Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, comte de Mirabeau
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Jacques Necker (IPA: [ʒak nɛkɛʁ]; 30 September 1732 – 9 April 1804) was a Genevan banker and statesman who served as finance minister for Louis XVI. He was a reformer, but his innovations sometimes caused great discontent.
- Overview
- Early career
- First ministry
- Outbreak of revolution
Jacques Necker (born September 30, 1732, Geneva—died April 9, 1804, Coppet, Switzerland) Swiss banker and director general of finance (1771–81, 1788–89, 1789–90) under Louis XVI of France. He was overpraised in his lifetime for his somewhat dubious skill with public finances and unduly deprecated by historians for his alleged vacillation and lack o...
Necker was the younger son of Charles-Frédéric Necker, a lawyer from Küstrin in the Electorate of Brandenburg who had become a citizen of the Genevan republic in January 1726. At age 16, Jacques Necker became a clerk in the bank of a friend of his father, and in 1750 he was transferred to the bank’s headquarters in Paris. In 1762 Necker was promote...
In his first ministry, Necker made several cautious experiments in social and administrative reform. He abolished mortmain (possession of lands by a corporation) on the royal domains in August 1779, reduced the numbers of the general tax farmers from 60 to 40, and established “provincial assemblies” for Berry and for Haute-Guyenne with administrati...
After both Charles-Alexandre de Calonne and Étienne-Charles de Loménie de Brienne had failed to solve the financial problems for which Necker was at least partially responsible, Necker himself was recalled as finance minister on August 26, 1788. France was now on the verge of bankruptcy, in spite of the aristocracy’s agreement to surrender its immunity from taxation. In the face of the financial crisis it was decided to summon a meeting of the Estates-General (the representatives of the clergy, nobility, and commons), which was to set in motion the French Revolution. As the decision to summon the Estates-General for 1789 had already been taken, Necker’s main preoccupation lay in the field of politics rather than in finance, though he was too complacent in assuming that the surrender of the fiscal immunities of the nobility would remove his financial anxieties. In preparing for the meeting of the Estates-General, Necker had to steer a difficult course between the claims of the Third Estate for double representation, which were conceded by the royal council on his recommendation in December 1788, and the insistence of the privileged classes on the traditional method of debate, order by order. He has often been blamed for not having clearly laid down the government’s proposals for political as well as financial reform in his opening speech to the Estates-General on May 5, 1789. He did, however, propose a reasoned program of social and constitutional reforms that was overlooked in the struggle over procedure. This struggle might have been avoided if Necker’s suggestion for conciliation had been adopted. His program of liberal concessions to the National Assembly (formed between June 10 and June 17) was drastically modified by the court reactionaries just before the “royal session” of June 23, 1789. His objective was a limited constitutional monarchy with a bicameral legislature on the English model. His dismissal, on July 11, 1789, an overt sign of court reaction, did much to provoke the disturbances in Paris that culminated in the storming of the Bastille. Having retired to Switzerland, he received the summons to return to office on July 20, 1789.
In his third ministry Necker struggled ineffectively with the rapidly mounting deficit and was overshadowed by Talleyrand and the comte de Mirabeau, who dictated revolutionary finance at that stage. Necker’s chief weakness as a politician was his vanity and his anxiety to preserve his popularity at all costs. After his final resignation (September 18, 1790), he lived in retirement until his death in 1804.
Jun 13, 2022 · Jacques Necker (l. 1732-1804) was a Swiss banker and statesman who served as finance minister to King Louis XVI of France (r. 1774-1792). He served in the king's ministry three separate times, tasked with navigating France through its dire financial crisis.
- What is Jacques Necker known for?Jacques Necker was finance minister to King Louis XVI of France, known for making French finances public with his Compte Rendu au Roi (Report to th...
- Why was Jacques Necker's appointment to the king's ministry scandalous?Jacques Necker's appointment was scandalous because he was a Protestant commoner.
- Why did Jacques Necker fall from power?Jacques Necker fell from power three times: the first in 1781 for insisting to be put on the royal council; the second in 1789 for granting concess...
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Jacques Necker (1732-1804) was a French finance minister and a critical participant in the unfolding revolution of 1789. Born in Geneva, Necker was the son of a Swiss law professor but shunned law and instead trained as a banker. He established his own bank in the 1750s and became independently wealthy, in part through loans to the French royal ...
Jacques Necker, (born Sept. 30, 1732, Geneva, Switz.—died April 9, 1804, Coppet), Swiss-born French financier and director-general of finance under Louis XVI. He became a banker in Paris, and, after becoming wealthy from speculating during the Seven Years’ War, he was appointed minister of Geneva in Paris (1768).
Leading Financier to Louis XVI 1732-1804. Born in Switzerland and trained as a banker, Jacques Necker accumulated a considerable personal fortune before becoming Louis XVI’s finance minister. He implemented a rigorous economic policy, reducing the crown’s expenditure and imposing structural reforms on the way the royal finances were ...
May 21, 2018 · The French financier and statesman Jacques Necker (1732-1804) served King Louis XVI as director general of finances. His efforts to reform French institutions prior to 1789 and to compromise with the Estates General after the start of the Revolution failed.
