Henri Masson

The Most Excellent Henri Masson Chevalier
Prime Minister of Satucin
In office 4 March 1921 – 22 May 1933
Monarch	Albert IV
Preceded by	Xavier Suchet
Succeeded by	Julien de Melle
In office 6 May 1940 – 2 February 1947
President	Himself^a Loïc Joguet
Preceded by	Josselin Lafaille
Succeeded by	Christian Azaïs
President of Satucin
In office 9 January 1936 – 9 January 1950
Prime Minister	Alexis Manoury Josselin Lafaille Himself^a
Preceded by	Fabien Beaumont (as Committee Chairman)
Succeeded by	Loïc Joguet
Tribune for Chloéterre
In office 4 July 1965 – 12 April 1971
Preceded by	Lionel Magnier
Succeeded by	Brice Beauvau
Governor of Chloéterre
In office 15 January 1958 – 15 January 1965
Lieutenant	Mathéo Mesny
Preceded by	Théo Azéma
Succeeded by	Jean-Marc Beaumanoir
Deputy for Arçay
In office 1 May 1911 – 4 July 1957
Preceded by	Lionel Magnier
Succeeded by	Brice Beauvau
Personal details
Born	Henri Augustus Percival Masson (1891-04-10)April 10, 1891 Ashcombe, Estmere
Died	April 12, 1975(1975-04-12) (aged 84) Saint-Chloé, Chloéterre
Citizenship	Satucin, Gaullica^b , Sanslumiere^c
Nationality	Gaullo-Satucine
Political party	Parti d'Action
Spouse	Sylvaine Pueyrredón
Children	Gaëlle Masson Ludovic Masson
Parent	Ludovic Masson (father) Flora FitzRoy (mother)
^a Masson served in both roles concurrently ^b His Gaullican citizenship was revoked in 1936, but later restored in 1943, before being permanently revoked in 1964 ^c Masson was awarded Sanslumieran citizenship for his part in bringing Sanslumiere into the ADC

Henri Augustus Percival Masson, chevalier (10 April 1891 – 12 April 1975) was a Gaullo-Satucine politician who rose to fame, first in the 1910s as the leader of the Parti d'Action, then in the 1920s as the Prime Minister and in the late 1930s as the President of Satucin. His career spanned over 40 years, both before, during and after the Great War, and he is considered one of the most iconic and controversial Satucine politicians.

Masson was born in Estmere, but spent most of his childhood in Chloéterre, Satucin. He moved first to Gaullican Tsabara in 1907 to live with his uncle, before moving to Rayenne in 1909 to study at the Rayenne Institute of Technology, where he first encountered communist teachings. In 1911, he gave up his studies to return to Satucin and join the Social Revolutionary Party's Satucine wing. Disputes with the leadership in 1916 split the party, with Masson and his followers founding the Parti d'Action. In 1918 while travelling to Verlois for a socialist conference he saw one of Duclerque's speeches and after a meeting with him became a dedicated National Functionalist. He reformed the Parti d'Action, merging it with the local Parti Populaire branch, but failed to make any significant gains despite being elected in the 1919 elections.

The abdication of Albert III and ascension of the pro-Functionalist Albert IV allowed the party to become the third largest in the 1921 elections and have Masson invited by Albert IV to form a new minority government. Through a mixture of intimidation and liquidation of other parties, Masson was able to achieve a majority without election and pass through his reforms, which were part of a new ideology based on socialism and National Functionalism he called Essentialism. His first five years in power resulted in a slow economic recovery from the Great Collapse, the creation of a large welfare system, and the annexation and distribution of wealthy church lands, which gave him significant popular support.

Despite his reservations against the war, Masson followed Verlois' directive and pledged full Satucine report. Increased tensions with the Duclerque Regime saw him largely sidelined from military planning and his power further reduced in 1931 by a military junta after he spoke out against the invasion of the Federation. In early 1935 he began preparations for Satucin to declare independence and negotiate terms with the Grand Alliance, but was precipitated by the surrender of Gaullica. He was removed from office soon after the war ended and replaced by a pro-Federation administration, but was rescued from imprisonment by mutinying officers and would never stand trial.

