1.
Robert Schumann
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Robert Schumann was a German composer and influential music critic. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest composers of the Romantic era, Schumann left the study of law, intending to pursue a career as a virtuoso pianist. He had been assured by his teacher Friedrich Wieck that he could become the finest pianist in Europe, Schumann then focused his musical energies on composing. Works such as Carnaval, Symphonic Studies, Kinderszenen, Kreisleriana, and his writings about music appeared mostly in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, a Leipzig-based publication which he jointly founded. In 1840, Schumann married Friedrich Wiecks daughter Clara, against the wishes of her father, following a long and acrimonious legal battle, which found in favor of Clara and Robert. Clara also composed music and had a concert career as a pianist. After a suicide attempt in 1854, Schumann was admitted to an asylum, at his own request. Diagnosed with psychotic melancholia, Schumann died two years later in 1856 without having recovered from his mental illness, Schumann was born in Zwickau, in the Kingdom of Saxony, the fifth and last child of Johanna Christiane and August Schumann. Schumann began receiving general musical and piano instruction at the age of seven from Johann Gottfried Kuntzsch, the boy immediately developed a love of music and worked at creating musical compositions himself, without the aid of Kuntzsch. Even though he often disregarded the principles of composition, he created works regarded as admirable for his age. At age 14, Schumann wrote an essay on the aesthetics of music and also contributed to a volume, edited by his father, titled Portraits of Famous Men. While still at school in Zwickau, he read the works of the German poet-philosophers Schiller and Goethe, as well as Byron and the Greek tragedians. His most powerful and permanent literary inspiration was Jean Paul, a German writer whose influence is seen in Schumanns youthful novels Juniusabende, completed in 1826, and Selene. Schumanns interest in music was sparked by seeing a performance of Ignaz Moscheles playing at Karlsbad and his father, who had encouraged the boys musical aspirations, died in 1826 when Schumann was 16. Neither his mother nor his guardian thereafter encouraged a career in music, in 1828 Schumann left school, and after a tour during which he met Heinrich Heine in Munich, he went to Leipzig to study law. In 1829 his law studies continued in Heidelberg, where he became a member of Corps Saxo-Borussia Heidelberg. During Eastertide 1830 he heard the Italian violinist, violist, guitarist, in July he wrote to his mother, My whole life has been a struggle between Poetry and Prose, or call it Music and Law. During his studies with Wieck, it has claimed that Schumann permanently injured a finger on his right hand
2.
Prime Minister of France
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The French Prime Minister in the Fifth Republic is the head of government and of the Council of Ministers of France. During the Third and Fourth Republics, the head of government position was called President of the Council of Ministers, the Prime Minister proposes a list of ministers to the President of the Republic. Decrees and decisions of the Prime Minister, like almost all decisions, are subject to the oversight of the administrative court system. Few decrees are taken after advice from the Council of State, all prime ministers defend the programs of their ministry, and make budgetary choices. The extent to which those decisions lie with the Prime Minister or President depends upon whether they are of the same party, manuel Valls was appointed to lead the government in a cabinet reshuffle in March 2014, after the ruling Socialists suffered a bruising defeat in local elections. The Prime Minister is appointed by the President of the Republic, the President can choose whomever they want. On the other hand, because the National Assembly does have the power to force the resignation of the government, for example, right after the legislative election of 1986, President François Mitterrand appointed Jacques Chirac prime minister. Chirac was a member of the RPR and an opponent of Mitterrand. Despite the fact that Mitterrands own Socialist Party was the largest party in the Assembly, the RPR had an alliance with the UDF, which gave them a majority. Such a situation, where the President is forced to work with a minister who is an opponent, is called a cohabitation. So far, Édith Cresson is the woman to have ever held the position of prime minister. Aristide Briand holds the record for most nomination as Prime Minister with 11 between 1909 and 1929 with some terms as short as 26 days, other members of Government are appointed by the President on the recommendation of the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister can engage the responsibility of his or her Government before the National Assembly and this process consists of placing a bill before the Assembly, and either the Assembly overthrows the Government, or the bill is passed automatically. In addition to ensuring that the Government still has support in the House, the Prime Minister may also submit a bill that has not been yet signed into law to the Constitutional Council. Before he is allowed to dissolve the Assembly, the President has to consult the Prime Minister, the office of the prime minister, in its current form, dates from the formation of the French Third Republic. Under the French Constitutional Laws of 1875, he was imbued with the powers as his British counterpart. In practice, however, the minister was a fairly weak figure. Most notably, the legislature had the power to force the cabinet out of office by a vote of censure
3.
Vincent Auriol
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Vincent Jules Auriol was a French politician who served as the first president of the Fourth Republic from 1947 to 1954. Auriol was born in Revel, Haute-Garonne, as the child of Jacques Antoine Auriol, a baker nicknamed Paul. His great-grandmother, Anne Auriol, was a first cousin of English engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel and he earned a law degree at the Collège de Revel in 1904 and began his career as a lawyer in Toulouse. A committed socialist, Auriol co-founded the newspaper Le Midi Socialiste in 1908, in 1914, Auriol entered the Chamber of Deputies as a Socialist Deputy for Muret, a position he retained until 1942. He also served as Mayor of Muret from 3 May 1925 to 17 January 1947, in December 1920, after the breakup of the SFIO, Auriol refused to join the newly created SFIC and became one of the leaders of the new SFIO, along with Léon Blum. Auriol became the leading spokesman on financial issues. He chaired the Finance Committee in the Chamber of Deputies from 1924-1926, Édouard Daladiers conservative–Radical government formed on 10 April 1938 returned Auriol to the Chamber of Deputies. Auriol was one of the 80 deputies who voted against the powers given to Prime Minister Philippe Pétain on 10 July 1940 that brought about the Nazi-backed Vichy government. As a result, he was placed under house arrest until he escaped to the French Resistance in October 1942, Auriol fled to London in October 1943. He represented the Socialists at the Free French Consultative Assembly, in July 1944, he represented France at the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. After World War II, Auriol served as Minister of State in de Gaulles provisional government and he was a member of the Constituent Assemblies which drafted the constitution of the short-lived French Fourth Republic, and was President of the Assemblies. He lobbied for a force between Communism and Gaullism. Auriol led the French delegation to the United Nations and was Frances first representative on the United Nations Security Council in 1946 and he served as a Deputy for Haute-Garonne in the National Assembly from 1946 until 31 December 1947. As president, Auriol pursued a relatively weak presidency like the office under the Third Republic and he attempted to reconcile political factions within France and warm relations between France and its allies. He was criticized for Frances ailing economy and political turmoil in the period. A series of debilitating strikes were waged across France in 1947, the strikes escalated into violence in November of that year, leading, on 28 November, to the government deploying 80,000 French Army reservists to face the insurrection. The Communist Party, who supported the strikes, were expelled from the legislature in early December. The strikes ended on 10 December, but more would come in 1948, apart from the inconclusive war in Indochina, Frances colonial empire decayed under Auriols presidency
4.
Paul Ramadier
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Paul Ramadier was a prominent French politician of the Third and Fourth Republics. Mayor of Decazeville, starting in 1919, he served as the first Prime Minister of the Fourth Republic in 1947, on 10 July 1940, he voted against the granting of the full powers to Marshal Philippe Pétain, who installed the Vichy regime the next day. Ramadier took part in the Resistance where he used the nom de guerre Violette and his name was included in the Yad Vashem Jewish memorial after the war. He voted for the Marshall Plan, from 1956 until 1957, Ramadier was Minister of Finance under Guy Mollet. The other Communist ministers also resign,9 May 1947 – Daniel Mayer succeeds Croizat as Minister of Labour and Social Security. Robert Prigent succeeds Marranne as Minister of Public Health and Population, jean Letourneau succeeds Tillon as Minister of Reconstruction and Town Planning. Eugène Thomas enters the Cabinet as Minister of Posts,11 August 1947 – Robert Lacoste succeeds Letourneau as Minister of Commerce, becoming thus Minister of Commerce and Industry
5.
President of the European Parliamentary Assembly
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The President of the European Parliament presides over the debates and activities of the European Parliament. He or she represents the Parliament within the EU and internationally. The presidents signature is required for enacting most EU laws and the EU budget, Presidents serve two-and-a-half-year terms, normally divided between the two major political parties. There have been twenty-eight presidents since the Parliament was created in 1952, two presidents have been women and most have come from the older member states. The current president is Antonio Tajani of Italy, the president chairs debates and oversees all the activities of the Parliament and its constituent bodies, in this the role is similar to that of a speaker in a national parliament. Below the president, there are 14 vice-presidents who chair debates when the president is not in the chamber and he or she represents Parliament in all legal matters and external relations, particularly international relations. When the European Council meets, the president addresses it to give the Parliaments position on subjects on the Councils agenda, the president also takes part in Intergovernmental Conferences on new treaties. The presidents signature is required for the budget of the European Union and Union acts adopted under codecision procedure to be adopted. The president also chairs conciliation committees with the Council under these areas, in most countries, the protocol of the head of state comes before all others. However, in the EU the Parliament is listed as the first institution, the gifts given to numerous visiting dignitaries depends upon the president. President Josep Borrell MEP of Spain gave his counterparts a crystal cup created by an artist from Barcelona which had engraved upon it parts of the Charter of Fundamental Rights among other things. With the reorganisation of leading EU posts under the Lisbon Treaty, the Parliaments president meanwhile articulates the EUs values such as democratic elections in other countries. The president is elected by the members of Parliament for a two-and-a-half-year term, since the European Peoples Party and Party of European Socialists began co-operating in the 1980s, they have had a tradition of splitting the two posts between them. Starting from the 2009–2014 session of the Parliament the outgoing president presides over the election of the new president, if the outgoing president is not re-elected as an MEP then one of the 14 vice-presidents takes up the role. While the outgoing president or vice president is in the chair, they hold all the powers of the president, before the ballot nominations are handed to the chair who announces them to Parliament. If no member holds a majority after three ballots, a fourth is held with only the two members holding the highest number of votes on the previous ballot. If there is still a tie following this, the eldest candidate is declared elected, a number of notable figures have been President of the Parliament and its predecessors. The first president was Paul-Henri Spaak MEP, one of the fathers of the Union
6.
Hans Furler
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Hans Furler was a German christian-democrat politician. He was the president of the European Parliament from 1956 to 1958, Furler was born in Lahr in the Baden portion of the Black Forest. After graduating from Lahr grammar school, Furler studied law in Freiburg in Breisgau, Berlin, in 1925 he passed his first state examination and in 1928 he earned his doctorate with a thesis on The Polices emergency measures and the states obligation to compensate. In December 1928, he passed the examination and first worked as an advocate in Pforzheim. Since 1930 he also lectured in patent law, in 1932, he habilitated at Technical University Karlsruhe. In 1940, the University appointed him professor for industrial property. From 1945 to 1948 he worked as the lawyer of a factory owned by his in-laws. In 1948 he opened a new law firm in Freiburg, after 1950 he lectured at the Albert-Ludwigs-University in Freiburg. In 1952, Furler joined the Christian-Democratic Union and was elected chairman of the economic council of the partys Baden branch. Furler was a member of the Bundestag from 1953 until 1972, until 1957, he was vice chairman of the committee for industrial property and copyright, in 1957 he was briefly chairman of the special committee common market/EURATOM. From 1959 to 1960 he was chairman of the committee of foreign affairs and he served as president of these bodies from 1956 to 1958 and from 1960 to 1962 and as vice president from 1962 to 1973. From 1958 to 1966, he was President of the German Council of the European Movement, Furler died on 29 June 1975 in Achern. Das polizeiliche Notrecht und die Entschädigungspflicht des Staates, Diss. jur, Heidelberg 1928 Parlamente über den Nationen. Entwicklung, Zustand und Aussichten in Europa, in, Die Politische Meinung,1957, Heft 11, reden und Aufsätze 1953–1957 Im neuen Europa. Erlebnisse und Erfahrungen im Europäischen Parlament, Frankfurt/Main 1963 Horst Ferdinand, hans Furler – Ein Europäer der ersten Stunde, in, Die Osterweiterung der EU. Europa – eine Vision wird Wirklichkeit
7.
