French cardinal-archbishop of Paris (created a cardinal in 1889). Declared a Servant of God.
ALS - Autograph Letter Signed, one page, dated 3 February 1897. Untranslated French. Accompanied by original mailing envelope with stamp and red heraldic seal on reverse. Addressed to Charles Célestin Boullay (1857-1940) Distinguished French lawyer. Officer of the Legion of Honor. Served at the Paris Court of Appeal. Former member of the Council of the Order. Recipient of the Liouville prize (1885).
In January 1900 the trial of the Assumptionist Fathers resulted in the dissolution of their society as an illegal association. The next day an official visit of the archbishop to the fathers was noted by the government as an act of a political character and Richard was officially censured. His attitude was in general exceedingly moderate, he had no share in the extremist policy of the Ultramontanes, and throughout the struggle over the law of Associations and the law of Separations he maintained his reasonable temper.
In September 1906 Richard presided over an assembly of bishops and archbishops at his palace in the rue de Grenelle, a few days after the papal encyclical forbidding French Catholics to form associations for public worship, but it was then too late for conciliation. In December he gave up the archiepiscopal palace to the government authorities. He was then an old man of nearly 90, and his eviction evoked great sympathy among the faithful.
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$135.00Price
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