Question...!

The 'Opportunistes' are those who after the defeat of 1871 were for the Republic and against the Royalists (who at that time had the majority at the Assembl�e Nationale i.e. Congress). They were in favour of a gradual rising of the Republic and Social Democracy using the backing of the peasants and the urban petty bourgeois. They were considered as moderate leftists, but they grew increasingly concervative.
The most famous is Leon Gambetta. There were also Jules Ferry, Jules Favres, Jules Simon, Jules Gr�vy (the four Jules) and Charles Fr�cinet.

The Radicaux were seen at the begining as more leftist. Their moto is private property and secularism (separation between the Church and the state in 1905). Their most famous members were Georges Clemenceau, Emile Combe and Ferdinand Buisson. They are seen as idealists and close to the free massons.
But they are quickly overtook on their left by the socialists (Jean Jaur�s). The new generation whith Herriot and Briant has little in commun with the previous radicaux of whom the bourgeois were afraid. Clemenceau himself will become pro-war and merely rightist during WWI.