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This article lists Presidents of the French Parliament or, as the case may be, of its lower chamber.
The National Constituent Assembly was created in 1789 out of the Estates-General. It, and the revolutionary legislative assemblies that followed – the Legislative Assembly (1791–1792) and the National Convention (1792–1795), had a quickly rotating Presidency. With the establishment of the Directory in 1795, there were two chambers of the French legislature. The lower, the Council of Five Hundred, also had a quickly rotating chairmanship. Under Napoleon I, the Legislative Corps had all authority to actually enact laws, but was essentially a rubberstamp body, lacking the power to debate legislation. With the restoration of the monarchy, a bicameral system was restored, with a Chamber of Peers and a Chamber of Deputies. The Chamber of Deputies, for the first time, had presidents elected for a substantial period of time.
With the revolution of 1848, the monarchical assemblies were dissolved and replaced again with a unicameral National Assembly, which Napoleon III replaced with a new version of his uncle's Legislative Corps. With the establishment of the Third Republic, the name of Chamber of Deputies was restored; after 1876 it was joined by a Senate as upper house. The Chamber of Deputies was renamed the National Assembly in the constitution of the Fourth Republic, and is still known as that.
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