Masson became the first President of Satucin in 1936, a position he would hold until 1950, and his denial of war-crimes, harbouring of war criminals, and hostility towards the Federation and former members of the Grand Alliance saw Satucin become an international pariah and from the 1940s begin to fall into an economic slump. His third premiership from 1947 to 1952, widely regarded as illegal because of his concurrent holding of the presidency, would be ineffectual and erode much of his popular support and influence within his own party. After losing the 1952 elections he resigned the leadership in favour of his son Ludovic and after 1957 focused on local politics in Chloéterre, becoming its governor and later a tribune, before retiring from politics in 1971. He died peacefully in 1975 and was given a large state funeral.

Ancestry

Masson's father Ludovic Masson (born Ludovic Szulc, 1848–1903) was the son of Christophe Szulc and Lucienne Niel. Ludovic for unknown reasons changed his surname to Bacque in 1886, then later to Maçon in 1887, standardising it later to Masson. It is theorised that it was changed due to its Werano-Wazovian roots, though the change from Bacque to Masson is unclear but his great-grandson Augustus Masson has suggested that it was likely merely out of preference for the way it sounded. Through his paternal roots he had Werano-Wazovian ancestry, the family having emigrated to Gaullica in the late 18th century, and his maternal roots were from Sylvagne in Saint-François where he spent most of his childhood.

Masson's mother Flora FitzRoy (1862-1949) was Estmerish, of Flurian ancestry on both sides. His parents met while his father was working in Ashcombe for a shipping company and married soon after in 1889.

Early years

Childhood and education

Henri Masson as an infant (c. 1891-92) with his mother, aunt and grandmother

Henri Masson was born on 10 April 1891 in Ashcombe, the capital of Estmere. He was christened as "Henri Augustus Percival Masson". He was the first of four children born to Ludovic Masson and his second wife, Flora FitzRoy. Two of Masson's siblings—Hugo, and Ignace—died in infancy, leaving him with a sole surviving sibling, his sister Augustine. When Masson was four, the family moved to Chloéterre, Satucin. There he acquired the distinctive Lower Geuche dialect, rather than Standard Gaullican, which marked his speech throughout his life. The family returned to Estmere and settled in Ashcombe in 1904 after the death of his father. The move to Ashcombe began the onset of mother-son conflicts caused by Masson's refusal to conform to the rules of his school and adopt Estmerish as his first language. Through the mediation of his grandmother Masson was sent to a Gaullican school and relations between him and his mother improved.

Early adulthood in Adunis and Rayenne

At the age of 16 in 1907 Masson left Ashcombe for Adunis, then part of Gaullican Tsabara, to live with and work for his uncle Séverin Szulc, his father's elder half-brother, who owned a construction company which had seen its fortunes rise when given lucrative contracts working on the Adunis-Saint Germaine Railway. Masson formed a close bond with Séverin and became close friends with his daughter Geneviève, keeping in contact until her death in 1933. It has been suggested by Éloi Bougie that their affection was deeper and that Masson had intended to marry his second cousin until Séverin forbade the match but this is not accepted by most historians. Under advice of his uncle Masson also converted to Solarian Catholicism, having been raised an Amendist by his mother due to his father's irreligious attitude, but he remained relatively irreligious despite this.

In 1909 Séverin provided Masson with the funds to study economics at the Rayenne Institute of Technology. It was at Rayenne that Masson, who at that point had been apolitical, was first introduced to communism and the various political philosophies of the left. He was drawn to communism initially from an economic standpoint, but later embraced its social and political aspects. He devoted most of his time to helping write for the Concorde, Rayenne's socialist newspaper, and as a result his grades began to suffer. In 1911 he formally gave up his studies to join the Social Revolutionary Party (PRS), and upon learning that his uncle had stopped his funds he offered to head the Satucine branch of the party, which was accepted.

