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Joint-Stock Business Organization in France, 1807–1867

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 July 2012

Charles E. Freedeman
Charles E. Freedeman
Affiliation:
Associate Professor of History, Northern Illinois University
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Abstract

The organizational alternatives available to businessmen are often important in the channeling of economic growth, as shown in this historical study of the French experience.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 39 , Issue 2 , Summer 1965 , pp. 184 - 204
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1965

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References

1 The standard work on French business organization, including joint-stock companies, during the ancien régime is Lévy-Bruhl, Henri, Histoire juridique des sociétés de commerce en France aux XVlle et XVIIIe siècles (Paris, 1938).Google Scholar This supersedes the older study of Lehmann, Karl, Die geschichtliche Entwicklung des Aketien Rechts bis zum Code de Commerce (Berlin, 1895).Google ScholarAdelson, Judah, “The Early Evolution of Business Organization in France,” Business History Review, vol. XXXI (Summer, 1957), pp. 226–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar, is a useful summary. The following works cover certain aspects of nineteenth-century French joint-stock companies: Lescoeur, C., Essai historique et critique sur la législation des sociétés commerciales en France et à l'étranger (Paris, 1877)Google Scholar; Fohlen, Claude, “Sociétés anonymes et développement capitaliste sous la monarchie censitaire,” Histoire des entreprises, No. 6 (novembre 1960), pp. 65–77Google Scholar and “Sociétés anonymes et développement capitaliste sous le Second Empire,” Histoire des entreprises, No. 8 (novembre 1961), pp. 65–79; Gille, Bertrand, Recherches sur la formation de la grande entreprise capitaliste (1815–1848) (Paris, 1959), pp. 33–39Google Scholar; and Dunham, Arthur L., The Industrial Revolution in France, 1815–1848 (New York, 1955), pp. 407–419Google Scholar.

2 Lévy-Bruhl, Henri, Un Projet de Code de commerce à la veille de la Révolution, Le projet Miromesnil (1778–1789) (Paris, 1932), pp. 20–21 and 26–29.Google Scholar

3 When the initial draft of the projected Code was sent to various Commercial Tribunals and Chambers of Commerce for their observations, the businessmen of these bodies complained about the restrictive clauses, but their advice was generally ignored. In December, 1802, Jean Antoine Chaptal, the Minister of Interior, characterized the initial draft of the Code in these terms: “Altogether, the majority of the provisions that it contains have been extracted from the Edict of 1673, the Ordinance of 1681, and various regulations that have appeared since; the literal wording of these laws has been retained when it was recognized that it was precise and not outmoded. As for new provisions, they are the result of experience or wishes emanating from the large commercial centers.” Quoted in Lavasseur, Emile, Histoire de commerce de la France (2 vols., Paris, 1911–1912), vol. II, p. 47.Google Scholar

4 Taylor, George V., “The Paris Bourse on the Eve of the Revolution, 1781–1789,” American Historical Review, vol. LXVII (July, 1962), p. 967.Google Scholar

5 Article 19. The proprietorship was not recognized by law as a form of business organization and therefore not subject to any formal requirements. Any individual was free to act on his own account.

6 Articles 27 and 28. Participation in management resulted in the loss of limited liability.

7 The Archchancellor Cambacérès feared this might happen. In one of the meetings of the Conseil d'Etat during the elaboration of the Code, he opposed allowing the capital of the commanditaires to be divided into shares for it would “permit a société anonyme to hide under the appearances of a société en commandite and avoid obtaining governmental authorization.” Locré, Esprit du Code de commerce, quoted by the Minister of Justice in the Chamber of Deputies, séance du 15 février 1838, Le Moniteur Universel, p. 313.

8 Articles 29–37.

9 Code de commerce (Paris, Edition des Archives de Droit Français, 1808), p. 16.

10 Ibid., appendix.

11 was able to find only 13 in the Bulletin des Lois, 9 for the Empire and 4 in 1816.

12 Ministère de l'Intérieur, Circulaires, instructions et autres actes, vol. III, pp. 266–72.

13 Ibid., pp. 349–55.

14 Vincens, Emile, Exposition raisonée de la législation commerciale (3 vols., Paris, 1821), vol. I, p. 336.Google Scholar Vincens was chief of the Bureau of Commerce in the Ministry of Interior when these volumes were published. He later became a Counsellor of State.

