La Roquette was born in
Paris, the half-brother of the Maréchal
de Saint-Arnaud. He trained as a lawyer before embarking upon a political career. He was successively Minister of Finance (26 November 1860 – 14 November 1861),
senator (1861), Vice-President of the
Conseil d'État (1863), Minister of Commerce and Minister of Agriculture (1867) and finally Minister of the Interior (from 17 December 1868) in the third government of
Napoleon III. He distinguished himself by his severity towards the opposition, and disapproved of the concessions of the
Empire libéral in the 1860s. After the formation of the cabinet of
Émile Ollivier on 2 January 1870, he resigned as a member of the senate and had himself elected
député for
Lot-et-Garonne, thereafter becoming one of the leaders of the right. After the fall of the
Second Empire, he retired from political life. In 1847, he became joint owner, with his half-brother the Maréchal de Saint-Arnaud, of the
Château Malromé, which he had restored, and where decades later
Toulouse-Lautrec died. == Sources ==