Emperor Napoleon IV?

Anaxagoras

Banned
IOTL, Napoleon IV was killed by the Zulus in 1879, while serving in the British Army. He was twenty-three and had been in exile from France since the fall of the Second Empire.

Suppose the Franco-Prussian War never broke out and the Second Empire had never fallen. Napoleon III likely would have died of his kidney disease sometime in the mid-1870s anyway, leaving Napoleon IV as the new Emperor of the French.

What sort of Emperor might Napoleon IV have made? He was obviously brave, but also seemed more than a little reckless. Would he have been France's version of Wilhelm II? Or might he have matured into a decent constitutional monarch?
 
Hard to tell. Most twenty-three year old lieutenants are a little reckless.

But he seems to have been a reasonable student, which suggests someone willing and able to learn.

Can't recall anything spectacular, but certainly nothing especially embarrassing.

I'd guess that he would probably make a few blunders as he got used to things, but wouldn't be too bad.
 
He would have faced a strange situation in Germany with a surviving NGC and an alliance of S German states probably in Prussia's orbit.

Spain would also be an issue, with Amedeo presumably still losing his crown (one cannot really see France supporting him) and Alphonso XII leading a Borbon restoration.

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
Napoleon IV was very curious, good student.
During his infancy, when he played game with other boys of his age within the court and when a silliness was committed, he always claimed responsibility to protect his comrades. This anecdot could in my opinion give a clue as to how he would behave.
Another anecdot: in the late 1860s (I can't remember exactly when), he escaped the surveillance of his guardians. He was searched all the day and when he came back at the palace, he said to have make a trip in Paris, to have met a man, then he asked ''Where is Cayenne?''...
 
He was young, he did not lack any bravery, he was a bright student.
It could go etheir way, but I think he would have been a good monarch.
 
The French Wiki has an excellent article on the Prince Imperial. He was a smart, charismatic guy who had already sketched out a political platform. The major planks: 1) Semi-federal constitution. Create 18 regions, each one voting on a budget. 2) A hybrid bicameral parliament, composed of an indirectly elected lower house- "Chambres des deputations provinciales"- and a House of Peers which like the HOL is filled with clergy, military, judiciary and various people in civil society. These chambers share legislative powers but the lower house gets budget veto powers. 3) Equal-opportunity conscription 4) Meritocratic aristocracy. Then there's a concern about safety nets for the working class and poor.

On foreign policy he might be hotheaded but probably more cautious than not, Anglophilic and suspicious of Germany. Also I seem to recall reading somewhere that Napoleon III would've abdicated when his son came of age, especially given the kidney disease Anax mentioned (which I assume wasn't curable in those days). Depending on how exactly Sedan is averted, he might pick up some lessons from that too.

His constitutional ideas seems to indicate a conservative liberal or a liberal conservative. Must've known that a directly elected lower house with real power inevitably leads to semi-constitutional or constitutional monarchy. And given that he'd be a healthy teenager upon ascending the throne, Louis could reign for a very long time indeed. I'd guess he eventually accepts semi-constitutional: an appointed PM takes a lot of domestic power but lets him conduct his own foreign policy and if feeling generous, some cherished domestic items too. But daily domestic governance is firmly in a PM's hands, not Napoleon's.
 
If he had lived and married Queen Victoria's daughter Beatrice, hemophilia might've been introduced to the Bonapartes of France.
 
RogueBeaver said:
IIRC the last thread's consensus was that in the end they wouldn't marry.
It seems to me that there is still a debate on whether or not the match was possible and the majority of people seemed to think it wasn't likely.

But anyway, the alternative for young Napoleon IV was a Spanish Infanta though I forgot her name. Problem is she died of illness at age 20, curiously enough not long after the Eaglet's death.
 
He would have faced a strange situation in Germany with a surviving NGC and an alliance of S German states probably in Prussia's orbit.

Spain would also be an issue, with Amedeo presumably still losing his crown (one cannot really see France supporting him) and Alphonso XII leading a Borbon restoration.

Best Regards
Grey Wolf

hmmm I wonder couldn't a German Empire form in an other way?
 
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