Free and Independent Faction
The Free and Independent Faction or Free and Independent Fraction was a nationalist and national liberal party in Romania, regionally centered on Western Moldavia. Originally informal, and defined by its adversaries, the Faction mainly comprised pupils and followers of the philosopher Simion Bărnuțiu. During most of its existence, it had as its recognized leader the academic and polemicist Nicolae Ionescu.
Grigore Sturdza's proclamation upon retaking control of Iași in May 1866, condemning the "barbaric propaganda" of local antisemites
June 1870 caricature in the "Red" gazette Ghimpele, showing the Epureanu cabinet (including Petre P. Carp) shooting down protesters in Pitești; the gibbon "Scarlat", a stand-in for Carol I, is depicted as ordering the alleged atrocity
Simion Bărnuțiu was a Romanian historian, academic, philosopher, jurist, and liberal politician. A leader of the 1848 revolutionary movement of Transylvanian Romanians, he represented its Eastern Rite Catholic wing. Bărnuțiu lived for a large part of his life in Moldavia, and was for long a professor of philosophy at Academia Mihăileană and at the University of Iași.
Simion Bărnuțiu