15 Vincens, Emile, Des Sociétés par actions, Des Banques en France (Paris, 1837), pp. 35–37.Google Scholar Much of the Conseil's inquiry repeated that of the ministry, but the Conseil insisted on its own inquiry because, according to Vincens, it distrusted the ministry.

16 Ibid., pp. 51–52. This requirement does not appear to have been strictly enforced.

17 Refusals of authorization were numerous. Of 206 requests for authorization examined by the Conseil for the period 1840–1844, only 114 anonymes were authorized. Certainly many promoters were discouraged from making the attempt because of the inconveniences involved and the uncertainty of the outcome. Many of these enterprises adopted the société en commandite form instead. Coquelin, Charles, “Des Sociétés commerciales en France et en Angleterre,” Revue des deux mondes, nouv. sér., vol. 3 (1843), 413–15Google Scholar and Gule, Recherches sur la formation de la grande entreprise capitaliste (1815–1848), p. 35.

18 Cochut, André, “La Politique du libre-échange: III, La Régime économique de la France de 1815 à 1860,” Revue des deux mondes, IIe pér., vol. 36 (1861), pp. 331–33Google Scholar; Wolowski, Louis, Des Sociétés par actions (Paris, 1838), p. 79Google Scholar.

19 The haute banque comprised the powerful private bankers of Paris.

20 Gille, Bertrand, La Banque et la crédit en France de 1815 à 1848 (Paris, 1959), pp. 109–113.Google Scholar The Société Commanditaire de l'Industrie was to have a capitalization of 100,000,000 francs, which would have made it the largest private business enterprise in France. (The nominal capital of the Credit Mobilier, organized in 1852, was only 60,000,000 francs). According to a contemporary writer, M. A. Jullien, the Conseil gave three reasons for its refusal: (1) the presence of foreign bankers among the promoters (Wilkinson of London, Hentsch of Geneva, and Bethmann of Frankfurt); (2) the derogation from the dignity of the aristocracy, some of whom were involved in the project, by associating themselves with bankers and industrialists; and (3) the large size of the capital. Revue encyclopédique, 2e sér., vol. XXXIX (1828), pp. 41–44.

21 Gras, Louis Joseph, Histoire économique générale des mines de la Loire (2 vols., Saint Etienne, 1922), vol. I, pp. 307, 332–33, 339Google Scholar; Journal des chemins de fer, vol. VI (1847), p. 956, vol. VII (1848), pp. 52 and 496. A strong reason for the refusal to authorize the Compagnie des mines de la Loire was that it was under attack from many quarters as constituting a dangerous monopoly.

22 Beaujouan, Guy et Lebée, Edmond, “La Fondation du Crédit Industriel et Commercial,” Histoire des entreprises, No. 6 (novembre 1960), pp. 9 and 23.Google Scholar The members of the syndicate, but without Rothschild, finally obtained authorization in 1864 as the Société Générale pour Favoriser le Développement du Commerce et de l'Industrie en France.

23 Ibid., pp. 16–17 and 37–40.

24 Less than half a dozen revocations of authorizations during the entire period 1807–67 are to be found in the Bulletin des Lois.

25 Some corporations neglected to submit these financial reports and when submitted they were not examined but simply filed. Vincens, Des Sociétés par actions, p. 58.

26 Ibid., p. 55. Vincens indicated that these positions were little more than sinecures.

27 The charters were usually 10–15 pages in length, though many were considerably longer.

28 Vincens, Des Sociétés par actions, p. 36.

29 Beginning in 1840 for a large number of the corporations, except railroads, insurance companies, and banks, no value was assigned to the real assets of the new corporation. Instead these assets were simply listed as part of the fonds social.

30 The effectiveness of this provision was questioned by Vincens. Since the major part of the capital of most firms would be tied up in real assets, the evaluation of these assets posed a difficult problem. Although their market value might be negligible, they represented a large capital investment. Des Sociétés par actions, pp. 43–48.

