DEATH OF M. MICHEL CHEVALIER.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1851, 28 January 1880, Page 3

DEATH OF M. MICHEL CHEVALIER.

M. Michel Chevalier, whoso chair at the College de France had for some time been provisionally filled by his son-in-law, M. Paul Leroy Beaulieu, died on Friday, November 20th, at Lodeve, at the ago of sixty-three. The son ef a tradesman at Limoges, he studied at the Polytechnic School and the School of Mines, and became civil engineer to the Department of the Nord. Ardently embracing the doctrines of Fourier and St. Simon, he was for two years editor of the “ Globe,” the organ of the sect, on the schism in which he adhered to Enfantin. The circular announcing the death of Madame Enfantin, mother of “Notre Pi're Supreme,” was signed “ Michel Chevalier Apotre.” He was a Cardinal in Enfanlin’s Sacred College, contributed to the “ Livre Nouveau,” and was condemned in 1835 as manager of the “ Globe ” to twelve months’ imprisonment. M. Thiers procured his release at the end ot six months and his despatch to the United States to study railway and water communications, his book on which was praised by Humboldt. In 1837 he was sent to England to report on the commercial crisis, and returned with a scheme of railway, canal, and other public works. Ho succeeded Rossi in 1840 as Professor of Political Economy at the College de Franco, became in 1845 a Conservative Deputy, and in 1847 joined Bastiat in attempting a free trade league. In 1848 he wrote against Socialism ; he accepted the Empire in 1852, and was appointed a Councillor of State, the Protectionists, however, preventing his re-admission to the Supreme Council of Commerce. He defended free trade and took a leading part in negotiating the Anglo-French Commercial Treaty, after which he was elevated to the Senate, where, in 1860, he condemned excessive armaments and constant loans. He presided over the French juries at the South Eensington Exhibition of 1862, and edited the reports on the Paris Exhibition ot 1867. Since the fall of the Empire he had taken no part in politics, which, indeed, with him were always subordinate to political economy. At the time of the Californian and Australian gold discoveries he advocated a silver standard, but of late years he was an opponent of Cernuschi’s campaign for bimetallism. In 1875 M. Chevalier paid a visit to England. His death will be regretted as that of the staunchest upholder of free trade and the most eminent French representative of the old school of political economy.