COUNT MIECISLAUS JOHANN

See also:

• COUNT MIECISLAUS JOHANN LEDOCHOWSKI (1822-1902)

LEDOCHOWSKI (1822-1902)  , Polish cardinal, was born on the 29th of October 1822 in Gorki (Russian Poland), and received his early education at the gymnasium and seminary of Warsaw . After finishing his studies at the Jesuit Accademia dei Nobili Ecclesiastici in Rome, which strongly influenced his religious development and his attitude towards church affairs, he was ordained in 1845 . From 1856 to outbreak of the Columbian revolution had to return to Rome . In 1861 Pope Pius IX. made him his nuncio at Brussels, and in 1865 he was made archbishop of Gnesen-Posen . His preconization followed on the 8th of January 1866 . This date marks the beginning of the second period in Ledochowski's life; for during the Prussian and German Kulturkampf he was one of the most declared enemies of the state . It was only during the earliest years of his appointment as archbishop that he entertained a different view, invoking, for instance, an intervention of Prussia in favour of the Roman Church, when it was oppressed by the house of Savoy . On the 12th of December 187o he presented an effective memorandum on the subject at the headquarters at Versailles . In 1872 the archbishop protested against the demand of the government that religious teaching should be given only in the German language, and in 1873 he addressed a circular letter on this subject to the clergy of his diocese . The government thereupon demanded a statement from the teachers of religion as to whether they intended to obey it or the archbishop, and on their declaring for the archbishop, dismissed them . The count himself was called upon at the end of 1873 to lay aside his office . On his refusing to do so, he was arrested between 3 and 4 o'clock in the morning on the 3rd of February 1874 by Stafidi, the director of police, and taken to the military prison of Ostrowo .

The pope made him a cardinal on the 13th of

March, but it was not till the 3rd of February 1876 that he was released from prison . Having been expelled from the eastern provinces of Prussia, he betook himself to Cracow, where his presence was made the pretext for anti-Prussian demonstrations . Upon this he was also expelled from Austria, and went to Rome, whence, in spite of his removal from office, which was decreed on the 15th of April 1874, be continued to direct the affairs of his diocese, for which he was on several occasions from 1877 to 1879 condemned in absentia by the Prussian government for " usurpation of episcopal rights." It was not till 1885 that Ledochowski re-solved to resign his archbishopric, in which he was succeeded by Dinder at the end of the year . Ledochowski's return in 1884 was forbidden by the Prussian government (although the Kulturkampf had now abated), on account of his having stirred up anew the Polish nationalist agitation . He passed the closing years of his life in Rome . In 1892 he became prefect of the Congregation of the Propaganda, and he died in Rome on the 22nd of July 1902 . See Ograbiszewski, Deulschlands Episko pat in Lebensbildern (1876 and following years); Holtzmann-Zoppfel, Lexikon fur Theologie and Kirchenwesen (and ed., 1888) ; Vapereau, Dictionnaire universel des contemporains (6th ed., 1893) ; Hz-tick, Geschichte der katholischen Kirche in Deutschland im neunzehnten Jahrhundert vol . 4 (1901 and 19o8); Lauchert, Biographisches Jahrbuch, vol . 7 (1905) . (J . HN.) LEDRU-ROLLIN, ALEXANDRE AUGUSTE (1807-1874), French politician, was the grandson of Nicolas Philippe Ledru, the celebrated quack doctor known as " Comus " under Louis XIV., and was born in a house that was once Scarron's, at Fontenay-aux-Roses (Seine), on the 2nd of February 1807 . He had just begun to practise at the Parisian bar before the revolution of July, and was retained for the Republican defence in most of the great political trials of the next ten years .

In 1838 he bought for 330,000 francs

Desire Dalloz's place in the Court of Cassation . He was elected deputy for Le Mans in 1841 with hardly a dissentient voice; but for the violence of his electoral speeches he was tried at Angers and sentenced to four months' imprisonment and a fine, against which he appealed successfully on a technical point . He made a rich and romantic marriage in 1843, and in 1846 disposed of his charge at the Court of Cassation to give his time entirely to politics . He was now the recognized leader of the working-men of France . He had more authority in the country than in the Chamber, where the violence of his oratory diminished its effect . He asserted that the fortifications of Paris were directed against liberty, not against foreign invasion, and he stigmatized the law of regency (1842) as an audacious usurpation . Neither from official Liberalism nor from the press did he receive support; even the Republican National was opposed to him because of his championship of labour . He therefore founded La Reforme in which to advance his propaganda . Between Ledru-Rollin and Odilon Barrot with the other chiefs of the " dynastic Left " there were acute differences, hardly dissimulated even during the temporary alliance which produced the campaign of the banquets . It was the speeches of Ledru-Rollin and Louis Blanc at working-men's banquets in Lille, Dijon and Chalons that really heralded the revolution . Ledru-Rollin prevented the appointment of the duchess of Orleans as regent in 1848 . He and Lamartine held the tribune in the Chamber of Deputies until the Parisian populace stopped serious discussion by invading the Chamber .

He was

minister of the interior in the provisional government, and was also a member of the executive committee r appointed by the Constituent Assembly, from which Louis Blanc and the extremists were excluded . At the crisis of the 15th of May he definitely sided with Lamartine and the party of order against the proletariat . Henceforward his position was a difficult one . He never regained his influence with the working classes, who considered they had been betrayed; but to his short ministry belongs the credit of the establishment of a working system of universal suffrage . At the presidential election in December he was put forward as the Socialist candidate, but secured only 370,000 votes . His opposition to the policy of President Louis Napoleon, especially his Roman policy, led to his moving the impeachment of the president and his ministers . The motion was defeated, and next day (June 13, 1849) he headed what he called a peaceful demonstration, and his enemies armed insurrection . He himself escaped to London where he joined the executive of the revolutionary committee of Europe, with Kossuth and Mazzini among his colleagues . He was accused of complicity in an obscure attempt (18J7) against the life of Napoleon III., and condemned in his absence to deportation . Emile 011ivier removed the exceptions from the general amnesty in 187o, and Ledru-Rollin returned to France after twenty years of exile . Though elected in 1871 in three departments he refused to sit in the National Assembly, and took no serious part in politics until 1874 when he was returned to the Assembly as member for Vaucluse . He died on the 31st of December of that year .

Under Louis Philippe he made large contributions to French

jurisprudence, editing the Journal du palais, 1791–1837 (27 vols., 1837), and 1837–1847 (17 vols.), with a commentary Repertoire general de la jurisprudence fran¢aise (8 vols., 1843–1848), the introduction to which was written by himself . His later writings were political in character . See Ledru-Rollin, ses discours et ses ecrits politiques (2 vols., Paris, 1879), edited by his widow .