Romanian politician (1902?2000)
Ion Gheorghe Iosif Maurer
(23 September 1902 – 8 February 2000)
[1]
was a
Romanian
communist
politician and lawyer, and the 49th
Prime Minister of Romania
. He is the
longest serving Prime Minister in the history of Romania
(having served for 12 years and 343 days).
Early life, family, and education
[
edit
]
Maurer was born in
Bucharest
to an
Alsatian
father of
German descent
and a
Romanian
mother with petit-bourgeois background.
[2]
[3]
He completed studies in law at the
University of Bucharest
in 1923, after which he pursued graduate studies at the
Sorbonne
in
Paris
.
[4]
Upon returning to Romania, he became an
attorney
, practicing law in
Sighi?oara
, then serving as public prosecutor and later judge. In 1932 he went to Bucharest as counsel for several large banks.
[4]
The first wife was named Dana Gavrilovici, according to other sources, Lucretia. She was older than him and had two daughters with him as well as a son from her first marriage, Alexandru Niculescu, who became an officer. He remarried in 1949 to Elena (Lili) St?nescu, ex-wife of his friend N.D. Cocea and with whom he had a son, Jean Maurer, who lives in Munich. His wife died a year before his death, but fearing a heart attack his son kept this fact a secret, so Maurer died believing his wife was still alive and being treated in a hospital.
Political career
[
edit
]
He became active politically, defending in court members of the illegal
leftist
and
Anti-fascist
movements.
[5]
Occasionally, as in the
1936 Craiova Trial
of
Romanian Communist Party
(PCR) activists, including
Ana Pauker
,
Alexandru Dr?ghici
, and
Alexandru Moghioro?
, he assisted
Lucre?iu P?tr??canu
.
[6]
Before 1937, he was briefly active in the Radical Peasants' Party, formed by
Grigore Iunian
as a splinter group of the
National Peasants' Party
;
[7]
however, he was by then already a member of the illegal Communist Party
[8]
and active in the
Agitprop
section.
[9]
In 1942?1943, during
World War II
he was imprisoned for his political activity (notably, in the
Targu Jiu internment camp
),
[10]
and, as a member of a
paramilitary
grouping,
[11]
played a secondary part in the
events of 23 August 1944
that led to the downfall of the
Ion Antonescu
regime.
[12]
During this time, although present among the few active leaders of the Party around
general secretary
?tefan Fori?
,
[13]
he became a supporter of
Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej
's faction (dominated by imprisoned activists).
[14]
In 1944, he played a hand in Fori?'s deposition, assisting
Emil Bodn?ra?
and Gheorghiu-Dej.
[15]
After the war, Maurer became a member of the
Central Committee
of the
Romanian Workers' Party
(the new name of the PCR after it had incorporated the
Social Democratic Party
) and took several ministerial positions in the new
communist government of Romania
— including that of undersecretary of the Communications and Public Works Ministry under Gheorghiu-Dej in the first
Petru Groza
government.
[16]
In 1946-1947, he was a member of Romania's delegation to the
Paris Peace Conference
(headed by
Gheorghe T?t?rescu
) and was briefly employed by Ana Pauker at the
Foreign Ministry
, before being dismissed for having an unsatisfactory level of political conviction.
[17]
He was removed from the forefront for the following decade,
[18]
working for the Institute of Juridical Research.
[19]
He supported Gheorghiu-Dej's
nationalist
policy, eventually becoming
foreign minister
of Romania in 1957 (replacing
Grigore Preoteasa
), holding office for six months, and serving in the delegations establishing closer contacts with the
People's Republic of China
during the
Sino-Soviet split
and a
detente
with
France
in 1959.
[20]
Regarded, according to the claims of dissident journalist
Victor Frunz?
[
ro
]
,
[21]
as Gheorghiu-Dej's chosen successor, Maurer was
head of state
(President of the Presidium of the
Great National Assembly
of Romania) from 1958 to 1961. He took the seat previously occupied by
Constantin Pirvulescu
on the
Politburo
,
[22]
and then replaced
Chivu Stoica
as
Prime Minister of Romania
in 1961.
[23]
In the latter capacity, he was the recipient of a 1963 letter by the
British
philosopher and activist
Bertrand Russell
, who pleaded with the Romanian authorities to free from jail
Belu Zilber
(a victim of the conflict between the Party leadership and P?tr??canu, Zilber had been a
political prisoner
for sixteen years by then).
[24]
Maurer was also one of three acting Chairmen of the State Council of Romania (
heads of state
) between March 19 and March 24, 1965.
Alongside
Emil Bodn?ra?
