Eugène Spuller

Who was Eugène Spuller?

Eugène Spuller was a French politician and writer.

He was born at Seurre, his father being a German who had married and settled in France. After studying law at Dijon, he went to Paris, where he was called to the bar, and became close to Léon Gambetta, collaborating with him in 1868 in the foundation of the Revue politique. He had helped Emile Ollivier in his electoral campaign in Paris in 1863, but when in 1869 Ollivier was preparing to "rally" to the empire, Spuller supported the republican candidate. During the siege of Paris he escaped from the city with Gambetta, becoming his energetic lieutenant in the provinces.

After the peace he edited his chief's Parisian organ, the République française, until in 1876 he entered the Chamber of Deputies for the department of the Seine. He was minister of foreign affairs during the brief Gambetta administration, and subsequently one of the vice-presidents of the chamber, serving on the budget commission and on a special industrial and agricultural inquiry. His Parisian constituents thought him too moderate on the clerical question, and he had to seek election in 1885 in the Côte d'Or, which in later years he represented in the Senate.