Luxembourg City
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Luxembourg, also known as Luxembourg City, is the capital city of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, and the countrys most populous commune. The city contains Luxembourg Castle, established by the Franks in the Early Middle Ages, as of January 2016, the commune had a population of 115,227, which was more than three times the population of the countrys second most populous commune. The citys metropolitan population, including that of surrounding communes of Hesperange, Sandweiler, Strassen, in 2011, Luxembourg was ranked as having the second highest per capita GDP in the world at $80,119, with the city having developed into a banking and administrative centre. In the 2011 Mercer worldwide survey of 221 cities, Luxembourg was placed first for personal safety while it was ranked 19th for quality of living, in the Roman era, a fortified tower guarded the crossing of two Roman roads that met at the site of Luxembourg city. Siegfried built his castle, named Lucilinburhuc, on the Bock Fiels, in 987, Archbishop Egbert of Trier consecrated five altars in the Church of the Redemption. At a Roman road intersection near the church, a marketplace appeared around which the city developed, the city, because of its location and natural geography, has through history been a place of strategic military significance. The first fortifications were built as early as the 10th century, by the end of the 12th century, as the city expanded westward around the new St. Nicholas Church, new walls were built that included an area of 5 hectares. In about 1340, under the reign of John the Blind, in 1443, the Burgundians under Philip the Good conquered Luxembourg. Subsequently, the Burgundians, the Spanish, the French, the Spanish again, the Austrians, the French again, in the 17th century, the first casemates were built, initially, Spain built 23 km of tunnels, starting in 1644. These were then enlarged under French rule by Marshal Vauban, during the French Revolutionary Wars, the city was occupied by France twice, once, briefly, in 1792–3, and, later, after a seven-month siege. After the Luxembourg Crisis, the 1867 Treaty of London required Luxembourg to dismantle the fortifications in Luxembourg City. Their demolition took sixteen years, cost 1.5 million gold francs, furthermore, the Prussian garrison was to be withdrawn. When, in 1890, Grand Duke William III died without any heirs, the Grand Duchy passed out of Dutch hands. Despite Luxembourgs best efforts to remain neutral in the First World War, on 30 August, Helmuth von Moltke moved his headquarters to Luxembourg City, closer to his armies in France in preparation for a swift victory. However, the victory never came, and Luxembourg would play host to the German high command for another four years. At the end of the occupation, Luxembourg City was the scene of an attempted communist revolution, on 9 November 1918, communists declared a socialist republic, in 1921, the city limits were greatly expanded. The communes of Eich, Hamm, Hollerich, and Rollingergrund were incorporated into Luxembourg City, in 1940, Germany occupied Luxembourg again. Under the occupation, the citys streets all received new, German names
8.
Luxembourg
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Luxembourg /ˈlʌksəmbɜːrɡ/, officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, is a landlocked country in western Europe. It is bordered by Belgium to the west and north, Germany to the east and its culture, people and languages are highly intertwined with its neighbours, making it essentially a mixture of French and Germanic cultures. It comprises two regions, the Oesling in the north as part of the Ardennes massif. With an area of 2,586 square kilometres, it is one of the smallest sovereign states in Europe, Luxembourg had a population of 524,853 in October 2012, ranking it the 8th least-populous country in Europe. As a representative democracy with a monarch, it is headed by a Grand Duke, Henri, Grand Duke of Luxembourg. Luxembourg is a country, with an advanced economy and the worlds highest GDP per capita. Luxembourg is a member of the European Union, OECD, United Nations, NATO, and Benelux, reflecting its political consensus in favour of economic, political. The city of Luxembourg, which is the capital and largest city, is the seat of several institutions. Luxembourg served on the United Nations Security Council for the years 2013 and 2014, around this fort, a town gradually developed, which became the centre of a state of great strategic value. In the 14th and early 15th centuries, three members of the House of Luxembourg reigned as Holy Roman Emperors, in the following centuries, Luxembourgs fortress was steadily enlarged and strengthened by its successive occupants, the Bourbons, Habsburgs, Hohenzollerns and the French. After the defeat of Napoleon in 1815, Luxembourg was disputed between Prussia and the Netherlands and this arrangement was revised by the 1839 First Treaty of London, from which date Luxembourgs full independence is reckoned. In 1842 Luxembourg joined the German Customs Union, the King of the Netherlands remained Head of State as Grand Duke of Luxembourg, maintaining a personal union between the two countries until 1890. At the death of William III, the throne of the Netherlands passed to his daughter Wilhelmina and this allowed Germany the military advantage of controlling and expanding the railways there. In August 1914, Imperial Germany violated Luxembourgs neutrality in the war by invading it in the war against France and this allowed Germany to use the railway lines, while at the same time denying them to France. Nevertheless, despite the German occupation, Luxembourg was allowed to maintain much of its independence, in 1940, after the outbreak of World War II, Luxembourgs neutrality was again violated when the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany entered the country, entirely without justification. A government in exile based in London supported the Allies, sending a group of volunteers who participated in the Normandy invasion. Luxembourg was liberated in September 1944, and became a member of the United Nations in 1945. Luxembourgs neutral status under the constitution formally ended in 1948, in 2005, a referendum on the EU treaty establishing a constitution for Europe was held
9.
Scy-Chazelles
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Scy-Chazelles is a commune in the Moselle department in Grand Est in north-eastern France. The town is built on Mont St. Quentin near Metz, the historical area of Scy-Chazelles was shared between the Gorze Abbey, the Bishop of Metz, and the city of Metz. In 1415, the town was inhabited by Burgundians until it was occupied by the Franks in 1444, Scy and Chazelles existed for many centuries as two separate entities before being put together in 1817. Scy, a village in the province of the Three Bishoprics. At that time there were 348 inhabitants in 100 houses in Scy and 125 inhabitants in 30 houses in Chazelles, Scy-Chazelles is located near Mont Saint-Quentin, from where the defense of Metz and its surroundings areas against invasions was organized. The slopes of this produced the varietal The King of Wines in the mid-16th century. The village of Scy-Chazelles has more than 13 religious sanctuaries, the church was founded around 1177 and subsequently strengthened to make people safe from thieves and looters. It also houses the remains of Robert Schuman, the father of Europe, the church of Saint-Rémi, dating from the late 6th century, is known for its Roman architecture with three naves on square pillars built in the 11th century and. It is located at the Place de l’Esplanade, opposite the hall, offering a panorama of the city of Metz. Like other towns of the Moselle, the German Empire annexed Scy-Chazelles as it grew, on April 1,1941, the town of Scy-Chazelles was renamed Sigach and was integrated into the urban of Metz. During the Battle of Metz, Scy-Chazelles was defended by the 462nd Volks-Grenadier-Division of General Otto von Knobelsdorffs First Army, on November 21,1944, Scy-Chazelles was liberated by General George S. Pattons Third Army. Bismarck tower, the one in France Founded in the 19th century. It is located at 11 Rue de Crimée, in the heart of the old Scy village, the building housing the school has been donated to the village of Scy-Chazelles in 1859 by the famous Bouteiller family. Associated to this donation is the obligation of maintaining a preschool indefinitely in the donated building
10.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
11.
Popular Republican Movement
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The Popular Republican Movement was a Christian democratic political party in France during the Fourth Republic. Its leaders included Georges Bidault, Robert Schuman, Paul Coste-Floret, Pierre-Henri Teitgen, in 1876, for the first time, the Republicans held a majority in the House of Deputies. One year later, they won the 1877 elections against President Mac-Mahon, Mac-Mahon wanted restoration of the monarchy. After his resignation in 1879, the Republicans controlled the legislative and executive powers, the Catholic Church mistrusted the Republic and the ideas of the French Revolution, as well as popular sovereignty, which questioned the superiority of the spiritual power over the temporal. For this reason, it supported all the governments of the 19th century, notably Mac-Mahon. In 1892, in his encyclical Au Milieu Des Sollicitudes, Pope Leo XIII advised the French Catholics to rally to the Republic, the previous year, another encyclical, Rerum novarum had denounced capitalistic society and the socialist ideology, and advocated creation of Catholic popular organizations. In 1894, students founded Le Sillon and its leader, Marc Sangnier, campaigned for spiritual values, democracy and social reforms. It represented the wing of French Catholicism. But it was dissolved in 1910 on an order from the papacy, at the beginning of the 20th century, many organizations appeared, the Christian Workers Youth, the Christian Agricultural Youth, and the French Confederation of Christian Workers. In 1924, the Popular Democratic Party was founded, but it remained a small centre-right party, however, the Christian Democratic ideas arose in intellectual circles. Emmanuel Mounier founded the review Esprit which denounced fascism and passivity of the Western democracies, in the paper LAube, Francisque Gay and Georges Bidault shared similar theses. These circles participated actively in the anti-Nazi underground Resistance during the Second World War, in 1944, some prominent French politicians wanted to rally all the non-Communist Resistance behind Charles De Gaulle. The French Section of the Workers International was refounded and people from the Christian resistance movement founded the Popular Republican Movement and it claimed its loyalty to de Gaulle, who led the provisional government composed of Communists, Socialists and Christian democrats. At the November 1945 legislative election, the MRP was second after the French Communist Party, the MRP benefited from the absence of real right-wing challengers to rally the conservative electorate. Indeed, among the three largest parties, it was the one that was not Marxist. Furthermore, it appeared the closest to de Gaulle, thats why it was defined as a centrist party with right-wing voters but a left-wing policy. Wanting to achieve the complete integration of the Catholicism in the Republic, in January 1946, the president of the provisional government resigned in protest at the restoration of the parties regime. The MRP ministers chose to stay in government, nevertheless, the party called on voters to reject the proposed constitution in May 1946, fearing the election of a pro-Communist regime
12.