Entry into politics

<imgur thumb="yes" w="150" comment="Henri Masson with Régis LeMahieu (1912).">TpwpqZo.png</imgur> Masson initially returned to Chloéterre and considered leaving politics, but without formal education or career prospects, he remained in the party. In July 1911 he was appointed the head of propaganda for the branch, assigned to influence the public and gain attention to their movement which, while established in Gaullica, had little presence in Satucin. At a PRS meeting on 12 September 1913, Branch Director Régis LeMahieu was impressed with Masson's oratorical skills and his ideas on relieving unemployment. He quickly promoted Masson to the upper echelons of the branch and made use of him as a public speaker often.

The Pasau Split

From 1914 onwards Masson and LeMahieu's working relationship began to deteriorate as Masson pushed for the PRS to end its boycott of elections and win power democratically. An argument in November of 1915 between them soon expanded into an internal party conflict as Masson sought to dislodge LeMahieu from his position. His efforts were unsuccessful and despite gaining himself a large following in Satucin he was regarded as a troublemaker by the party chiefs in Rayenne. LeMahieu was able to slowly strip Masson of several positions and began to exclude him from important meetings and conferences.

In 1916 LeMahieu was able to firmly neuter Masson's influence in the party by appointing him the liaison between the headquarters in Rayenne and the branch in Anniane. In this role he would have to spend the majority of his time physically travelling between Gaullica and Satucin to ferry important and confidential documents. He protested several times and refused to accept the role, but by April 1916 Rayenne had responded and had given him the choice of taking the role of being expelled from the party. Masson initially surrendered and was allowed to attend the conference in May. He used his influence to gain a speaking slot and there gave a vicious speech denouncing LeMahieu and the party chiefs in Rayenne. He was expelled from the party the next day.

Dissatisfied with his experience with the PRS, Masson quickly founded the Parti d'Action with many former colleagues from the PRS who had supported him against LeMahieu. Though initially driven by a desire for revenge, the party soon fell into disarray as some of its members re-defected back to the PRS. By late 1917 it was essentially dead, with Masson unable to formulate a manifesto which would differentiate it enough from the multitude of minor communist and socialist parties operating in Gaullica and Satucin.

Meeting in Verlois

<imgur thumb="yes" w="150" comment="Masson attending one of Duclerque's rallies. (1918)">autUo3X.png</imgur>

Masson first took an interest in Duclerque and Functionalism in 1915, but remained a committed communist. This firm belief gradually began to fade as his conflicts within and later with the PRS eroded his assumption of a unified communist victory, either through democratic or revolutionary means. This had left him troubled and unable to lead his party in a direction with solid principles or even a manifesto. His trip to Verlois was intended to reinvigorate the Parti d'Action and possibly create some alliances or a merger with 'mainland' communist parties. Instead it would change the direction of his political career forever.

Raefael Duclerque and the Parti Populaire were on the rise in post-depression Gaullica, though Verlois in 1918 still remained a battleground for influence between a myriad of parties, ideologies and figures. With Functionalism sweeping the rest of the country, Duclerque had begun to focus his efforts upon conquering Verlois and influencing the young Albert IV, after their failure to win Albert III to their cause. This resulted in Duclerque giving speeches almost weekly, with many of them being hastily improvised to coincide with speeches of his main rivals to further disrupt them.

Henri Masson stumbled upon one such speech, Duclerque's famous Tears of the Luzège Speech on January 3rd, and was impressed by Duclerque's oratory skills. He did not become a passionate supporter of Functionalism from the outset, noting in his diary that "the words were crafted by the gods of old, and spoken so clearly they flowed as gently as the Luzège, but I was still ignorant of their meaning or that they were the nourishment I had come to Verlois to find." Instead he continued to attend various meetings with other communist, socialist and social democratic parties, but when little came to fruition and his abrasive personality caused conflicts, he began to attend more of Duclerque's speeches.

It was after watching a fifth speech in late March that Masson was able to gain a meeting with Duclerque. By chance a former friend of his from Rayenne recognised him at one of the speeches and recommended to Duclerque that he meet the man who "single-handedly destroyed the PRS in Satucin." Masson never revealed much about what happened during the two-hour meeting at Duclerque's favourite café but he emerged a committed National Functionalist and a member of the Parti Populaire. After spending several more months in Verlois attending several more speeches, meeting with other Functionalists and coming to understand his newfound ideology and party more, he returned to Satucin.

