Robert Schuman: the Clausen child who became a father of Europe

Born in Luxembourg City in 1886, Robert Schuman grew up between three languages and two nationalities before becoming the French minister whose 1950 declaration set the European Union in motion.

A childhood in Clausen

Robert Schuman was born on 29 June 1886 in Clausen, a district of Luxembourg City. His father, Jean-Pierre Schuman, was born French in Evrange, Lorraine, in 1837 and became German after the 1871 annexation. His mother, Eugénie Duren, came from Bettembourg, and Luxembourgish was the boy's mother tongue. Three of his four grandparents held Luxembourg nationality. From 1892 to 1896, he attended primary school in Clausen, where he learned German and French, before entering the Athénée and adding Latin and Greek. The family rented the house at 4 rue Jules Wilhelm, built in 1872-73 by the lawyer Jean-Nicolas Feyden, and stayed there until his mother's death in 1911, his father died in 1900. The family also owned another house in Grand-Rue.

Europe will not be made all at once, or according to a single plan.

From Metz to the 1950 declaration

After the Athénée, Schuman took his Abitur in Metz in 1904, then studied law at the universities of Bonn, Munich, Berlin and Strasbourg until 1910. In 1912, he opened his own law office in Metz. When Alsace-Lorraine returned to France after the First World War in 1919, he became French and won election as MP for Moselle. Imprisoned by the Nazis during the Second World War, he later joined the Resistance. Peace brought him to the top of French politics: finance minister in 1946-47, President of the Council from November 1947 to July 1948, then foreign minister from 1948. On 9 May 1950, in Paris, he presented a declaration prepared with Jean Monnet, proposing to place French and German coal and steel production under a common High Authority.

Luxembourg, first home of the Community

The High Authority of the European Coal and Steel Community held its inauguration at Luxembourg City Hall in August 1952, uniting France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. Schuman went on to preside over the European Movement from 1955 to 1961, served as the first president of the European Parliamentary Assembly in Strasbourg from 1958 to 1960, and died on 4 September 1963 in Scy-Chazelles, near Metz. The Grand Duchy has kept his memory close. In 1966, a monument designed by the architect Robert Lentz was unveiled on the Kirchberg plateau, the same day as the Grand Duchess Charlotte Bridge. In 1985, the Luxembourg Government acquired the Robert Schuman House, and the Centre Robert Schuman opened there in 1991. Since 2019, 9 May has been a public holiday in Luxembourg, the only EU Member State to mark it that way.

This article was written by artificial intelligence and reviewed by our editors.