European Union
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The European Union is a political and economic union of 28 member states that are located primarily in Europe. It has an area of 4,475,757 km2, the EU has developed an internal single market through a standardised system of laws that apply in all member states. Within the Schengen Area, passport controls have been abolished, a monetary union was established in 1999 and came into full force in 2002, and is composed of 19 EU member states which use the euro currency. The EU operates through a system of supranational and intergovernmental decision-making. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community, the community and its successors have grown in size by the accession of new member states and in power by the addition of policy areas to its remit. While no member state has left the EU or its antecedent organisations, the Maastricht Treaty established the European Union in 1993 and introduced European citizenship. The latest major amendment to the basis of the EU. The EU as a whole is the largest economy in the world, additionally,27 out of 28 EU countries have a very high Human Development Index, according to the United Nations Development Programme. In 2012, the EU was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, through the Common Foreign and Security Policy, the EU has developed a role in external relations and defence. The union maintains permanent diplomatic missions throughout the world and represents itself at the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the G7, because of its global influence, the European Union has been described as an emerging superpower. After World War II, European integration was seen as an antidote to the nationalism which had devastated the continent. 1952 saw the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community, the supporters of the Community included Alcide De Gasperi, Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman, and Paul-Henri Spaak. These men and others are credited as the Founding fathers of the European Union. In 1957, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany signed the Treaty of Rome and they also signed another pact creating the European Atomic Energy Community for co-operation in developing nuclear energy. Both treaties came into force in 1958, the EEC and Euratom were created separately from the ECSC, although they shared the same courts and the Common Assembly. The EEC was headed by Walter Hallstein and Euratom was headed by Louis Armand, Euratom was to integrate sectors in nuclear energy while the EEC would develop a customs union among members. During the 1960s, tensions began to show, with France seeking to limit supranational power, Jean Rey presided over the first merged Commission. In 1973, the Communities enlarged to include Denmark, Ireland, Norway had negotiated to join at the same time, but Norwegian voters rejected membership in a referendum
13.
Council of Europe
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The Council of Europe is an international organisation focused on protecting human rights, democracy, rule of law in Europe and promoting European culture. Founded in 1949, it has 47 member states, covers approximately 820 million people, No country has ever joined the EU without first belonging to the Council of Europe. Unlike the EU, the Council of Europe cannot make binding laws, the best known body of the Council of Europe is the European Court of Human Rights, which enforces the European Convention on Human Rights. The Commissioner for Human Rights is an independent institution within the Council of Europe, mandated to promote awareness of, the Secretary General heads the secretariat of the organisation. Other major CoE bodies include the European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines, the headquarters of the Council of Europe are in Strasbourg, France. English and French are its two official languages, the Committee of Ministers, the Parliamentary Assembly and the Congress also use German, Italian, Russian, and Turkish for some of their work. In a speech at the University of Zurich on 19 September 1946, Sir Winston Churchill called for a kind of United States of Europe and he had spoken of a Council of Europe as early as 1943 in a radio broadcast. There were two schools of thought competing, some favoured a classical international organisation with representatives of governments, both approaches were finally combined through the creation of the Committee of Ministers and the Parliamentary Assembly under the Statute of the Council of Europe. The Council of Europe was founded on 5 May 1949 by the Treaty of London and those conventions and decisions are developed by the member states working together at the Council of Europe. Both organizations function as concentric circles around the foundations for European co-operation and harmony. The European Union could be seen as the circle with a much higher level of integration through the transfer of powers from the national to the EU level. The Council of Europe and the European Union, different roles, Council of Europe conventions/treaties are also open for signature to non-member states, thus facilitating equal co-operation with countries outside Europe. The Convention created the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, the Court supervises compliance with the European Convention on Human Rights and thus functions as the highest European court. It is to court that Europeans can bring cases if they believe that a member country has violated their fundamental rights. The various activities and achievements of the Council of Europe can be found in detail on its official website, Promotion of the right to education under Article 2 of the first Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights and several conventions on the recognition of university studies and diplomas. Promotion of fair sport through the Anti-Doping Convention Promotion of European youth exchanges and co-operation through European Youth Centres in Strasbourg and Budapest, Promotion of the quality of medicines throughout Europe by the European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and its European Pharmacopoeia. The institutions of the Council of Europe are, The Secretary General, mr Thorbjørn Jagland, the former Prime Minister of Norway was elected Secretary General of the Council of Europe in September 2009. In June 2014, he was re-elected, and his term in office commenced on 1 October 2014
14.
NATO
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The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance based on the North Atlantic Treaty which was signed on 4 April 1949. The organization constitutes a system of collective defence whereby its member states agree to mutual defence in response to an attack by any external party, three NATO members are permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and are officially nuclear-weapon states. NATOs headquarters are located in Haren, Brussels, Belgium, while the headquarters of Allied Command Operations is near Mons. NATO is an Alliance that consists of 28 independent member countries across North America and Europe, an additional 22 countries participate in NATOs Partnership for Peace program, with 15 other countries involved in institutionalized dialogue programmes. The combined military spending of all NATO members constitutes over 70% of the global total, Members defence spending is supposed to amount to 2% of GDP. The course of the Cold War led to a rivalry with nations of the Warsaw Pact, politically, the organization sought better relations with former Warsaw Pact countries, several of which joined the alliance in 1999 and 2004. N. The Treaty of Brussels, signed on 17 March 1948 by Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, France, the treaty and the Soviet Berlin Blockade led to the creation of the Western European Unions Defence Organization in September 1948. However, participation of the United States was thought necessary both to counter the power of the USSR and to prevent the revival of nationalist militarism. He got a hearing, especially considering American anxiety over Italy. In 1948 European leaders met with U. S. defense, military and diplomatic officials at the Pentagon, marshalls orders, exploring a framework for a new and unprecedented association. Talks for a new military alliance resulted in the North Atlantic Treaty and it included the five Treaty of Brussels states plus the United States, Canada, Portugal, Italy, Norway, Denmark and Iceland. The first NATO Secretary General, Lord Ismay, stated in 1949 that the goal was to keep the Russians out, the Americans in. Popular support for the Treaty was not unanimous, and some Icelanders participated in a pro-neutrality, the creation of NATO can be seen as the primary institutional consequence of a school of thought called Atlanticism which stressed the importance of trans-Atlantic cooperation. The members agreed that an attack against any one of them in Europe or North America would be considered an attack against them all. The treaty does not require members to respond with military action against an aggressor, although obliged to respond, they maintain the freedom to choose the method by which they do so. This differs from Article IV of the Treaty of Brussels, which states that the response will be military in nature. It is nonetheless assumed that NATO members will aid the attacked member militarily, the treaty was later clarified to include both the members territory and their vessels, forces or aircraft above the Tropic of Cancer, including some Overseas departments of France. The creation of NATO brought about some standardization of allied military terminology, procedures, and technology, the roughly 1300 Standardization Agreements codified many of the common practices that NATO has achieved
15.
College of Europe
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The College of Europe is an independent university institute of postgraduate European studies with the main campus in Bruges, Belgium. It has the status of Institution of Public Interest, operating according to Belgian law, since 1993 the college has also had an additional smaller campus in Warsaw, Poland. Students are usually selected in cooperation with their countries ministries of foreign affairs, the number of students each year used to be very low—for several decades less than 100—but has increased since the early 1990s. The College of Europe is bilingual, and students must be proficient in English, students receive an advanced masters degree following a one-year programme. Traditionally, students specialise in either European law, international economics, or European political and administrative studies, in recent years, additional programmes have been created. According to The Times, the College of Europe, in the medieval Belgian city of Bruges, is to the European political elite what the Harvard Business School is to American corporate life and it is a hothouse where the ambitious and talented go to make contacts. The Economist describes it as a finishing school for aspiring Eurocrats. The Financial Times writes that the elite College of Europe in Bruges is an institution geared to producing crop after crop of graduates with an enthusiasm for EU integration. European Commissioner for Education Ján Figeľ described the college as one of the most emblematic centres of European studies in the European Union, the BBC has referred to it as the EUs very own Oxbridge. The college has also described as the leading place to study European affairs. RFE/RL has referred to the college as a Euro-federalist hot-spot, the Global Mail has described its students as Europes leaders-in-waiting. Each academic year is named for a patron and referred to as a promotion, the academic year is opened by a leading European politician. The College of Europe in Belgium shares several traditions with the École nationale dadministration of France, many of its anciens go on to serve as diplomats and senior civil servants in European institutions. The College of Europe was the world’s first university institute of postgraduate studies and it was founded in 1949 by leading European figures, such as Salvador de Madariaga, Winston Churchill, Paul-Henri Spaak and Alcide De Gasperi, in the wake of the Hague Congress of 1948. They imagined a college where Europes future leaders, some countries only a short while before at war with each other, could live. The Hague Congress also led to the creation of the European Movement, a group of Bruges citizens led by the Reverend Karel Verleye succeeded in attracting the college to Bruges. Professor Hendrik Brugmans, one of the leaders of the European Movement. The college now operates as ‘one College – two campuses, ’ and what was referred to as the ‘esprit de Bruges’, is now known as the ‘esprit du Collège’
16.
Clausen, Luxembourg
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Clausen is a quarter in central Luxembourg City, in southern Luxembourg. In 2011, the quarter had a population of 798 people and its parish church, St. Cunegonde, is the location for Luxembourgs weekly celebration of Tridentine Mass on Sundays at 11.30 a. m. as of 5 October 2014. The church has a number of wall paintings depicting the life of St. Cunegonde. The statesman Robert Schuman was born in a house which his parents were renting at the time along the rue Jules Wilhelm in Clausen and he later attended the local primary school. In 1985 the house was purchased by the state and it is now home to a research institute. The artist used local people as models for a crowd scene and the young Robert Schuman was used to represent a small boy
17.
Metz
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Metz is a city in northeast France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers. Metz is the prefecture of the Moselle department and the seat of the parliament of the Great East region, located near the tripoint along the junction of France, Germany, and Luxembourg, the city forms a central place of the European Greater Region and the SaarLorLux euroregion. The city has been steeped in Romance culture, but has strongly influenced by Germanic culture due to its location. Because of its historical, cultural, and architectural background, Metz has been submitted on Frances UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List, Metz is home to some world-class venues including the Arsenal Concert Hall and the Centre Pompidou-Metz museum. A basin of urban ecology, Metz gained its nickname of The Green City, as it has extensive open grounds, the historic city centre is one of the largest commercial pedestrian areas in France. A historic garrison town, Metz is the heart of the Lorraine region, specialising in information technology. In ancient times, the town was known as city of Mediomatrici, after its integration into the Roman Empire, the city was called Divodurum Mediomatricum, meaning Holy Village or Holy Fortress of the Mediomatrici, then it was known as Mediomatrix. During the 5th century AD, the name evolved to Mettis, Metz has a recorded history dating back over 3,000 years. Before the conquest of Gaul by Julius Caesar in 52 BC, between the 6th and 8th centuries, the city was the residence of the Merovingian kings of Austrasia. After the Treaty of Verdun in 843, Metz became the capital of the Kingdom of Lotharingia and was integrated into the Holy Roman Empire. During the 12th century, Metz rose to the status of Republic, with the signature of the Treaty of Chambord in 1552, Metz passed to the hands of the Kings of France. Under French rule, Metz was selected as capital of the Three Bishoprics, with creation of the departments by the Estates-General of 1789, Metz was chosen as capital of the Department of Moselle. Metz remained German until the end of World War I, when it reverted to France, however, after the Battle of France during the Second World War, the city was annexed once more by the German Third Reich. In 1944, the attack on the city by the U. S, Third Army freed the city from German rule and Metz reverted one more time to France after World War II. During the 1950s, Metz was chosen to be the capital of the newly created Lorraine region, with the creation of the European Community and the later European Union, the city has become central to the Greater Region and the SaarLorLux Euroregion. Metz is located on the banks of the Moselle and the Seille rivers,43 km from the Schengen tripoint where the borders of France, Germany, and Luxembourg meet. The city was built in a place where branches of the Moselle river creates several islands. The terrain of Metz forms part of the Paris Basin and presents a plateau relief cut by river valleys presenting cuestas in the north-south direction
18.
