Paul-Émile Janson

Paul-Émile Janson
Portrait of Paul-Émile Janson
Prime Minister of Belgium
In office 23 November 1937 – 15 May 1938
Monarch	Leopold III
Preceded by	Paul van Zeeland
Succeeded by	Paul-Henri Spaak
Personal details
Born	30 May 1872 Brussels, Belgium
Died	3 March 1944 (aged 71) Buchenwald concentration camp, Germany
Political party	Liberal Party
Alma mater	Free University of Brussels

Paul-Émile Janson (30 May 1872 – 3 March 1944) was a francophone Belgian liberal politician and Prime Minister (1937–1938). During the German occupation, he was arrested as a political prisoner and died in a German concentration camp in 1944.

Biography

Born in Brussels, Janson was the son of liberal statesman Paul Janson (died 1913).^[1] He studied law at the Free University of Brussels (now split into the Université Libre de Bruxelles and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel), practised as a lawyer, and also taught at the university.

Political career

Janson was elected as a liberal to the Belgian Chamber of Representatives in 1910. He was not re-elected in 1912, but he was again elected in 1914. He held various minister posts including War (1920), Justice (1927-1931; 1932-1934; 1939, 1940) and minister without portfolio (1940-1944). He was made an honorary Minister of State in 1931.

He served as the 30th Prime Minister of Belgium in 1937–1938. In the early part of the Second World War, Janson served as Foreign minister, and as minister without portfolio, in the government of Hubert Pierlot. He remained in France when the government in exile moved to London. In 1943 he was detained by the occupying German forces and incarcerated in the Buchenwald concentration camp. He died there in 1944.^[2][3]

His sister Marie Janson was the first woman to be elected to the Chamber of Representatives in 1921 and the mother of Paul-Henri Spaak, Janson's nephew and the man who directly succeeded him as Prime Minister in 1938.

Commemoration

• A street in Ixelles is named Rue Paul Emile Janson in his honour.
• The Université Libre de Belgique has an auditorium named after him.

See also

• Liberal Party

References

1. Bulletin de la Classe des lettres et des sciences morales 1973 "Paul Janson ne connaissait pas le flamand, ce qui, disait-il, lui causait du regret"
2. Betty Garfinkels Belgique, terre d'accueil: problème du réfugié : 1933-1940 1974 "Mieux que tout autre, Paul-Emile Janson mettait en pratique ce qu'il disait. Conciliateur et tolérant, il était aussi le pacificateur du clan Janson qui se réunissait régulièrement dans la propriété de Chooz. Son humour, que tant de personnes appréciaient lors des séances de la Chambre, vida bien des différends entre sœurs et alliés, entre enfants et parents. ll ne lui resta guère de temppour voyager. ... Et cependant, là encore, il réunissait autour de lui ses compagnons d'infortune qu'il réconfortait. Le 3 mars 1944, il s'éteignit dans les bras d'Albert François."
3. Bulletin de la Classe des lettres et des sciences morales 1973 "Le 27 janvier 1944, en compagnie de Soudan, il était, dans un convoi de wagons à bestiaux, envoyé à Buchenwald. ... Le 3 mars 1944, dans les bras de son compagnon de captivité Albert François, ancien sénateur socialiste, il mourait .."

Sources

• D'Ydewalle, Ch., Silhouettes politiques : Paul-Emile Janson, in : Revue Générale, LXII, 1929, p. 86-90.
• Miroir, A., in : Parisel, W., Histoire de La Loge Les Vrais amis de l'Union et du Progrès Réunis 1892-1980, Brussel, 1980, p. 283-285.
• Stengers, J., Paul-Emile Janson, in : Académie Royale de Belgique, Bulletin de la Commission des Lettres et des Sciences Morales et Politiques, 5e série, LIX, 1973–1976, p. 202-281.

External links

• Paul-Emile Janson at Liberaal Archief
• Paul-Emile Janson at the Prime Minister's Office