Eugène Deschenaux

Eugène Deschenaux

Eugène Deschenaux (born June 16, 1874 in Romont , † May 28, 1940 in Friborg ) was a Swiss politician ( CVP ) and judge .

Life

He was Catholic and from Romont . His parents were Romain Deschenaux, banker and then state collector, and Julie b. Perroud, housewife, from a notable family from Châtel-Saint-Denis . In 1906 he married Valentine Hartmann (born 1880), daughter of Henri-Théobald, from a family of lawyers who held municipal offices in Freiburg and Villars-sur-Glâne .

Eugène Deschenaux studied law in Freiburg , Paris , Berlin and Munich , where he also acquired excellent knowledge of German. In 1897 he completed his studies with a licentiate . At the same time he did his military service and rose to the rank of major .

He served as a lawyer from 1900 to 1904 before being appointed President of the Saane District Court . In 1901 he was elected to the Grand Council as a conservative, from which he resigned in 1919.

In 1909, at the age of 35, he was elected to the State Council. For ten years he headed the Justice and Police Directorate. In addition, he sat not only in the Grand Council, but also in the National Council (1911-1919), where he worked on the commission for drafting the new Federal Criminal Code. In addition, he was appointed to the board of directors of the cantonal mortgage bank in 1907. In 1917 he took over the presidency of the State Bank (FSB) and the Conservative People's Party of Switzerland (from 1912: Conservative People's Party, today: Christian Democratic People's Party ). In addition, he was President of the Swiss Catholic People's Association . In the press he was referred to as a "popular government representative".

The year 1919 marked a turning point in Deschenaux's career: he became a federal judge . He owed this prestigious office not only to his recognized legal and linguistic knowledge, but also to the connections he had made in the National Council. Due to this professional reorientation, he had to forego the Presidium of the FSB and all political offices. In 1921 he also resigned from the board of directors of Hypothekarkasse . In contrast, he remained a member of the board of directors of the private Banque commerciale fribourgeoise (BCF).

When the latter went bankrupt in 1922, Deschenaux submitted his resignation as a federal judge. In order to cope with this moral and financial drama, he resumed his legal practice in 1925, but was no longer active in politics. The Federal Criminal Code commented on by Tuor was translated into French by him. He died on May 28, 1940 in Freiburg at the age of 66.

literature

• Georges Andrey , John Clerc, Jean-Pierre Dorand et Nicolas Gex: The Freiburg Council of State: 1848–2011. History, organization, members . Editions La Sarine, Freiburg 2012, ISBN 978-2-88355-153-4 .
• Erich Gruner: The Swiss Federal Assembly 1848–1920. Francke, Bern 1966, Volume 1, p. 388.
• La Liberté , May 28, 1940
• Monthly roses 84 , 1940, 12

Web links

• Georges Andrey: Deschenaux, Eugène. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .