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Georges Benjamin Clemenceau was a French statesman who was prime minister of France from 1906 to 1909 and again from 1917 until 1920. A physician turned journalist, he played a central role in the politics of the Third Republic, particularly amid the end of the First World War. He was a key figure of the Independent Radicals, advocating for the separation of church and state, as well as the amnest…
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politics · Prime Minister of France (1906–1909, 1917–1920) · politician · journalist · physician · screenwriter · novelist · head of government · mayor · teacher · author · minister · also Georges Clemenceau, Georges Benjamin Clemenceau, Clemenceau
Born 28 September 1841 · Died 24 November 1929 · Q171730
79 published statements · 0 followers
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We need a barrier behind which, in the years to come, our people can work in security to rebuild its ruins. The barrier is the Rhine. I must take national feelings into account. That does not mean that I am afraid of losing office. I am quite indifferent on that point. But I will not, by giving up the occupation, do something which will break the willpower of our people.
I used to be an idealist, but the older I grow the more I am convinced that it is Force that counts.
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“We need a barrier behind which, in the years to come, our people can work in security to rebuild its ruins. The barrier is the Rhine. I must take national feelings into account. That does not mean that I am afraid of losing office. I am quite indifferent on that point. But I will not, by giving up the occupation, do something which will break the willpower of our people.”
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Foreign Affairs: The Tiger: Georges Clemenceau
MutualArt.com: Georges Clemenceau
PBS: Georges Clemenceau
“Como citado no "The Unlawful Concert : An Account of the Presidio Mutiny Case" (1970) por Fred Gardner.”
“Original French, as quoted in The End of an Age, and Other Essays (1948) by William Ralph Inge, p. 139: Quatorze? Le bon Dieu n'a que dix.”
Was to be named after Clemenceau
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“I used to be an idealist, but the older I grow the more I am convinced that it is Force that counts.”
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“Como citado em "Soixante Anneés d'Histoire Française" [Sessenta anos de história francesa] (1932), de Georges Suarez”
Died 1929-11-24.
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“All that I know I learned after I was thirty.”
“Bismarck is a dangerous enemy, but even more dangerous perhaps as a friend: he showed us Tunis, placing us in conflict with England, and is now negotiating with us over the Congo.”
“Absurdo é o homem que nunca muda.”
“La guerre! C’est une chose trop grave pour la confier à des militaires.”
“The difficulty between us and Germany is this: that Germany believes that the logic of her victory means domination, while we do not believe that the logic of our defeat is serfdom [vassalité].”
“The Germans may take Paris, but that will not prevent me from going on with the war. We will fight on the Loire, we will fight on the Garronne, we will fight even in the Pyrenees. And if at last we are driven off the Pyrenees, we will continue the war at sea.”
“[Clemenceau] said that the Rhine was a natural boundary of Gaul and Germany and that it ought to be made the German boundary now, the territory between the Rhine and the French frontier being made into an Independent State whose neutrality should be guaranteed by the great powers.”
“Mr. Wilson bores me with his Fourteen Points; why, God Almighty has only Ten!”
“Variant: Fourteen? The good Lord had only ten.”
“We need a barrier behind which, in the years to come, our people can work in security to rebuild its ruins. That barrier is the Rhine. I must take national feelings into account. That does not mean that I am afraid of losing office. I am quite indifferent on that point. But I will not, by giving up the occupation, do something which will break the willpower of our people.”
“I do not know whether war is an interlude in peace, or whether peace is an interlude in war.”
“I have come to the conclusion that force is right. Why is this chicken here? (pointing to his plate). Because it was not strong enough to resist those who wanted to kill it. And a very good thing too!”
“Variant translation: War is too important a matter to be left to the military.”
“War is too serious a matter to leave to soldiers.”
“A young man who isn't a socialist hasn't got a heart; an old man who is a socialist hasn't got a head.”
“Opis: znany przydomek, jaki zyskał z powodu bezkompromisowości w dyskusjach”
“America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to degeneration without the usual interval of civilization.”
“Military justice is to justice what military music is to music.”
“Americans have no capacity for abstract thought, and make bad coffee.”
“There is no passion like that of a functionary for his function.”
“Ah, se io potessi pisciare come lui [Vittorio Emanuele Orlando] piange!”
As an undoing of the entente between France and Britain
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Awarded Order of the White Eagle (Second Polish Republic) (1922).
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“As for France, it is a real enemy who disappears. Lloyd George did not hide it: at my last visit to London he cynically admitted it”
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Clemenceau remarked, "As for France, it is a real enemy who disappears
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And said if he had been in power, he would have persuaded the British to join it
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Awarded Honorary doctor of the University of Liège (1919).
