Čestmír Císař

Life and career

Čestmír Císař was born in Hostomice nad Bílinou on 2 January 1920. He studied at Lycée Carnot in Dijon, France, and later attended Charles University in Prague, but was forced to leave following the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1939. During the Nazi occupation and World War II, he worked as an accountant. After the war ended, he joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ) in 1945 and became involved in the party's cultural programs in Plzeň. From 1952 to 1957, he served as department head and Secretary of the KSČ regional committee in Plzeň, and in the early 1960s he held the post of Secretary of the Central Committee of the KSČ. He served as Minister of Culture and Education of Czechoslovakia from 1963 to 1965, but angered party leaders for expressing liberal viewpoints; President Antonín Novotný accused him of 'dabbling too much with intellectuals' and removed him from the ministry in 1965, sending him as ambassador to Romania. After Novotný resigned as First Secretary in January 1968, Alexander Dubček replaced him, and Císař returned from Romania at Dubček's behest. Císař campaigned for President of Czechoslovakia in March 1968, receiving support from university students and Dubček, but the party chose General Ludvík Svoboda instead. He became Chairman of the Czech National Council in 1968, introducing liberal reforms during the Prague Spring. He attempted to halt the 1968 Soviet invasion, was removed from office and expelled from the KSČ, and subsequently left politics, taking small jobs for a living.