1901  Frédéric Passy
1902  Elie Ducommun
1902  Albert Gobat
1905  Bertha von Suttner
1908  Fredrik Bajer
1910  Permanent International Bureau of Peace
1911  Alfred Fried
1913  Henri La Fontaine
photo of Frédéric Passy

 

Frédéric Passy

 

“…international justice, although imperfect as yet, shall one day be as much respected as civil justice, without which society could not exist.”

 

Frédéric Passy was a French economist and politician and became an ardent pacificist. He was the Auditor for the French Council of State from 1846 to 1849 and strongly supported free trade as the best means to promote peaceful relations between states. Passy founded the International League for Peace in 1867, which established his leadership in the world pacificist movement. He was a member of the Chamber of Deputies from 1881 to 1889 and met with a group of British legislators, led by Randal Cremer. This meeting led to the establishment of the Inter-Parliamentary Union in 1889, an organization designed as a forum where national legislators could meet, exchange ideas, and support legislation which encouraged peace through arbitration. Passy received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1901 with Jean-Henri Dunant and died in Paris on June 12, 1912.



1822 -- Born in Paris

1845-1849 -- Auditor for the French Council of State

1857 -- Mélanges éconmiques, which established him as a theoretical economist and ardent free trader

1867 -- Led public opinion through Le Temps in averting a potential war between France and Prussia over the Luxembourg question

 -- Founded the International League for Peace (Ligue internationale et permanente de la paix)

1871 -- Reorganized the International League for Peace as the French Society for the Friends of Peace (Société française des amis de la paix) after the Franco-Prussian War

1877 -- Elected to the Académie de sciences morales et politiques, a unit of the Institut de France, for his research on economics and education

1881-1889 -- Member of the Chamber of Deputies where he supported legislation favorable to labor (industrial accidents), opposed French colonial policy, drafted a disarmament proposal, and called for the arbitration of international disputes

1888 -- Meeting of British Members of Parliament, led by Randal Cremer, with French deputies in Paris to discuss arbitration and lay the groundwork of an organization to promote international acceptance of arbitration

1889 -- Conference of Parliamentarians from France, Britain, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Hungary, Belgium, and the United States established the Inter-Parliamentary Union with Passy as one of the three presidents: the Union serves as a clearinghouse of ideas, encourages the formation of individual national parliamentary groups, and supports legislation which leads to peace through arbitration

 -- Established the French Society for Arbitration between Nations (Société française pour l’arbitrage entre nations)

1901 -- Nobel Peace Prize Laureate

1909 -- Published For Peace (Pour la paix)

1912 -- Died in Paris