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“Declaração para Woodrow Wilson em Paris na Conferência da Paz (12 de janeiro de 1919), conforme citado no "The Macmillan Dictionary of Political Quotations" (1993) por Lewis D. Eigen e Jonathan Paul Siegel, p. 689”
France adopted a new electoral system and the legislative election gave the National Bloc (a coalition of right-wing parties) a majority
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“Discours de Paix" [Discurso sobre a Paz], Verdun (20 de Julho de 1919)”
(which came into operation in October 1920) prohibited employment in bakeries between the hours of 10 P
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“Discours de Paix" [Speech on Peace] Verdun (20 July 1919)”
“Referring to his rival Raymond Poincaré, as quoted in Paris 1919 : Six Months That Changed the World (2003) by Margaret MacMillan, p. 33”
“Remarks to Woodrow Wilson (28 March 1919), quoted in Anthony Adamthwaite, Grandeur and Misery: France's Bid for Power in Europe 1914-1940 (London: Arnold, 1995), p. 49”
“Remarks to Poincaré in Cabinet (25 April 1919), quoted in David Robin Watson, Georges Clemenceau: A Political Biography (London: Eyre Methuen, 1974), p. 352”
“Statement to Woodrow Wilson at the Paris Peace Conference (12 January 1919), as quoted in The Macmillan Dictionary of Political Quotations (1993) by Lewis D. Eigen and Jonathan Paul Siegel, p. 689”
“Arguing against seeking the death penalty for the anarchist who had attempted to assassinate him on 19 February 1919, shooting at him seven times and hitting him only once in the chest, as quoted in A Time for Angels : The Tragicomic History of the League of Nations (1975) by Elmer Bendine, p. 106”
Clemenceau thought that France should adopt Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points, mainly because of its point that called for the return of Alsace-Lorraine to France
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“Citation rapportée par son confident le général Mordacq, le soir de l'armistice du 11 novembre 1918.”
Career landmark: seat 3 of the Académie française (1918–1929).
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Mount Clemenceau (3,658m) in the Canadian Rockies was named after Clemenceau in 1919
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“Discours au Sénat, 22 juillet 1917.”
Career landmark: President of the Council (1917–1920).
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Career landmark: Minister of War (1917–1920).
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“South America To-Day : A Study of Conditions, Social, Political, and Commercial in Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil (1911) Ch. 14, Brazilian Coffee, p. 395”
Traveling to Brazil, Uruguay, and Argentina (where he went as far as Santa Ana (Tucuman) in northwest Argentina)
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“Frase após sua visita à Buenos Aires em 1910”
And in April that year a decree was issued prescribing special regulations (as noted by one study) “for the hygiene of industries in which workmen are exposed to lead poisoning,”, while a law concerning health and safety
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“Letter to Georges Louis (28 July 1908), quoted in David Robin Watson, Georges Clemenceau: A Political Biography (London: Eyre Methuen, 1974), p. 221”
In which he declared that if women were given the vote France would return to the Middle Ages
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Career landmark: President of the Council (1906–1909).
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“Letter to Georg Brandes (9 January 1906), quoted in David Robin Watson, Georges Clemenceau: A Political Biography (London: Eyre Methuen, 1974), pp. 220-221”
“Letter (19 June 1902), in which he claims to have chosen the headline title for Émile Zola's famous open letter on the Dreyfus affair, as quoted in Clemenceau (1974) by D. R. Watson, and Brewer's Famous Quotations : 5000 Quotations and the Stories Behind Them (2006) by Nigel Rees”
Career landmark: senator of the French Third Republic (1902–1920).
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Withdrew from La Justice to found a weekly review, Le Bloc, to which he practically was the sole contributor
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In 1897, Joseph, Prince de Caraman-Chimay and Georges Clemenceau (then the President of the Council of Paris, later the Prime Minister of France), fought a duel with swords over an article published by Clemenceau in L'Écho de Paris. "Both were wounded simultaneously, Clemenceau receiving a gash in the right arm and the Prince a slight scratch on the shoulder."
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Joseph, Prince de Caraman-Chimay and Georges Clemenceau (then the President of the Council of Paris, later the Prime Minister of France), fought a duel with swords over an article published by Clemenceau in L'Écho de Par
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And was responsible for the inclusion of Georges Ernest Boulanger in the Freycinet cabinet as war minister
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His criticism of the conduct of the Sino-French War contributed strongly to the fall of the Ferry cabinet that year
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Clemenceau started his newspaper, La Justice, which became the principal organ of Parisian Radicalism
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His demand for the indictment of the Broglie ministry brought him prominence
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After the Crisis of 16 May 1877, he was one of the republican majority who denounced the ministry of the Duc de Broglie
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Career landmark: member of the French National Assembly (1876–1885).
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Clemenceau stood for the Chamber of Deputies (which replaced the National Assembly in 1875) and was elected for the 18th arrondissement
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Career landmark: member of the French National Assembly (1871–1871).
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“Poster (23 September 1870) during the Franco-Prussian War, quoted in David Robin Watson, Georges Clemenceau: A Political Biography (London: Eyre Methuen, 1974), p. 38”
Career landmark: arrondissement mayor (1870–1871).
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During the Franco-Prussian War and the fall of the Second French Empire
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Born 1841-09-28.
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