Louis Wolowski (1810-1876)

At the same time, his importance as an economist grew: he published dozens of books and brochures. In 1855, he became a member of the elite French Academy of Moral and Political Sciences and, through it, of the Institute of France. He took a prominent part in all the high-profile French economic debates of the era. His voice also influenced the subsequently adopted legal solutions.

He managed to return to politics after the fall of the Second Empire in 1871. He became first a deputy, then, a few months before his death, a senator for life. He belonged to a group of liberal deputies, former monarchists, who eventually built the Third Republic.

Wolowski was associated with the émigré Polish Literary Society, the Polish School in Paris, the Polish Bureau of the Hotel Lambert in 1861–1864, the Institute of Polish Ladies, the famous Parisian Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers, the Crédit Foncier, the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, the Paris Society of Political Economy, the Free Trade Association, and finally with the French National Assembly during the Revolution of 1848 and after 1871. This needs to be topped with his intellectual activity, published books and articles. He left his own mark on all of these institutions through his activity.

At the same time, in the case of Wolowski, researchers are struck by another fact: he was never, in any of his fields of activity, an unambiguously leading figure. At the Hotel Lambert, at the Crédit Foncier, in parliament – he always remained in the shadow of others. And yet, as Iwona Pugacewicz put it, “all the doors of the most important institutions in Paris were open to his name”³.

My intention, therefore, was to explain the phenomenon of this extraordinary man. A phenomenon which, in my opinion, is important for understanding 19^th century French and Polish politics in general. To understand the mechanisms governing public life in the 19^th century, it is necessary to look beyond the leading figures, beyond the best-known names. It is also necessary to recognise those who operated right behind the scenes of big politics. Wolowski was one of them. On the one hand, he was in many ways a typical representative of the French political and intellectual elite operating between the July Monarchy and the Third Republic. Tracing his political stance, its twists and turns and its evolution provides a better understanding of the events of the period. On the other hand, Wolowski, like few others, was able to bring together different people for different purposes and different ventures. Working behind the backs of the most important figures in French and Polish (émigré) political life, he created bridges between disparate communities. He acted like glue, sometimes weakly visible at first sight, but indispensable for the functioning of the state. Recognising this role of Wolowski allows for a better understanding of politics in general, not only 19^th-century politics. In this sense, Wolowski’s biography also differs from the major political figures of the period: Napoleon III, Czartoryski, Thiers, Guizot, Mac Mahon – to name but a few. Nor is it a biography of an average Polish émigré or an average French parliamentarian, economist, or politician. It sits, in my opinion, somewhere in between. This also makes it relevant and interesting.

What were Wolowski’s sources of strength? What social or political strategies did he adopt? What constraints did he face? How did he resemble other French or Polish politicians of the period, what made him different? Finally, how far did his action in Paris reach, both in Polish and French affairs? These are the key questions that this work asks.

Questions, I should add, which historiography has so far failed to answer or has answered poorly. Louis Wolowski’s name has been, of course, mentioned in Polish studies devoted to the Great Emigration, or French works on the political, parliamentary, or economic history of the 19^th century. Two biographies of Wolowski and a monograph on his economic thought have been published in France. However, all these works date from the 19^th century. A year after Louis Wolowski’s death, Emile Levasseur published a 36-page brochure, La vie et les travaux de Wolowski (Paris, 1877). For years, Levasseur was the Pole’s close friend and colleague, and the husband of his relative. The text therefore contains interesting personal recollections and some relevant information. Its shortcoming, apart from its brevity, is a lack of temporal and personal distance: Levasseur’s work is understandably an apologia for Wolowski. Similar objections can be raised against another biography of the Polish French banker, written in 1880 by Antony Roulliet, a lawyer and economist, entitled Wolowski. Sa vie et ses travaux. Much more extensive than Levasseur’s, Roulliet’s biography is unfortunately equally apologetic. In both cases, the authors lacked access to Polish sources, which resulted in serious omissions and errors concerning the Polish part of Wolowski’s biography or his family. Jules Rambaud’s work L’Oeuvre économique de L. Wolowski (Paris, 1882) is simply a comprehensive compilation and summary of the subsequent economic studies of the Pole.

The most complete biography of Louis Wolowski to date has never been published. I mean the text of Patrice Markiewicz’s 1994 doctoral thesis, Louis Wolowski. Un intellectuel et un représentant du libéralisme en France au milieu du XIXe siècle (Paris X – Nanterre, 1994). Markiewicz presented the French part of Wolowski’s life best, while treating the Polish part too briefly. Leaving aside the otherwise understandable errors related to the complicated family colligations of the Wołowskis, in my opinion Markiewicz also made another important mistake – at times, his narrative resembled Wolowski’s self-narration too much.

