The 16 May 1877 crisis, or more simply the Seize Mai, was a political crisis and institutional crisis that occurred in France during the Third Republic. It pitted the President of the Republic, Marshal Patrice de Mac Mahon, a convinced monarchist, against the republican majority that had emerged from the 1876 legislative elections.
The events took place in a turbulent political context. In the Chamber of Deputies, the republicans led by Léon Gambetta, who sought to break with the lingering Orléanist spirit of the regime, attempted to impose their demands and fiercely opposed ultramontanism. Marshal de Mac Mahon, who reproached the Jules Simon government for its lack of firmness, dismissed it on 16 May 1877. From then on, the situation escalated: left-wing deputies met to sign the manifesto of the 363, which condemned the president's attitude; Mac Mahon in turn appointed the duke Albert de Broglie as head of a government that marked the return of the ordre moral. Mac Mahon dissolved the Chamber on 25 June 1877, but the subsequent legislative elections in October confirmed the republican majority. Initially, President Mac Mahon refused to yield and rumours of an alleged coup d'état circulated, but he eventually submitted and acknowledged his political defeat on 13 December 1877 by recalling the republican Jules Dufaure to the presidency of the Council.
The significance of this political crisis was immense, as it definitively shaped the practical operation of the institutions. It set aside the conservative interpretation of the constitutional laws of 1875, in favour of a strictly republican interpretation of the Constitution in which the government is accountable only to parliament, which invests and dismisses it. The head of state's renunciation of his constitutional prerogatives henceforth placed the executive power under the domination of the legislative power, while the practice of the right of dissolution, although enshrined in the Constitution, disappeared. Furthermore, the 16 May crisis marked the transition between two eras of French democracy and strengthened the rooting in people's minds of a still-nascent republican regime, dashing the hopes of the various monarchist currents of seeing a new restoration established.
An event relatively little studied by historiography, the Seize Mai has left some traces in popular culture and marks an important date for republicans, who regularly referred to it in their political struggles. It was also in the context of this crisis that Victor Hugo published his Histoire d'un crime.
Difficulties of a nascent republic
Initial hesitations between republic and monarchy
On 4 September 1870, amid the ruins of the Second Empire defeated by Prussia, the republic was proclaimed. In order to stem the insurrection and rule out the prospect of a revolutionary government, the republican deputies agreed on the formation of a Government of National Defense. A series of military disasters and the suffering by the people during the siege of Paris ultimately swept away the cabinet despite the determination of Léon Gambetta. Until 1877, monarchists and republicans engaged in an intense political struggle for control of the institutions and for the legal definition to be given to them.
After the large victory of the monarchists in the legislative elections of 8 February 1871, Adolphe Thiers was appointed "head of the executive power of the French Republic", pending the signature of peace and the restoration of order. Under the leadership of the head of state, who officially received the title of President of the Republic after the passage of the Loi Rivet, the regime gradually moved toward a conservative republicanism. In fact, the monarchists, while awaiting a pretender to the throne, postponed the drafting of a definitive constitution and the provisional institutions evolved slowly, while the republicans advanced in every by-election.
Hopes for a monarchical restoration resurfaced after Thiers's resignation in 1873 and the election of Patrice de Mac Mahon, whose political ambition appeared limited to the return of the king and to "moral order". However, the intransigence of the Count of Chambord, leader of the Legitimist monarchists who demanded the adoption of the white flag in place of the tricolour flag, ruled out any possibility of a royalist restoration in the short term.
On 20 November 1873, the Duke of Broglie had the septennat law passed, an institutional solution that made it possible to further postpone the definitive choice of the nature of the regime and oriented it toward a parliamentary republic, since, because of the reserve and irresponsibility of the President of the Republic, it was up to the Vice-President of the Council to assume responsibility for the executive's actions before the Assembly.
Constitution of the Third Republic (1875)
In his message to the Nation on 6 January 1875, President Mac Mahon urged the Chamber to begin the debate on the regime's constitution, but rather than a sudden conversion to republican ideas, this appeal reflected the growing concern of the monarchists and moderate republicans in the context of a new Bonapartist surge, several deputies of that tendency having been elected the previous year in by-elections. The republican principle of the regime appeared definitively established on 30 January 1875 by the adoption, by a majority of one vote (353 against 352), of the Wallon amendment. The latter provided that the President of the Republic is elected for seven years by an absolute majority of votes by the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies meeting as a National Assembly, which marked a decisive turning point: by dissociating the office from its holder, the Wallon amendment institutionalised an impersonal presidency of the Republic.
The constitutional laws that followed, passed between February and July 1875, were the result of a compromise between monarchists and republicans and established a parliamentary regime with a strong executive. The President of the Republic was its main actor and enjoyed extensive powers. In addition to the armed forces and the right of pardon, he appointed and dismissed ministers who were responsible to the Chamber of Deputies, with the possibility of dissolving the latter subject to the conforming opinion of the Senate. In legislative matters, the president shared the initiative of laws with the two Chambers. It was his duty to promulgate them after their vote in Parliament, and then to ensure and oversee their execution. Furthermore, since the president was irresponsible, each of his decisions had to be countersigned by a minister who assumed responsibility for it before the Chamber.
The government appointed by the president was therefore theoretically accountable both to the president and to the deputies, which made it, according to Professor Marcel Morabito, the "true centre of the opposition between the constituted organs that strive to weigh on its orientation".
Elected President of the Republic by the royalist majority on 24 May 1873 to replace Adolphe Thiers, Patrice de Mac Mahon acted "as absolute master of the executive power" during the early years of his term and, unlike his predecessor, provided himself with a real head of government in the person of Albert de Broglie, Vice-President of the Council of Ministers, a title that marked his submission to the head of state.
Following the elections of 30 January 1876, the Senate retained a narrow conservative majority with 151 seats for the monarchists and Bonapartists against 149 for the republicans. In contrast, the legislative elections of February–March 1876 confirmed the trend seen in the most recent by-elections and gave an absolute majority to the republicans, who held nearly 350 sieges in the Chamber of Deputies.
The collapse of the conservatives was experienced as a disaster by President Mac Mahon, who appointed Jules Dufaure to head a government composed of moderate monarchists and centre-left republicans. A conservative republican, Dufaure came under pressure from the deputies and his ministry constantly sought compromises. On 9 December, accused by the republican majority of supporting the president's opposition to the amnesty of the Communards, he resigned.