Up for auction "Prime Minister of Laos" Prince Souvanna Phouma Signed First Day Cover Dated 1964. 

ES-3097D

Prince Souvanna Phouma (7

October 1901 – 10 January 1984) was the leader of the neutralist faction

and Prime Minister of

the Kingdom of Laos several

times (1951–1954, 1956–1958, 1960, and 1962–1975). Souvanna Phouma was the son

of Bounkhong, the last vice-king of Luang Prabang and a nephew of King Sisavang Vong of Laos, given a French education in Hanoi, Paris and Grenoble, where he obtained his degree in architecture and engineering. He returned to his homeland in

1931, married Aline Claire Allard, the daughter of a French father and a Lao

mother, and entered the Public Works Service of French Indochina. Souvanna

Phouma, together with his brother, Prince Phetsarath Rattanavongsa (1891–1959)

and his half-brother, Prince Souphanouvong (1909–1995), around the end of World War

II, joined the Lao Issara (Free

Laos) movement established to counter the French occupation and its provisional

Vientiane government (1945–46). When the French reoccupied Laos, Souvanna fled

to exile in Bangkok, but returned to Laos in 1949 as France began

conceding autonomy to Laos. Souvanna Phouma and his wife had four children

including Mangkra Souvanna Phouma and

Princess Moune, who married Perry J. Stieglitz, cultural-affairs attaché of the

U.S. embassy. In 1951, Souvanna became Prime Minister of Laos under

the National Progressive Party banner

with a landslide victory, winning 15 of the 39 seats in the National Assembly. He was

prime minister until 1954. After elections in December 1955, Souvanna Phouma

returned to the prime ministership on a platform of national reconciliation. In

August 1956 Souvanna and the Communist Pathet Lao, which his half-brother Souphanouvong headed agreed on broad proposals for a

‘government of national union’. Elections for 21 extra assembly seats were

finally held in May 1958, with parties aligned with the Pathet Lao acquiring

13. Souphanouvong entered

the government as Economic Minister. Another Pathet Lao leader, Phoumi Vongvichit, also acquired a Ministry. In June 1958

Souvanna was again forced to resign by the rightists. The king accepted the

vote as legal the next day when he signed Royal Ordinance No. 282, dismissing

Souvanna Phouma's government and giving powers provisionally to the

Revolutionary Committee. Royal Ordinance No. 283, approved a provisional

government formed by Prince Boun Oum, who acted as front man for Phoui Sananikone. He was one of the Three Princes, whom Sisavang Vatthana appointed to form a coalition

government between the rightists and Pathet Lao but it collapsed, and the Laotian Civil War began.