Napoleon III of France in the context of "Battle of Sedan"

The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon (German: Der 18te Brumaire des Louis Napoleon) is an essay written by Karl Marx between December 1851 and March 1852, and originally published in 1852 in Die Revolution, a German monthly magazine published in New York City by Marxist Joseph Weydemeyer. Later English editions, such as the 1869 Hamburg edition with a preface by Marx, were entitled The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte. The essay serves as a major historiographic application of Marx's theory of historical materialism.

The Eighteenth Brumaire focuses on the 1851 French coup d'état, by which Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, president of the Second Republic and Napoléon Bonaparte's nephew, became emperor of the Second French Empire as Napoleon III. It seeks to explain how capitalism and class struggle created conditions which enabled "a grotesque mediocrity to play a hero's part". Marx describes the divisions and alliances among the bourgeoisie, the petty bourgeoisie, the peasantry, revolutionaries, and social democrats, among other groups, and how a lack of dominance of any one group led to the re-emergence of monarchy, despite the Revolution of 1848. Marx describes the Second Empire as a "Bonapartist" state, an exception to the basic Marxist conception of the state as an instrument of class rule in that the Bonapartist state becomes semi-autonomous, representing the interests of no single class.

Jean Laborde (16 October 1805 in Auch – 27 December 1878 in Mantasoa, Madagascar) was an adventurer and early industrialist in Madagascar. He became the chief engineer of the Merina monarchy, supervising the creation of a modern manufacturing center under Queen Ranavalona I. Later he became the first French consul to Madagascar, when the government of Napoleon III used him to establish French influence on the island.

Born to a blacksmith, Laborde emigrated to India, before attempting to recover treasure from ships wrecked along the coast of Madagascar in 1831. After becoming shipwrecked himself, Laborde made his way to Antananarivo where he manufactured muskets and gunpowder for the queen in a factory located in Ilafy.

Presidential elections were held for the first time in France on 10 and 11 December 1848, electing the first and only president of the Second Republic. This election marked the birth of the Second Republic and the dramatic end of the July Monarchy, a transformation born of the February Revolution’s fervour.

The election ended in a landslide victory for Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, nephew of Napoleon I, who won 74% of the popular vote. His appeal to peasants, conservatives, and those nostalgic for Napoleonic glory gave him a decisive edge. This was the only direct presidential election until the 1965 French presidential election under the Fifth Republic.

A referendum was held in France on 20 and 21 December 1851. Voters were asked whether they approved of the continuation of the authority of Louis Napoléon Bonaparte and to delegate the powers required to produce a new constitution. It was approved by 92% of voters with an 81.7% turnout.

All French men over the age of 21 were entitled to vote in a commune in which they had resided for six months. Algerians and Kanaks had no right to vote. The vote was secret with the exception of those serving in the military. However, the authorities only printed yes ballots - voters had to supply their own ballots with no.

The Government of National Defense (French: Gouvernement de la Défense nationale) was the first government of the Third Republic of France from 4 September 1870 to 13 February 1871 during the Franco-Prussian War. It was formed after the proclamation of the Republic in Paris on 4 September, which in turn followed the surrender and capture of Emperor Napoleon III by the Prussians at the Battle of Sedan. The government, headed by General Louis Jules Trochu, was under Prussian siege in Paris. Breakouts were attempted twice, but met with disaster and rising dissatisfaction of the public. In late January the government, having further enraged the population of Paris by crushing a revolutionary uprising, surrendered to the Prussians. Two weeks later, it was replaced by the new government of Adolphe Thiers, which soon passed a variety of financial laws in an attempt to pay reparations and thus oblige the Prussians to leave France, leading to the outbreak of revolutions in French cities, and the ultimate creation of the Paris Commune.

The Exposition Universelle of 1867 (French pronunciation: [ɛkspozisjɔ̃ ynivɛʁsɛl]), better known in English as the 1867 Paris Exposition, was a world's fair held in Paris, France, from 1 April to 3 November 1867. It was the second of ten major expositions held in the city between 1855 and 1937. A number of nations were represented at the fair. Following a decree of Emperor Napoleon III, the exposition was prepared as early as 1864, in the midst of the renovation of Paris, marking the culmination of the Second French Empire. Visitors included Tsar Alexander II of Russia, a brother of the King William and Otto von Bismarck of Prussia, Prince Metternich and Franz Josef of Austria, Ottoman Sultan Abdülaziz, and the Khedive of Egypt Isma'il.