Hendrik Pieter "Henri" Marchant (12 February 1869 – 12 May 1956) was a Dutch politician who served as a member of parliament from 1900 until 1933, and as education minister from 1933 until 1935.
First elected to the House of Representatives in 1900, he was a co-founder of the Free-thinking Democratic League (VDB) the next year, and became the party's parliamentary leader in 1916. He was a sharp debater and a feared opponent, and left a deep imprint on his party. In parliament, he led the charge for women's suffrage, which was achieved in 1919. He opposed the confessional Coalition cabinets of the early interwar period, but joined a government of national unity in 1933 as Minister of Education, Arts, and Sciences. After a brief and largely unsuccessful ministership, he resigned in 1935 following controversy regarding his conversion to Catholicism.
Early life and education Hendrik Pieter Marchant was born in Deventer on 12 February 1869 to Carel Anthonij Marchant, a public prosecutor in that city, and Apollonia Jacoba van der Horst. The later artist Mien Marchant was his sister. Marchant went to study law at Leiden University in 1888, and received his doctorate there with a dissertation entitled Begrip en gevolg van belediging in het burgerlijk recht ("Concept and consequences of defamation in civil law") in 1894. In the same year, he moved back to his place of birth to set up practice as a solicitor and barrister. In 1897, he was elected to the municipal council of Deventer, and in 1899 he became alderman responsible for the city's finances, social welfare and hospital.
Tenure in Parliament, 1900–1933 Early tenure
As a candidate for the Radical League, Marchant contested a 1900 parliamentary by-election in the district of Deventer triggered by the death of incumbent member Willem Hendrik de Beaufort. He defeated the Free Liberal candidate Samuel van Houten, and was installed as a member of the House of Representatives on 8 June of that year. In the House, he joined the Free-thinking Democratic parliamentary group, comprising progressive liberals favouring the expansion of suffrage, and in 1901, he was one of the founding members of the corresponding political party, the Free-thinking Democratic League.
Marchant left a significant imprint on the Free-thinking Democratic League throughout his political career. He served as the party's chairman between 1905 and 1908, and became the leader of its parliamentary group in 1916. From 1911 onwards, he wrote political columns for the party publications Vragen des Tijds and De Opbouw, and sat on the editorial board of both. He also frequently contributed to De Vrijzinnig-Democraat. His domineering behaviour within the party earned him the nickname "the general", to which he was positively disposed.
In parliament, Marchant gained a reputation as combative and militant, and possessing a critical mind. Whenever he took on those he disliked or encountered matters he deemed unjust, he stopped at nothing and left little standing. He was feared in debate and usually came out on top; his arguments were clear, sharp and witty, with a touch of banter. In debate, however, he often took a one-sided stance; he rarely realised that a matter could have different sides to it. If he changed his mind, he was quick to forget that he had thought differently only a short while before. He was sometimes called le tigre neerlandais, in reference to Georges Clemenceau.
Women's suffrage One of Marchant's most famous legislative achievements was the introduction of women's suffrage. The Pacification of 1917 had resulted in the introduction of universal male suffrage, as well as passive suffrage (the right to stand for election) for women. The 1918 general election saw the election of the women to parliament for the first time; the famous women's suffrage activist Aletta Jacobs was placed high on the VDB's candidate list, but narrowly missed out on a seat. While the VDB and the Social Democratic Workers' Party (SDAP) had wanted to extend active suffrage (the right to vote) to women as well, this was a bridge too far for the confessional parties. However, the matter was left out of the Constitution, such that women's suffrage could be introduced by law.
The 1918 election led to the formation of a confessional Coalition cabinet which was unlikely to make use of this opportunity, so Marchant took it upon himself to introduce a private member's bill. In the wake of the November Revolution in Germany and the Red Week the Netherlands, prime minister Charles Ruijs de Beerenbrouck declared that the cabinet would not oppose Marchant's effort for women's suffrage. This declaration, intended to address the calls for reform, was made against the wishes of the majority of his cabinet, but his colleagues went along with it. Marchant defended the bill in parliament, and it was approved in the House of Representatives on 9 May 1919 by 64 votes to 10, and in the Senate on 10 July of that year by 34 votes to 5. Opposition came only from among the ranks of the Protestant parties, most notably the Anti-Revolutionary Party (ARP).
Opposition to the Coalition
Marchant strongly opposed the confessional Coalition cabinets that governed uninterruptedly from 1918 to 1933, and the party's stated goal was to break down existing party divisions. The Pacification of 1917 had resulted in the equal financing of religious schools, and thus in an end to the school struggle. This, in Marchant's view, meant that the division between confessional and secular parties represented by the antithesis theory no longer had any basis for existence, and ought to be replaced by cooperation between groups on both sides of the old dividing line on the basis of a democratic programme. A logical conclusion of this view was that the SDAP should not be categorically excluded from government participation.