, Maurer was an important member of the
Politburo
in opposing the ambitions of
Gheorghe Apostol
and, together with Bodn?ra?, helping along the establishment of the
Nicolae Ceau?escu
regime.
[25]
Among others, Maurer helped silence potential opposition from inside the Party by withdrawing his support for
Corneliu M?nescu
and welcoming Ceau?escu's directives, before being himself criticized and sidelined (at the same time as his collaborator
Alexandru Barl?deanu
).
[26]
Pensioned in 1974, he was still present in the forefront at most Party ceremonies.
[27]
A prominent member of the
nomenklatura
for much of his life, he was known for his latent conflict with a large part of the PCR hierarchy.
[19]
He accumulated a sizable wealth and was known for his ostentatious lifestyle.
[19]
In 1989, Maurer's earlier support for Ceau?escu led the sidelined PCR members who were planning to state their opposition to the regime by drafting the so-called
Letter of the Six
(
Gheorghe Apostol
,
Alexandru Barl?deanu
,
Silviu Brucan
,
Constantin Pirvulescu
, and
Grigore R?ceanu
) not to enlist his assistance in the process.
[28]
Death
[
edit
]
He died in Bucharest a decade after the
Romanian Revolution
of
December 1989
, leaving a son, Jean. He was 97.
Notes
[
edit
]
- ^
Profile of Ion Gheorghe Maurer
- ^
Deletant, Dennis
(1999).
Romania under communist rule
. Center for Romanian Studies. p. 22.
ISBN
973-98392-8-2
.
- ^
Parto?; Deletant indicates in passing that Maurer's father was an
Alsatian
French language
teacher, and that his mother was Romanian (
Communist Terror...
, p.19); he also states that Maurer was of "German origin" (
Ceausescu...
, p.69)
- ^
a
b
"Rumania's Man Abroad ? Ion Gheorghe Maurer"
.
The New York Times
. 28 July 1964
. Retrieved
14 September
2022
.
- ^
Betea; Deletant,
Communist Terror...
, p.19; Tism?neanu, p.298-299
- ^
Deletant,
Communist Terror...
, p.19; Tism?neanu, p.298-299
- ^
Alexandrescu et al.
- ^
Deletant,
Communist Terror...
, p.19; Tism?neanu, p.99, 298
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.99
- ^
Frunz?, p.468; Tism?neanu, p.298
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.298
- ^
Frunz?, p.129
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.119
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.37, 298, 323
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.151
- ^
Frunz?, p.188, 217; Tism?neanu, p.112
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.239, 298-299
- ^
Frunz?, p.437; Tism?neanu, p.299
- ^
a
b
c
Tism?neanu, p.299
- ^
Frunz?, p.240, 439, 448, 452; Tism?neanu, p.215, 219, 299, 342
- ^
Frunz?, p.462
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.207
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.207, 299
- ^
Griffin, p.572
- ^
Frunz?, p.463-464, 475-478; Tism?neanu, p.213, 221-222, 299, 323, 344
- ^
Deletant,
Ceausescu...
, p.69-70; Frunz?, p.479-480, 483, 510-511; Tism?neanu, p.37, 299
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.239
- ^
Tism?neanu, p.299, 343
References
[
edit
]
- Ion Alexandrescu, Ion Bulei, Ion Mamina, and Ioan Scurtu,
Partidele politice din Romania, 1862?1994: Enciclopedie
, Bucharest, Editura Mediaprint, 1995; fragment published in
Dosarele Istoriei
, 12/III 1998, p. 26-27
- (in Romanian)
Lavinia Betea, "Gheorghe Maurer ? "apar?tor al comuni?tilor""
, in
Jurnalul Na?ional
, February 9, 2005
- Dennis Deletant
,
Communist Terror in Romania
, C. Hurst & Co.,
London
, 1999;
Ceau?escu and the Securitate
,
M. E. Sharpe
,
Armonk, New York
, 1995
- Victor Frunz?,
Istoria stalinismului in Romania
,
Humanitas
, Bucharest, 1990
- Nicholas Griffin (ed.),
The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell
,
Routledge
, London, 2002
- Gabriel Parto?, "Obituary: Ion Gheorghe Maurer"
in
The Independent
, February 15, 2000
- Vladimir Tism?neanu
,
Stalinism pentru eternitate
,
Polirom
,
Ia?i
, 2005
ISBN
973-681-899-3
(translation of
Stalinism for All Seasons: A Political History of Romanian Communism
,
University of California Press
,
Berkeley
, 2003,
ISBN
0-520-23747-1
)
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