University of Berlin
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The Humboldt university model has strongly influenced other European and Western universities. In 1949, it changed its name to Humboldt-Universität in honour of both its founder Wilhelm and his brother, geographer Alexander von Humboldt. The first semester at the newly founded Berlin university occurred in 1810 with 256 students and 52 lecturers in faculties of law, medicine, theology, du Bois and European unifier Robert Schuman, as well as the influential surgeon Johann Friedrich Dieffenbach in the early half of the 1800s. The structure of German research-intensive universities, such as Humboldt, served as a model for institutions like Johns Hopkins University, Alexander von Humboldt, brother of the founder William, promoted the new learning. With the construction of research facilities in the second half of the 19th Century teaching of the natural sciences began. During this period of enlargement, Berlin University gradually expanded to other previously separate colleges in Berlin. An example would be the Charité, the Pépinière and the Collegium Medico-chirurgicum, in 1717, King Friedrich I had built a quarantine house for Plague at the city gates, which in 1727 was rechristened by the soldier king Friedrich Wilhelm, Es soll das Haus die Charité heißen. By 1829 the site became Berlin Universitys medical campus and remained so until 1927 when the more modern University Hospital was constructed, Berlin University started a natural history collection in 1810, which, by 1889 required a separate building and became the Museum für Naturkunde. The preexisting Tierarznei School, founded in 1790 and absorbed by the university, also the Landwirtschaftliche Hochschule Berlin, founded in 1881 was affiliated with the Agricultural Faculties of the University. After 1933, like all German universities, it was affected by the Nazi regime, the rector during this period was Eugen Fischer. The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service resulted in 250 Jewish professors and employees being fired during 1933/1934, students and scholars and political opponents of Nazis were ejected from the university and often deported. During this time one third of all of the staff were fired by the Nazis. The Soviet Military Administration in Germany ordered the opening of the university in January 1946, the SMAD wanted a redesigned Berlin University based on the Soviet model, however they insisted on the phrasing newly opened and not re-opened for political reasons. The University of Berlin must effectively start again in almost every way and you have before you this image of the old university. What remains of that is nought but ruins, the teaching was limited to seven departments working in reopened, war-damaged buildings, with many of the teachers dead or missing. However, by the semester of 1946, the Economic. This program existed at Berlin University until 1962, the East-West conflict in post-war Germany led to a growing communist influence in the university. This was controversial, and incited strong protests within the student body, Soviet NKVD secret police arrested a number of students in March 1947 as a response
19.
University of Munich
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Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich is a public research university located in Munich, Germany. The University of Munich is among Germanys oldest universities, in 1802, the university was officially named Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität by King Maximilian I of Bavaria in his as well as the universitys original founders honour. Among these were Wilhelm Röntgen, Max Planck, Werner Heisenberg, Otto Hahn, pope Benedict XVI was also a student and professor at the university. The LMU has recently been conferred the title of university under the German Universities Excellence Initiative. LMU is currently the second-largest university in Germany in terms of student population, in the semester of 2015/2016. Of these,8,671 were freshmen while international students totalled 7,812 or almost 15% of the student population, the university was founded with papal approval in 1472 as the University of Ingolstadt, with faculties of philosophy, medicine, jurisprudence and theology. Its first rector was Christopher Mendel of Steinfels, who became bishop of Chiemsee. In the period of German humanism, the universitys academics included names such as Conrad Celtes, the theologian Johann Eck also taught at the university. From 1549 to 1773, the university was influenced by the Jesuits, the Jesuit Petrus Canisius served as rector of the university. At the end of the 18th century, the university was influenced by the Enlightenment, in 1800, the Prince-Elector Maximilianv IV Joseph moved the university to Landshut, due to French aggression that threatened Ingolstadt during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1802, the university was renamed the Ludwig Maximilian University in honour of its two founders, Louis IX, Duke of Bavaria and Maximilian I, Elector of Bavaria. The Minister of Education, Maximilian von Montgelas, initiated a number of reforms sought to modernize the rather conservative. In 1826, it was moved to Munich, the capital of the Kingdom of Bavaria, the university was situated in the Old Academy until a new building in the Ludwigstraße was completed. The locals were critical of the number of Protestant professors Maximilian. They were dubbed the Nordlichter and especially physician Johann Nepomuk von Ringseis was quite angry about them, in the second half of the 19th century, the university rose to great prominence in the European scientific community, attracting many of the worlds leading scientists. It was also a period of great expansion, from 1903, women were allowed to study at Bavarian universities, and by 1918, the female proportion of students at LMU had reached 18%. In 1918, Adele Hartmann became the first woman in Germany to earn the Habilitation, during the Third Reich, academic freedom was severely curtailed. In 1943 the White Rose group of anti-Nazi students conducted their campaign of opposition to the National Socialists at this university, the university has continued to be one of the leading universities of West Germany during the Cold War and in the post-reunification era
20.
University of Bonn
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The University of Bonn is a public research university located in Bonn, Germany. Founded in its present form in 1818, as the successor of earlier academic institutions. The University of Bonn offers a number of undergraduate and graduate programs in a range of subjects. Its library holds more than five million volumes, the University of Bonn has 544 professors and 32,500 students. The Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2016 and the Academic Ranking of World Universities 2015 ranked the University of Bonn as one of the 100 best universities in the world. The universitys forerunner was the Kurkölnische Akademie Bonn which was founded in 1777 by Maximilian Frederick of Königsegg-Rothenfels, in the spirit of the Enlightenment the new academy was nonsectarian. The academy had schools for theology, law, pharmacy and general studies, in 1784 Emperor Joseph II granted the academy the right to award academic degrees, turning the academy into a university. The academy was closed in 1798 after the bank of the Rhine was occupied by France during the French Revolutionary Wars. The Rhineland became a part of Prussia in 1815 as a result of the Congress of Vienna, shortly after the seizure of the Rhineland, on 5 April 1815, King Frederick William III of Prussia promised the establishment of a new university in the new Rhine province. At this time there was no university in the Rhineland, as all three universities that existed until the end of the 18th century were closed as a result of the French occupation, the Kurkölnische Akademie Bonn was one of these three universities. The other two were the Roman Catholic University of Cologne and the Protestant University of Duisburg, the new Rhein University was then founded on 18 October 1818 by Frederick William III. It was the sixth Prussian University, founded after the universities in Greifswald, Berlin, Königsberg, Halle, the new university was equally shared between the two Christian denominations. This was one of the reasons why Bonn, with its tradition of a university, was chosen over Cologne. Apart from a school of Roman Catholic theology and a school of Protestant theology, inititally 35 professors and eight adjunct professors were teaching in Bonn. The university constitution was adopted in 1827, in the spirit of Wilhelm von Humboldt the constitution emphasized the autonomy of the university and the unity of teaching and research. Similar to the University of Berlin, which was founded in 1810, only one year after the inception of the Rhein University the dramatist August von Kotzebue was murdered by Karl Ludwig Sand, a student at the University of Jena. The Carlsbad Decrees, introduced on 20 September 1819 led to a crackdown on universities, the dissolution of the Burschenschaften. One victim was the author and poet Ernst Moritz Arndt, who, only after the death of Frederick William III in 1840 was he reinstated in his professorship
21.
University of Strasbourg
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The University of Strasbourg in Strasbourg, Alsace, France, is the second largest university in France, with about 46,000 students and over 4,000 researchers. On 1 January 2009, the fusion of three universities reconstituted a united University of Strasbourg. With as many as 18 Nobel laureates, the university is now ranked among the best in the League of European Research Universities, the university emerged from a Lutheran humanist German Gymnasium, founded in 1538 by Johannes Sturm in the Free Imperial City of Strassburg. It was transformed to a university in 1621 and elevated to the ranks of a university in 1631. Among its earliest university students was Johann Scheffler who studied medicine and later converted to Catholicism and became the mystic and poet Angelus Silesius. The Lutheran German university still persisted even after the annexation of the City by King Louis XIV in 1681, during the German Empire the university was greatly expanded and numerous new buildings were erected because the university was intended to be a showcase of German against French culture in Alsace. In 1918, Alsace-Lorraine was returned to France, so a reverse exodus of Germanophone teachers took place, during the Second World War, when France was occupied, personnel and equipment of the University of Strasbourg were transferred to Clermont-Ferrand. In its place, the short-lived German Reichsuniversität Straßburg was created, the university campus covers a vast part near the center of the city, located between the Cité Administrative, Esplanade and Gallia bus-tram stations. Modern architectural buildings include, Escarpe, the Doctoral College of Strasbourg, Atrium, Pangloss, the student residence building for the Doctoral College of Strasbourg was designed by London-based Nicholas Hare Architects in 2007. The structures are depicted on the inner wall of the Esplanade university restaurant, accompanied by the names of their architects. The administrative organisms, attached to the university, are located in the Agora building
22.
Chamber of Deputies of France
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1875–1940 during the French Third Republic, the Chamber of Deputies was the legislative assembly of the French Parliament, elected by universal suffrage. When reunited with the French Senate at Versailles, the French Parliament was called the National Assembly, created by the Charter of 1814 and replacing the Corps législatif, which existed under the First French Empire, the Chamber of Deputies was composed of individuals elected by census suffrage. Its role was to discuss laws and, most importantly, to vote taxes, according to the Charter, deputies were elected for five years, with one-fifth renewed each year. Deputies needed to be 40 years old and to pay 1000 francs in direct contributions, government ministers could be chosen from among the deputies, and this resulted in giving the Restoration government a slight, albeit minor, parliamentary and liberal character. This body was dissolved upon the entry of Coalition troops into Paris on 7 July, for the period 1815–1816, the Ultra-royalist chamber was referred to as the Chambre introuvable. The Chamber of Deputies was elected by census suffrage according to the Charter of 1830, the political life of the July Monarchy was defined by the split within the Chamber of Deputies between the progressive movement and the conservative wing. Although both parties traded power in the stages, by 1840 the conservative members around François Guizot had seized control. From 1830, deputies were elected for five years and they needed to be 30 years old and to pay 500 francs in direct contributions. In 1852, the Chamber of Deputies retook the name Corps législatif
23.
