2024-02-15 13:35:27
The name of Robert Badinter will be registered “alongside those who have done so much (…) for France “. It is in these terms that Emmanuel Macron opened the way, Wednesday February 14, to the pantheonization of the former Minister of Justice.
However, no information on the possible date of the event has been provided. Indeed, the pantheonization of a personality is a long process, even when the decision has been made. For Joséphine Baker, four months had passed between Emmanuel Macron’s approval, on July 21, 2021, and the ceremony, on November 30, 2021.
A decision taken by the president
Since 1791, the Pantheon has symbolically or physically hosted the remains of the bodies of personalities who have left their mark on France, from the Count of Mirabeau – the first to enter – to the artist Joséphine Baker, transferred in 2021.
Initially, the decision fell to the Constituent Assembly before it was entrusted to the Convention from 1794. Under the First Empire, the choice depended entirely on Napoleon I, who also multiplied the pantheonizations. From 1885, the decision returned to parliamentarians.
It is only since the start of the Fifth Republic, in 1958, that the president has regained power. It is he who decrees who can be transferred to the monument. A decision which cannot, however, be made without the agreement of the family of the deceased.
The heirs of Albert Camus had thus refused the pantheonization of the writer. General de Gaulle had expressed his wish to be buried in Colombey-les-Deux-Églises and not to be buried in the Republican monument.
Merit, the only official criterion
Only a decree of May 26, 1885 officially specifies the condition for entering the Pantheon. “The remains of the great men who deserved well for their country will be placed there,” he indicates. The assessment of the criterion of “deserves” therefore falls to the head of state, even if popular approval proves to be an unofficial condition.
The French expect the personality to be unifying, beyond political divisions. According to a survey carried out by the regional daily West France56% of those questioned said they were in favor of the pantheonization of Robert Badinter.
The possible pantheonized must also embody the ideals of the Republic. A condition which led, in 2007, to suspend reflections around the entry into the Pantheon of the Marquis de La Fayette, considered not republican enough.
French nationality, on the other hand, is not an absolute requirement. The poet and resistance fighter Missak Manouchian (1906-1944), who will enter the Pantheon with his wife Mélinée on February 21, was of Armenian origin before becoming stateless.
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