The Eighty (Les Quatre-Vingts) were a group of elected French parliamentarians who, on 10 July 1940, voted against the constitutional change that effectively dissolved the Third Republic and established the authoritarian regime of then-Prime Minister Philippe Pétain.
Some of the Vichy 80, like Léon Blum, would go on to be imprisoned by regime, while others managed to join the French Resistance, through groups like the Francs-Tireurs et Partisans and the Brutus network.
Several of the Eighty, including Vincent Auriol and Paul Ramadier, would play key roles in the establishment of the French Fourth Republic after the end of World War II.
[4] Sixty-one communist parliamentarians had previously had their rights to serve as deputies and senators denied to them in January 1940, as the Soviet Union was a co-belligerent of Nazi Germany at the time.
He highlights the cases of Joseph Laniel who voted in favour of Pétain's inauguration but was subsequently a leading member of the French resistance and the Conseil national de la Résistance.