Louis Frank

He represented Marie Popelin at the bar during the “Popelin affair” and co-founded the Belgian League for the Rights of Women.

At the end of his life, he led a fight for pacifism and campaigned to make the city of Brussels a “federal district of the world”.

Biography Youth and early life Louis Franck was born into a modest Belgian Jewish family. Aged sixteen, his father died and his mother quickly spent the family patrimony. He followed a brilliant scholarship and was awarded in 1878, the prize for the general competition of the athenaeums of the kingdom. with the mention distinction and great distinction. A year later he was awarded the "Laurea in Giurisprudezia con lode" from the University of Bologna for his work on "illegitimate children", Louis Franck concludes that his client has the right to receive at least the title and the quality of lawyer. Frank is called as adviser, and support by publishing numerous articles and pamphlets in his favor, attacking the injustice of the Napoleonic Code.

Women's rights activist and theorist As early as 1886, he wrote numerous essays on women's rights and participated in numerous conferences. The event is often considered as the "birth certificate" of Belgian feminism. He leads the organization as Secretary General and continues to write books on feminism such as La femme dans les emplois publics.

The question of peace is also of concern to Frank, and he defended the role that women could play in this cause before the International Peace Congress held in Antwerp in 1894.

During this period, he also focused his activism on access to higher education for women and founded the 'Œuvre des conférences féministes' at the ULB.

Louis Frank defends female suffrage. His project is supported by Louise van den Plas, while Popelin is reserved. It also attracts the support of political figures such as Édouard Descamps or Auguste Beernaert, the latter offering him his "warmest congratulations".

Frank also proposes to create a celebration of the centenary of the Battle of Waterloo in the hope that this would mark the beginning of a period of world peace.

On the occasion of the 1910 Brussels World Fair, he was editor of the book La Belgique illustrée published by Larousse and included his idea of a world federal district and presented Belgium as an internationalist and pacifist. His pamphlet is thus promoted during the event, but also in international gatherings taking place in parallel. His idea is echoed in the Belgian press and is taken seriously as a project of a "world city" rather than as a utopia.

In 1913, Frank thought of creating his project in Tervuren/Brussels and tried to be joined by Hendrik Christian Andersen. The plans will finally be abandoned. As the First World War broke out, Louis Frank collected postcards illustrating the greatness of Belgium in albums entitled "Souvenirs". patriotic". He mentions in particular the first international conference on the law of war held in Brussels. His project was taken up again after his death and at the end of the war, by Paul Otlet.

Reception According to Françoise de Bueger-Van Lierde, both his avant-garde ideas, his exaggerated pretensions and his Jewish origin in a hostile climate played to his disadvantage. He died "in oblivion" in 1917.