Moselle (department)
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Moselle is the most populous department in Lorraine, in the east of France, and is named after the river Moselle, a tributary of the Rhine, which flows through the western part of the department. Inhabitants of the department are known as Mosellans, Moselle is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4,1790. It was created from the province of Lorraine. One of its first prefects was the comte de Vaublanc, from 1805 to 1814, by the Treaty of Paris of 1814 following the first defeat and abdication of Napoleon, France had to surrender almost all the territory it had conquered since 1792. In northeastern France, the Treaty did not restore the 1792 borders, however, as a result, France ceded the exclave of Tholey as well as a few communes near Sierck-les-Bains to Austria. France thus became a net beneficiary of the Treaty of Paris, all the new territories ceded to her being far larger, all these new territories were incorporated into the Moselle department, and so Moselle had now a larger territory than ever since 1790. However, with the return of Napoleon and his defeat at the Battle of Waterloo. Tholey and the communes around Sierck-les-Bains were still to be ceded as agreed in 1814, at the end of 1815 Austria transferred all these territories to Prussia, making for the first time a shared border for those two states. Thus, by the end of 1815, the Moselle department had finally the limits that it would keep until 1871, between 1815 and 1871, the department had an area of 5,387 km². It had four arrondissements, Metz, Briey, Sarreguemines, France merged the remaining area of Briey with the truncated Meurthe department to create the new Meurthe-et-Moselle department with its préfecture at Nancy. In 1919, following the French victory in the First World War, however, it was decided not to recreate the old separate departments of Meurthe and Moselle by reverting to the old department borders of before 1871. Instead, Meurthe-et-Moselle was left untouched, and the part of Lorraine was reconstituted as the new department of Moselle. Thus, the Moselle department was reborn, but with different borders from those before 1871. The new Moselle department now reached its current area of 6,216 km², larger than the old Moselle because the areas of Château-Salins and Sarrebourg were far larger than the area of Briey and Longwy. At the declaration of World War II on September 3,1939 around 30% of Moselles territory lay between the Maginot Line and the German front,302,732 people, around 45% of the departments population, were evacuated to departments in central and western France during September 1939. Of those evacuated, around 200,000 returned after the war, in spite of the June 22,1940 armistice, Moselle was again annexed by Germany in July of that year, it became part of the Gau Westmark. Adolf Hitler considered Moselle and Alsace parts of Germany, and as a result the inhabitants were drafted into the German Wehrmacht, several organized groups were formed in resistance to the German occupation, notably the Groupe Mario, led by Jean Burger, and the Groupe Derhan. During these years more than 10,000 Mosellans were deported to camps, many to the Sudetenland, the United States Army liberated Moselle from the Third Reich in the Battle of Metz in September 1944, although combat continued in the northeastern part of the department until March 1945
24.
World War I
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World War I, also known as the First World War, the Great War, or the War to End All Wars, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. More than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, were mobilised in one of the largest wars in history and it was one of the deadliest conflicts in history, and paved the way for major political changes, including revolutions in many of the nations involved. The war drew in all the worlds great powers, assembled in two opposing alliances, the Allies versus the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary. These alliances were reorganised and expanded as more nations entered the war, Italy, Japan, the trigger for the war was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, by Yugoslav nationalist Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. This set off a crisis when Austria-Hungary delivered an ultimatum to the Kingdom of Serbia. Within weeks, the powers were at war and the conflict soon spread around the world. On 25 July Russia began mobilisation and on 28 July, the Austro-Hungarians declared war on Serbia, Germany presented an ultimatum to Russia to demobilise, and when this was refused, declared war on Russia on 1 August. Germany then invaded neutral Belgium and Luxembourg before moving towards France, after the German march on Paris was halted, what became known as the Western Front settled into a battle of attrition, with a trench line that changed little until 1917. On the Eastern Front, the Russian army was successful against the Austro-Hungarians, in November 1914, the Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers, opening fronts in the Caucasus, Mesopotamia and the Sinai. In 1915, Italy joined the Allies and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers, Romania joined the Allies in 1916, after a stunning German offensive along the Western Front in the spring of 1918, the Allies rallied and drove back the Germans in a series of successful offensives. By the end of the war or soon after, the German Empire, Russian Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire, national borders were redrawn, with several independent nations restored or created, and Germanys colonies were parceled out among the victors. During the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, the Big Four imposed their terms in a series of treaties, the League of Nations was formed with the aim of preventing any repetition of such a conflict. This effort failed, and economic depression, renewed nationalism, weakened successor states, and feelings of humiliation eventually contributed to World War II. From the time of its start until the approach of World War II, at the time, it was also sometimes called the war to end war or the war to end all wars due to its then-unparalleled scale and devastation. In Canada, Macleans magazine in October 1914 wrote, Some wars name themselves, during the interwar period, the war was most often called the World War and the Great War in English-speaking countries. Will become the first world war in the sense of the word. These began in 1815, with the Holy Alliance between Prussia, Russia, and Austria, when Germany was united in 1871, Prussia became part of the new German nation. Soon after, in October 1873, German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck negotiated the League of the Three Emperors between the monarchs of Austria-Hungary, Russia and Germany
25.
Alsace-Lorraine
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The Alsatian part lay in the Rhine Valley on the west bank of the Rhine River and east of the Vosges Mountains. The Lorraine section was in the upper Moselle valley to the north of the Vosges, the territory was made up of 93% of Alsace and 26% of Lorraine, the remaining portions of these regions continued to be part of France. For historical reasons, specific legal dispositions are still applied in the territory in the form of a local law, in relation to its special legal status, since its reversion to France following World War I, the territory has been referred to administratively as Alsace-Moselle. Alsace-Lorraine had an area of 14,496 km2. France long sought to attain and preserve its boundaries, which are the Pyrenees to the southwest, the Alps to the southeast. These strategic claims led to the annexation of territories located west of the Rhine river in the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation. What is now known as Alsace was progressively conquered by Louis XIV in the 17th century and we Germans who know Germany and France know better what is good for the Alsatians than the unfortunates themselves. In the perversion of their French life they have no idea of what concerns Germany. In 1871, the newly created German Empires demand for Alsace from France after its victory in the Franco-Prussian War was not simply a punitive measure. The transfer was controversial even among the Germans, The German Chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, was opposed to it. Some German industrialists did not want the competition from Alsatian industries, from an ethnic perspective, the transfer involved people who for the most part spoke Alemannic German dialects. From a military perspective, by early 1870s standards, shifting the frontier away from the Rhine would give the Germans a strategic buffer against feared future French attacks, however, domestic politics in the new Reich may have been decisive. Although it was led by Prussia, the new German Empire was a decentralized federal state. As recently as the 1866 Austro-Prussian War, these states had been Prussias enemies, in the new Empires constitution, both states, but especially Bavaria, had been given concessions with regard to local autonomy, including partial control of their military forces. For this reason, the Prussian General Staff argued that it was necessary for the Reichs frontier with France to be under direct Prussian control, thus, by annexing Alsace-Lorraine, Berlin was able to avoid complications with Baden and Bavaria on such matters as new fortifications. Memories of the Napoleonic Wars were still fresh in the 1870s. In the years before 1870, it is arguable that the Germans feared the French more than the French feared the Germans. Many Germans at the thought that the creation of the new Empire in itself would be enough to earn permanent French enmity
26.
Thionville
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Thionville is a commune in the Moselle department in Grand Est in north-eastern France. The city is located on the bank of the river Moselle. The population of Thionville has increased mainly in the first half of the 20th century due to development of the upper Moselle basin. The economic slowdown and the crisis of the 1970s affected the town. Thionville was settled as early as the time of the Merovingians, after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the region was inhabited by the Germanic Alamanni. It was known in the German of that era as Theudonevilla or Totonisvilla, king Pippin had a royal palace constructed here. The Synod of Thionville was held beginning on February 2,835. It reinstated Emperor Louis the Pious and reversed his conviction on crimes — none of which he actually committed — and deposed the Archbishop of Rheims. The Synod was composed of 43 bishops, on February 28,835, in Mainz, Ebbo admitted that Louis had not committed the crimes of which he had been indicted and for which he had been deposed as Holy Roman Emperor. From the 10th century onward, the area was part of the Holy Roman Empire and it was in possession of the House of Luxembourg until 1462 and then, until 1477, of the Duke of Burgundy. From 1477 to 1643, it was Habsburg territory, eskil, Archbishop of Lund, was imprisoned at Thionville upon his return from his 1153 pilgrimage to Rome. The Siege of Thionville in June 1639 occurred as part of the Thirty Years War, in 1659 Diedenhofen was annexed by France. Fortifications were constructed under the direction of Sébastien de Vauban, in 1792, Thionville was besieged by the Duke of Brunswick, who unsuccessfully sought to defeat the French Revolution and restore Louis XVI to the royal throne. The writer François-René de Chateaubriand was left for dead during Condés military émigré expedition against Thionville in 1792, after the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, the area of Alsace-Lorraine was annexed by the newly created German Empire in 1871 by the Treaty of Frankfurt and became a Reichsland. Thionville was renamed Diedenhofen and became a prosperous German city, some large neo-Romanesque buildings typical of the German Empire were constructed in the city. The German Army decided to build a line from Mulhouse to Luxembourg to protect the new Reichsland. The centerpiece of this line was the great Moselstellung, a system protecting Metz. Each position was surrounded by ditches, with shelters and observation cupolas
27.
Germany
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Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe. It includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres, with about 82 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular destination in the world. Germanys capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while its largest conurbation is the Ruhr, other major cities include Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Leipzig. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity, a region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward, beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation, in 1871, Germany became a nation state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic, the establishment of the national socialist dictatorship in 1933 led to World War II and the Holocaust. After a period of Allied occupation, two German states were founded, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, in 1990, the country was reunified. In the 21st century, Germany is a power and has the worlds fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP. As a global leader in industrial and technological sectors, it is both the worlds third-largest exporter and importer of goods. Germany is a country with a very high standard of living sustained by a skilled. It upholds a social security and universal health system, environmental protection. Germany was a member of the European Economic Community in 1957. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999, Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. The national military expenditure is the 9th highest in the world, the English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz popular, derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- people, the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a mine in Schöningen where three 380, 000-year-old wooden javelins were unearthed
28.
Paul Reynaud
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Paul Reynaud was a French politician and lawyer prominent in the interwar period, noted for his stances on economic liberalism and militant opposition to Germany. He was the penultimate Prime Minister of the Third Republic and vice-president of the Democratic Republican Alliance center-right party, after the outbreak of World War II and the collapse of French resistance in 1940, Reynaud persistently refused to support an armistice with Germany and resigned. After unsuccessfully attempting to flee France, he was arrested by Philippe Petains administration, surrendered to German custody in 1942, he was imprisoned in Germany and later Austria until liberation in 1945. Elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 1946, he became a prominent figure again in French political life, Reynaud was born in Barcelonnette, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence. His father had made a fortune in the industry, enabling Reynaud to study law at the Sorbonne. He entered politics and was elected to the French Chamber of Deputies from 1919 to 1924, representing Basses-Alpes, in the 1920s, Reynaud developed a reputation for laxity on German reparations, at a time when many in the French government backed harsher terms for Germany. In the 1930s during the Great Depression, particularly after 1933, Reynaud backed a strong alliance with the United Kingdom and, unlike many others on the French Right, better relations with the Soviet Union as a counterweight against the Germans. Reynaud held several posts in the early 1930s, but he clashed with members of his party after 1932 over French foreign. He was not given another position until 1938. Like Winston Churchill, Reynaud was a maverick in his party and often alone in his calls for rearmament and he strongly opposed appeasement in the run-up to the Second World War. He also clashed with his party on economic policy, backing the devaluation of the franc as a solution to Frances economic woes. Pierre Étienne Flandin, the leader of the Democratic Republican Alliance, agreed with several of Reynauds key policy stances, Reynaud returned to the cabinet in 1938 as Minister of Finance under Édouard Daladier. Reynaud publicly made his case, and in response Flandin pamphleted Paris in order to pressure the government to agree to Hitlers demands, Reynaud subsequently left his party to become an independent. Reynaud still had Daladiers support, however, whose politique de fermeté was very similar to Reynauds notion of deterrence, Reynaud, however, had always wanted the Finance ministry. Reynauds reforms were implemented, and the government stood down a one-day strike in opposition. Reynaud addressed Frances business community, arguing that We live in a capitalist system, for it to function we must obey its laws. These are the laws of profits, individual risk, free markets, more importantly, Frances industrial productivity jumped from 76 to 100 from October 1938 to May 1939. At the outbreak of war, however, Reynaud was not bullish on Frances economy, the French Right was ambivalent about the war in late 1939 and early 1940, feeling that the greater threat was from the Soviets
29.
