NECKER, JACQUES (1732-1804), French statesman, finance minister of Louis XVI., was born at Geneva in Switzer land. His father was a native of Ciistrin in Brandenburg, and be came a citizen of Geneva. Jacques Necker had been sent to Paris in 1747 to become a clerk in the bank of M. Vernet. He soon afterwards established the famous bank of Thellusson and Necker. Thellusson superintended the bank in London, and Necker the Paris branch. Both became extremely rich by loans to the treasury and speculations in grain. In 1763 Necker fell in love with Madame de Vermenou, the widow of a French officer. But while on a visit to Geneva, Madame de Vermenou met Suzanne Curchod, the daughter of a pastor near Lausanne, to whom Gibbon had been engaged, and brought her to Paris in 1764. Necker married Suzanne before the end of the year. She encouraged her husband to make himself a public position. He accordingly became an able director of the French East India Company, and defended it against the attacks of A. Morellet in 1769. Meanwhile he had made interest with the French govern ment by lending it money, and was appointed resident at Paris by the republic of Geneva. Madame Necker entertained the chief leaders of the political, financial and literary worlds of Paris. In 1773 Necker won the prize of the Academie Francaise for an e/oge on Colbert, and in 1775 published his Essai sur la legislation et le commerce des grains, in which he attacked the free-trade policy of Turgot. His wife believed he could get into office as a great financier, and made him transfer his share in the bank to his brother Louis.
In October 1776 Necker was made finance minister of France,, with the title of director of the treasury, which he changed in 1777 to director-general of the finances. He regulated the finances by attempting to divide the taille or poll tax more equally, by abolishing the "vingtieme d'industrie," and establishing monts de piete (establishments for loaning money on security). But his greatest financial measures were his attempt to fund the French debt and his establishment of annuities under the guarantee of the state. In the operation of funding Necker rather pointed out the line to be followed than completed the operation. He treated French finance rather as a banker than as a political economist, and thus fell far short of Turgot, the greatest economist of his day. His establishment of provincial assemblies was only a timid application of Turgot's great scheme for the administrative reor ganization of France. In 1781 he published his famous Compte rendu, in which he drew up the balance sheet of France. His dis missal in the same year was not really due to his book, but to the influence of Marie Antoinette, whose schemes for benefiting the duc de Guines he had thwarted.
In 1787 Necker was banished by "lettre de cachet" 4o leagues from Paris for attacking Calonne. In 1788 the country, which had at the bidding of the literary guests of Madame Necker come to believe that Necker was the only minister who could "stop the deficit," as they said, demanded Necker's recall, and in September 1788 he became once more director-general of the finances.
Throughout the momentous months which followed the biography of Necker is part of the history of the French Revolution (q.v.). Necker put a stop to the rebellion in Dauphine by legalizing its assembly, and then arranged for the summons of the states gen eral. Throughout the early months of 1789 he was regarded as the saviour of France, but he regarded the states general as an assembly which should grant money, not organize reforms. But as he had advised the calling of the states general, and the double representation of the third estate, and then permitted the orders to deliberate and vote in common, he was regarded as the cause of the Revolution by the court, and on July II was ordered to leave France at once.
Necker's dismissal brought about the taking of the Bastille, which induced the king to recall him. He was received with joy in every city he traversed, but in Paris he proved himself unequal to the crisis. After his resignation (Sept. 1790) he lived at Coppet, near Geneva. Madame Necker died in 1794, and he lived with his daughter Madame de Stael (q.v.), and his niece, Madame Necker de Saussure. He died in 1804.