“Hey! I'm their leader, I've got to follow them!”
Eh! je suis leur chef, il fallait bien les suivre!
Among the Paris mob at the barricades during the French Revolution of 1848.
Quoted by Eugène de Mirecourt in Histoire Contemporaine, No. 79 http://books.google.com/books?id=iA-5arv1bBYC&q=%22Eh+je+suis+leur+chef+il+fallait+bien+les+suivre%22&pg=PA11#v=onepage (1857).
The attribution to Ledru-Rollin is uncertain; see Leadership#L.