Joseph Foiche, a French revolutionist and minister of police, born at La Martiniere, near Nantes, May 29, 1763, died in Trieste, Dec. 25, 1820. He was sent to Paris to study theology, but without taking orders became professor of philosophy in Arras and other towns, and in 1788 was placed at the head of the college of Nantes. He afterward became an advocate, founded a republican association in Nantes, was chosen in 1702 member of the national convention, voted for the immediate execution of Louis XVI., and in 1793 proceeded to Lyons with Collot d'Herbois, charged with the execution of the decree issued by the convention against that city, and shared in the violent measures and wholesale executions carried out there. After his return to Paris he was elected president of the Jacobin club (June 4, 1794). His influence and opposition gave umbrage to Robespierre, who caused him to be expelled from the club; but he rejoined it after the execution of Robespierre (July 28, 1794), upon whom he now endeavored to throw all the odium of his violent proceedings at Lyons. But he was denounced as a terrorist, driven from the convention (Aug. 9, 1795), and placed under arrest, but restored to liberty by the amnesty of Oct. 26, 1795. He afterward ingratiated himself with Barras, the president of the directory, by betraying to him the movements of Babeuf. The latter was guillotined in 1797, and Fouche was rewarded with a large interest in the contracts for the army, and in September, 1798, was made minister to the Cisalpine republic.

In the beginning of 1799 he was sent in the same capacity to Holland, but was soon called to Paris to enter upon the duties of minister of police. He adopted rigorous measures against political agitators, without distinction of party, cooperated in the coup d'etat of the 18th Brumaire, and strengthened Bonaparte's position by his vigilance in detecting royalist and Jacobin conspiracies; but the first consul, who distrusted his minister, discarded him as soon as the apparent return of tranquillity rendered it practicable to dispense with his services, the office being abolished (September, 1802). He was made a senator, a post which yielded him about $13,000 annually, and Napoleon rewarded him also with half of the reserve fund in the treasury of the police, which amounted to nearly $250.000. In 1804, when Napoleon's position became, more complicated, Fouche was again employed, He opposed the execution of the duke d'Enghien, and said to Napoleon. It is more than a crime, it is a political fault;" a saying which, in the form It is worse than a crime, it is a blunder," has become proverbial, and has been generally attributed to Talleyrand. After the establishment of the empire, Fouche was formally reinstalled as minister of police (July 10, i804), and under his administration tranquillity and order were secured at home, while Napoleon was engaged in fighting his battles abroad.

In 1809 he received the title of duke of Otranto, with a large pension from the revenues of the kingdom of Naples. In the same year, while the minister of the interior Cretet was sick, Fouche managed his department along with his own; and when the English landed on the island of Walcheren, he caused the whole national guard of France to be put in motion. In the following year he opened unauthorized negotiations with the court of St. James, and was dismissed (June 5). Savary was appointed minister of police, and the governorship of Rome was assigned to Fouche, as a sort of honorable exile. He did not go to Rome, but was compelled to leave France on his refusing to surrender certain autograph letters of Napoleon and other important documents, and was only permitted to come back on condition of giving them up. Napoleon began to fear the intrigues of Fouche, and kept him out of France by calling him to Dresden, and sending him afterward to Illyria as governor, and subsequently to Rome. In January, 1814, he wrote to the emperor from Rome, recommending the adoption of a more conciliatory policy.

Returning to France in the spring, he announced at Lyons and at Avignon the approaching fall of Napoleon, and entered Paris two days before the count d'Artois. On April 23 he wrote again to Napoleon, urging him to leave Elba for the United States. At the same time he put himself in communication with the Bourbons. They suspected him, however, and on Napoleon's return from Elba issued an order for his arrest; but he contrived to make his escape, and became for the third time Napoleon's minister of police, while he was at the same time Talleyrand's correspondent, the tool of the court of emigres. at Ghent, and the bosom friend of the liberal deputies in the chamber. After the battle of Waterloo he sent for Dupont de l'Eure, Lafayette, and others, and made use of their republican feelings to precipitate the overthrow of the emperor; and after his master's final abdication he became the leader of the provisional government (June 22, 1815). He was appointed for the fourth time minister of police by Louis XVIII. (July 6), but, placed between the opposition of the extreme republicans and the extreme royalists, his position became intolerable.

He presented to the king two reports on the disturbed state of France, which created a great sensation, and which are the best of his political writings, He resigned the ministry Sept. 19, and was appointed ambassador at Dresden, but was deprived of that office by the law of Jan. 12, 1816, which affected all who had voted for the death of Louis XVI. From Dresden he removed to Prague, where he spent about two years; and having become in 1818 a naturalized subject of Austria, he resided for some time in Linz, and for the rest of his life in Trieste.-See Count Martel's Etude sur Fouche et sur le communisme dans la pratique en 1794 (Paris, 1873).