The Project Gutenberg eBook of France and the Republic
Title: France and the Republic
Author: William Henry Hurlbert
Release date: May 16, 2007 [eBook #21498]
Language: English
Credits: Produced by Julia Miller, Janet Blenkinship and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
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FRANCE
AND THE REPUBLIC
A RECORD OF THINGS SEEN AND LEARNED
IN THE FRENCH PROVINCES DURING
THE 'CENTENNIAL' YEAR 1889
By
WILLIAM HENRY HURLBERT
AUTHOR OF 'IRELAND UNDER COERCION'
WITH A MAP
LONDON
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.
AND NEW YORK: 15 EAST 16th STREET
1890
All rights reserved
PRINTED BY
SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE
LONDON
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1890 by William Henry Hurlbert in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington
CONTENTS
| INTRODUCTION | PAGE | |
|---|---|---|
| I. | Scope of the book—French Republicanism condemned by Swiss and American experience—Its relations to the French people | xxiii |
| II. | M. Gambetta's Parliamentary revolution—What Germany owes to the French Republicans—Legislative usurpation in France and the United States | xxvi |
| III. | The Executive in France, England, and America—Liberty and the hereditary principle—General Grant on the English Monarchy—Washington's place in American history | xxxvii |
| IV. | The legend of the First Republic—A carnival of incapacity ending in an orgie of crime—The French people never Republican—Paris and the provinces—The Third Republic surrendered to the Jacobins, and committed to persecution and corruption—Estimated excess of expenditure over income from 1879 to 1889, 7,000,000,000 francs or 280,000,000l | li |
| V. | Danton's maxim, 'To the victors belong the spoils'—Comparative cost of the French and the British Executive machinery—The Republican war against religion.—The present situation as illustrated by past events | lxviii |
| VI. | Foreign misconceptions of the French people—An English statesman's notion that there are 'five millions of Atheists' in France—Mr. Bright and Mr. Gladstone the last English public men who will 'cite the Christian Scriptures as an authority'—Signor Crispi on modern constitutional government and the French 'principles of 1789'—Napoleon the only 'Titan of the Revolution'—The debt of France for her modern liberty to America and to England | lxxvi |
| VII. | The Exposition of 1889 an electoral device—Panic of the Government caused by Parisian support of General Boulanger—Futile attempt of M. Jules Ferry to win back Conservatives to the Republic—Narrow escape of the Republic at the elections of 1889—Steady increase of monarchical party since 1885—-Weakness of the Republic as compared with the Second Empire | lxxxix |
| VIII. | How the Republic maintains itself—A million of people dependent on public employment—M. Constans 'opens Paradise' to 13,000 Mayors—Public servants as political agents—Open pressure on the voters—Growing strength of the provinces.—The hereditary principle alone can now restore the independence of the French Executive—Diplomatic dangers of actual situation—Socialism or a Constitutional Monarchy the only alternatives | xcvi |
| CHAPTER I | |
|---|---|
| IN THE PAS-DE-CALAIS | |
| Calais—Natural and artificial France—The provinces and the departments—The practical joke of the First Consulate—The Counts of Charlemagne and the Prefects of Napoleon—President Carnot at Calais—Politics and Socialism in Calais—Immense outlay on the port, but works yet unfinished—Indifference of the people—A president with a grandfather—The 'Great Carnot' and Napoleon—The party of the 'Sick at heart'—The Louis XVI. of the Republic—Léon Say and the 'White Mouse'—Gambetta's victory in 1877—Political log-rolling, French and American—Republican extravagance and the 'Woollen Stocking'—Boulanger and his legend—Wanted a 'Great Frenchman'—The Duc d'Aumale and the Comte de Paris—The Republican law of exile—The French people not Republican—The Legitimists and the farmers—A French journalist explains the Presidential progress—Why decorations are given | 1-22 |
| CHAPTER II | |
| IN THE PAS-DE-CALAIS (continued) | |