The Polish list of studies on Wolowski is incomparably shorter and contains only three short academic texts, one popular science text and two dictionary entries. The ambition of the present work is therefore to fill this gap.

My intention has been to describe Wolowski as a figure characteristic of France of his time, a representative of part of the elite educated during the July Monarchy, then struggling to find his feet in the Second Republic, collaborating with Napoleon III, and at the end of his life co-founding the Third Republic. At the same time, I wanted to show Wolowski as a man who often operated behind the scenes, very effectively linking different circles and different people, and thus influencing politics. He acted as a necessary link between Polish émigré politicians and the French political and economic elite; as the glue that united people from different ideological circles in one bank. Finally, as a liberal economist, a typical representative of the second generation of the French classical school. Understanding people like Wolowski, their official and behind-the-scenes role in 19^th century France and among Polish émigrés will, in my view, allow for a better understanding of the mechanisms of French and Polish politics, economy, and finance in general, from the decline of Louis-Philippe’s state, through the Revolution of 1848, the Second Empire, to the first years of the Third Republic.

For this purpose, I managed to access all or almost all the publications of the Polish French economist. Unfortunately, however, I found only a limited stock of his correspondence. The rest of it no longer exists, is in private hands unknown to me, or remains scattered in minor archives. I have only reached some of the Crédit Foncier materials, stored in the French Archives Nationales du Monde du Travail; access to them is still restricted and requires the owner’s separate permission. The material that I have managed to obtain from the ANMT is included in this work. However, I have gathered the entire corpus of archival material from the French National Archives (Archives Nationales), the Archives of the French National Assembly (Archives de l’Assemblée Nationale), the Archives of Paris (Archives de Paris), the National Library of France (Bibliothèque Nationale de France), the Polish Library in Paris, the Adam Mickiewicz Museum in Paris, the Polish Central Archives of Historical Records, the National Library, the Archives of the City of Warsaw, the State Archives in Cracow, the Princes Czartoryski Library in Cracow, the Archives of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences in Cracow, and the Ossolińskis National Institute in Wrocław.

The division of the book results in part from the turns of Louis Wolowski’s life. Chapter I describes his family, its Frankist roots, the fate of Louis’ mother and father, and their influence on their son. Chapter II (Youth in Poland) deals with his studies in Warsaw, his participation in the conspiracy movement and the November Uprising. In Chapter III, the readers learn about Wolowski’s first years in exile, a time when he made the decision to naturalise and began to build the foundations of his career as an economist. Chapter IV is devoted to the Revolution of 1848 and its impact on Wolowski’s political thinking, against the broad background of French politics. Chapter V tells the story of his involvement in the creation and operation of the Crédit Foncier, coupled with a broader picture of the entire change taking place in French banking in the 1850s and 1860s. Chapter VI depicts the 1850s and 1860s when Wolowski reached the apogee of his career, became a member of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, published the most, participated in key economic discussions in France, and experienced a series of turbulence and family changes. Chapter VII describes Wolowski’s return to politics after the collapse of the Second Empire and his participation in the building of the Third Republic, against an extensive French background. The penultimate chapter is devoted entirely to Wolowski’s economic thought, his research method, his economic liberalism, his advocacy of free trade, his vision of money, the banking system, etc. The final chapter of the work deals with the extremely important and diverse Polish émigré activities of Louis Wolowski. This classical division allows, in my view, for a thorough tracing of Wolowski’s political career along with the evolution of his attitude over the years. It facilitates a comprehensive presentation of his Polish activities, as well as his banking career. Finally, it allows us to illustrate the development and transformation of his economic thought, its successive developments.

Behind every book is an author. Behind the author, however, are those who have assisted him, pointed out new leads, helped to eliminate shortcomings, to obtain materials for the work. Co-workers, friends, acquaintances without whom no book would be possible. I would like to express my sincere thanks to them. A word of great gratitude goes to Professor Jerzy Fiećko, who led me to new clues concerning Wolowski’s relationship with Zygmunt Krasiński. I am also extremely grateful to Julia Słupska for her excellent biography of Ksawery Branicki, for her consultation on the relationship between Branicki and Wolowski and for the materials she sent me. I would also like to express my gratitude to Professors Eric Anceau and Dominique Barjot: I could always count on their assistance in French matters. For all the comments, words of encouragement and support, I sincerely thank the members of my home department at the Faculty of History of Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań: Prof. Waldemar Łazuga, Prof. Damian Szymczak, Prof. Sebastian Paczos, Mariusz Menz, Ph.D. and Anna Chudzińska, Ph.D. I would also like to thank Piotr Kuligowski, Ph.D. and Stanisław Knapowski, for their comments and invaluable help.

