Government of National Defence (1870)

After Gambetta proclaimed the Republic at the Hôtel de Ville on 4 September, the government at once assumed control of all affairs in France and resolved to continue the war. Its members were Louis-Jules Trochu as president (also governor of Paris), Jules Favre as vice-president and foreign minister, Léon Gambetta as interior minister, Le Flô at war, Fourichon at the navy, Picard at finance, Jules Ferry as secretary, Jules Simon at education, Crémieux at justice, Dorian at public works and Rochefort, Glais-Bizoin, Garnier-Pagès and Pelletan as ministers without portfolio. Various factions except the Bonapartists were included, but Orleanists, Legitimists and conservatives held real power, and the Orleanist Trochu accepted the presidency on a promise to "resolutely defend religion, property, and the family". One account says the leading powers except Prussia recognised the government within days; another that only the United States and Spain did so at once. Bismarck asked whether a body composed entirely of Parisians could act as France's government, and, since the emperor was a captive and the empress in exile but there had been no abdication de jure, called Napoleon III "the legitimate ruler of France". The government recalled troops from Rome, Algeria and the colonies to Paris, strengthened the fortifications and stockpiled food, and when Paris was surrounded on 20 September left a delegation under Fourichon and Crémieux at Tours. On 7 October Gambetta left Paris by balloon and directed the war from Tours as minister of the interior and of war; cut off from each other, the governments in Paris and Tours often acted without consulting, and Gambetta became the virtual dictator of unoccupied France.

The government was reluctant to try to break out, and when the "great sortie" of the night of 28 November and the sortie of 18 January 1871 failed, Parisian opinion heaped blame on it. The government suspected the National Guard as "a rabble of ill-disciplined drunks", while the population saw the Guard as an unstoppable force. On 22 January the government sacked Trochu as governor of Paris in favour of Vinoy, though he remained president of the republic, and Favre became the de facto leader; a small rising on 23 January was crushed by force, further infuriating the city. On 28 January Favre signed the convention on the armistice and the capitulation of Paris with Bismarck, accepting 200 million francs within a fortnight, over five billion francs in total reparations and the surrender of the forts around Paris. Gambetta, told by telegram on the 29th, wished to fight on but was persuaded to step down by diplomats who arrived from Paris by train, and resigned on 6 February. The elections of 8 February returned an overwhelming number of conservative rural deputies, and the National Assembly, seated at Versailles, elected Thiers chief executive; he took over from Trochu on 13 February. The new government's financial laws, passed in haste to pay the reparations and oblige the Prussians to leave, angered Parisians and led to the Paris Commune.