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In this article, Éric Anceau examines the coup d'État of 2 December 1851, which was carried out by the President of the French Republic at the time, Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte, against the Legislative Assembly. By viewing the coup from the parliamentary side and by using the method of prosopography, the author reevaluates an apparently well-known period, while refraining from partisan judgements and hasty generalizations. In the first part, the author analyses the immediate and contrasted reactions of the 741 parliamentarians to the coup. He then describes their negotiations and alignments. He finally shows the consequences for the parliamentarians of their different attitudes towards the coup: active support, acceptance, total abstention (a stance chosen by approximately a fifth of them) or outright resistance. In fact, Éric Anceau shows the great variety of their responses. Nevertheless he underlines the undecided, wait-and-see and pragmatic attitude chosen by most of the representatives. He concludes by mentioning the long-lasting consequences of the coup on the relationship between the new regime and the former Assembly representatives.
