VAILLANT, EDOUARD MARIE French politician, was born in Vierzon (Cher) on Jan. 28, 1840. He studied science, residing in Heidelberg; Tubingen, Vienna. On his return to Paris he took part in the republic and socialist battle against the Second Empire, becoming a disciple and friend of Blanqui. On March 18, 1871 he took part in the Commune In surrection, and, on the 26th, was elected a member of the Com mune. He was a delegate on the executive Commission, and his work for public instruction displays his revolutionary audacity and his scientific knowledge.
After the defeat of the Commune he fled to England and be came associated with Karl Marx. But, after having been a member of the general committee of the First International, after having participated in 1872 in the Congress at The Hague, he induced his friends to abandon this association because it seemed to him to be insufficiently revolutionary. He founded "The Revolutionary Commune" which published the manifesto in which these disciples of Blanqui declared themselves to be atheists, republicans, com munists, revolutionaries, and partisans of class conflict.
Condemned to death by the War Council in 1872, Vaillant only returned to France in 1880 under amnesty. He was a founder
of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, and in 1884, he became a Municipal Councillor of Paris, becoming deputy in 1893. Under his direction, the Blanquist party made itself noticeable among the other socialist parties. In Boulangisme (1889), he separated from other blanquists, who, through nationalism, were inclined to accept a plebiscitary dictator.
In 1899, and again in 1905, Vaillant made himself the apostle of socialist unity in France. When in 1905, all the socialist parties united, he became a very close friend of Jaures, and secured with him the majority in all socialist congresses until 1914. He advo cated the eight-hour day, security and hygiene for workers, remedies against stoppage of work, and a struggle against war.
In August 1914, he considered that France was attacked and that it was the duty of the socialists to defend it, as in 1870 and 1871. He resumed the formulae of blanquist socialism and de clared himself unreservedly in favour of national defence.