In 1882 Déroulède, along with the historian Henri Martin and Félix Faure, founded the Ligue des patriotes, to promote France's "revanche" against Germany. Déroulède served initially as the deputy to vice-president Faure, and the league quickly attained a membership of 182,000, a relatively large number for the time. Déroulède eventually became the president of the league, in March 1885. The league sought education reforms intended to increase patriotism among French students, but when those reforms were ignored by the French legislature Déroulède began to despair of "parliamentarism" as a method of reform.