Leo IX. had entrusted papal affairs to Hildebrand until a new Pope should be elected, hence all eyes were on him and his friends wanted to make him Supreme Pontiff. But he saw the time was not ripe for his work and refused. Hildebrand then headed a delegation to ask the Emperor Henry III. to confirm the nomination of Gebhard, Bishop of Eichstädt, a friend and relative. After the imperial nomination at Mainz, Gebhard went to Rome, was there elected in due canonical form as Pope Victor II. (1055), and immediately took up Hildebrand's sweeping reform policy.[437:2] Formerly he had advocated a national Church and was a master of Clugniac politics. Now, however, he accepted the papal theory in its entirety. With the Emperor he held a council at Florence which forbade the alienation of Church property, enacted rules of discipline, and determined matters of doctrine.[437:3] To cure abuses of the French clergy he sent Hildebrand to France, who succeeded in humbling the bishops guilty of simony.[437:4] Victor II. himself held a council at Tours to discuss the imperial claims of Ferdinand the Great of Spain and Henry III. of Germany, thus assuming that it was his prerogative to act in the capacity of arbiter. He went to Germany in 1056 to see Henry III. die, to hold the centrifugal forces in check in behalf of Henry IV., and to thwart the ambition of Mamno of Cologne and Adelbert of Bremen to establish a northern patriarchate. The following year he returned to Italy and there soon died (1057), beloved throughout all Christendom. Five days after the death of Victor II. the Romans, not waiting for the return of Hildebrand, who was still absent on papal business, chose Cardinal Frederick of Lorraine Pope and jubilantly inaugurated him (Aug. 2, 1057). The new Pontiff, who took the name of Stephen IX., was an old enemy of Henry III., had been made Cardinal and Chancellor by Leo IX., had been sent to Constantinople to heal the breach between the East and the West (1054), and had been appointed Abbot of Monte Casino (1057).[438:1] Since he was elected without the consent of the German imperial party, Hildebrand, elevated to the dignity of cardinal-archdeacon, was sent north to appease the Queen Regent. Stephen IX. manifested his sincere desire to carry forward the work of reformation. Allied with him to accomplish this work were Hildebrand, the greatest man in Rome, and Damiani, the leader of the reform party, whom he appointed Cardinal-Bishop of Ostia. This trio no doubt would have made great headway in the reform propagandism had not the Pope died so soon (Mar. 29, 1058). Before death stilled his tongue, however, he made his court promise not to elect a successor without the advice of Hildebrand, who was still absent in Germany.