| Boulogne—Arthur Young and the Boulonnais—Boulogne and Quebec—The English and French types of civilisation—A French ecclesiastic on the religious question—The oppressive school law of 1886—The Church and the Concordat—Rural communes paying double for free schools—Vexatious regulations to prevent establishment of free schools—All ministers of religion excluded from school councils—Government officers control the whole system—Permanent magistrates also excluded—Revolt of the religious sentiment throughout France against the new system—Anxiety of Jules Ferry to make peace with the Church—Energy shown by the Catholics in resistance—St.-Omer—The Spanish and scholastic city of Guy Fawkes and Daniel O'Connell—M. De la Gorce, the historian of 1848—High character of the population—Improvement in tone of the French army—Morals of the soldiers—Devotion of the officers to their profession—Derangement of the Executive in France by the elective principle—The 'laicisation' of the schools—Petty persecutions—Children forbidden to attend the funeral of their priest—The Marist Brethren at Albert—Albert and the Maréchal d'Ancre—A chapter of history in a name—Little children stinting their own food, to send another child to school—President Carnot and the nose of M. Ferry—French irreligion in the United States—The case of Girard College—Can Christianity be abolished in France?—The declared object of the Republic—Morals of Artois—Dense population—Fanatics of the family—Increase of juvenile crime—American experience of the schools without religion—A New England report on 'atrocious and flagrant crimes in Massachusetts'—Relative increase of native white population and native crime in America—An American Attorney-General calls the public school system 'a poisonous fountain of misery and moral death'—A local heroine of St.-Omer—The statue of Jacqueline Robins—The Duke of Marlborough and the Jesuits College—A curious sidelight on English politics in 1710—How St.-Omer escaped a siege | 23-43 |
| CHAPTER III | |
| IN THE PAS-DE-CALAIS (continued) | |
| Aire-sur-la-Lys—Local objections to a national railway—A visit to a councillor-general—Pentecost in Artois—The Artesians in 1789—Wealth and power of the clergy—Recognition of the Third Estate long before the Revolution—The English and the French clergy in the last century—Lord Macaulay and Arthur Young—Sympathy of the curés with the people—Turgot, Condorcet and the rural clergy—-The Revolution and public education—M. Guizot the founder of the French primary schools—The liberal school ordinance of 1698—The Bishop of Arras, in 1740, on the duty of educating the people—The experience of Louisiana as to public schools and criminality—The two Robespierres saved and educated by priests—What came of it—A rural church and congregation in Artois—The notary in rural France—A village procession—'Beating the bounds' in France—An altar of verdure and roses—The villagers singing as they march—Ancient customs in Northern France | 44-52 |
| CHAPTER IV | |
| IN THE PAS-DE-CALAIS (continued) | |
| Aire-sur-la-Lys—Local and general elections in France—A public meeting in rural Artois—A councillor-general and his constituents—Artois in the 18th and 19th centuries—Well-tilled fields, fine roads, hedges, and orchards—Effect of long or short leases—A meeting in a grange—French, English, and American audiences—Favouritism under the conscription—Extravagant outlay on scholastic palaces—Almost a scene—A political disturbance promoted—Canvassing in England and France—Tenure of office in the French Republic—'To the victors belong the spoils,' the maxim not of Jackson but of Danton—'Epuration,' what it means—If Republicans are not put into office 'they will have civil war'—'No justice of the peace nor public school teacher to be spared'—'Terror and anarchy carried into all branches of the public service'—M. de Freycinet declares that 'servants of the State have no liberty in politics'—The Tweed régime of New York officially organised in France—-Men of position reluctant to take office—The expense of French elections—1,300,000l. sterling the estimated cost of an opposition campaign—A little dinner in a French country house—The French cuisine national and imported—An old Flemish city—Devastations of the Revolution—The beautiful Church of St.-Pierre—A picturesque Corps de Garde—The tournament of Bayard at Aire—Sixteenth-century merry-makings at Aire—Gifts to Mary of England on her marriage to Philip of Spain—The ancient city of Thérouanne—Public schools in the 17th century—Small landholders in France before 1789. | 53-72 |
