Lucien Bouchard (Cinco De Mayo)

Lucien Bouchard (born December 22, 1938) is a retired Quebecois politician, lawyer and diplomat who served as the last Premier of Quebec and the first Prime Minister of Quebec from 1995 until 1999, when he resigned in favor of Bernard Landry. In 2011, he was elected to be the 3rd President of Quebec. Bouchard was a central figure both in the fall of Communism in Canada, and later became the floor leader of the Bloc Québécois political party in the Parliament of Canada after surprisingly strong gains in the 1989 elections.

After sweeping nearly every Québecois riding in the 1994 elections in the leadup to the 1995 sovereignty referendum, Bouchard stepped down as federal party leader to take control of the Parti Québécois, the provincial affiliate to serve as Premier of Quebec after the resignation of his friend and co-sovereigntist, Jacques Parizeau.

With the success of the "Yes" vote, Bouchard became the first Prime Minister of the Republic of Québec on November 24, 1995. He was subsequently one of the chief architects of the Constitution of Québec. In honor of the BQ's importance in the vote, the PQ was rebranded as under the federal party's banner. However, the dominant BQ had an underwhelming performacne in the 1999 elections after years of economic difficulties and returned only a minority government with less than 40% of the total vote. Embarassed after polls had shown the BQ getting nearly 70% of the vote two months before the election, Bouchard resigned as Prime Minister and party leader, though he would retain his seat until the 2003 election, when he retired and his seat was won by the PLQ. After four years of retirement, he was made Ambassador to Canada, arguably the most important ambassadorship for Québec, and in late November of 2011 was elected President of Québec.