Barrot began his career in 1814 as a barrister in the Court of Cassation. After making his name as a defender of liberals, he was elected president of the society Aide-toi, le ciel t'aidera (“Heaven helps those who help themselves”), an organization for promoting resistance, by legal means, against the reactionary government of the Bourbon Restoration. During the July Revolution (1830), Barrot supported the proclamation of Louis-Philippe as king of the French and was one of the three commissioners of the new government who escorted the former king, Charles X, to Cherbourg on his way into exile.

From 1830 to 1848 Barrot, as deputy from Eure, was an active member of the opposition in the Chamber of Deputies. During 1846–47 he was one of the managers of the “banquets” campaign, which attempted to pressure the government into extending the franchise.

The reforms did not come, but a republican revolution did. After the flight of Louis-Philippe in 1848, Barrot joined the moderate Republicans. He headed the first ministry called by Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (December 1848) and also became minister of justice. Dismissed from the government in October 1849, Barrot was imprisoned briefly after the coup d'état of Dec. 2, 1851, and then retired to private life. In 1871 he became vice president of the new Council of State.