After being educated in France and the German Confederation, he returned to his native country and rallied with the nationalist and liberal opposition to Prince Mihail Sturdza under the Regulamentul Organic regime.

[1] Following the 1848 Revolution and Sturdza's deposition, despite his political choices, with Russia's approval, the Moldavian Divan appointed Ghica as ruler for a seven-year term[1] (recognition from the Ottoman Empire, the country's other overseer, was obtained through the Convention of Balta Liman).

[4] Grigore Alexandru Ghica's program was ended by the Crimean War, when Russian troops occupied the Danubian Principalities as a means to attack the Ottoman Empire.

[5] The legislative project was drafted by Mihail Kogălniceanu and Petre Mavrogheni, and passed with the Divan's unanimous vote on 22 December 1855,[6] providing compensation for all adult and able Roma, part of which was to be collected from former state-owned slaves.

[6] Confronted with the news and aware that he would not be allowed to marry a free woman, Dincă shot his wife and then himself, an event which served to draw additional support for the abolitionist cause.

[6] Ghica's overt approval of the nationalist program, which called for uniting Moldavia and Wallachia[1] and implied measures to support Partida Națională's activities, provoked the opposition of Austria and the Ottoman Empire.

[6] Feeling insulted by the arguments, Ghica also grew disenchanted by Emperor Napoleon III's refusal to grant him an audience (despite the fact that, by then, the French monarch had chosen to endorse new Moldavian elections).

[6] When the Moldo-Wallachian union was effected by the 1859 double election of Alexandru Ioan Cuza, who reigned as Domnitor, Ghica's law on censorship served as a model for new legislation, and was generalized throughout Romania.