Rise to power

<imgur thumb="yes" w="250" comment="Henri Masson with several founding members of the Parti d'Action (1919, colourised).">MBRpiwU.jpg</imgur>

During his time in Verlois Masson had managed to impress Duclerque enough to gain a senior position in the Satucine branch of the Parti Populaire. This branch had suffered from the party's main efforts being focused upon Gaullica and therefore lacked a strong support base in Satucin. It, like the socialist parties Masson had been thoroughly acquainted with, had been characterised as an anti-monarchist and anti-Catholic force by the Verlois-aligned colonial elites which pushed away the largely conservative populace. Masson had impressed Duclerque with his knowledge of the electorate and was granted the authority to reform the branch "in any way he saw fit" so long as it remained aligned with the 'mainland' party.

Reforming the Parti d'Action

The state of the Satucine branch of the Parti Populaire as described by Duclerque had been optimistic, as Masson encountered a stilted force which had been stopped in its tracks by incompetent leadership and a furious campaign by both the colonial elites and democratic centrists. Masson dismissed most of the leadership and set himself up as the leader of the branch. When several of those ousted began to complain to the headquarters in Verlois, Masson dismissed them from the party and wrote to Duclerque that they were 'saboteurs' who had deliberately damaged the Satucine branch. The silence from Verlois gave approval to Masson's actions and his authority within the party was greatly strengthened.

For several months Masson continued to run both the Satucine branch of the Parti Populaire and his own Parti d'Action, which he had firmly restructured to adhere to his newfound National Functionalist principles, though it was with this party he experimented with his changes which would later coalesce into Essentialism. Historians are divided as to whether Masson had always intended to merge the parties, or whether he was deliberately weakening the Satucine Parti Populaire so as to establish his own party as the main Functionalist force in Satucin and himself as Duclerque's rival, but most tend towards the former.

Informing Duclerque that the Satucine Parti Populaire was unsalvageable as both a party machine and political brand, Masson merged it with his own Parti d'Action, which had tripled in membership while the Satucine Parti Populaire had almost halved. Historians largely agree that Masson likely purposefully sabotaged the Parti Populaire, as he viewed leading his own party independent but tied to Duclerque's as more dignified than being Duclerque's inferior and one who could be replaced at a whim. Duclerque and the Gaullican branch were unhappy at the news but were too focused upon the fast-moving events in Gaullica to protest. Masson remained a member of the Parti Populaire, and even encouraged the members of his own party to have dual-membership, but had successfully co-opted the Functionalist movement in Satucin.

Personal Life

Marriage and children

Masson met his future wife, Sylvaine Pueyrredón, in 1922 at a ball in the Imperial Palace in Verlois. In March 1923, they met again at a dinner party hosted by the Marquis de Vallée. Masson found himself seated beside Sylvaine, and they soon began a lifelong romance. He proposed to Sylvaine during a house party at Chateau Cazal on 11 August 1923, in a small summer house known as the Puele Cottage. On 12 September 1923, he and Sylvaine were married in St. Abelin's, Verlois. They had four children, though only two survived into adulthood.

• Évelyne Masson (1924)
• Gaëlle Masson (1925–2006)
• Ludovic Masson (1928-2011)
• Sabine Masson (1929-1934)

The Massons were married for 52 years, until his death in 1975. Masson was aware of the strain that his political career placed on his marriage, but it endured despite several periods of separation.

Religion

Masson was christened on June 11, 1891, in the chapel of St. Cyril, Ashcombe, and was raised in the Amendist Church of Estmere, his mother's faith. His religious beliefs during his childhood and early adulthood have been described as agnostic, bordering upon atheist, a result of his father's influence. His time in Tsabara saw him convert to Solarian Catholicism upon the advice of his uncle, though it is clear he viewed it as an extension of his identity as a Gaullican moreso than of his actual religious beliefs. Despite his agnostic leanings he remained an active member of the Catholic church throughout his life.