Talk:List of state leaders in 1947

French Co-prince of Andorra

See also: fr:Discussion:Philippe Pétain § Philippe Pétain doit-il être cité parmi les co-princes d'Andorre ?

Dear Mathglot, you keep deleting Léon Blum as French Co-Prince of Andorra (but bizarrely not as head of state of France). I presume it's above dispute that the French head of state is ex officio the French Co-Prince. So the question is: Who was the head of state of France between 1946 and 1947.

Archontology lists the Heads of the Provisional Government as heads of state for this period, and between 12 Dec 1946 - 22 Jan 1947 that position was indeed filled by Léon Blum. See: http://www.archontology.org/nations/france/

As for www.rulers.org (which you invited me to check again), under Andorra for the French Co-Prince it contains a links to the list of French heads of state from 27 Mar 1806 onward. If you click on it and check the list of heads of state under France, it has the following note for the period between 1944 and 1947 (under the heading 'Acting heads of state'): "see heads of government". This means that the head of government was acting in the function of the head of state in said period. And if you scroll further down to check who the head of the government was during this time (bearing the title 'Chairman of the Provisional Government') than you will indeed find Léon Blum for the period 16 Dec 1946 - 23 Jan 1947. (Yes, there is a difference of a few days between the Archontology and rulers.org sources both at the beginning and the end of term, but that's beside the point here.) http://www.rulers.org/rula2.html#andorra

Furthermore if you check the Worldstatesmen.org site, for the French Co-Prince, it links the French heads of state for the period since 1814. And if you check their list of heads of state for the period 3 Jun 1944 - 16 Jan 1947 (titled 'Acting heads of state'), it again says 'the heads of government'. And again, if you scroll down to the list of heads of government, you find none other, than Mr Blum between 16 Dec 1946 - 16 Jan 1947 (titled 'Chairman of the Provisional Government'). http://www.worldstatesmen.org/Andorra.html

To my mind this leaves no question about who was acting in the functions of the French head of state between 1946 and 1947 (without relying on any original research).

If you disagree, please explain, provide sources and name your alternative suggestion. ZBukov (talk) 20:16, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

I see you reverted my removal of Léon Blum as Co-Prince of Andorra. I will respond to your individual points above in a later post, but first I wanted to go over some basic principles with you, just to make sure we're on the same page.

A core principle of Wikipedia is verifiability by reliable sources. This doesn't mean that everything has to be sourced, but it does mean that any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation. So far, I assume this is uncontroversial and we're in agreement.

Accordingly, I hereby formally challenge the following line in the article (in section Europe) concerning Léon Blum:

1. Léon Blum, French Co-Prince of Andorra (1946–1947)

and I have tagged it with a {{dubious}} template linking the tag to this Talk page section. Please do not remove it.

In response, I expect someone to find a reliable source which says something to the effect of, "Leon Blum was Co-Prince of Andorra from date X to Y" or similar, and add the source in the comments below so we may discuss it. Once consensus has been achieved here that the source is reliable and that the citation verifies the claim, anyone may add the source to the disputed line using an inline citation and remove the {{dubious}} template. Until that time, please leave the {{dubious}} template in place undisturbed.

If no reliable source can be found within a reasonable time, then the line in the article marked dubious should be removed.

I hope that at least we are in agreement that this is how WP works in the case of an accuracy dispute, and that we are following the correct procedures. Mathglot (talk) 23:50, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

In your comments above, you spend a lot of effort trying to document Léon Blum's position in France as head of the Provisional Government. This was completely unnecessary, and it's a mystery to me why you bothered with something so obvious and documented to within an inch of its life by innumerable reliable sources.

On the other hand, you completely skipped the core issue here, which is, "Find a reliable source stating that Léon Blum was Co-Prince of Andorra." This shouldn't be so hard (if true); the Vatican has lists of Popes, lists of Kings and Queens of England are well-documented, and so on.

All of the sources you listed, rulers.org, archontology, and worldstatesmen may well list Blum's position in France (how could they not?) but that was never at issue here. None of them make an incontrovertible statement that Blum was Co-Prince of Andorra, and consequently you followed a hyperlink trail from one page to another, drawing conclusions from separate statements to make your case. Possibly this is enough to uphold the claim about Blum, but I don't think so, and I'd like the opinion of other editors on this point.

I believe I do see what you are trying to say, namely you wish to point out that Blum was Co-Prince of Andorra by means of the following syllogism:

P1. The French head of state is automatically French Co-Prince of Andorra.

P2. Léon Blum was French head of state.

If P1 & P2, then P3:

P3. Therefore, Léon Blum was French Co-Prince of Andorra.