Nazi
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National Socialism, more commonly known as Nazism, is the ideology and practice associated with the 20th-century German Nazi Party and Nazi Germany, as well as other far-right groups. Nazism subscribed to theories of racial hierarchy and Social Darwinism, identifying Germans as part of what Nazis regarded as an Aryan or Nordic master race and it aimed to overcome social divisions and create a homogeneous society, unified on the basis of racial purity. The term National Socialism arose out of attempts to create a nationalist redefinition of socialism, the Nazi Partys precursor, the Pan-German nationalist and anti-Semitic German Workers Party, was founded on 5 January 1919. By the early 1920s, Adolf Hitler assumed control of the organisation, following the Holocaust and German defeat in World War II, only a few fringe racist groups, usually referred to as neo-Nazis, still describe themselves as following National Socialism. The full name of Adolf Hitlers party was Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, the shorthand Nazi was formed from the first two syllables of the German pronunciation of the word national. The term was in use before the rise of the NSDAP as a colloquial and derogatory word for a peasant, characterizing an awkward. It derived from Ignaz, being a version of Ignatius, a common name in Bavaria. Opponents seized on this and shortened the first word of the name, Nationalsozialistische. The NSDAP briefly adopted the Nazi designation, attempting to reappropriate the term, the use of Nazi Germany, Nazi regime, and so on was popularised by German exiles abroad. From them, the spread into other languages and was eventually brought back to Germany after World War II. In English, Nazism is a name for the ideology the party advocated. The majority of scholars identify Nazism in practice as a form of far-right politics, far-right themes in Nazism include the argument that superior people have a right to dominate over other people and purge society of supposed inferior elements. Adolf Hitler and other proponents officially portrayed Nazism as being neither left- nor right-wing, but the politicians of the Right deserve exactly the same reproach. It was through their miserable cowardice that those ruffians of Jews who came into power in 1918 were able to rob the nation of its arms, a major inspiration for the Nazis were the far-right nationalist Freikorps, paramilitary organisations that engaged in political violence after World War I. The Nazis stated the alliance was purely tactical and there remained substantial differences with the DNVP, the Nazis described the DNVP as a bourgeois party and called themselves an anti-bourgeois party. After the elections in 1932, the alliance broke after the DNVP lost many of its seats in the Reichstag, the Nazis denounced them as an insignificant heap of reactionaries. The DNVP responded by denouncing the Nazis for their socialism, their violence. Kaiser Wilhelm II, who was pressured to abdicate the throne and flee into exile amidst an attempted communist revolution in Germany, there were factions in the Nazi Party, both conservative and radical
30.
Gestapo
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The Gestapo, abbreviation of Geheime Staatspolizei, or the Secret State Police, was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various security agencies of Prussia into one organization. Then from 27 September 1939 forward, it was administered by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt and was considered an organization to the SS Sicherheitsdienst. This gave Göring command of the largest police force in Germany, soon afterward, Göring detached the political and intelligence sections from the police and filled their ranks with Nazis. On 26 April 1933, Göring merged the two units as the Geheime Staatspolizei, which was abbreviated for a stamp and became known as the Gestapo. He originally wanted to name it the Secret Police Office, and its first commander was Rudolf Diels, a protégé of Göring. Diels was appointed with the title of chief of Abteilung Ia of the Political Police of the Prussian Interior Ministry, Diels was best known as the primary interrogator of Marinus van der Lubbe after the Reichstag fire. In late 1933, the Reich Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick wanted to integrate all the forces of the German states under his control. Göring outflanked him by removing the Prussian political and intelligence departments from the interior ministry. Göring himself took over the Gestapo in 1934 and urged Hitler to extend the agencys authority throughout Germany and this represented a radical departure from German tradition, which held that law enforcement was a Land and local matter. In this, he ran into conflict with Heinrich Himmler, who was chief of the second most powerful German state. Frick did not have the muscle to take on Göring by himself so he allied with Himmler, with Fricks support, Himmler took over the political police of state after state. Concerned that Diels was not ruthless enough to counteract the power of the Sturmabteilung, Göring handed over control of the Gestapo to Himmler on 20 April 1934. Also on that date, Hitler appointed Himmler chief of all German police outside Prussia, Heydrich, named chief of the Gestapo by Himmler on 22 April 1934, also continued as head of the SS Security Service. Himmler wanted to free himself entirely from Roehm, who he viewed as an obstacle, roehms position was menacing as upwards of over 4. Several Nazi chieftains, among them Goering, Joseph Goebbels, Rudolf Hess, both the SD and Gestapo released information concerning an imminent putsch by the SA. Once persuaded, Hitler acted by setting Himmlers SS into action, on 17 June 1936, Hitler decreed the unification of all police forces in the Reich and named Himmler as Chief of German Police. This action effectively merged the police into the SS and removed it from Fricks control, Himmler was nominally subordinate to Frick as police chief, but as Reichsführer-SS, he answered only to Hitler
31.
Dachau concentration camp
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Dachau concentration camp was the first of the Nazi concentration camps opened in Germany, intended to hold political prisoners. It is located on the grounds of a munitions factory northeast of the medieval town of Dachau, about 16 km northwest of Munich in the state of Bavaria. The Dachau camp system grew to include nearly 100 sub-camps, which were work camps or Arbeitskommandos. The camps were liberated by U. S. forces on 29 April 1945, There were 32,000 documented deaths at the camp, and thousands that are undocumented. Approximately 10,000 of the 30,000 prisoners were sick at the time of liberation, in the postwar years the Dachau facility served to hold SS soldiers awaiting trial. After 1948, it held ethnic Germans who had expelled from eastern Europe and were awaiting resettlement. It was finally closed in 1960, There are several religious memorials within the Memorial Site, which is open to the public. After the takeover of Bavaria on 9 March 1933, Heinrich Himmler, then Chief of Police in Munich, began to speak with the administration of an unused gunpowder and he toured the site to see if it could be used for quartering protective-custody prisoners. The Concentration Camp at Dachau was opened 22 March 1933, with the arrival of about 200 prisoners from Stadelheim Prison in Munich and it became the first regular concentration camp established by the coalition government of the National Socialist German Workers Party and the German National Peoples Party. Jehovah’s Witnesses, homosexuals, and emigrants were sent to Dachau after the 1935 passage of the Nuremberg Laws which institutionalized racial discrimination, in early 1937, the SS, using prisoner labor, initiated construction of a large complex capable of holding 6,000 prisoners. The construction was completed in mid-August 1938. More political opponents, and over 11,000 German and Austrian Jews were sent to the camp after the annexation of Austria and the Sudetenland in 1938. Sinti and Roma in the hundreds were sent to the camp in 1939, the prisoners of Dachau concentration camp originally were to serve as forced labor for a munition factory, and to expand the camp. It was used as a center for SS guards and was a model for other concentration camps. The camp was about 300 m ×600 m in rectangular shape, the prisoners entrance was secured by an iron gate with the motto “Arbeit macht frei”. This reflected Nazi propaganda, which trivialized concentration camps as labor and re-education camps, as of 1938, the procedure for new arrivals occurred at the Schubraum, where prisoners were to hand over their clothing and possessions. One former Luxembourgian prisoner, Albert Theis, reflected about the room, everything had to be handed over, money, rings, watches. The camp included a building that contained offices for the Gestapo trial commissioner, SS authorities
32.
Gauleiter
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A Gauleiter was the party leader of a regional branch of the NSDAP or the head of a Gau or of a Reichsgau. The word can be singular or plural, depending on the context, Gauleiter was the second highest Nazi Party paramilitary rank, subordinate only to the higher rank Reichsleiter and to the position of Führer. During World War II, the rank of Gauleiter was obtained only by appointment from Adolf Hitler. The first use of the term Gauleiter by the Nazi Party was in 1925 after Adolf Hitler refounded the Nazi party following the failed Beer Hall Putsch, the name derives from the German word Gau and Leiter. The word Gau is an old term for a region of the German Reich, the Frankish Realm and the Holy Roman Empire were subdivided in Gaue, which corresponds roughly with the english word shire. It is still in use today for some regions in Belgium and Switzerland, in the earliest days of the terms existence, Gauleiter were heads of election districts during a time period when the Nazis were attempting to gain political representation in the Weimar Republic. Gauleiter oversaw several politische Leiter who assisted the Nazis with election campaigns, in 1928, a mid-level official known as a Kreisleiter was introduced as an intermediary between the Gauleiter and the Political Leaders. It was also at this time that a political uniform was created for the Gauleiter, consisting of a brown Nazi Party shirt. In 1933, when the NSDAP took power and established the state of Nazi Germany, Gauleiter became the second-highest Nazi paramilitary rank, the Gauleiter now became the heads of the Gauleitung — the system of Nazi political regions set up to mirror the German states. Also at that time Gauleiter adopted the two-leaf collar insignia most often associated with the rank. In theory, a Gauleiter merely functioned as a representative of the Nazi Party who served to coordinate regional Nazi Party events, in practice, each Gauleiter had unquestioned authority in his particular area of responsibility. The legal governmental establishment merely existed as a stamp for the Gauleiter. Party control over the administration became institutionalized, as in many cases the Gauleiter also held the supreme civil administrative post in his areas. Within each Gau were a number of Kreise, followed by the Ort level, there were also two additional lower local levels, describing Party Cells and local Neighborhood Blocks. By this point, all political leaders wore official uniforms, with piping, the original insignia for a Gauleiter consisted of Army styled collar tabs, accompanied by a braided shoulder cord worn on a brown Nazi Party shirt. After 1933, the Gauleiter adopted a two oak leaf insignia worn on a colored collar patch. The Stellvertreter-Gauleiter wore a single oak leaf, the Gauleiter insignia, however, was considered too well entrenched to change and thus was not incorporated into the new insignia system. Both Gauleiter and Reichsleiter insignia was modified slightly to display a pronounced national eagle crest
33.
Joseph Buerckel
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Joseph Bürckel was a Nazi Germany politician and a member of the German parliament. He was an member of the Nazi party and was influential in the rise of the National Socialist movement. Joseph Bürckel was born in Lingenfeld, in the Bavarian Palatinate, from 1909 to 1914 he studied to become a teacher in Speyer. He took part in the First World War as a volunteer, after the war, he continued his training as a teacher and graduated in 1920. From 1921 onwards, he was engaged in nationalist groups, fighting separatism in the Palatinate, an energetic organizer in the National Socialist movement of the Saar-Palatinate from 1925, the former schoolmaster rose through the ranks to become Gauleiter for the region in 1934. On 13 March 1938, Bürckel was appointed acting head of the Party to carry out the referendum on the Anschluss and he declared, This is a revolution. The Jews may be glad that it is not of the French or Russian pattern, saying Vienna was overfilled with Jews, he stated his aim to leave them with no more than five percent of their property. Upon his return to the Westmark, he continued his previous lifestyle, from 9 November 1937, he also held a leading position in the Schutzstaffel and the staff of the Reichsführer-SS, Heinrich Himmler. Bürckel died at about 11,04 a. m. in Neustadt-an-der-Weinstrasse on 28 September 1944 and he suffered an inflammation of the intestine with diarrhoea, eventually becoming too ill to continue. Ewig was called in on 26 September 1944, Bürckel soon contracted pneumonia and blood failure. The consensus was that he gave up the will to live, bormann responded by dispatching Willi Stöhr to oversee the construction work. Five days after Bürckels death, Hitler awarded him the German Order, Gauleiter, Regional Leaders Of The Nazi Party And Their Deputies, 1925-1945 -Volume 1 by Michael D. Miller and Andreas Schulz R. James Bender Publishing,2012. Farewell to Gauleiter Bürckel Translation of the Berliner Morgenpost,5 October 1944 Reichsgau Wien at Verwaltungsgeschichte. de Josef Bürckel - Gauleiter der Westmark Josef Bürckel biography
34.