Finally, this book would not have been possible without the endless patience and understanding of my beloved wife, Kamila. Thank you.

The Wołowskis, baptised Frankists, maintained the customs characteristic of this group for several generations: they married among themselves and gave their children similar names. Louis Wolowski was therefore the son of Franciszek Wołowski and Tekla… née Wołowska. The name Ludwik (Louis) was a regular occurrence in the family, as was Franciszek, Michał, Jan and Józef⁶. In the light of the fact that many of them practised the same profession (lawyers) and the shortcomings following the destruction of the Polish archives during WWII, the confusions, and errors in the descriptions of the history of the Wołowskis are easier to understand.

The Wołowski family originated from Podolia, from Rabbi Schor Efraim Salomon ben Naftali, author of the acclaimed book Tevuat Schor, who died in 1633. The surname Schor probably derives from a Hebrew reflexive epithet meaning ox, and has biblical roots⁷. The most significant moment in the family’s history came in the mid-18^th century. A little earlier (it is not known exactly when), the Schors became involved with the Sabbatean movement⁸. Podolia became a mainstay of the Sabbateans during this period, and – according to Paweł Maciejko – the Schors were “probably the most important family” among the Sabbateans⁹. At the time, the family was headed by Elisha Schor (b. 1688) whose daughter Haia was perceived as a Sabbatean prophetess. The Schors also had family ties with the Sabbateans from across the region.

Although the “messiah” Sabbatai Zewi had died decades earlier, his followers secretly awaited the arrival of his next incarnation. This became Jacob Frank. He was born in 1726 in Podolia¹⁰. His father, Leib, was most likely a Sabbatean and probably had contacts with his fellow southern believers¹¹. Perhaps it was the accusation of the Sabbatean affinity that contributed to Leib’s departure from Poland with his family. They arrived in Bucharest where the young Jacob ended up as a shop assistance in training. He had most likely learned to read and write as a child, but his knowledge of the Talmud remained limited: he described himself much later as a “simpleton”, an unlearned man. Jacob engaged in trade, and it was trade that took him all the way to Smyrna. While in Turkey, he became a “Frank”: a European, a foreigner according to the local nomenclature¹². In Smyrna, in 1750 he began his Kabbalistic studies and became more familiar with the Sabbatean doctrine. In 1752, he married Chana, the daughter of Yehuda Towa ha-Levi, a Sabbatean theologian. A short time later, he and his wife arrived in Thessaloniki. It was there that he probably recognised himself as the messiah¹³.

In Smyrna and Thessaloniki, Frank may have encountered co-religionists arriving for trade or religion from Polish Podolia, some of whom may already have recognised his messianic message. It seems quite likely that Elisha Schor was among them. Meanwhile, the news from Podolia was not good, and the situation of the Polish Sabbateans, and therefore probably also of the Schors, began to complicate. The conflict between them and the Orthodox Jews was clearly escalating. In 1752, during a dispute ¹⁴ in Brody, Rabbi Natan ben Levi accused Rabbi Jonathan Aibeshits of the Sabbatean heresy¹⁵. The discussion around the Sabbateans and Aibeshits which initially ended with his exoneration, resurfaced in 1753 during a session of the Council of the Four Lands (centrall Jewish authority in Poland) in Yaroslav, where Aibeshits was again acquitted (although he was ordered to destroy the amulets he distributed among his pupils).¹⁶

Perhaps this is why Frank decided to return to Poland – summoned, as Doktór writes – by Schor and others¹⁷. Upon his arrival, the latter’s sons Salomon and Natan also clearly recognised him as the leader of the Sabbatean community. Unfortunately, little is known of Frank’s teaching. What we do know, however, is that an event took place of key importance to the history of all Frankists. On 27 January 1756, outraged Jews burst into the house in Lanckoroń on the Zbruch where Frank and his pupils were staying. They confiscated the writings found on the spot, and the Frankists were battered and arrested. Jewish witnesses later claimed that the Frankists sang and danced around the naked Haia Schor, kissing her breasts. Frank, on the other hand, argued that the ritual was limited to dancing and singing¹⁸.