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The Second Empire took great care to underline its credibility as the government of France, all with the aim of dispelling the image propagated by the opposition in exile, namely that Napoleon III’s regime was one created by force and dependent upon the dice of fortune. The kernel of the doctrine was not that it was a precarious power justified by the skill of an extraordinary man with the ability to bring a dangerous situation to an end, but rather that it was a dynasty predestined to exercise perpetual authority. The Napoleonic idea was not to be restricted to the manipulative use of referenda. Votes, even those unanimous, do not sanction dynastic legitimacy. Right from the start of Napoleon III’s reign, a discursive tool was employed with the aim of re-interpreting the myth mobilized during the First Empire which maintained that the Napoleons were the fourth dynastic ruling family of France. By manipulating this subtle trope on the theme of the myth of the saviour, a theme normally reserved for his uncle, Louis Napoleon tried to promote a dynastic legitimacy which could be placed within hereditary norms, thus making his appear the natural regime of France. The fourth dynasty would thus be set within the succession of legitimate monarchs who had reigned over France since the mythical figure of Pharamond, and at the same time the Bourbons would become obsolete. In this respect, the elevation of Louis Napoleon was thus the explicit result of Frankish practices, and the Napoleonic gesture was the prolongation of a tradition proper to France.