| CHAPTER V | |
| IN THE SOMME | |
| Amiens—Picardy Old and New—Arthur Young and Charles James Fox in Amiens—'The look of a capital'—The floating gardens of Amiens—A stronghold of Boulangism—Protest of Amiens against the Terror of 1792—The French nation and the Commune of Paris—Vergniaud denounces the Parisians as the 'slaves of the vilest scoundrels alive'—Gambetta and his balloon—Amiens and the Revolution of September 1870—The rise of M. Goblet—The 'great blank credit opened to the Republic in 1870'—What has become of it—The Prussians in Amiens—Warlike spirit of the Picards—A political portrait of M. Goblet by a fellow citizen—A Roman son and his father's funeral—A typical Republican senator and mayor—How M. Petit demolished the crosses in the cemetery—M. Spuller as Prefect of the Somme—The Christian Brothers and their schools—M. Jules Ferry withholds the salaries earned by teachers—The Emperor Julian of Amiens—How the Sisters were turned out of their schools—The mayor, the locksmith, and the curate—Mdlle. de Colombel—A senatorial epistle—Ulysses deserted by Calypso—Why Boulangism flourishes at Amiens—The First Republic invoked to justify the destruction of crosses on graves—The Cathedral of Amiens and Mr. Ruskin. | 73-94 |
| CHAPTER VI | |
| IN THE SOMME—(continued) | |
| Amiens—Party names taken from persons—The effect of Republican misrule at Amiens—Why the Monarchists acted with the Boulangists—The Picards incline towards the Empire—How the Republic of 1848 captured France—Armand Marrast and the French mail coaches—Mr. Sumner's story—The political value of paint—Paris and the provinces—M. Mermeix offers with a few million francs and a few thousand rowdies to change the French Government—General Boulanger's campaign in Picardy—Capturing the mammas by kissing the babies—The Monarchical peasantry—The National Accounts of France not balanced for years—Conservatives excluded from the Budget Committee—The Boulanger programme—Expenses of the political machine in France, England, and America—The Boulangist campaign conducted by voluntary subscriptions—General Boulanger and the army—The common sewer of the discontent of France—The local finances of a French city—Municipal expenses of Amiens—Pressure of the octroi—A local deficit of millions since the Republicans got into power—The mayor and the prefect control the accounts—Immense expenditure on scholastic palaces—Estimated annual increase in France since 1880 of local indebtedness, 10,000,000l. sterling—M. Goblet on the growth of young men's monarchical clubs—History of the octroi—General prosperity of Picardy—Rural ideas of aristocracy—Land ownership in Ireland and France—'Land-grabbing' in Picardy a hundred years ago—The corvée abolished before the Revolution, but it still exists under the Republic, as a prestation en nature—Public education in Picardy two centuries ago—Small tenants as numerous under Edward II. in Picardy as small proprietors now are—Home rule needed in France—'The opinion of a man's legs' | 95-124 |
| CHAPTER VII | |
| IN THE AISNE | |
| St.-Gobain—Paris and the Ile-de-France—Reclamation of the commons—Mischievous haste in the Revolutionary transfer of lands—The evolution of property and order in France and England—The flower gardens of France—The home counties around London compared with the departments around Paris—Superiority of the French fruit and vegetable markets—The military city of La Fère—A local cabbage-leaf—French farmers and the Treaties of Commerce—Arthur Young at St.-Gobain—The largest mirror in the world—The great French glassworks—'An industrial flower on a seignorial stalk, springing from a feudal root'—Evolution without Revolution—Two centuries and a half of industrial progress—Labour in the Middle Ages—The Irish apostle of North-eastern France—The forests of France—A factory in a château—A centenarian royal porter—The Duchesse de Berri and the Empress Eugénie—A co-operative association of consumers—A great manufacturing company working on lines laid down under Louis XIV.