ANTOINE LOUIS LEON DE RICHE BOURG DE (1767-1794), French revolutionary leader, was born at Decize in the Nivernais on Aug. 25, 1767. At the out break of the Revolution he was elected an officer in the National Guard of the Aisne. He assumed a stoical demeanour united to a tyrannical policy. He entered into correspondence with Robes pierre, who, flattered by his worship, admitted him to his friend ship. Thus supported, Saint-Just became deputy to the National Convention, where he made his first speech on the condemnation of Louis XVI.—gloomy, fanatical, remorseless in tone—on Nov. 13, 1792. In the Convention, in the Jacobin club, and among the populace he was dubbed the "St. John of the Messiah of the People." In the name of the Committee of Public Safety he drew up reports to the Convention upon the absorbing themes of the overthrow of the party of the Gironde (report of July 8, 1793), of the Hebertists, and finally, of that denunciation of Danton which consigned him and his followers to the guillotine. In Saint Just's hands these so-called reports furnished the occasion for a display of fanatical daring, of gloomy eloquence, and of undoubted genius. Camille Desmoulins said of Saint-Just—the youth with the beautiful countenance and the long fair locks—"He carries his head like a Holy Sacrament." "And I," savagely replied Saint Just, "will make him carry his like a Saint Denis." The threat was not vain : Desmoulins accompanied Danton to the scaffold.
Saint-Just proposed that the National Convention should, through its committees, direct all military movements and all branches of the Government (report of Oct. Io, 1793). This was agreed to, and Saint-Just was despatched to Strasbourg to superintend the military operations. It was suspected that the enemy without was being aided by treason within. Saint-Just "organized the Terror," and soon the heads of all suspects sent to Paris were falling under the guillotine. But there were no executions at Strasbourg, and Saint-Just repressed the excesses of J. G. Schneider, who, acting as public prosecutor to the revolu tionary tribunal of the Lower Rhine, had ruthlessly applied the Terror in Alsace. Schneider was sent to Paris and guillotined.
The conspiracy was defeated, the frontier was delivered and Germany invaded. On his return Saint-Just was made president of the Convention. Later, with the army of the North, he placed before the generals the dilemma of victory over the enemies of France or trial by the dreaded Revolutionary tribunal ; and before the eyes of the army itself he organized a force specially charged with the slaughter of those who should seek refuge by flight. Success again crowned his efforts, and Belgium was gained for France (May, Meanwhile affairs in Paris looked gloomier than ever, and Robespierre recalled Saint-Just to the capital. Saint-Just pro posed a dictatorship as the only remedy for the convulsions of society. At last, at the famous sitting of the 9th Thermidor, he ventured to present as the report of the committees of General Security and Public Safety a document expressing his own views, a sight of which, however, had been refused to the other members of committee on the previous evening. Then the storm broke. He was vehemently interrupted, and the sitting ended with an order for Robespierre's arrest (see ROBESPIERRE), which entailed that of Saint-Just. On the following day, July 28, 1794, 22 men, nearly all young, were guillotined. Saint-Just maintained his proud self-possession to the last.
See Oeuvres de Saint-Just, pricedees d'une notice historique sur sa vie (1833-34) ; E. Fleury, Etudes revolutionnaires (2 vols., 1851), with which cf. articles by Sainte-Beuve (Causeries du lundi, vol. v.), Cuvil lier-Fleury (Portraits politiques et revolutionnaires) ; E. Hamel, His toire de Saint-Just (1859), which brought a fine to the publishers for outrage on public decency ; F. A. Aulard, Les Orateurs de la Legislative et de la Convention (2nd ed., 1905) ; M. Leneru, Saint-Just (1922). The Oeuvres completes de Saint-Just were edited with notes by C. Vellay (1908).