Background
Jean Louis Joseph Lebeau was born on the 3rd of January, 1794 in Huy, Belgium.
lawyer politician prime minister
Jean Louis Joseph Lebeau was born on the 3rd of January, 1794 in Huy, Belgium.
Jean Louis Joseph Lebeau attended the University of Liège.
Jean Louis Joseph Lebeau became a clerk. He raised money to study Law at the University of Liège, and was called to the bar association in 1819. Lebeau had not aimed for the separation of the Netherlands and Belgium, but his hand was forced by the August Revolution of 1830.
Jean Louis Joseph Lebeau was sent by his native district to the National Congress, and became minister of foreign affairs in March 1831 during the interim regency of Érasme-Louis Surlet de Chokier. By proposing the election of Leopold of Saxe-Coburg as King of the Belgians he secured a benevolent attitude on the part of the United Kingdom, but the restoration to the Netherlands of part of the duchies of Limburg and Luxembourg provoked a heated opposition to the 1839 Treaty of London, and Lebeau was accused of treachery to Belgian interests. He resigned the direction of foreign affairs on the accession of King Leopold, but in the next year became minister of justice.
Jean Louis Joseph Lebeau was elected deputy for Brussels in 1833, and retained his seat until 1848. Differences with the king led to his retirement in 1834. He was subsequently governor of the Province of Namur (1838), ambassador to the Frankfurt Diet (1839), and in 1840 he formed a short-lived Liberal ministry. From this time he held no office of state, although he continued his energetic support of liberal and anti-clerical measures. He died at Huy.