What French populists from '50s can teach about yellow vests roiling Paris

Today, the French government is again facing an existential threat over an unpopular tax

The populist protests roiling France remind me of a similar anti-tax revolt that occurred in Paris nearly 65 years ago.

In January 1955, tens of thousands of French men and women gathered at the Porte de Versailles in Paris to express their disgust for the elites who had burdened their lives with crushing taxes. They had come to hear the populist icon Pierre Poujade, a bookstore owner from the rural Lot valley and the leader of a movement that tried to topple the government of Pierre Mendès-France.

Today, the French government is