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BARERE DE VIEUZAC, BERTRAND (1755-1841)

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Originally appearing in Volume V03, Page 398 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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BARERE DE VIEUZAC, See also:

BERTRAND (1755-1841) , one of the most notorious members of the See also:French See also:National See also:Convention, was See also:born at See also:Tarbes in See also:Gascony on the loth of See also:September 1755. The name of Bathe de Vieuzac, by which he continued to See also:call himself See also:long after the renunciation of feudal rights on the famous 4th of See also:August, was assumed from a small See also:fief belonging to his See also:father, a lawyer at Vieuzac. He began to practise as an See also:advocate at the See also:parlement of See also:Toulouse in 1770, and soon earned a considerable reputation as an orator; while his brilliant and flowing See also:style as a writer of essays led to his See also:election as a member of the See also:Academy of Floral See also:Games of Toulouse in 1788. At the See also:age of See also:thirty he married. Four years later, in 1789, he was elected See also:deputy by the estates of Bigorre to the states-See also:general, which met in May. He had made his first visit to See also:Paris in the preceding See also:year. His See also:personal See also:appearance, his See also:manners, social qualities and liberal opinions, gave him a See also:good See also:standing among the multitude of provincial deputies then thronging into Paris. He attached himself at first to the constitutional party; but he was less known as a See also:speaker in the See also:Assembly than as a journalist. His See also:paper, however, the Point du Jour, according to See also:Aulard, owes its reputation not so much to its own qualities as to the fact that the painter See also:David, in his famous picture of the " See also:Oath in the See also:Tennis See also:Court," has represented Barere kneeling in the corner and See also:writing a See also:report of the proceedings as though for posterity. The reports of the debates of the National Assembly in the Point du Jour, though not inaccurate, are as a See also:matter of fact very incomplete and very dry. After the See also:flight of the See also:king to Varennes, Barere passed over to the republican party, though he continued to keep in See also:touch with the See also:duke of See also:Orleans, to whose natural daughter, Pamela, he was See also:tutor. Barere, however, appears to have been wholly See also:free from any guiding principle; See also:conscience he had none, and his conduct was regulated only by the determination to be on the See also:side of the strongest.

After the See also:

close of the National Assembly he was nominated one of the See also:judges of the newly instituted court of cassation from See also:October 1791 to September 1792. In X792 he was elected deputy to the National Convention for the See also:department of the Hautes-See also:Pyrenees. At first he voted with the See also:Girondists, attacked See also:Robespierre, "a See also:pygmy who should not be set on a See also:pedestal," and at the trial of the king voted with the See also:Mountain for the king's See also:death "with-out See also:appeal and without delay." He closed his speech with a See also:sentence which became memorable: " the See also:tree of See also:liberty could not grow were it not watered with the See also:blood 'of See also:kings." Appointed member of the See also:Committee of Public Safety on the 7th of See also:April 1793, he busied himself with See also:foreign affairs; then, joining the party of Robespierre, whose resentment he had averted by timely flatteries, he played an important See also:part in the second Committee of Public Safety—after the 17th of See also:July 1793 —and voted for the death of the Girondists. He was thoroughly unscrupulous, stopping at nothing to maintain the supremacy of the Mountain, and rendered it See also:great service by his rapid See also:work, by the telling phases of his See also:oratory, and by his clear expositions of the problems of the See also:day. On the gth See also:Thermidor (July 27th, 1794) Barere hesitated, then he See also:drew up the report outlawing Robespierre. In spite of this, in Germinal of the year III. (the 21st of See also:March to the 4th of April 1795), the Thermidorians decreed the See also:accusation of Barere and his colleagues of the Terror, See also:Collot d'Herbois and Billaud-Varenne, and he was sent to the Isle of See also:Oleron. He was removed to See also:Saintes, and thence escaped to See also:Bordeaux, where he lived in concealment for several years. In 1795 he was elected member of the See also:Council of Five See also:Hundred, but was not allowed to take his seat. Later he was used as a See also:secret See also:agent by See also:Napoleon I., for whom he carried on a See also:diplomatic See also:correspondence. On the fall of Napoleon, Barere played the part of royalist, but on the final restoration of the Bourbons in 18x5 he was banished for See also:life from See also:France as a See also:regicide, and then withdrew to See also:Brussels and temporary oblivion. After the revolution of July 1830 he reappeared in France, was reduced by a See also:series of lawsuits to extreme indigence, accepted a small See also:pension assigned him by See also:Louis Philippe (on whom he had heaped abuse and railing), and died, the last survivor of the Committee of Public Safety, on the 13th of See also:January 1841.

End of Article: BARERE DE VIEUZAC, BERTRAND (1755-1841)

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