—Glass-working, Venetian and French—A jointstock company of the 18th century—The old and new school of factory discipline—French industry and the Terror—'Two aristocrats' called in to save a confiscated property—St.-Gobain and the Eiffel Tower—Royal luxuries in 1673, popular necessaries of life in 1889—How great mirrors are cast—Beauty of the processes—The coming age of glass—Glass pavements and roofs—The hereditary principle among the working classes—Practical co-operation of capital and labour—Schools, asylums, workmen's houses and gardens, social clubs, and savings-banks—Co-operative pension funds—A great economic family—Of 2,650 workpeople more than 50 per cent. employed for more than ten years—A subterranean lake—The crypts of St.-Gobain and the Cisterns of Constantinople—A spectral gondolier—A Venetian promenade with coloured lanterns underground | 125-161 |
| CHAPTER VIII | |
| IN THE AISNE—(continued) | |
| Laon, Chauny, and St.-Gobain—The French Revolution and Spanish soda—The most extensive chemical works in France—A miniature Rotterdam—A Cité Ouvrière—The religious war in Chauny—Local and immigrant labour—M. Allain-Targé on Boulanger, the High Court of Justice, common sense and common honesty—-French elections, matters of bargain and sale—'The blackguardocracy'—Sketches by a Republican minister—French freemasonry a persecuting sect—Their power in the Government—Utterly unlike the freemasonry of England, Germany, or America—The war against Christianity in France and Spanish America—1867 and the industrial progress of France—Extent of the chemical works of France—Retiring pensions for workmen—Chauny in the olden time—How the honest burghers freed their city in 1432—A contrast with the rioters of the Bastille in 1789—Henri IV. and La Belle Gabrielle—Chauny and the Revolution—The murder of d'Estaing—Chauny acclaims the Restoration, and gives a gold medal to the Prussian commandant—Public charity and public education in the 12th century—Benevolent foundations pillaged in 1793—Law and order under the ancien régime—A canal in the law courts—An enterprising American turns rubbish into indiarubber at Chauny | 162-185 |
| CHAPTER IX | |
| IN THE AISNE—(continued) | |
| Laon—A feudal fortress home—Chauny and the green monkeys of Rabelais—The festival of the jongleurs and the learned dogs—A damsel of Chauny on English good sense and Queen Victoria—A region of parks and châteaux—The cradle of the French Monarchy—How the Revolution robbed France—The rural reign of pillage and murder—Horrors committed in the provinces during 1789—Arthur Young and Gouverneur Morris on the general depravation and lawlessness—The National Assembly a mere noisy 'mob'—The outbreak of crime which preceded the Terror—The truth about Madame Roland—Her hatred of Marie Antoinette and her thirst for blood—The legend of the Gironde—Brissot de Warville on robbery as a virtuous action—The relations of the French Revolution to property—France more free before 1789 than after it—The laws against emigrants—Girls of fourteen condemned to death—Emigration made a crime, that property might be pillaged—How Irène de Tencin defended the family estate—The story of the Saporta family—The Laonnais in the 18th century—Wide-spread ruin of its churches, convents, and châteaux—Destruction of accumulated capital—How syndicates of rogues stole bronzes, brasswork, and monuments—The story of two châteaux—The bishop's château at Anizy—The burghers and the seigneurs in the 16th century—The local 'directory' in 1790—Wreck, ruin, and robbery—The Château of Pinon—Once the property of a granddaughter of Edward III. of England—A domain of the Duc d'Orléans—A tragedy of love and murder—Death of the Marquis d'Albret—How Pinon passed to the family of De Courvals—The present owner an American lady—The finest château in the Laonnais—What has the Laonnais gained from the ruin of the Anizy? | 186-225 |
| CHAPTER X | |
| IN THE AISNE—(continued) | |
