Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte and Victor Hugo: Contrasting Visions of Political Legitimacy

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[...] He builds the bridle of a collective identity to rally the army and to show his legitimacy by exploiting symbols (Nora, 1984). He also evokes the revolutions of 1830 and 1848 as defeats of the army in the face of the people (Milza, 2007) and recalls the treatment they received. He is then likely trying to play on the ego of the soldiers by telling them that it is the best time to show their strength while installing a symbolic continuity between the First Empire. [...]

[...] However, he considers here that the army betrays its role in supporting a coup d'état seen as an attack on the rights of the people of France. II. Contrast in the conception of political legitimacy a. Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte: justification of a legitimate and providential power Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte presents himself as the incarnation of the popular will, which he describes as superior to that of parliamentary institutions.: 'The Assembly tried to attack the authority that I hold from the entire nation; it has ceased to exist' to 11). He mobilizes here the popular support acquired during his election in 1848. [...]

[...] (2002). La Deuxième République and the Second Empire. Paris : Armand Colin. Pansini, V. (2015). The battle, event in space: localization, memory, celebration Marengo June 1800. In A. Boltanski, Y. Lagadec & F. Mercier (Eds.), La bataille : from the fact of arms to the ideological combat, 11th-19th century (pp. 245-259). Rennes, France : Presses universitaires de Rennes. [...]

[...] Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte proposed an authoritarian and providentialist vision of the State where the army represented a loyal instrument in service to the leader. He mobilized his family prestige to represent himself as the guarantor of national unity. He put forward a personal approach to sovereignty around his authority guided by the will of the people. Victor Hugo promoted a republican and emancipatory vision of the army. He put forward the roles of the army as guardians of the values of the Republic and the sovereignty of the people. [...]

[...] However, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte sought to modify this Constitution, but he faced parliamentary opposition. Faced with this obstacle, he decided, on 2 December 1851, to carry out a coup d'état by dissolving the National Assembly and establishing an authoritarian regime: the Second Empire. The two studied texts therefore inscribe themselves in this political climate. The first letter is written by Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (1808-1873), on December the day of the coup d'état. He is the nephew of Napoleon I and president of the Republic elected by universal male suffrage under the Second Republic (1848-1851). [...]