The first problem I see here, is WP:SYNTH, it seems that we're putting together information from different portions of a source or sources and drawing a conclusion. For starters, what's the source for P1? (Note, I'm not disputing P1, I'm asking where it came from.) Is it Andorran law? French law? What language is it in? (Catalan is official in Andorra.) Do we have a link to the law? What does it say, very precisely? Does it talk about "French head of state", or does it say "French head of government"? Or, does it maybe say, "President of the French Republic"?

Regarding P2, this is important because Blum held some of these titles, but not others. His official designation was "Président du Gouvernement provisoire de la République française". At the time of Blum's tenure, it was between the Third and Fourth Republics and Blum didn't hold the title President of the Republic of France. Was his position equivalent to "head of state"? Are we scholars of French history and sovereign law, to be able to answer such a question? Even if we were, it would be improper for us to draw any conclusions, rather, we should confine ourselves to finding sources that state that "Blum was Co-Prince of Andorra".

So, I see problems individually with P1 and P2 taken separately, and also a problem of synthesis by putting them together and drawing a conclusion, although you could argue this was summary not synthesis, however that would require you to credit P1 and P2 as already established and reliably sourced.

The last issue that troubles me, is the reliability of the sources. I question whether rulers.org is a reliable source. The website is owned by an individual, Benjamin Schemmel, who is also the author of the self-published book Rulers: A comprehensive record of heads of state and heads of government since 1800 which at 1,074 pages long, certainly sounds comprehensive, but what are his sources, and who is he? Other than rulers.org and this book, the internet has no trace of him, as might otherwise be expected if he were a historian. At first glance, his website and book seem to be a labor of love by an amateur, which OTOH is great, but OTO is also worrisome as far as Wikipedia relying upon it to the exclusion of any other independent resource. I have not examined the other two sites in detail yet with a view to analyzing their reliability as sources.

This leaves us where we started: if Léon Blum was Co-Prince of Andorra, can we just source that from a simple statement of fact from some reliable reference? P.S. Just wanted to be clear about one thing: I'm not claiming he wasn't Co-Prince, I think it's rather likely that he was. But my opinion is irrelevant in the matter, since WP requires verifiability, and I'm in favor of strictly upholding this principle, because not to do so damages the quality of the encyclopedia.

Mathglot (talk) 02:35, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

So, I've searched around a bit for the other two sources, and this is what I've found, so far:

• archontology - maintained by an individual, Oleg Schultz from Saarbruecken. Wikipedia has a poorly sourced article about Archontology (17k bytes) originally created by User:Oleg Schultz who has many contributions in the area of heads of state, but also contributes to other articles. There are no reviews of his website or book, and little to nothing on the internet about him.
• worldstatesmen - maintained by an individual, Ben Cahoon from Arlington, Virginia. I haven't found any reviews or anything about his website on the internet. There is a database manager in Arlington with that name.

This calls into question the reliability of these two sites as sources, as they seem to have no standing in the historiographic community. Mathglot (talk) 11:56, 17 September 2015 (UTC)

Hi, @Zoltan Bukovszky: did you want to discuss this further? I'd like to know your thoughts on my comments above. Though I'm in no hurry, I'd like to move this discussion forward at some point. I was hoping other editors of this article might stop by as well and weigh in, so we could get more opinions on this topic. If not, I might ask for help at WP:3O. Cordially, Mathglot (talk) 00:03, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

searching Andorran sites

I'm investigating some new possible avenues for documenting French Co-princes. I figured if anybody has evidence of this, Andorra itself will. It turns out that Andorra has recently received its own ccTLD, namely ad, and there are about 20 million pages on it already. (Note the "site:ad" special token which allows you to search just Andorran sites.) I tried several different searches, such as site:ad "Léon Blum" (0 results) and various others; finally with site:ad coprinceps (196,000 results; "coprincep" is co-prince in Catalan) I got some good leads, including www.coprince-fr.ad/ca/ which led me to Coprínceps Francesos (in French).

This page has a list of French Co-princes, and Blum is not listed there. I note that there is no holder of the title between 1940 and 1947, which contains the period during which List of state leaders in 1947 claims Blum was Co-Prince.