French Resistance
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The Résistance also planned, coordinated, and executed acts of sabotage on the electrical power grid, transport facilities, and telecommunications networks. Estimated to have a strength of 100,000 in June 1944 and this burden amounted to approximately 20 million German reichsmarks per day, a sum that, in May 1940, was approximately equivalent to four hundred million French francs. Because of this overvaluation of German currency, the occupiers were able to make fair and honest requisitions and purchases while, in effect. Prices soared, leading to food shortages and malnutrition, particularly among children, the elderly. The labour shortage was worsened by the fact that a number of the French were also held as prisoners of war in Germany. Beyond these hardships and dislocations, the occupation became increasingly unbearable, onerous regulations, strict censorship, incessant propaganda and nightly curfews all played a role in establishing an atmosphere of fear and repression. The sight of French women consorting with German soldiers infuriated many French men, as reprisals for Résistance activities, the authorities established harsh forms of collective punishment. For example, the militancy of communist resistance in August 1941 led to the taking of thousands of hostages from the general population. A typical policy statement read, After each further incident, a number, reflecting the seriousness of the crime, during the occupation, an estimated 30,000 French civilian hostages were shot to intimidate others who were involved in acts of resistance. In early 1943, the Vichy authorities established a paramilitary group and they worked alongside German forces that, by the end of 1942, were stationed throughout France. The group collaborated closely with the Nazis, and was the Vichy equivalent of the Gestapo security forces in Germany and their actions were often brutal and included torture and execution of Résistance suspects. After the liberation of France in the summer of 1944, the French executed many of the estimated 25,000 to 35,000 miliciens for their collaboration. Many of those who escaped arrest fled to Germany, where they were incorporated into the Charlemagne Division of the Waffen SS, the experience of the Occupation was a deeply psychologically disorienting one for the French as what was once familiar and safe become strange and threatening. Many Parisians could not get over the shock experienced when they first saw the huge swastika flags hanging over the Hôtel de Ville, Many résistants often spoke of some climax when they saw some intolerable act of injustice, after which they could not longer remain passive. Barthelt recalled, I recognized him only by his hat, only by his hat, I tell you and because I was waiting on the roadside to see him pass. I saw his face all right, but there was no skin on it, both his poor eyes had been closed into two purple and yellow bruises. In the beginning, resistance was limited to such as severing phone lines, vandalizing posters. Another form of resistance was underground newspapers like Musée de lHomme which circulated clandestinely, the Musée de lHomme was founded by two professors, Paul Rivet and the Russian émigré Boris Vildé in July 1940
35.
Zone libre
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The zone libre was a partition of the French metropolitan territory during World War II, established at the Second Armistice at Compiègne on 22 June 1940. It lay to the south of the line and was administered by the French government of Marshal Philippe Pétain based in Vichy. To the north lay the zone occupée in which the powers of Vichy France were severely limited, in November 1942, the zone libre was invaded by the German and Italian armies in Case Anton, as a response to Operation Torch, the Allied landings in North Africa. Thenceforth, the zone libre and zone occupée were renamed the zone sud, from then on both were under German military administration. The line separating French territory into two zones was defined on a map attached to the treaty. Begins, in the East, at the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, thence, it passes at a distance of twenty kilometres to the east of the Tours-Angoulême-Libourne railway line, then further by Mont-de-Marsan and Orthez, up to the Spanish border. This separation line took effect on 25 June 1940 and it was thereafter referred to as the ligne de démarcation. In the occupied parts of France, the German Reich will exercise all rights of an occupying power, when the Allies invaded North Africa on 8 November 1942, the Germans and Italians immediately occupied the remaining free part of France. After being renamed zone sud, it was ruled by the Wehrmacht as a part of occupied France. The liberation of France began on 6 June 1944 with the Allied forces landing on D-Day, most of France was liberated by September 1944. The zone libre constituted an area of 246,618 square kilometres, approximately 45% of France. The ligne de démarcation passed through 13 of the 90 departments, henri Espieux suggests, During the occupations, the Franks were separated from the Occitans by the famous demarcation line. We have long thought that the route of line was suggested to Hitler by the romance language specialists in his entourage. The Italian occupation zone concerned certain border areas conquered by Italian troops and this zone was of limited importance, comprising 800 square kilometeres and 28,000 inhabitants. Four departments were covered by the Italian occupation, Alpes-Maritimes, Basses-Alpes, Hautes-Alpes. In addition, a zone was established containing all French territory within 50 km from the zone of Italian occupation. The department of Corsica was neither occupied nor demilitarized by any provision of the armistice, on 8 November 1942 Allied forces invaded French North Africa. German and Italian forces responded on 11 November 1942 by invading the zone libre in Case Anton, after the capitulation of Italy at Cassibile became public knowledge on 8 September 1943, the Italian armies retreated and the Germans united the southern zone under their own exclusive control
36.
Nazi Germany
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Nazi Germany is the common English name for the period in German history from 1933 to 1945, when Germany was governed by a dictatorship under the control of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Under Hitlers rule, Germany was transformed into a fascist state in which the Nazi Party took totalitarian control over all aspects of life. The official name of the state was Deutsches Reich from 1933 to 1943, the period is also known under the names the Third Reich and the National Socialist Period. The Nazi regime came to an end after the Allied Powers defeated Germany in May 1945, Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany by the President of the Weimar Republic Paul von Hindenburg on 30 January 1933. The Nazi Party then began to eliminate all opposition and consolidate its power. Hindenburg died on 2 August 1934, and Hitler became dictator of Germany by merging the powers and offices of the Chancellery, a national referendum held 19 August 1934 confirmed Hitler as sole Führer of Germany. All power was centralised in Hitlers person, and his word became above all laws, the government was not a coordinated, co-operating body, but a collection of factions struggling for power and Hitlers favour. In the midst of the Great Depression, the Nazis restored economic stability and ended mass unemployment using heavy military spending, extensive public works were undertaken, including the construction of Autobahnen. The return to economic stability boosted the regimes popularity, racism, especially antisemitism, was a central feature of the regime. The Germanic peoples were considered by the Nazis to be the purest branch of the Aryan race, millions of Jews and other peoples deemed undesirable by the state were murdered in the Holocaust. Opposition to Hitlers rule was ruthlessly suppressed, members of the liberal, socialist, and communist opposition were killed, imprisoned, or exiled. The Christian churches were also oppressed, with many leaders imprisoned, education focused on racial biology, population policy, and fitness for military service. Career and educational opportunities for women were curtailed, recreation and tourism were organised via the Strength Through Joy program, and the 1936 Summer Olympics showcased the Third Reich on the international stage. Propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels made effective use of film, mass rallies, the government controlled artistic expression, promoting specific art forms and banning or discouraging others. Beginning in the late 1930s, Nazi Germany made increasingly aggressive territorial demands and it seized Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938 and 1939. Hitler made a pact with Joseph Stalin and invaded Poland in September 1939. In alliance with Italy and smaller Axis powers, Germany conquered most of Europe by 1940, reichskommissariats took control of conquered areas, and a German administration was established in what was left of Poland. Jews and others deemed undesirable were imprisoned, murdered in Nazi concentration camps and extermination camps, following the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the tide gradually turned against the Nazis, who suffered major military defeats in 1943
37.
European Economic Community
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The European Economic Community was a regional organisation which aimed to bring about economic integration among its member states. It was created by the Treaty of Rome of 1957, upon the formation of the European Union in 1993, the EEC was incorporated and renamed as the European Community. In 2009 the ECs institutions were absorbed into the EUs wider framework and it gained a common set of institutions along with the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Atomic Energy Community as one of the European Communities under the 1965 Merger Treaty. In 1993, a single market was achieved, known as the internal market, which allowed for the free movement of goods, capital, services. In 1994, the market was formalised by the EEA agreement. This agreement also extended the market to include most of the member states of the European Free Trade Association. Upon the entry into force of the Maastricht Treaty in 1993 and this was also when the three European Communities, including the EC, were collectively made to constitute the first of the three pillars of the European Union, which the treaty also founded. The EEC was also known as the Common Market in the English-speaking countries and sometimes referred to as the European Community even before it was renamed as such in 1993. In 1951, the Treaty of Paris was signed, creating the European Coal and this was an international community based on supranationalism and international law, designed to help the economy of Europe and prevent future war by integrating its members. In the aim of creating a federal Europe two further communities were proposed, a European Defence Community and a European Political Community. While the treaty for the latter was being drawn up by the Common Assembly, the ECSC parliamentary chamber, after the Messina Conference in 1955, Paul Henri Spaak was given the task to prepare a report on the idea of a customs union. The so-called Spaak Report of the Spaak Committee formed the cornerstone of the negotiations at Val Duchesse castle in 1956. Together with the Ohlin Report the Spaak Report would provide the basis for the Treaty of Rome, in 1956, Paul Henri Spaak led the Intergovernmental Conference on the Common Market and Euratom at the Val Duchesse castle, which prepared for the Treaty of Rome in 1957. The conference led to the signature, on 25 March 1957, the resulting communities were the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community. These were markedly less supranational than the communities, due to protests from some countries that their sovereignty was being infringed. The first formal meeting of the Hallstein Commission, was held on 16 January 1958 at the Chateau de Val-Duchesse, the EEC was to create a customs union while Euratom would promote co-operation in the nuclear power sphere. The EEC rapidly became the most important of these and expanded its activities, one of the first important accomplishments of the EEC was the establishment of common price levels for agricultural products. In 1968, internal tariffs were removed on certain products, another crisis was triggered in regard to proposals for the financing of the Common Agricultural Policy, which came into force in 1962
38.
Single market
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The goal is that the movement of capital, labour, goods, and services between the members is as easy as within them. The physical, technical and fiscal barriers among the states are removed to the maximum extent possible. These barriers obstruct the freedom of movement of the four factors of production, a common market is usually referred to as the first stage towards the creation of a single market. It usually is built upon a trade area with relatively free movement of capital and of services. A unified market is the last stage and ultimate goal of a single market and it requires the total free movement of goods, services, capital and people without regard to national boundaries. A common market allows for the movement of capital and services. It eliminates all quotas and “tariffs” – duties on imported goods – from trade in goods within it, however “non-tariff barriers” remain such as differences between the Member States’ safety, packaging requirements and national administrative procedures. They prevent for example manufacturers from marketing the same goods in all member states, the objective of a common market is most often economic convergence and the creation of an integrated single market. It is sometimes considered as the first stage of a single market, the European Economic Community was the first example of a common market. Citizens can study, live, shop, work and retire in any member state, consumers enjoy a vast array of products from all member states and businesses have unrestricted access to more consumers. A single market is commonly described as frontier-free, however, several barriers remain such as differences in national tax systems, differences in parts of the services sector and different requirements for e-commerce. In addition separate national markets still exist for financial services, energy, laws concerning the recognition of professional qualifications also may not be fully harmonized. The European Union is the economic union whose objective is completing the single market. A completed, unified market usually refers to the removal of barriers. Complete economic integration can be seen many countries, whether in a single unitary state with a single set of economic rules. Movement of people and goods among the states is unrestricted and without tariffs, a single market has many benefits. With full freedom of movement for all the factors of production between the countries, the factors of production become more efficiently allocated, further increasing productivity. For both business within the market and consumers, a market is a very competitive environment
39.
