Politician. He was a 19th-century French politician who was the Prime Minister of France from September 19, 1847 to February 23, 1848. His short administration as Prime Minister of France became the longest and the last under the constitutional monarchy of France. Born the son of a lawyer, André Guizot, his father was executed in 1794 during the French Revolution, which led his mother to escape with him and his two-year-younger brother, Jean-Jacques, to Switzerland in exile. His family were protestants in a country basically ruled by the Roman Catholic church. Along with hundreds of other Frenchmen, who met the same fate, his father sided with the Girondins during the French Revolution, and was sentenced to a public death on the scaffold during the time of the Reign of Terror. He and his mother returned to France six years later. He began to study law and participated in anti-Napoleonic literary circles. In October of 1809, at the age of twenty-two, he started submitting articles to periodicals. He was appointed professor of history at the University of Paris and eventually, was appointed the chair of Modern History. In 1812, he married Pauline de Meulan, an intellect liberal aristocrat, who was fourteen years his senior. Before his wife's 1827 death, the couple had two sons; the oldest died as an infant, and the second, François, died of pneumonia at age 21 after passing his law examinations. Abandoning his educational career in 1814, he joined the first Bourbon Restoration after the fall of Napoleon and began to deal with the ultraroyalist political groups. Not meeting the mandatory age requirement of 40 years old, he was not a candidate for Parliament but became an advisor. With the assassination of Charles Ferdinand de Artois, the Duke of Berry in 1820, he was forced to resign from all political duties as this was a turning point in French politics. Between 1820 and 1830, he researched France's history producing in the French language, the three-volume "General History of Civilization in Europe" in 1829 and "The History of Civilization in France" from 1829 to 1832. After gaining public recognition for this accomplishment, he began to lecture again at the Sorbonne in 1828 along with publishing political articles in various newspapers, inspiring the minds of young students. Sharing the king's political doctrines, he became a political leader in the unstable French government of the July Revolution of 1830. From 1832 to 1837 he was minister of education and was responsible for the so-called Guizot law of June 23, 1833, which established the principle that a secular primary education should be accessible to all citizens and not an education system controlled by the Roman Catholic church. He attempted to form a teacher's college for female students. His second wife, the niece of his first wife, Eliza, died in 1833 two months after the birth of a son, leaving him a widower with two young daughters and an infant son while being a busy politician. His elderly mother came to his aide to tend his children. Both of his wives had been successful authors. His oldest son died in 1837. That same year while grieving for his son, he met Dorothea Lieven, who became the widow in 1838 of the former Russian Ambassador to London Prince Christopher Andreevich Lieven. They became close and exchanged over 5,000 letters in a twenty-year friendship, and he remained fixed to her while she was on her 1857 deathbed. While Prime Minister from 1847 to 1848, he had to delegate to others the duties of the military and while France was facing an economical depression since 1846, financial responsibilities as he knew little about these subjects. As Prime Minister, he fought an uphill battle on most subjects but remained focus with a stubborn conviction on the idea of France having a liberal government and constitutional law. On February 23, 1848 King Louis-Philippe summoned him to chambers and upon leaving, he resigned his post, thus becoming the last prime minister of France under the constitutional monarchy of France. Louis-Philippe abdicated the throne the next day, escaping to England. A change in public opinion caused him to also flee to England in February of 1848, living in exile for a year. Although a candidate for election after returning in 1849, he was never elected but often acted as an advisor. Besides minister of education, other political positions which he held were Interior Minister for a short period in 1830, ambassador to London, France foreign minister from 1840 to 1848 and France Chamber of Deputies from 1830 to 1848. While ambassador to London, he received with distinction by Queen Victoria and by London society for his writings and secured the return of Napoleon's ashes to France. His home in England is marked with a Blue Heritage Plaque. In his later years, he continued to write volumes on history, biographies, and religion while residing in his Normandy estate at Val-Richer until his sudden death. Since 1994, the Prix Guizot is an annual prize, which is awarded by the Academy of France. In his honor, his bust is on the façade of a Paris high school. Created in 2013, the François Guizot-Institut de France Prize is awarded every two years to the author of a great work of history, a study of the contemporary world, social or political analysis recently published or broadcast, and accessible to a wide audience.