After service as an official in Indochina and Africa (1885–93), Doumergue was elected as a Radical-Socialist member of the Chamber of Deputies from Nîmes (1893). In June 1902 he was appointed to the first of his 11 ministerial posts. In 1910 he was elected to the Senate. On Dec. 13, 1913, he formed his own Cabinet, and, although it collapsed within seven months, he remained in various ministerial positions until March 1917. He then returned to the Senate and was its president until his election to the presidency of the republic on June 13, 1924.

Doumergue's presidential victory came as a rebuff to the Cartel des Gauches, a coalition of leftist parties, which had just won a substantial parliamentary victory. Hence, his term was marked by constant ministerial problems—there were 15 different cabinets—as well as severe social tensions caused by the beginning of the Great Depression. In February 1934, three years after he left the presidency, Doumergue was called upon to form a new government, but his plans for a Union Nationale, a broad-based coalition of all parties, and constitutional reforms were unsuccessful. He resigned Nov. 8, 1934, and retired completely from political life.