[3] He was born at home in a humble house in Roubaix, an industrial city where his mother was a housekeeper and his father a textile worker.

[4] A Republican under the Second Empire and a syndicalist, Jean-Baptiste Lebas's father was a socialist who had become member of the Parti Ouvrier Français (POF) at its foundation in 1880.

[5] Altogether, it was observable that Jean-Baptiste Lebas had been brought up in a working class family and steeped in a left-wing milieu in his birth town.

Between the two world wars, Lebas developed and implemented a social policy for his city aimed at constructing decent and salubrious housing and providing access to education.

[11] For some undeclared reason, Lebas did not take part to the vote on the constitutional change that established an authoritarian regime under the government of Marshal Philippe Pétain.