| Laon—The ruins of Coucy-le-Château—A rural inn in France—The sugar crisis—The birthplace of César de Vendóme—The bell which tolls and is heard by the dying alone—The hanging of boys for killing rabbits—Game laws, French and English—The true story of Enguerrand de Coucy—A little feudal city—The finest donjon in France—An official guardian—A dinner with four councillors-general—'What France really wants is a man'—Agricultural philosophers—How a councillor-general tested chemicals—Peasantry on the highway—A land of gardens—A city set on a hill—Simple good-natured people—A raging Boulangist at Laon—What a barber saw in Tonkin—The diamond belt of King Norodom—Castelin the friend of Boulanger—A revolutionary shoemaker on government by committees—Evils of the Exposition—Foreigners steal the ideas of France—The railways, the new feudal system—They are the real 'enemy' of the people—Extravagance of the ministers—Freemasonry at Laon—How it controls the press—The rise of Deputy Doumer—How he lost his seat in 1889—The author of 'Chez Paddy' at Château Thierry—Over-zeal of the curés—The question of working men's unions—M. Doumer's report on the Law of Associations—He proves that the Republic has done absolutely nothing with this law—'Five years' spent in drawing up a report—'The Republic never existed until 1879'—And nothing done for working men until 1888—M. de Freycinet and M. Carnot only 'studied measures which might be taken;' but were not!—The first practical step taken by M. Doumer by making an enormous report in 1888, recommending things to be done hereafter—The true Republic eluding for ten years questions which the Emperor grappled with in 1867—The voters of Laon in September defeat M. Doumer—A curious little chapter of French politics—M. Doumer's coquetry with General Boulanger—After his defeat M. Doumer becomes secretary of the President of the Chamber and lets the working men's question alone—Politics as a profession in France and the United States—Intense centralisation of power in France makes it easier and more profitable than in America | 226-258 |
| CHAPTER XI | |
| IN THE NORD | |
| Valenciennes—The shabbiest historic town in North-eastern France—Perfect cultivation of French Flanders—Cock-fighting and flowers—Prosperity of the cabarets—One to every forty-four inhabitants around Valenciennes—Growth of the mining and manufacturing towns—Interesting buildings in Valenciennes—Carelessness of the citizens about their city—A graceful edifice of the 15th century falling into ruins—Valenciennes in the days of the Hanse of London—Mediæval burghers and their sovereigns—A citizen of Valenciennes, in 1357, the richest man in Europe—Festivals in the olden times—Religious wars—Vauban at Valenciennes—How the clothworkers fled from the Spanish persecution—Dumouriez at Valenciennes—The Hôtel de Ville—Interesting local artists from Simon Marmion down to Watteau and Pater—The triptych of Rubens—Some historic portraits—The Musée Carpeaux—The coal mines of Anzin—14,035 workmen there employed and 200,210,702 tons of coal extracted—Competition with Belgium, the Pas-de-Calais, England, and Germany—The coal mines of Anzin organised a century and a half ago—The discovery of coal in North-eastern France—Energy shown by the local noblesse—Pierre Mathieu, an engineer, strikes the vein in 1734—The lords of the soil claim their rights over the coal—A long lawsuit ending in a compromise—A business arrangement under the ancien régime—The hereditary principle recognised in the organisation and undisturbed by the Revolution—An orderly, quiet, and prosperous town—A region of factories intermingled with farms—Charming home of the director—The company encourages workmen's homes, with gardens and allotments—An improvement on the Cité Ouvrière—2,628 model homes now occupied by workmen—For three francs a month a workman secures a well-built cottage, with drainage and cellarage, six good rooms and closets, and a plot of ground—2,500 families hold garden sites for cultivation—Fuel allowed, and a general 'participation in profits' of a practical sort—The right of the workmen to be consulted recognised at Anzin a century and a half ago—Beneficial and educational institutions—An industrial republic—How the National Assembly meddled with the mines—Mining laws in France, ancient and modern—Influence of politics on the output of the mines—Every Republican development at Paris diminishes, and every check to Republicanism at Paris develops, the great coal industry—The great strike of 1884—During that year the company expended for the benefit of the workmen a sum equivalent to the profits divided amongst the shareholders—What caused the collision therefore between capital and labour?