GAMBETTA, LEON (1838-1882), French statesman, was born at Cahors on April 2, 1838. In his sixteenth year young Gambetta lost by an accident the sight' of his left eye, which eventually had to be removed. Notwithstanding this privation, he highly distinguished himself at the public school of Cahors, and in 1857 proceeded to Paris to study law. His southern vehemence gave him great influence among the students of the Quartier Latin, and he was soon known as an inveterate enemy of the imperial government. He was called to the bar in In 1868 he defended the journalist Delescluze, prosecuted for having promoted the erection of a monument to Baudin, who was killed in resisting the coup d'etat of 1851. Gambetta seized his opportunity and assailed both the coup d'etat and the govern ment with an eloquence of invective which made him immediately famous.
In May 1869 he was returned to the Assembly, both by the first circumscription of Paris and by Marseilles, defeating Hippolyte Carnot for the former constituency and Thiers and Lesseps for the latter. He elected- to sit for Marseilles, and lost no oppor tunity of attacking the Empire in the Assembly. He was at first opposed to the war with Germany, but when it had become :nevigable, he threw himself with all his energy into the work of national defence. After Sedan Gambetta himself proclaimed the fall of the emperor at the corps legislati f , and the establish ment of the republic at the hotel de ville. He was minister of the interior in the new government of national defence. He advised his colleagues to leave Paris and conduct the government from some provincial city. This advice was rejected from dread of another revolution in Paris, and a delegation to organize resistance in the provinces was despatched to Tours, but when this was seen to be inefficient Gambetta himself (Oct. 7) quitted Paris in a bal loon, and upon arriving at Tours took the supreme direction of affairs as minister of the interior and of war. Aided by M. de Freycinet, then a young officer of engineers, as his assistant secre tary of war, he organized an army, which might possibly have effected the relief of Paris if Metz had held out, but after the surrender of Bazaine and the defeat of the French near Orleans early in December the seat of government had to be transferred to Bordeaux. When Paris surrendered at the end of January, Gambetta submitted to the capitulation concluded with Prince Bismarck. He immediately resigned his office. Elected by nine departments to the National Assembly meeting at Bordeaux (March 1, 18 71) he chose to sit for Strasbourg, which by the terms of the treaty was to be ceded to Prussia, and when the treaty was adopted by the Assembly he resigned in protest and retired to Spain.
He returned to France in June, was elected by three depart ments in July, and agitated for the definitive establishment of the Republic. His new journal, La Republique francaise, soon became the most influential in France. His orations at Bordeaux on his re turn, and at Grenoble on Nov. 26, 1872, in which he spoke of po litical power having passed to les nouvelles couches sociales showed him at the height of his oratorical powers. But in spite of his re publican convictions Gambetta urged moderation on his supporters on the fall of Thiers and the accession to power of the conserva tive MacMahon. His tact and parliamentary dexterity, no less than his eloquence, secured the voting of the constitution in Feb. 18 75. This policy he continued during the early days of the now consolidated Republic, and gave it the appropriate name of "opportunism." It was not until May 4, 1877, when the peril from reactionary intrigues was notorious, and the clerical party had begun a campaign for the restoration of the temporal power of the pope, that he delivered his famous speech denouncing "clericalism" as "the enemy." On May 16 MacMahon perpetrated his parliamentary coup d'etat in support of the clerical reaction aries and on Aug. 15, Gambetta, in a speech at Lille, gave him the alternative se soumettre ou se demettre. He roused the re publican party throughout France in a campaign which culmi nated in a speech at Romans (Sept. 18, 1878) formulating its programme. MacMahon had no choice but to dismiss his advisers and form a moderate republican ministry under the premiership of Dufaure.
After the abdication of MacMahon, Gambetta declined to be come a candidate for the presidency, but gave his support to Grevy; nor did he attempt to form a ministry, but accepted the office of president of the chamber of deputies (Jan. 1879). This position did not prevent his occasionally descending from the presidential chair to make speeches, one of which, advocating an amnesty to the communards, was especially memorable. Although he really directed the policy of the various ministries, he main tained a neutral attitude as far as possible ; but events hurried him on, and early in 1881 he placed himself at the head of a movement for restoring the scrutin de liste in place of scrutin d'arrondissement. A bill to re-establish scrutin de liste was passed by the Assembly on May 19, 1881, but rejected by the Senate on June 19.
Gambetta's supporters were in a large majority, and on the reassembling of the chamber, he formed a ministry—known as Le Grand Ministere. Every one suspected him of aiming at a dic tatorship; attacks, not the less formidable for their injustice, were directed against him from all sides. and his cabinet fell on Jan. 26, 1882, after an existence of only sixty-six days. His declarations leave no doubt that he would have cultivated the British alliance and co-operated with Great Britain in Egypt; and when the Freycinet administration shrank from that enterprise only to see it undertaken with signal success by England alone, Gambetta's foresight was quickly justified. His fortunes were in the balance. At his house in Ville d'Avray, near Sevres, on Nov. 27, 1882, he was shot in the hand by a revolver which accidentally went off. He died on Dec. 31, as the result of this accident.
Gambetta rendered France three inestimable services : by preserving her self-respect through the gallantry of the resistance he organized during the German War, by his tact in persuading extreme partisans to accept a moderate Republic, and by his en ergy in overcoming the usurpation attempted by the advisers of MacMahon. His death cut short a career which had given prom ise of still greater things, for he had real statesmanship in his conceptions of the future of his country, and a potent eloquence to secure their acceptance. The romance of his life was his liaison with Leonie Leon (d. 1906), with whom Gambetta fell in love in 1871. Gambetta himself constantly urged her to marry him during this period, but she always refused, fearing to com promise his career; she remained, however, his confidante and intimate adviser in all his political plans. The date of the mar riage had been fixed, when the accident which caused his death occurred in her presence. It is certain that there was no question of suicide. Their correspondence is of absorbing interest. But in various matters of detail the serious student of political history must be cautious in accepting her later recollections.
Gambetta's Discours et plaidoyers politiques were published by J. Reinach in II vols. (1881-86) ; his Depeches, circulaires, decrets . . in 2 vols. (1886-91) . The principal biographies are J. Reinach, Leon Gambetta (1884), Gambetta orateur (1884) and Le Ministere Gam betta, histoire et doctrine (1884) ; Neucastel, Gambetta, sa vie, et ses idees politiques (1885) ; J. Hanlon, Gambetta (1881) ; Dr. Laborde, Leon Gambetta, biographie psychologique (1898) ; P. B. Gheusi, Gam betta, Life and Letters (Eng. trans. by V. M. Montagu, 191o) ; P. Deschanel, Gambetta 0919). See also G. Hanotaux, Histoire de la France contemporaine (1903, etc.) ; H. Stannard, Gambetta and the Foundations of the Third Republic (1921) . F. Laur's Le Coeur de Gambetta (1907, Eng. trans., 5908) contains the correspondence with Leonie Lion ; see also his articles on "Gambetta and Bismarck" in The Times of Aug. 17 and 19, 1907, with the correspondence arising from them.