The list seems to show continuous titleholders from 1265 to the present, except for two breaks: one in 1793-1806, and from 1940-1947. The first lapsus is more or less contiguous with the French First Republic which spanned the National Convention and the Directorate (see remarks at List of Presidents of France), and the second is the WWII and immediate post-war period of Vichy and the Provisional Government. What the two lapses in the Co-Prince timeline have in common, imho, is that they are considered not fully legitimate governments of France, and it may be that Andorran law excludes them for this reason. [Note: it appears that France opted out of the French Co-Prince arrangement during the first period of immediate post-revolutionary France when anti-monarchical feeling was at its peak; they were certainly not an illegitimate government, except in the eyes of the deposed monarchy who were on the losing side of history. However this is irrelevant wrt to the main discussion, which concerns Blum and WWII and after.]

But that's just a supposition on my part. Whatever the reason is, I don't see that Blum is listed there. Now, as a secondary issue, I haven't looked into the reliability of this source yet, so the jury's out on that one. But at least it's on the Andorran TLD, and at first blush looks pretty authoritative. Mathglot (talk) 01:56, 21 September 2015 (UTC) Edited to add inline "Note" above; by Mathglot (talk) 23:12, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

As to the reliability, the page styles itself as Representació de S.E. Copríncep Francès (Representation of His Excellency the French Co-Prince). This page lists the delegations in Paris and in Andorra la Vella. I e-mailed the delegate in Andorra, Mr. Escande, but have not heard back yet. Mathglot (talk) 07:58, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Dear Mathglot, I'm afraid I was ignorant of this potential vacancy in the position of the French Co-Prince, as the above three websites which I regularly consult fail to mention it. The break in the list on the http://www.coprince-fr.ad/ca/coprinceps-francesos site does indeed appear convincing, and the lack of any google hits about this vacancy might well be the consequence of Andorra's little contact with the outside world. I hope Mr Escande will help to settle this question. ZBukov (talk) 20:14, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Hi @Zoltan Bukovszky:, I heard back from M. Escande, who writes back about both gaps in the list; I can include what he says about the first gap also if you're interested, but here's what he says about the second one. (I wrote in English and invited him to respond in Catalan, Spanish, or French if he preferred and he chose French.)

En ce qui concerne les périodes 1940-1944 et 1945-1946, période de l’ »l’Etat français » et du gouvernement provisoire de la république, il apparaissait délicat, compte tenu des circonstances historiques, de conférer à leurs titulaires la qualité de Coprince.

With respect to the periods 1940-1944 and 1945-1946, given the historical circumstances of the period of the "French State" and of the Provisional Government of the Republic, it seemed to be a delicate situation as far as conferring upon their officeholders the title of Co-Prince. my translation  

This is very French, actually, the way he soft-pedals and kind of avoids categorically stating something, it's all softness and implication and sounds like a diplomatic statement to avoid giving offense to anybody. I've left nothing out of what he said pertaining to this, the next line says "Cordially," followed by the sig line. So this is as much as we're going to get. At first, it sounded a bit too vague to me. But in a way, that is to be expected: he is, after all, a diplomat, or at least, the designated representative of a principality, talking to a member of the public (me) who he has no idea who I am or what my purpose is. So given that, I think the phrasing of it is perfectly acceptable, and upholds our theory. How do you feel about it? Do you feel further contact is necessary? I'm kind of loathe to insist on more from him, unless you feel very strongly about it. Mathglot (talk) 03:53, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi @Mathglot:, I agree that if Mr Escande wasn't willing to be definitive on the subject than probably more insistence won't change his mind. Maybe only Andorran historians would be willing to go into more details, if someone decided to pursue the topic. While doing the rounds on Google I saw it incidentally mentioned that both Philippe Pétain (in 1940) and Charles de Gaulle (in 1944) declared themselves to be the French Co-Prince (mentioned in 'The Organization and Order of Battle of Militaries in World War II written by Charles D. Pettibone https://books.google.hu/books?id=p2qj8VHx4kcC&pg=PA519&lpg=PA519&dq=Charles+de+Gaulle+co-prince+1944&source=bl&ots=tYpSeI6euF&sig=Z6PIV1FQqqNywkYiE4QjCnofyXc&hl=hu&sa=X&ved=0CB0Q6AEwADgKahUKEwiBzIabq6PIAhVGxxQKHS8oAkE#v=onepage&q=Charles%20de%20Gaulle%20co-prince%201944&f=false'), but even if this were true it would still be a question if the Andorran state recognized this. And it still leaves open the question of the status of the other Chairmen of the Provisional Government (Gouin, Bidault and Blum). Interestingly Andorra appears to have issues commemorative stamps naming De Gaulle as Co-Prince for the period 1944-46: http://www.stampsoftheworld.co.uk/wiki/Andorra_-_French_1972_Tribute_to_Charles_de_Gaulle ZBukov (talk) 08:18, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