Foreign Minister (France)
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The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is the ministry in the government of France that handles Frances foreign relations. Its headquarters are located on the Quai dOrsay in Paris, close to the National Assembly of France and its cabinet minister, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Development is responsible for the foreign relations of France. The current minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, was appointed in February 2016, in 1547, secretaries to the King became specialized, writing correspondence to foreign governments, and negotiating peace treaties. The four French secretaries of state where foreign relations were divided by region, in 1589, the Ancien Régime position of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs became Foreign Minister around 1723, and was renamed Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1791 after the French Revolution. All ministerial positions were abolished in 1794 by the National Convention, for a brief period in the 1980s, the office was retitled Minister for External Relations
40.
Hague Congress (1948)
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The Congress brought together representatives from across a broad political spectrum, providing them with the opportunity to discuss ideas about the development of European political co-operation. A broad range of philosophers, journalists, church leaders, lawyers, professors, entrepreneurs, a call was launched for a political, economic and monetary Union of Europe. This landmark conference was to have an influence on the shape of the European Movement. The Spanish statesman Salvador de Madariaga proposed the establishment of a College of Europe at the Congress and this would be a college where university graduates from many different countries, some only a short while before at war with each other, could study and live together. The Congress also discussed the structure and role of the Council of Europe. Teitgen and Maxwell-Fyfe were instrumental in creating the Convention of Human Rights, the Congress provided the means to heighten public opinion for European unity. On 20 July 1948, at the Hague meeting of ministers of Western European Union, Schumans Foreign Minister Georges Bidault proposed the creation of a European Assembly, thus the conclusions of the Congress became French government policy and then the subject of European governmental policy
41.
Supranational
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A supranational union is a type of multinational political union where negotiated power is delegated to an authority by governments of member states. The concept of union is sometimes used to describe the European Union. The EU is the entity which provides for international popular elections. The term supranational is used in a loose, undefined sense in other contexts. Another method of decision-making in international organisations is intergovernmentalism, in state governments play a more prominent role. He thought this might begin with the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union and he broached the idea in a November 1945 and November 1947 articles in The Atlantic Monthly that described how the constitution of such an organization might be written. In an April 1948 address at Carnegie Hall, he reiterated, There is only one path to peace and security, the term supranational occurs in an international treaty for the first time in the Treaty of Paris,18 April 1951. This new legal term defined the Community method in creating the European Coal and Steel Community and it defines the relationship between the High Authority or European Commission and the other four institutions. In the treaty, it relates to a new democratic and legal concept, the Founding Fathers of the European Community and the present European Union said that supranationalism was the cornerstone of the governmental system. This is enshrined in the Europe Declaration made on 18 April 1951 and this Europe remains open to all nations. We profoundly hope that other nations will join us in our common endeavour and it was made to recall future generations to their historic duty of uniting Europe based on liberty and democracy under the rule of law. Thus, they viewed the creation of a wider and deeper Europe as intimately bound to the development of the supranational or Community system. This Europe was open to all nations who were free to decide, a supranational union is a supranational polity which lies somewhere between a confederation that is an association of States and a federation that is a state. The EU has supranational competences, but it possesses these competences only to the extent that they are conferred on it by its member states. Within the scope of competences, the union exercises its powers in a sovereign manner, having its own legislative, executive. The supranational Community also has a chamber for organised civil society including economic and social associations, unlike states in a federal super-state, member states retain ultimate sovereignty, although some sovereignty is shared with, or ceded to, the supranational body. Supranational agreements encourage stability and trust, because governments cannot break international accords at a whim, the supranational action may be time-limited. This was the case with the European Coal and Steel Community, supranational accords may be permanent, such as an agreement to outlaw war between the partners
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European Coal and Steel Community
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The European Coal and Steel Community was an organisation of 6 European countries set up after World War II to regulate their industrial production under a centralised authority. It was formally established in 1951 by the Treaty of Paris, signed by Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. The ECSC was the first international organisation to be based on the principles of supranationalism, the ECSC was first proposed by French foreign minister Robert Schuman on 9 May 1950 as a way to prevent further war between France and Germany. He declared his aim was to make war not only unthinkable but materially impossible which was to be achieved by regional integration, of which the ECSC was the first step. The Treaty would create a market for coal and steel among its member states which served to neutralise competition between European nations over natural resources, particularly in the Ruhr. These would ultimately form the blueprint for todays European Commission, European Parliament, the Council of the European Union, the 1967 Merger Treaty led to all of ECSCs institutions to merge into that of the European Economic Community, but the ECSC retained its own independent legal personality. In 2002, the Treaty of Paris expired and the ECSC ceased to exist in any form, its activities fully absorbed by the European Community under the framework of Amsterdam and Nice treaties. Despite stiff ultra-nationalist, Gaullist and communist opposition, the French Assembly voted a number of resolutions in favour of his new policy of integrating Germany into a community, the International Authority for the Ruhr changed in consequence. Schumans guiding principles were moral, based on the equality of states, the Schuman Declaration of 9 May 1950 occurred after two Cabinet meetings, when the proposal became French government policy. France was thus the first government to agree to surrender sovereignty in a supranational Community and it laid out a plan for a European Community to pool the coal and steel of its members in a common market. Such an act was intended to help economic growth and cement peace between France and Germany, who were historic enemies, Coal and steel were vital resources needed for a country to wage war, so pooling those resources between two such enemies was seen as more than symbolic. Schuman saw the decision of the French government on his proposal as the first example of a democratic and supranational Community, a new development in world history. The plan was seen by some, like Monnet, who crossed out Reuters mention of supranational in the draft and inserted federation. The Schuman Declaration that created the ECSC had several distinct aims and it would make war between member states impossible. It would transform Europe in a step by step process leading to the unification of Europe democratically and it would create the worlds first supranational institution. It would create the worlds first international anti-cartel agency and it would create a common market across the Community. It would, starting with the coal and steel sector, revitalise the whole European economy by similar community processes and it would improve the world economy and the developing countries, such as those in Africa. Firstly, it was intended to prevent further war between France and Germany and other states by tackling the cause of war
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Washington, D.C.
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Washington, D. C. formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, the District, or simply D. C. is the capital of the United States. The signing of the Residence Act on July 16,1790, Constitution provided for a federal district under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Congress and the District is therefore not a part of any state. The states of Maryland and Virginia each donated land to form the federal district, named in honor of President George Washington, the City of Washington was founded in 1791 to serve as the new national capital. In 1846, Congress returned the land ceded by Virginia, in 1871. Washington had an population of 681,170 as of July 2016. Commuters from the surrounding Maryland and Virginia suburbs raise the population to more than one million during the workweek. The Washington metropolitan area, of which the District is a part, has a population of over 6 million, the centers of all three branches of the federal government of the United States are in the District, including the Congress, President, and Supreme Court. Washington is home to national monuments and museums, which are primarily situated on or around the National Mall. The city hosts 176 foreign embassies as well as the headquarters of international organizations, trade unions, non-profit organizations, lobbying groups. A locally elected mayor and a 13‑member council have governed the District since 1973, However, the Congress maintains supreme authority over the city and may overturn local laws. D. C. residents elect a non-voting, at-large congressional delegate to the House of Representatives, the District receives three electoral votes in presidential elections as permitted by the Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in 1961. Various tribes of the Algonquian-speaking Piscataway people inhabited the lands around the Potomac River when Europeans first visited the area in the early 17th century, One group known as the Nacotchtank maintained settlements around the Anacostia River within the present-day District of Columbia. Conflicts with European colonists and neighboring tribes forced the relocation of the Piscataway people, some of whom established a new settlement in 1699 near Point of Rocks, Maryland. 43, published January 23,1788, James Madison argued that the new government would need authority over a national capital to provide for its own maintenance. Five years earlier, a band of unpaid soldiers besieged Congress while its members were meeting in Philadelphia, known as the Pennsylvania Mutiny of 1783, the event emphasized the need for the national government not to rely on any state for its own security. However, the Constitution does not specify a location for the capital, on July 9,1790, Congress passed the Residence Act, which approved the creation of a national capital on the Potomac River. The exact location was to be selected by President George Washington, formed from land donated by the states of Maryland and Virginia, the initial shape of the federal district was a square measuring 10 miles on each side, totaling 100 square miles. Two pre-existing settlements were included in the territory, the port of Georgetown, Maryland, founded in 1751, many of the stones are still standing
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Dante
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Durante degli Alighieri, simply called Dante, was a major Italian poet of the Late Middle Ages. In the late Middle Ages, the majority of poetry was written in Latin. In De vulgari eloquentia, however, Dante defended use of the vernacular in literature, as a result, Dante played an instrumental role in establishing the national language of Italy. In addition, the first use of the interlocking three-line rhyme scheme, Dante has been called the Father of the Italian language and one of the greatest poets of world literature. In Italy, Dante is often referred to as il Sommo Poeta and il Poeta, he, Petrarch, Dante was born in Florence, Republic of Florence, present-day Italy. The exact date of his birth is unknown, although it is believed to be around 1265. This can be deduced from autobiographic allusions in the Divine Comedy, in 1265, the sun was in Gemini between approximately May 11 and June 11. Dante claimed that his family descended from the ancient Romans, but the earliest relative he could mention by name was Cacciaguida degli Elisei, born no earlier than about 1100. Dantes father, Alaghiero or Alighiero di Bellincione, was a White Guelph who suffered no reprisals after the Ghibellines won the Battle of Montaperti in the middle of the 13th century. Dantes family had loyalties to the Guelphs, an alliance that supported the Papacy and which was involved in complex opposition to the Ghibellines. The poets mother was Bella, likely a member of the Abati family and she died when Dante was not yet ten years old, and Alighiero soon married again, to Lapa di Chiarissimo Cialuffi. When Dante was 12, he was promised in marriage to Gemma di Manetto Donati, daughter of Manetto Donati, contracting marriages at this early age was quite common and involved a formal ceremony, including contracts signed before a notary. But by this time Dante had fallen in love with another, Beatrice Portinari, years after his marriage to Gemma he claims to have met Beatrice again, he wrote several sonnets to Beatrice but never mentioned Gemma in any of his poems. The exact date of his marriage is not known, the certain information is that, before his exile in 1301. Dante fought with the Guelph cavalry at the Battle of Campaldino and this victory brought about a reformation of the Florentine constitution. To take any part in life, one had to enroll in one of the citys many commercial or artisan guilds, so Dante entered the Physicians. In the following years, his name is recorded as speaking or voting in the various councils of the republic. A substantial portion of minutes from meetings in the years 1298–1300 was lost, however
