Background
He was born in Sem, close to Norway's oldest city, Tønsberg, on the 30th of July 1816. His father, Jakob Sverdrup, was a land steward, and the founder of the first school of agriculture in Norway.
He was born in Sem, close to Norway's oldest city, Tønsberg, on the 30th of July 1816. His father, Jakob Sverdrup, was a land steward, and the founder of the first school of agriculture in Norway.
He finished his law studies in 1841.
Johan entered the Storthing in 1850, sitting first for Laurvik, and then for the district of Akershus, and was its president from 1871 to 1884, during the whole of the dispute over the prerogative of the Crown. He built up a strong political party, which, relying for support chiefly on the Norwegian peasantry, was determined to secure strict constitutional government and practically to destroy the power of the king. Under his leadership the opposition, in 1872, secured the passing of a bill for the admission of the ministers to the Storthing, which was a step to the establishment of the dependence of the cabinet on a majority in that assembly. King Charles XV refused his sanction to this bill, and on its third passing in 1880 Oscar II opposed his veto, at the same time claiming his right to the absolute veto. Sverdrup then proposed the proclamation of the law in defiance of the king's action. The retirement of Frederik Stang removed Sverdrup's chief political opponent from the field. He was aided in his campaign by Bjornstjerne Bjornson, and after a series of political crises he became prime minister in June 1884. But when he became prime minister he soon found himself at issue with Bjornson on church matters. Inspired chiefly by his nephew Johan he secured the refusal of a pension to the novelist Kielland because of his anticlerical views, and he further wished to give the parish councils the right to strike off the voting list persons who had broken away from church discipline. Therefore, although during his term of office no fewer than eighty-nine measures, many of them involving useful reforms, became law, he failed to satisfy the extremists among his supporters, and was driven to rely on the moderate Liberals. He was compelled to retire in 1889, and died on the 17th of February 1892 at Christiania.
The views towards this controversial political leader will differ greatly with the political and historical affiliation of those expressing a view. It can not be denied that Sverdrup was an extremely skilled and able opposition leader and strategist whose influence of domestic politics was enormous for about 30 years. What can be said against such a viewpoint, is that most of the results of his opposition was destructive because he sold his radical and social liberal political views in order to gain influence in Jaabæk's loosely knit alliance of peasants. On the other hand one tends to forget that there was a class struggle between the peasants and the public servant and tradesmen classes, which in Norway with no nobility, were the most influential, and that Sverdrup, a public servant, joined the vast and less influential group of peasants in order to transform the society.
His weakness was his inability to bury hatchets and his apparent lack of flexibility in older age. His inability to understand the concept of parliamentarism, which seemed to be the ultimate goal of his policies. His clinging to the symbols of power can be ascribed to his age, but he was only about 70. Most historians would conclude that his fight against the king's appointed Council lasted too long. He was too old to harvest the fruits, but he paved the way for a new political situation in Norway.