@Zoltan Bukovszky: To engage in a Gedankenexperiment for a minute: It occurs to me that there may have been periods when the Andorrans may have had some variation in the list, or have been uncertain what to do during periods of rapid change, such as after the Fall of France in June 1940. However such things get decided, I wouldn't think they had a committee that met daily or weekly in response to changing events in France to decide what to do, so there might be a time lag in drafting whatever the "official" list was at the time. Even if they did, I could totally imagine them in the first weeks and months saying that WwI hero Marshall Petain was Co-Prince; after all, he may have been seen at first as the "free" alternative to Occupied France; then as things progressed, they may have become more and more uncomfortable with Vichy and with him representing Andorra, and perhaps finally at some point undid their earlier version of the list. In the case of De Gaulle, I could imagine them having a huge sigh of relief after the Vichy/Petain debacle and the end of the war, that the leader of the Free French with impeccable credentials being Co-Prince, and in an outburst of relief and pride, put him on the stamp as Co-Prince and listed him at that time. This, of course, is all pure speculation on my part. While (perhaps) an interesting theory, we have no evidence of it (perhaps further investigation would unearth what happened over time).

In thinking what to do here, I believe we should go with the best evidence we have. My feeling is that it's the Andorran list. However, if you believe that reliable sources are available on both sides of this question, then we should accommodate both viewpoints somehow. As you know, I have concerns about the reliability of the three sources you use, as I believe they may be self-published sources; that doesn't disqualify them ipso facto, but it raises questions, like, who are their sources, and why aren't we using those?

At this point, I'd like to hear from other editors on this question. Since you're very involved with heads of state, can you recommend and {{ping}} a couple of editors you trust? And it might be nice to have a couple of independent voices as well, among editors who know nothing about all this. What do you think? Mathglot (talk) 19:56, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

@Mathglot: Events could easily have happened the way you described. But anyway I find it amazing that we should have to speculate about who the head of state of a European country was, well within living memory (as this should normally be a simple matter of fact). Of course, I would welcome input from anyone who has anything to contribute to this inquiry.

There is one other thing we could investigate. Until 1993 both Co-Princes used to be represented in Andorra by a vicar (in French: viguier), as they must be much busier filling their original offices (heading the French state and the diocese of Urgell) than overseeing Andorra. If we can establish who represented the French co-prince between 1940 and 1946 (who delegated the vicar), then we have the person who was the de facto Co-Prince, regardless whether he was subsequently disowned by Andorra, or not. Because I presume if there had been a real vacancy with no-one performing the French Co-Prince's duties (e.g. signing laws, consenting to international treaties, pardoning criminals, or whatever his tasks were at the time) that would be noted. Both www.worldstatesmen.org and the relevant French Wikipedia page (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viguier_d'Andorre#cite_ref-10) names Jules Lasmartres for 1940-1944 (delegated by Vichy France), Robert Barran 1944-1945, Georges Degrand 1945-1947. But because of worldstatesmen's lack of credentials it would be useful to find some other sources. What do you think? ZBukov (talk) 21:18, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi @Zoltan Bukovszky:, as far as the proposal of investigating the Vicar, that could be interesting background info whose results we could record here on the Talk page, but I'd be loathe to use the information as a basis for deciding who to list as Co-Prince on the article page, as I believe something like that would be original research. The problem I see is this: "If we can [find the Co-Prince representative] then we have the de facto Co-Prince" which is the OR part; and I'm especially wary of "...regardless whether he was disowned by Andorra or not". I prefer to go back to first principles, and let Andorra say who is or isn't Co-Prince, find reliable sources for that, and not try to draw inferences about who "must have been".

My thinking now, is, that we should leave a gap in the article for the same period(s) that the Co-Princeps page has a gap, and at least for the WWII gap perhaps add an "asterisk" along with a Note-type footnote ref saying something like, "some sources[1][2][3] imply that Léon Blum was Co-Prince but these cannot be confirmed and the Andorran official page shows the title as vacant during this period and does not list Blum," and you could add further comment about CDG due to his appearing on the postage stamp if you think that carries sufficient weight.

I'd still like to hear from other editors, and since this is a very dark and dusty corner of WP, maybe an WP:Rfc here is the right way to go. If you want to discuss further on the Talk page or try the vicar research first before we do that, I'll wait as there's no hurry. Otherwise, I think it would be pretty easy to formulate an Rfc question, and then we could both present our brief arguments about how we see it, and then throw it open to the floor. Thinking ahead, are you okay with an Rfc question formulated thus: {{Rfc|hist}}Should Léon Blum be listed as French Co-Prince of Andorra? If not, please suggest alternative wording that you are happy with. I'll wait on posting an Rfc though, if you want more time for the vicar research or further discussion. Mathglot (talk) 19:52, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi @Mathglot:, as much as I understand our problem is that the exact opposite of your first principles is happening. Andorra is neither willing to acknowledge a vacancy having occurred in the position of the French Co-Prince, nor willing to own Pétain, de Gaulle, Gouin, Bidault and Blum as Co-Princes for the period between 1940 and 1947.

