Popular Republican Movement

The Popular Republican Movement (, MRP) was a Christian-democratic political party in France during the Fourth Republic. Its base was the Catholic vote and its leaders included Georges Bidault, Robert Schuman, Paul Coste-Floret, Pierre-Henri Teitgen and Pierre Pflimlin. It played a major role in forming governing coalitions, in emphasizing compromise and the middle ground, and in protecting against a return to extremism and political violence. It played an even more central role in foreign policy, having charge of the Foreign Office for ten years and launching plans for the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community, which grew into the European Union. Its voter base gradually dwindled in the 1950s and it had little power by 1954. History Origins of French Christian Democracy In the late 19th century secular forces sought to radically reduce the power of the Catholic Church in France, especially regarding schools. The Catholic bishops mistrusted the Republic and the ideas of the French Revolution, as well as the idea of popular sovereignty, which questioned the superiority of the spiritual power over the temporal. For this reason, it supported all the conservative governments of the 19th century, notably MacMahon and his policy of "moral order". 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 both capitalistic society and socialist ideology, and advocated the creation of Catholic popular organisations. In 1894, students founded Le Sillon (The Furrow). Its leader, Marc Sangnier, campaigned for spiritual values, democracy and social reforms. It represented the progressive wing of French Catholicism. Radical forces triumphed in 1905 and disestablished the Catholic Church and seized its properties. The very conservative Pope Pius X told the bishops to distance themselves from the state. Better relations were restored in the 1920s, but the parties on the left (Radical, Socialist and Communist) were strongly anticlerical.