De Gaulle as Pétain

The Third French Republic came to an inglorious end between Bordeaux on June 16 and Vichy on July 10, 1940. That June 16 in Bordeaux, makeshift capital of France at the height of the German invasion, Premier Paul Reynaud made way for a successor, Marshal Philippe Pétain, to request armistice terms. Then on that July 10 as much of the French parliament as could meet in Vichy voted Pétain’s government full powers to draft a new, authoritarian constitution for popular approval and to rule by fiat meanwhile. Eighteen years later, between May 28 and June 1-3, 1958, the Fourth French Republic came to an equally inglorious end. In Paris on that May 28 Premier Pierre Pflimlin made way for General Charles de Gaulle to succeed him in order to avert a coup d’État by the military fearful of a sellout to rebels fighting French rule in Algeria. Then on that June 1-3 the parliament voted a government under de Gaulle full powers to draft a new, authoritarian constitution for popular approval and to rule by fiat meanwhile.1 Pétain did not, whereas de Gaulle did, deliver on a new constitution for popular approval, but never mind: for now I am considering only how the two republics fell.