I have never done a 'Request for comment', so I don't know its procedures & criteria. But I'm happy to go along with it without any further ado. But since the phenomenon doesn't concern Blum alone, shouldn't the question refer to the crux of the matter or the period instead? E.g. Who should be listed as French Co-Prince for Andorra between 1940 and 1947? ZBukov (talk) 22:01, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi @Zoltan Bukovszky: Yes, your wording sounds good. I'll probably get to it later this evening. Meanwhile, you can find some old Rfc's (open or closed) to see how they go, and having a look at WP:Rfc might be a good idea, but I'll give it a start, and you'll pick up on it easily. So, ttyl, Mathglot (talk) 22:52, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, gimme another copla three days... :-) Mathglot (talk) 07:46, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Legitimacy of Vichy

Couple of heads-up:

• I added a new section Terminology to the article Vichy France, which explains about the term "French State" being the official name of the Vichy regime at the time. (This is translated from the lede of the French article.) This is the term that M. Escande used, so when he says French State he is talking about Vichy.
• In the new section (and repeated in the Legitimacy section below it) there's a footnote including a reference to the August 9, 1944 law of the French Provisional Government which nullified every law and document created under Vichy. This law also declared that the "continuity of the French Republic" had never ceased during Occupation and Vichy (though it doesn't say where it resided; maybe with the Free French, maybe in hyperspace).

This nullification and declaration of Republican Continuity is the legal basis of the complete delegitimization of Vichy, which, in turn, may underline the question of who was French Co-prince of Andorra. Namely, if Vichy was not the French Republic, because the French Republic was out there somewhere "existing continuously", then maybe that's why there is no French Co-Prince, because the "French Republic" existed, but in concept only rather than in reality. Again, my reading of the 8/9/44 law and events; apparently historians still argue about the legitimacy of the July 10 1940 law voting Petain full Constitutional Powers. Having learned all this, I think I now understand better why M. Escande replied as he did, it all makes perfect sense. The "French Republic" was in hyperspace, no actual humans inhabited it, hence, the "head" of the French Republic was vacant, which would explain the vacancy of the Co-Principality. That takes us up through the Provisional Government, which apparently didn't embody "the French Republic" either, until the Fourth Republic came along late in 1946, and the soul of the French Republic floating in hyperspace fused with it. Wouldn't surprise me if there's a law somewhere under the 4th Republic which declares itself the legal embodiment of the "French Republic" to lay claim to that eternal French mantle. And so then the list of French Co-Princes picks up with the first head of the 4th Republic. Again, just my reading of it. Mathglot (talk) 09:19, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi @Mathglot:, in my opinion the legality of the succession of French states is immaterial from the point of view of Andorra for the following reasons:

1) In charting history (what a list of state leaders is about) what matters is what actually happened, not what should have happened (or seems politically opportune in hindsight). So when de facto and de jure radically diverge, it is the former which is relevant – otherwise we would ignore consequences of revolutions and we’d still be listing the Shah as head of state of Iran, or the Romanovs for Russia. So if someone was acting as Co-Prince (or the Co-Prince’s representative), and was accepted as such at the time, then denying it in hindsight is merely an attempt to rewrite history. To my mind the question is not about finding the correct interpretation of a face-saving myth of national continuity, but identifying the people whose signatures promulgated the laws passed by the Andorran legislature between 1940 and 1947 (i.e. who performed the head of state functions).

2) Evidently Andorra takes whoever is the leader of France. Their official list of Co-Princes faithfully follows France’s numerous regime changes, switching from King to Emperor, back to King, President, Emperor and back to President again. And revolutions rarely respected constitutional due process. So unless Andorra declares a vacancy having occurred then we have no reason to presume that they broke with their centuries-old tradition – especially as they don't even proffer an alternative version. ZBukov (talk) 13:00, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I've just found some documents, which appear to have been published by the University of Málaga (http://www.eumed.net/rev/cccss/10/pag.htm). In a 1944 foreign ministry letter sent to the Bishop (the other Co-Prince), De Gaulle is being referred to Co-Prince, and a 1945 letter refers to Degrand as 'Viguier de France en Andorre'. What do you think? ZBukov (talk) 23:28, 3 November 2015 (UTC)