Konstantinos Raktivan (Greek:Κωνσταντίνος Ρακτιβάν; 1865 – 21 May 1935) was a Greek jurist and politician, who served as cabinet minister, as thede facto first Governor-General ofMacedonia, president of theAthens Bar Association and of theCouncil of State,Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament and member and president of theAcademy of Athens.
Konstantinos Raktivan was born in 1865 atManchester, where his father Demetrios Raktivan (naturalized in Britain as Ractivand[1]), a merchant fromVeroia, was active in business. His mother, Maria Ismiridou, hailed fromConstantinople.[2]
The young Raktivan studied law at theUniversity of Athens, and began his practice as a lawyer in 1885, the same year as he published his first legal study. After a brief service as judge inSyros in 1888–89, he resigned from the Judicial Corps to focus on his career as a lawyer. He exercised this profession for 25 years (1885–1912), and was distinguished for his ability and integrity.[2] Raktivan also became a driving force behind the foundation of theAthens Bar Association in 1909, of which he was elected as the first Vice President, and subsequently President for three consecutive years in 1910–12.[2][3]
TheGoudi coup of 1909 and the subsequent entry ofEleftherios Venizelos in Greek public life marked a decisive turning-point in Raktivan's life, as he soon became one of the Cretan politician's closest collaborators. Elected to theHellenic Parliament representingAttica in theNovember 1910 elections, he played a leading role in the drafting of the newGreek Constitution of 1911.[2] Raktivan was re-elected in theMarch 1912 andMay 1915 elections. In 1912 he becameMinister of Justice under Venizelos as Prime Minister, a development which also marked the definitive end of his career as a lawyer. He remained Justice Minister until the cabinet's resignation on 25 February 1915.[2][4]
Following the outbreak of theFirst Balkan War in October 1912 and the successes of theGreek Army, Raktivan was sent by Venizelos toThessaloniki to oversee the administration of the newly conquered areas ofMacedonia. The political situation there was extremely delicate.[2] Thessaloniki in particular was a multi-national and cosmopolitan city where Greeks were a minority, and whose future was uncertain, as the interests of Greece'sBalkan League allies—chieflyBulgaria, which had troops stationed in and north of the city and claimed acondominium with Greece—as well as those of theGreat Powers, clashed with Greece's. Raktivan's main task was to ensure good governance, as well as to exercise Greek sovereignty over the territory in question so as to strengthen Greece's claims in any future negotiations.[2] In this, he was forced to work mostly through the pre-existing Ottoman administration, including theOttoman Gendarmerie, which had been left in place. He remained at this post until June 1913, when, with theSecond Balkan War against Bulgaria under way, he was replaced byStephanos Dragoumis.[2]
In 1918, Raktivan was namedInterior Minister in the Venizelos government, a post he kept until theVenizelist electoral defeat in November 1920. From this position, he oversaw the incorporation of eastern Macedonia (autumn 1918) andWestern Thrace (1920) into Greece.[2][5] Raktivan remained on the sidelines during thePeople's Party administration in 1920–22, but was elected to Parliament (the IV National Assembly) inDecember 1923, serving as its speaker in 1924–25.[2] In 1926 he was appointed to the newly foundedAcademy of Athens by the dictatorial government ofTheodoros Pangalos, but refused to recognize this act until it was repeated by a legitimate government in 1929. In 1933, he was elected president of the Academy.[2]
In 1928, the new Venizelos cabinet appointed him as president of the newly foundedCouncil of State, which began working the next year. Raktivan himself had ardently championed the Council's foundation as the country's supreme court in 1910–11, and had even composed its first charter, but the wars andinternal turmoil of the following decade had delayed its creation until 1928.[2] Raktivan remained as head of the Council of State until his retirement in 1935, shortly before his death. From this position he laboured to, in his own words, "establish our country as astate of justice, especially in regards to Public Administration", but his effort was ill-timed: theSecond Hellenic Republic of theInterwar period was extremely unstable, and became progressively more and more undemocratic, culminating in the restoration of the monarchy and the dictatorialFourth of August Regime ofIoannis Metaxas in 1936.[2]
| Legal offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| New title | President of theCouncil of State 1929–1935 | Succeeded by |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament 21 January 1924 – 3 September 1925 | Vacant Dictatorship ofTheodoros Pangalos |
| Preceded by | Minister of the Interior ofGreece 3 January 1918 – 4 November 1920 | Succeeded by |
| New title | Governor-General of Macedonia (de facto) October 1912 – June 1913 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister of Justice ofGreece 18 May 1912 – 25 February 1915 | Succeeded by |
