory after Caporetto but failed to win its territorial claims at the peace conference

Born in Palermo, he became a renowned law professor and from 1897 sat in the Chamber of Deputies as a Liberal. When the government fell after the defeat at Caporetto in October 1917 he became prime minister, dismissed Cadorna and rebuilt the army, and the victory of Vittorio Veneto in 1918 earned him the name “Premier of Victory”. At the peace conference he demanded Dalmatia, promised by the Treaty of London, and Fiume, obtained neither, walked out in April 1919 and resigned in June. The “mutilated victory” helped Mussolini’s rise. He at first supported Mussolini but broke with him after the murder of Matteotti in 1924. He died in Rome in 1952.

United Kingdom state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1863–1945 ○ Natural death

Liberal prime minister who led Britain in the later war and argued for moderation towards Germany at the peace conference

Born in Manchester to Welsh parents, he made his name as a radical Liberal orator. As chancellor of the exchequer he introduced the 1909 People’s Budget and the National Insurance Act, laying foundations of the welfare state. After serving as minister of munitions and secretary for war he became prime minister in December 1916. At the Paris Peace Conference he opposed reparations that would wreck the German economy and sought to check French dominance. In 1921 he concluded the Anglo-Soviet Trade Agreement and negotiated the creation of the Irish Free State, but resigned in 1922 when the Conservatives left the coalition. In 1936 he met Hitler and praised him. He died in 1945.

Finland state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1865–1952 ○ Natural causes

Jurist who shaped Finland’s republican constitution and, as its first president, sought to reconcile the defeated Reds

Born in Suomussalmi in 1865, he was a jurist and a constitutionalist of the Young Finnish Party who resisted Russification by legal means. He was senator for trade and industry in the Mechelin Senate in 1905–1907, professor of administrative law at the University of Helsinki in 1908–1918 and Speaker of Parliament in 1914. As chairman of the Constitutional Council from 1917 he led the drafting of the republican constitution, and in 1918 he backed a republic against the constitutional monarchy favoured by the victors of the civil war. Elected the first president by Parliament in July 1919, defeating Mannerheim by 143 votes to 50, he favoured peace with Soviet Russia, pardoned most of the Red prisoners and ratified the Treaty of Tartu. He did not seek re-election in 1925, was kidnapped by Lapua Movement activists in 1930 and died in 1952.

Hungary Liberalism and republicanism 1871–1944 ○ Heart attack

Last prime minister of the Hungarian People’s Republic, who resigned with his cabinet over the Vix note

A lawyer from a Calvinist family in Komárom County, he headed the international department of the Ministry of Justice until 1918 and was a founding member of the social-science review Huszadik Század. After the Aster Revolution he was justice minister in the Károlyi government from November 1918 and became prime minister in January 1919. When the French Lieutenant Colonel Fernand Vix handed him the Entente note on 20 March, he resigned with his cabinet rather than accept terms that violated the country’s territorial integrity, opening the way to the Soviet Republic. He then withdrew from politics, worked as a lawyer from 1920 and published studies in international, criminal and private law. He died of a heart attack in Budapest in 1944.

Hungary Liberalism and republicanism 1875–1955 ○ Natural causes

Liberal aristocrat who came to power in the Aster Revolution and was president of the First Hungarian Republic

Born into an extremely wealthy Catholic aristocratic family, he led the small anti-war faction in parliament that demanded an immediate peace during the First World War. The Aster Revolution of October 1918 made him prime minister; when the People’s Republic was proclaimed on 16 November he also became provisional head of state, and in January 1919 he was recognised as president. As an example for land reform he gave his family estates to his tenants. After his government fell over the Vix note in March 1919 the Soviet Republic was proclaimed, and in July he went into exile. He returned in 1946 and was ambassador to France from 1947 to 1949, resigning in protest at the Rajk trial, and died in Vence, France, in 1955.

Hungary Liberalism and republicanism 1875–1957 ○ Died

Social scientist who led the Radical Party and served as minister of nationalities in the Károlyi government

Born to a Jewish doctor’s family in Nagykároly, he saw the family change its name to Jászi and convert to Calvinism in 1881. In 1900 he co-founded the social-science review Huszadik Század (Twentieth Century) and became its leading editor for two decades, arguing for universal secret suffrage and land reform. In June 1914 he founded the National Civic Radical Party. After the Aster Revolution of October 1918 he became minister of nationalities in the Károlyi government and tried to keep the minorities within Hungary by offering them maximum autonomy, but failed and resigned in December. Unable to tolerate the Soviet Republic’s denial of freedom of thought and conscience, he emigrated on 1 May 1919. In 1925 he joined the faculty of Oberlin College in the United States as a history professor, wrote The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy (1929) and died in Oberlin in 1957.

