He was elected MP for Jbeil for the first time in 1953, after which he was returned at every election until 1992 except that of 1964, when his whole election ticket was defeated. But he recovered his seat in a by-election in 1965. His party boycotted the general elections of 1992 and 1996. As an MP during the presidency of Camille Chamoun (1952-58), Eddé was responsible for the enactment of two important laws, one concerning rents (1954), the other establishing banking confidentiality (1956).

In the summer of 1958, when the country was facing the gravest crisis it had known since independence in 1943, Raymond Eddé stayed out of the conflict, rebuking both Chamoun for not publicly stating that he did not intend to run for a second term as president, and General Fuad Shehab, commander-in-chief of the Army, for not intervening to end the fighting. In the presidential poll of 1958, which saw Shehab elected following the intervention of the Western powers, Eddé stood as a "candidate of principle", winning 14 votes in the first round and 7 in the second.

At the start the new president worked with him, appointing Eddé to the four-man "Cabinet of Public Safety", whose formation put an end to the crisis. In this government Eddé held the posts of the Interior, Social Affairs, Labor, and Post and Telecommunications. But he distanced himself from President Shehab and, in October 1959, resigned in protest against the interference of the Deuxième Bureau (military intelligence) in political, electoral and administrative affairs. Henceforth, Eddé was the constant opponent of the general-president and of "Shehabism", strongly criticizing military infringements on civil liberties and the political activities of Army officers. He continued in this role during the tenure of President Charles Helou (1964-70), before establishing, with Camille Chamoun and Kataeb Party leader Pierre Gemayel, a coalition known as the "Helf" (alliance) in 1968. The grouping was widely supported.

1968 increasing activity in South Lebanon by Palestinian guerrillas against Israel, and there was growing tension in the rest of the country. Once again, Eddé was asked to join a new cabinet of public safety in which he held several portfolios. But he resigned three months later in protest at the Army's failure to act during the destructive Israeli raid on Beirut Airport on December 28, 1968. At that time Eddé stood out among Lebanese politicians for his firm and clear stands on South Lebanon. He called for the deployment of a UN force on the Lebanese-Israeli border, the first time in 1964 when, in a move against Israel, the Arab League proposed to divert the tributaries of Jordan, and a second time in 1968 following the raid against Beirut Airport. This aim of avoiding war with Israel, consistently maintained, drew criticism from Arab nationalists, who accused him of wanting to "prevent Lebanon from assuming its Arab responsibilities".

In 1969, following the first serious clash between the Lebanese Army and Palestinian fighters, he declared his opposition to the Cairo Agreement concluded under Egyptian mediation by the Helou Administration with the Palestine Liberation Organization, which gave the PLO a privileged position in this country. Eddé pointed out that the accord provided Tel Aviv with a pretext for attacking and, eventually, for occupying South Lebanon. He reproached his ally Pierre Gemayel for voting in favor of the Agreement, thus causing the demise of the "Helf". Nearly a quarter-century later, following the deaths of tens of thousands of people, the Agreement was finally abrogated. To prevent the election of Elias Sarkis, the Shehabist candidate for the presidency, Eddé threw his support to Suleiman Franjieh, who was elected on August 17, 1970. But he subsequently turned against Franjieh as well, and at the end of 1974 he formed a new combination with two leading Sunnite politicians, Rashid Karami and Saeb Salam. Eddé marked himself strongly from other Maronite leaders when the Lebanese war began in April 1975.

Resolutely denouncing all plans of partition, which he said went clean against the interests of the Christians, he represented a moderate Christian view in favor of coexistence with Moslems and with Palestinians. He undertook two trips abroad, to France and the Vatican in 1975, and to the United States and the United Nations in 1976, in an attempt to foil the conspiracy which, he believed, was being prepared against Lebanon. He was the only principal Christian leader to live in mainly Moslem West Beirut, and this gave him a privileged position among Lebanese Moslems. He worked to bring about the departure of the government of military officers (May 23, 1975) and tried, without success, to obtain the resignation of President Franjieh. In addition, he intervened on several occasions to secure the liberation of many Christians who had been kidnapped in the western part of the capital. In an attempt to avert the disaster towards which he saw the country moving, he ran as a presidential candidate against Elias Sarkis in the election of May of the year. The conduct of the election was controversial as it appeared to be rigged; Eddé failed to obtain a single vote.

As the fighting increased in volume in the spring and summer of 1976, he accused the Christian parties of accepting a plan, sociated with a number of external forces but particularly, Eddé claimed, with US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, dismember Lebanon, in return for an assurance that those parties would be allowed to hold power in the portion of the country allotted to them. Eddé also accused Kissinger of planning to carve up other Mideastern countries into sectarian statelets of which the little Christian Lebanon would be the prototype. In the same fateful year, following three attempts on his life, Nahr Ibrahim (May 25) and in front of his home in Beirut's Sanayeh quarter (November 11 and December 11).

Eddé left Lebanon on December 22, 1976 and settled in Paris in self imposed exile vowing not to return to Lebanon until both Israeli and Syrian troops leave the country. It was to be a definitive departure. But he continued to follow Lebanese developments closely, calling for the departure of Syrian troops and the end of the Israeli occupation. His sister was killed by a sniper in Beirut in 1978.

Raymond died Wednesday, May 10, 2000 in Paris, at the age 87. Raymond Eddé's body was returned to Beirut and his funeral took place on May 14 at St. George's cathedral in Martyrs' Square. He was buried in the family vault in Ras al-Nabeh. His last words were relayed in a tearful speech by Sakhr Salem, the doctor who was at Edde's bedside in Paris:

"I'm not concerned about death ­ my conscience is clear. I've lived a great deal and should have died a long time ago like Jumblatt and Rashid Karami, have you forgotten the bullets in my body? I'm going to die tomorrow I want to go back to Lebanon, to be next to my parents, my mother and father...I'm happy, I'm going to see my mother."

When advised to sleep he replied, "I'm thinking. I'm thinking of Lebanon."

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