31 Malepeyre, et Jourdain, , Traité des sociétés commerciales (Paris, 1833), pp. 143–45.Google Scholar

32 Vincens, Des Sociétés par actions, p. 24.

33 Wolowski, op. cit., pp. 48–56.

34 Vincens, Des Sociétés par actions, pp. 23–27.

35 Bearer shares (actions au porteur) found in continental countries have no counterpart in Britain and the United States where shares are always nominatives with the name of the owner inscribed on the share and on the records of the company. See de Sola Canizarès, F., Etude sur les titres émis par les sociétés par actions en droit comparé (Paris, 1962), p. 19.Google Scholar

36 Typical of these provisions are those found in the charter of the Hauts Fourneaux et Forges de la Maison-Neuves et de Rozé (raison sociale: de Nausoutt frère et Cíe.), a société en commandite founded in 1858, which provided that after shareholders had received 5 per cent interest on their capital, one-tenth of the profits was to go into a reserve until that reserve had attained 100,000 francs.

37 One of the few voices to be raised on behalf of free incorporation was that of the economist, Charles Coquelin, in an article in the Revue des deux mondes in 1843.

38 Hunt, Bishop C., The Development of the Business Corporation in England, 1800–1867 (Cambridge, Mass., 1936), pp. 56–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

39 Le Moniteur Universel (16 février 1838) p. 314.

40 Le Moniteur Universel (25 avril 1838) p. 1011. The Chamber adjourned in June without considering either bill.

41 Say, Horace, “Des Sociétés Commerciales en France et en Angleterre,” Journal des economistes, 2e série, vol. II (1854), pp. 349–50Google Scholar.

42 The annual average number of commandites par actions formed for the period 1853–1856 was 382; for the period 1857–1859, the annual average dropped to 156. Certainly part of this decline was attributable to the deteriorating business outlook of the late 1850's. These figures were compiled from the Annuaire de l'économie politique et de la statistique (1861), p. 537.

43 Before the French law of 1856 on commandites, and the British Act of 1856 granting limited liability, there were some reverse examples, such as the London General Omnibus Company, which was organized in Paris as a société en commandite in 1855. Cameron, Rondo, France and the Economic Development of Europe, 1800–1914 (Princeton, 1961), p. 98.Google Scholar

44 The law on the société à responsabilité limitée was abrogated in 1867 when the anonyme was freed from the necessity for governmental authorization. The Crédit Lyonnais was one of the first companies to be formed under this law with the maximum allowable capitalization of 20,000,000 francs. The use of the société à responsabilité limitée was hindered by the restrictions placed on the administrators of the enterprise. This earlier société à responsabilité limitée is not to be confused with the present société à responsabilité limitée, which was introduced into France from Germany, via Alsace-Lorraine, in 1925.

45 Law of July 24, 1867.

46 Vincens, Exposition raisonée vol. I, pp. 245–46.

47 Bulletin des Lois, Sér. VI, vol. 7 (1818), p. 278.

48 Marion, Marcel, Histoire financière de la France depuis 1715 (6 vols., Paris, 1914–1931), vol. V, p. 250.Google Scholar

49 The Ouest (1855) and the Paris, Lyon et la Mediterranée (1857) railroads were excluded as they did not represent new issues but rather the consolidation of many previously authorized roads.

50 Fohlen, Claude, L'Industrie textile au temps de Second Empire (Paris, 1956), pp. 98–108.Google Scholar

51 Girard, Louis, La Politique des travaux publics du Second Empire (Paris, 1952), p. 293.Google Scholar

52 Legentil, M., “Rapport fait au nom de la Commission chargée d'examiner le projet de loi sur les sociétés en commandite et anonyme,” Le Moniteur Universel (25 avril 1838), p. 1010.Google Scholar

53 Annuaire de l'économie politique et de la statistique (1861), p. 537.

54 Le Moniteur Universel (25 avril 1838), p. 1010.

55 Ibid.

56 Compiled from Vitu, A., Guide financier, répertoire général des valeurs financières et industrielles (Paris, 1864), pp. 80–90Google Scholar.

57 Journal des chemins de fer, vol. X (1851), p. 3.