—A syndicate of miners under a former Anzin workman, Basly, puts a pressure from Paris upon the workmen at Anzin to develop the strike—The pretext found in contracts granted to good workmen—The object of the strike to establish the equality of bad with good workmen—Boycotting and intimidation—Dynamite and Radical deputies from Paris—A Republican minister asks the company to accept Basly and his syndicate as an umpire—Bitter opposition of the Basly syndicate to the saving fund system—They demand a State pension fund—And pending this a fund controlled by the syndicate—A despotism of agitators—Upshot of the strike—The mines in the Pas-de-Calais—Visits to workmen's houses—Fine appearance and carriage of the miners—Their politics—Women and children—Good ventilation and sanitation of the mines—'No man can be a miner not bred to it as a boy'—Excellent housekeeping of the women—Miners of Southern and Northern France—Influence of high altitudes on character—The elective principle in the mines—Morals and conduct of the mining people—Churches and schools—A children's school at St. Waast—A digression into the Artois—What the Tiers-Etat of Northern France wanted in 1789—The cahiers of the Tiers-Etat—Respect for vested interests—A visit to St.-Amand—The conspiracy of Dumouriez—Ruin of a magnificent abbey—A beautiful belfry—Interesting pictures by Watteau—Co-operation at Anzin—What its advantages are to the workmen—Eight per cent. dividends to the members in 1866, and an average during 23 years to 1889 of 11-80/100 per cent.—How the workmen and their families live—Table of articles purchased—Attendance upon the schools—Influence of women and families—Increase of juvenile crime under irreligious education in France and the United States—Louis Napoleon's National Retiring Fund for Old Age—Regulations of the Anzin Council affecting this fund—Average expenditure of the Anzin company for the benefit of workmen 'fifty centimes for every ton of coal extracted'—The Decazeville strikes in 1888—They begin with the murder of one of the best engineers and end with a workman's banquet to the engineer-in-chief | 259-331 |
| CHAPTER XII | |
| IN THE NORD—(continued) | |
| Lille—The Flamand flamingant—Pertinacity of the Flemish tongue—A historic city without monuments—Old customs and traditions—The Musée Wicar—The unique wax bust—A 'pious foundation' of art, and M. Carolus Duran—Excellent educational institutions of Le Nord—A land flowing with beer—Increase of the factory populations—Decrease of drunkenness in the cities—Increase in the rural districts—Special cabarets for women—Should women smoke?—Flemish cock-fighting and the example of England—A model Republican prefect—Juvenile prostitution—The souls of the people and their votes—Danton's system of uneducated judges—Dislike of good people to politics—A pessimist rebuked—The Monarchist majorities in Lille—Inaccurate representation of the people in the Chamber—Hazebrouck and its Dutch gardens—The Republic hated for its extravagance—Relative strength of Republican and Monarchical majorities—Elections conducted under secret instructions—Cutting down majorities—The case of M. Leroy-Beaulieu in the Hérault—Keeping out dangerous economists—Ballot 'stuffing' in France and the United States—The methods of Robespierre readopted—Systematic 'invalidation' of elections—The people must not choose the wrong men—Boulanger and Joffrin—'Tactical necessities' in politics—The delusion of universal suffrage—An Austrian view of the elective and hereditary principles—Energy of the Catholics in North-eastern France—Father Damien—Public charity—Hereditary mendicants in French Flanders—Dogs and douaniers—The division of communes—Foundling hospitals and the struggle for life—Mutual Aid Societies—Is woman a 'Clubbable' animal?