66 Facts About Nicolae Fleva

Nicolae Fleva experimented with creating a third party, negotiated common platforms for the various opposition forces, including the Conservatives and the Junimea society, during contiguous National Liberal administrations.

Nicolae Fleva was notoriously involved in the major scandals of the 1880s, when his ridicule of National Liberal power generated street battles and sparked two separate shooting incidents.

Nicolae Fleva clashed with the party over a number of issues, returned into opposition, and was later the Conservative Minister of Agriculture.

Nicolae Fleva was a descendant of Greek settlers, who probably arrived to the Buzau region during the Phanariote era.

Nicolae Fleva had a sister, Cleopatra, whose daughter Alexandrina was married to Ion Istrati, Adjutant to the King of Romania between 1892 and 1897.

In youth, Nicolae Fleva attended the Saint Sava College, Bucharest, and graduated in law at the University of Naples.

Nicolae Fleva brought professional harness racing to Romania, and received honorable mention for his own contribution to that sport.

Nicolae Fleva notoriously organized electoral National Liberal rallies in front of patriotic landmarks, such as the Michael the Brave Monument in University Square.

Nicolae Fleva stood out in that legislature with claims that the election for town and city councils were being rigged by the political establishment, and congratulated those who, like Nicolae Moret Blaremberg, denounced the politics of Prime Minister M C Epureanu.

Nicolae Fleva, who rested his defense tactic on contending that Epureanu's men had incited and misled Romanian republicans, publicized his speeches in court as the 1871 booklet Procesul lui 8 august.

Nicolae Fleva was again sent to the Assembly after the 1871 election, but this time represented Muscel County.

Nicolae Fleva's hold of the seat was contested by a rival politician, Potoceanu: in early 1875, just before the scheduled election the Assembly plenum ruled to remove Fleva from his position of deputy.

Subsequently, Nicolae Fleva played a part in the effort to unite a single liberal opposition against the conservatism of Prime Minister Lascar Catargiu and other political leaders closest to Carol.

Nicolae Fleva was personally involved in the negotiations presided upon by Lakeman, which resulted in the formation of a single National Liberal Party.

Nicolae Fleva returned as National Liberal deputy in the early elections of 1876, and was reconfirmed in 1879.

Nicolae Fleva was at the time collecting support for a motion to sue Catargiu for damages, years after Catargiu had quelled the riots in Bucharest.

Around 1880, when the anti-liberal pole was organizing itself into the Conservative Party, Nicolae Fleva was being identified by his adversaries as a main exponent of a new National Liberal ideology and morality.

The interval witnessed renewed republican agitation, during which Nicolae Fleva openly sided with revolutionary politics.

Nicolae Fleva's speech was reviewed in 2012 by academic Codrin Liviu Cutitaru as a classic misinterpretation of that principle, since it validated a permanent "state of revolt" among those who felt disenfranchised.

Close to this pole, Nicolae Fleva was among those jaded party militants who accused their Prime Minister of tyrannical stances, and who turned on Carol.

Nicolae Fleva soon became the main accusatory voice, producing evidence which incriminated two National Liberal policy-makers: Emil Costinescu and Pherekyde.

Nicolae Fleva discussed cooperation with Junimea, the Conservative inner faction and splinter group, meeting with Junimist spokesman Alexandru Marghiloman.

Some have nevertheless described these as unimportant achievements; literary historian Ioana Parvulescu summarizes his term with the words "he did nothing", while, according to Apostol, Nicolae Fleva "left no trace on how Bucharest developed".

Nicolae Fleva eventually presented his resignation in April 1886, citing disagreements with the City Council and the leaders of Police.

Nicolae Fleva had by then drafted and proposed, unsuccessfully, a reform of the law on the attributes of Prefects.

Nicolae Fleva registered a personal victory by proving to the Assembly that government had pocketed large sums set aside for building Bucharest's system of forts.

All opposition forces, including Nicolae Fleva's group, reached most of their electoral goals, even though the government remained in place.

Nicolae Fleva stood accused of inciting the riots, and even suspected of the murder: police alleged that a gun had been found on his person, but other reports state that none of the deputies was armed.

Nicolae Fleva was promptly released from Vacaresti, and again delivered to the enthusiastic crowds.

Nicolae Fleva was approached by Carp with an offer to head Internal Affairs.

Nicolae Fleva himself acknowledged that the split had occurred: leaving behind the United Opposition, he presented himself as an independent in the 1888 race for the Bucharest City Hall.

Nicolae Fleva was a National Liberal candidate to the Assembly of Deputies in the election of January 1891.