One area in which Marchant provided opposition to the Coalition cabinets was on the matter of defence; with his anti-militarist stance, he frequently thwarted successive ministers of war. After World War I, he pushed for cuts in the military budget, stating that the general exhaustion provisionally ruled out the continuation of warfare. During the debate on the war budget in 1919, Marchant sought to see military expenditure significantly reduced; he would only approve expenditure necessary to keep the forces operational. He managed to secure cuts to this budget on so many points that the minister of war, George Alting von Geusau, resigned. In 1922, he advocated limiting military activity to border control, and in October 1923 he helped to defeat the naval bill. In November 1924, the VDB replaced the military clause with the principle of national disarmament. During the debate on the Foreign Affairs budget in December 1924, Marchant therefore argued for the abolition of an independent armed forces.
Marchant's main political opponent was Hendrikus Colijn, the leader of the ARP who became prime minister in August 1925. In October of that year, the two clashed when Marchant stated in parliament that Colijn's promise was worthless, in reference to an earlier commitment by Colijn that civil servants would receive a compensatory payment in 1925, which had not materialised because a condition had not been met. Colijn felt personally offended by this remark, and it took mediation by Catholic leader Wiel Nolens to defuse the situation somewhat.
Marchant's opposition to the Coalition reached a climax in November 1925. In the debate on the Foreign Affairs budget, Gerrit Hendrik Kersten, leader of the Reformed Political Party (SGP), tabled a motion to scrap the budget for the diplomatic mission of the Netherlands to the Holy See. Adoption of this motion would lead the Roman Catholic State Party (RKSP) to vote against the budget, and would therefore imperil the Coalition. Marchant saw this as an opportunity to exploit divisions between Coalition parties, and supported the motion, which was subsequently adopted, leading to the fall of Colijn's first cabinet. Marchant was subsequently appointed formateur, tasked with forming a new government. His attempt to form a centre-left cabinet comprising the VDB, the SDAP and the RKSP was met with opposition from the latter, who held onto the Nolens Doctrine, stating that they would collaborate with the SDAP only in cases of "utmost necessity".
Municipal politics During his tenure in parliament, Marchant was also active in the local politics of The Hague. He had moved to the city in 1901, and continued his practice as a solicitor there. He became a member of the municipal council on 27 August 1923, and of the municipal executive on 27 August 1931. In this capacity, he was responsible for education in the city. He served in both offices until his appointment as minister in 1933.
Ministership, 1933–1935 Policy and legislation
In 1933, amid the Great Depression, the second Colijn cabinet was formed as a government of national unity comprising the Coalition parties, the Liberal State Party (LSP) and the VDB. Alongside Pieter Oud, Marchant was one of two VDB members to take part in the government, taking office as Minister of Education, Arts and Sciences on 26 May of that year. Marchant's ministership, which was entirely characterised by austerity measures, was less successful. He lacked sufficient tact and, moreover, left virtually everything, save for a few matters of particular interest to him, to his director-general, Gerrit van Poelje. This created too great a distance between him and his subordinates, depriving him of a comprehensive range of information. Consequently, he often encountered fierce opposition in parliament and, in the long run, even faced resistance from within his own party.
He often found himself stuck between conflicting demands from the left and the right. As part of cost-cutting measures, he imposed a consolidation of public schools, but was made to leave religious schools intact, which was criticised by the left. Another difficult measure was that of married female schoolteachers. In 1933, the right sought to oblige municipalities to dismiss female schoolteachers upon marriage, to the great displeasure of the left. Marchant asked that the initiative in this matter be left to the government, but came up with the proposal himself a year later; an amendment of the 1920 Lower Education Act to this effect was passed in 1935.
In 1934, Marchant made an attempt at spelling reform. The reform was a compromise of the traditional De Vries and Te Winkel spelling and the proposals at simplification made by Roeland Anthonie Kollewijn and his Association for a Simplified Spelling. It comprised the dropping of the inflectional ending -n, the consistent spelling of e and o in open syllables as opposed to ee and oo, and the change from sch to s where only an s was pronounced. Marchant's proposal was so fiercely attacked in parliament by Protestant, Catholic and liberal parties that Marchant had to settle for the compromise that his spelling would only be compulsory in school examinations, whilst in a number of cases the -n ending would be retained. Marchant also faced fierce criticism outside of parliament, particularly from historian the Johan Huizinga. Nevertheless, his compromise was formally prescribed for government and education by decree in both the Netherlands and Belgium shortly after World War II.
Resignation