Germany state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1878–1929 ○ Natural death

Weimar chancellor who ended passive resistance in 1923 and, as foreign minister, concluded the Locarno treaties

Born in Berlin, he entered the Reichstag for the National Liberals in 1907 and during the war backed annexations and unrestricted submarine warfare. After the defeat he founded the German People’s Party and came to accept the republic. Chancellor and foreign minister from August 1923, he ended passive resistance in the Ruhr, used the army to remove the Saxon and Thuringian governments that included Communists, and halted hyperinflation with the Rentenmark. Ousted by a no-confidence vote in November, he remained foreign minister until his death, shaping the Dawes Plan, the Locarno treaties and entry into the League of Nations, and shared the 1926 Nobel Peace Prize. He died of a stroke in 1929.

France state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1878–1966 ○ Natural causes

A republican statesman who urged resistance in the face of defeat

In June 1940, he argued that France should continue the war from North Africa.

Paul Reynaud was a French republican statesman and lawyer whose independent positions ranged across economics, colonial policy, and defence. Facing Nazi Germany, he pressed for wartime financial mobilisation and modern warfare built around tanks and air power. When France collapsed in 1940, he sought to preserve the alliance with Britain and continue the war from North Africa, but resigned as premier after the armistice camp prevailed and was subsequently detained by Vichy and Germany. After liberation he returned to parliament and remained a prominent defender of parliamentary government.

Finland state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1879–1943 ○ Natural causes

Finnish forest scientist and statesman who built forest-type theory and led the cabinet on the eve of war

During the Winter War the poorly equipped reservists, sent out with little beyond civilian clothes, a belt and a rifle, were popularly nicknamed 'Model Cajander'. The label stuck to him as premier, though responsibility for the defence shortfalls was not his alone.

Finnish forest scientist and politician. Born in Uusikaupunki, he took a botany doctorate in 1903 based on Siberian fieldwork, became docent in botany at Helsinki in 1904 and professor of silviculture in 1911. Acting director-general of the Forest Board (Metsähallitus) in 1918 and director-general in 1934, he led state forest administration until his death. He was prime minister three times, in 1922, 1924 and 1937, and chaired the National Progressive Party from 1933. He resigned after the Winter War began and died at the Parliament House on 21 January 1943.

Spanish Republic Liberalism and republicanism 1880–1940 ○ Natural causes

The last president of the Republic who embodied the republican cause but crossed into France and resigned when Catalonia fell

'Peace, pity, and pardon.' On 18 July 1938, the second anniversary of the rising, Azaña spoke for seventy-four minutes from Barcelona's city hall, pleading for an end to the bloodshed and reconciliation. Neither Franco's camp nor the hardliners in his own Republic would listen.

The last President of the Second Spanish Republic and the symbolic centre of the Republican cause throughout the Civil War. As war minister and prime minister from 1931 he drove military reform, anti-clerical legislation and land redistribution; in 1934 he built the Popular Front and won the 1936 election, becoming president, but once the war began real power passed to his prime ministers. In July 1938 he appealed for 'Peace, Pity, Pardon' from the Barcelona city hall, but Franco would accept only unconditional surrender, and after Catalonia fell in February 1939 Azaña walked the Pyrenees into France and resigned. Condemned as desertion even inside republican ranks, his act stripped the remaining Republic of legitimacy, and he died in occupied France a year later.

United States state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1882–1945 ○ Cerebral hemorrhage

The only four-term president, who carried America through depression and war and spent his last strength at Yalta

Returning from Yalta, Roosevelt addressed Congress on March 1, 1945 seated — the first time he publicly conceded to the disability he had hidden all his public life.

Roosevelt was the 32nd president of the United States, the only one elected to four terms, who led the country through the Great Depression and the Second World War. His New Deal redefined the role of the federal government, and after Pearl Harbor he drove the Allied war effort under a Europe-first strategy. At the Yalta Conference in February 1945, already gravely weakened by congestive heart failure and hypertension, he staked his personal diplomacy with Stalin on two overriding goals: Soviet entry into the Pacific war and the founding of the United Nations. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage two months later, and his Yalta agreements (praised for securing the UN and criticized for conceding Eastern Europe) remained a flashpoint of Cold War historiography.