—M. Welche and the agricultural syndicates—'Les Prévoyants de l'Avenir,' a phenomenal success—It begins in 1882 with 757 members and 6,237 francs; in 1889 it numbers 59,932 members, with a capital of 1,541,868 francs—The Franco-German war and the religious sentiment—The great Catholic University—Private contributions of 11,000,000 francs—The scientific and medical schools—M. Ferry and the free universities—Catholic education in France and the United States—The case of Girard College—The dangers of the French system—The monopoly of the University of France—Liberal outlay of the Catholics of Paris—A mediæval Catholic merchant—'The work of God' in a business partnership—Mutual assistance in the Lille factories—Model houses at Roubaix—A true Mont-de-Piété—The Masurel fund of 1607—Loans without interest—A prosperous charity plundered by the Republic—A benevolent fund of 455,454 francs in 1789 reduced to 10,408 francs in 1803—The fund restored under the Monarchy and Second Empire—The 'King William's Fund' of the Netherlanders in London—Count de Bylandt and Sir Polydore de Keyser | 332-368 |
| CHAPTER XIII | |
| IN THE MARNE | |
| Reims—The capital of the French kings—Clotilde and Clovis, Jeanne d'Arc and Urban II.—Vineyards and factories—The wines of Champagne known and unknown—The red wine of Bouzy—Mr. Canning and still Champagne—The syndication of famous brands—A visit to the cardinal archbishop—Employers and employed—The Catholic workmen's clubs and the Christian corporations—M. Léon Harmel—The religious education of a factory—How the workmen Christianised themselves—The conversion of a wife by a gown—The local authorities discouraging religion—'Planting Christians like vines'—'The Rights of Man' and capital and labour—Mediæval and modern methods compared—Capital and universal suffrage—Money in the first Revolution—Le Pelletier, the millionaire, and the mobs of the Palais Royal—The dramatic justice of a murder—Unwritten chapters of revolutionary history—The duty of employers—'The Masters' Catechism'—The invasion of 1870 and the Christian corporations—Modern syndications and the ancient maîtrise—Professional syndicates and professional strikes—Good out of evil—The working men and the upper classes—Count Albert de Mun—A popular vote against universal suffrage—The Holy See and the Catholic labour movement in France—The parochial clergy and the laymen—The Wesleyans and the Catholics—Privileged purveyors—The financial aspect of the Catholic corporations—A revival of the old guilds—The national system of the corporations—Provincial and general assemblies—The German Cultur-Kampf and the French Catholic clubs—The Republican attack on religion—Religious freedom and freedom from religion—The State church of unbelief—The 'moral unity' men—Napoleon and Guizot—The Jacobins of 1792 and 1879—Moral unity under Louis XIV.—Alva and M. Jules Ferry—A chapter of the Revolution at Reims—Mr. Carlyle's little 'murder of about eight persons'—The political influence of massacres—The 'days of September' and the elections to the Convention—How they chose Jacobin deputies at Reims—The documentary story of the eight murders—Mayors under the Republic—The defence of Lille—How the Republic voted a monument and Louis Philippe built it—Desecration of a great cathedral—The legend of Ruhl and the sacred ampulla—The demolition of St.-Nicaise and the bargain of Santerre—How Napoleon disciplined the Faubourg St.-Antoine—Is the Cathedral of Reims in danger?—Its restoration under the cardinal archbishop—The budget of public worship—Expenses of the administration—The salaries of the clergy, Protestant and Catholic—Jewish rabbis paid less than servants in the Ministère—Steady cutting down of the budget—No statistics of religious opinion in France—A Benedictine archbishop—Great increase of the religious sentiment in Reims—The Church driven by the Republic into opposition—Léon Say and the present Government—The home of Montaigne—A deputy of the Dordogne invalidated to snub Léon Say—Socrates and David Hume in modern France—Dogmatic irreligion—Jules Simon on the proscription of Christianity—Abolishing the history of France—A practical protest of the Catholic Marne—The great pope of the crusades—Catholic and Masonic processions—The Triduum of Urban II.