Nicolae Fleva won the second available seat for that constituency, benefiting from months of Junimist and Conservative infighting.

Nicolae Fleva was persuaded by the new party leader, Dimitrie Sturdza, and his platform, the "Program of Iasi".

However, Nicolae Fleva failed to persuade Sturdza that the party should come to power by rebellion.

Finally, Premier Catargiu was denounced by Nicolae Fleva for ordering a clampdown on the republican newspaper, Adevarul.

Nicolae Fleva built contacts with Austria-Hungary's Romanian National Party and the Cultural League for the Unity of All Romanians, being a special guest at their 1894 banquet in Bucharest.

Also that year, Nicolae Fleva donated books to the Romanians of Bukovina region, through their Society for Romanian Literature and Culture.

Nicolae Fleva was again in Parliament in December 1894, when he narrowly lost the elections for Assembly Vice President.

Nicolae Fleva had a notoriously tense relationship with Eugeniu Carada, who, as the National Liberal's economic adviser, had helped establish Romania's National Bank.

In October 1895, Nicolae Fleva came to lead Internal Affairs, within Sturdza's National Liberal cabinet.

Once appointed by Carol, the government had to be confirmed by an election, and, sources attest, Nicolae Fleva served his democratic ideal by ensuring that the 1895 election was carried without fraud.

At the time, Nicolae Fleva's perceived demagogy was a subject of amusement: painter-aristocrat Eugen N Ghika-Budesti published cartoons of Fleva, showing him as a would-be Gracchus of Romania.

Caragiale ridiculed claims that Nicolae Fleva's ministerial mandate was an episode of electoral freedom, depicting him for posterity as pathological in his loquacity.

Sturdza interpreted this work as a sign of disloyalty, and the National Liberal paper Vointa Nationala made a show of Nicolae Fleva, publishing allegations about his conduct in both public and private.

Nicolae Fleva was eventually faced with accusations that, while in office, he had secretly engaged in contraband.

Iepurescu's story was that, against the specialists' advice, Nicolae Fleva had ordered massive imports of hay for national or ministerial use.

Nicolae Fleva asked to present his version with a speech in Parliament, programmed for January 13,1896.

Nicolae Fleva is believed to have coined the term Oculta, which was used to designate the secretive triumvirate of National Liberal figures, allegedly Sturdza's puppet-masters: Carada, Pache Protopopescu, Gogu Cantacuzino.

In February 1898, Nicolae Fleva was the only parliamentarian to vote against the national debt-conversion project, as advanced by Finance Minister Gogu Cantacuzino.

Reputedly, Nicolae Fleva officially joined the Conservative Party in 1899, but, to the press, he was more a "national democrat" ally of the Conservative militants.

Probably called upon as an arbiter by Bogdan-Pitesti, Nicolae Fleva visited the area and conducted an inquiry.

Nicolae Fleva himself observed irregularities at the State Fisheries, but his move to depose their caretaker, Grigore Antipa, was resisted by other Conservatives.

Nicolae Fleva's campaign was unusually supported by Caragiale, who had turned Conservative-Democrat, and who spoke directly to the regular voters about Fleva's merits.

Nicolae Fleva received most votes, and propelled his party into the top position.

Nicolae Fleva looked over Romanian Railways ledgers, investigated the collapse of Galati docks, and exposed the works on NMS Regele Carol and NMS Romania.

Nicolae Fleva quit the party, which had by then allied itself to the National Liberals, noting that Ionescu no longer stood for the initial goals: updating the 1866 Constitution and promoting land reform.

In 1913, when Bogdan-Pitesti was taken to court by the financier Aristide Blank, Nicolae Fleva headed the defense team.

Nicolae Fleva was again a member of the Assembly in the 1914 legislature.

Dimineata daily, which had anti-German and pro-Entente sentiments, reported with pleasure that the Germans could not convince Nicolae Fleva to take over as Searas editorial manager; its claims were partly backed by Nicolae Fleva's own note, published in Dreptatea.

In October 1915, Nicolae Fleva signed on as "Political Director" of Libertatea.

The Germanophile figure Ioan Bianu specifically noted that Fleva had received 100,000 lei from German intelligence before taking over at Libertatea.

Such allegations remain unproven, and, to his admirers, Nicolae Fleva endured the incorruptible politician.

Nicolae Fleva survived the war and the Central Powers' two-year-long occupation of southern Romania.

Nicolae Fleva died on August 4,1920, either in Jideni or in Focsani.

Nicolae Fleva was by then noticeably poor, and largely forgotten by the general public.