United Kingdom state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1883–1946 ○ Natural death

British economist who left the Treasury in protest at the peace treaty and warned of the damage reparations would do

Born in Cambridge, he studied mathematics at King’s College. Entering the Treasury in 1915, he designed the terms of credit between Britain and its continental allies. At the Paris Peace Conference he tried to keep Germany’s reparations within its capacity to pay but was largely excluded from the high-level talks, and the treaty’s outcome led to his resignation from the Treasury. The Economic Consequences of the Peace (1919), predicting the treaty’s damaging effects, made him internationally famous. In the Depression he argued that aggregate demand determined the level of economic activity and called for fiscal and monetary policy against slumps, publishing The General Theory in 1936. He led the British delegation at Bretton Woods in 1944, where the American plan largely prevailed. He died of heart attacks in 1946.

France state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1884–1970 ○ Illness

The Radicals' 'Bull of Vaucluse', who helped build the Popular Front and dismantled it with his own hands

'Ah! les cons! s'ils savaient...', the words attributed to him on seeing the crowds cheering at Le Bourget airfield on his return from Munich on 30 September 1938. Whether he said them, and where and to whom, is disputed.

A baker's son and history teacher who rose to lead the Radical Party. He quit as premier after the 6 February 1934 riot, then as defence minister from June 1936 helped sustain the Popular Front, but after returning as premier in April 1938 he ended the 40-hour week by decree in November and broke the general strike. He signed the Munich accords in September 1938, declared war on Germany on 3 September 1939 and banned the Communist Party after the Nazi-Soviet pact. He fell over the failure to aid Finland in March 1940, stood trial at Riom and was interned near Buchenwald and at Itter Castle until 5 May 1945. Back in the Chamber after the war, he opposed de Gaulle's full powers in 1958 and died in Paris on 10 October 1970.

Greece state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1888–1968 ○ Died

A liberal statesman at the threshold of liberation and civil war

At Caserta, he agreed that military command after liberation would pass to the British commander, General Scobie.

A Greek liberal politician, Papandreou opposed the monarchy while also confronting the communist movement, combining social reform with firm anti-communism. During the Second World War he led the government-in-exile and, through the Lebanon Conference and the Caserta Agreement, helped establish a framework for resistance participation in government and the integration of armed forces. Returning in 1944 as prime minister of the Government of National Unity, he sought to restore state authority amid British intervention and conflict between EAM and non-EAM forces, a project that gave way to the Dekemvriana and civil war. He later founded the Centre Union and defended parliamentary democracy until his death under house arrest after the 1967 military coup.

Finland state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1889–1956 ○ War-responsibility conviction 1946, pardoned 1949

Finnish president who, as wartime prime minister, negotiated the Moscow Peace Treaty

This trial is a farce. The real prosecutor is not the Finnish state but the government of one superpower, and the real defendant is the Finnish people.

When the Winter War broke out, Risto Ryti became prime minister of Finland and led the legitimate government that the Soviet Union refused to recognize while backing the Terijoki puppet regime; he negotiated the Moscow Peace Treaty in March 1940. A liberal economist and governor of the Bank of Finland, he was elected president and led Finland through the Continuation War in cooperation with Germany, but in 1944 he signed the Ryti-Ribbentrop Agreement in his personal capacity and resigned, enabling his successor Mannerheim to make peace with the USSR. Convicted to ten years' imprisonment in the post-war war-responsibility trials under Soviet pressure, he was pardoned in 1949 and is remembered in Finland as a leader who sacrificed himself for his country.

France state institutions Liberalism and republicanism 1902–1989 ○ Natural causes

A Radical Socialist who defended the Republic

“Long live the Republic all the same!”

Vincent Badie was a French Radical Socialist lawyer and politician who worked in local government and parliament, defending veterans and republican institutions. In July 1940 he accepted that constitutional revision might be considered, but rejected transferring power to Pétain in a way that would abolish the Republic; he tried to present a motion signed by 27 parliamentarians and then voted against the grant of full powers. After Vichy suspended him as mayor, he joined the Resistance, was arrested, and deported to Dachau. After the war he returned to parliament and twice served as minister for veterans, while also defending French colonial rule and overseas presence.