The National Rally (RN) announced this Monday, December 2, its intention to vote on the motion of censure on the Social Security budget, which would overthrow the government. Under the Fifth Republic, only one motion of censure has so far been adopted, under Georges Pompidou.
A unique case, but not for long? The government of Michel Barnier is this Monday, December 2, more than ever under the threat of censorship, brandished by the National Rally (RN) and the left if it activates 49.3 on the Social Security budget. Until now, only one motion of censure has been adopted in the history of the Fifth Republic, in 1962.
At the time, Charles de Gaulle, then President of the Republic, was experiencing a major political crisis, following the Algerian War. After being the subject of an assassination attempt during the Petit-Clamart attack, the head of state decided to act.
To gain political legitimacy, on September 30, 1962, he announced a referendum to submit to the French an important reform of the Constitution: that they elect the president by direct universal suffrage and no longer indirectly by a college of electors, which included deputies and senators.
Parliamentarians do not hide their dissatisfaction with this reform which weakens legislative power. They also deplore that the president prefers to go through a referendum rather than article 89 of the Constitution, which provides for the vote of the two assemblies before the founding text of the Fifth Republic is revised.
Parliamentarians overthrow Pompidou
The deputies and senators then decided to table, on their own initiative, a motion of censure against the Pompidou government, by activating article 49.2 of the Constitution, on October 4, 1962. It was adopted the next day by 280 votes in favor out of 480. .
However, the victory of the elected officials is short-lived. If Georges Pompidou presents his resignation to Charles de Gaulle 24 hours later, the president only accepts it formally and the executive remains in place.
It is the turn of the Head of State to react since he dissolves the National Assembly. After the yes victory in the referendum on the Constitution (62.2% against 37.8% no) on October 28, the parliamentarians experienced a new failure during the early legislative elections on November 25, since the Gaullists, the only ones not to have voted for the motion of censure, came in first with 40% of the votes.
A motion ultimately failed
After resigning, Georges Pompidou was finally reappointed by the president to the position he had just left. The motion of censure of 1962, if it was adopted, will ultimately not have achieved its objective, since the Prime Minister remained in place.
Since this episode, no motion of censure has been adopted under the Fifth Republic. However, several times the deputies tried to overthrow the government in place, but without ever achieving the sufficient number of votes.
In total, 56 spontaneous motions of censure have been launched against Prime Ministers since Georges Pompidou, including 3 against Gabriel Attal and 3 against Élisabeth Borne, according to the Assembly's count.
The Barnier government is now on borrowed time. If it falls, it would then become the shortest in the history of the Fifth Republic.