—A great celebration at Châtillon—Hildebrand and his disciple—The Angelus and the 'Truce of God'—Mgr. Freppel on the anti-religious war—Jeanne d'Arc at Reims—A magnificent festival—Gounod's Mass of the Maid of Orléans—Catholic protest against the persecution of the Jews—The Republic threatens the grand rabbis with the archbishops—Deriding a death-bed in a hospital—The amnesty of the Communards—The rehabilitation of crime—Tyranny in the village schools—Religious freedom in France and Turkey—The home of Jeanne d'Arc—'Laicising' Domrémy-la-Pucelle—Piety and hypnotism—The chamber and garden of Jeanne—Louis XI. and the French yeomen—A shrine converted into a show—A scurvy job in a place of pilgrimage—The banner of Patay—Jeanne and her voices—A western worshipper of the Maid of Orléans—The Château de Bourlémont—The Princesse d'Hénin and Madame de Staël—The revolutionary traffic in passports—A generous act of Madame Du Barry—'Laicisation' in the Vosges—The defeat of Jules Ferry—The Monarchists going up, the Republicans going down | 369-436 |
| XIV | |
| IN THE CALVADOS | |
| Val Richer—The home of Guizot—The French Protestants and the Third Republic—Free education in France the work of Guizot—Education in France checked by the Revolution—Mediæval provisions for public education—The effect of the English and the religious wars upon education in France—Indiscriminate destruction of educational foundations by the First Republic—Progress of illiteracy after 1793—The guillotine as a financial expedient—The Directory painted by themselves—The two Merlins—'Republican Titans' wearing royal livery—Barras on the cruelty of poltroons—Education under Napoleon—The Concordat and the Church—Napoleon's University of France—A machine for creating moral unity—The despotism of 1802 and 1882—The Liberals of 1830—Primary education under M. Guizot—The rights of the family and the encroachments of the State—Catholic vindication of Protestant liberty under Louis XIV.—The heirs of M. Guizot in Normandy and Languedoc—M. de Witt at Val Richer—Three historic châteaux—The birthplace of Montesquieu at La Brède—The Abbey of Thomas à-Becket—The Château de Broglie—Lisieux—M. Guizot as a landscape gardener—A Protestant statesman among the Catholics of the Calvados—The Sieur de Longiumeau and the sacred right of insurrection—'Moral unity' and 'moral harmony'—Catholicism in the Calvados, Brittany, and Poitou—Charlotte Corday—The historic family of De Witt—An election in the Calvados—The people and the functionaries—Bonnebosq—The Normans and personal liberty—The procedure of a French election—Mayors with votes in their sleeves—Glass urns and wooden boxes—Gerrymandering in France and America—Catholic constituents congratulating their Protestant candidate—'Vive le roi!'—M. Bocher on two Republican presidents—Wilsonism and the Norman farmers—The domestic distilleries—The war against religion in Normandy—'The Church as the key of trade'—How the officials revise the elections—Prefects interfering in the elections—A solid Monarchist department—Politics and the apple crop—The weak point of the Monarchists—The traditions of Versailles and 'modern high life'—Louis XV. and Barras—Madame Du Barry and Madame Tallien—The 'noble' grooms of ignoble cocottes—The Legitimists under the Empire—The war of 1870-71, and the fusion of classes—Historic names in the French army—Officers and the châteaux—An American minister and the Comte de Paris—The Monarchist and the Republican representatives—The Duc de Broglie in the Eure—Architectural evidence as to the social life of the ancien régime—The war of classes a consequence, not a cause, of the Revolution—The Vicomte de Noailles and Artemus Ward—Feudal serfs and New York anti-renters—Jefferson and lettres de cachet—The Bastille and the Tower of London—Don Quixote and the wine skins—The Château d'Eu—Private rights in the 14th century—The 'Nonpareil' of the world—La Grande Mademoiselle and her lieges at Eu—Her hospitals and charities—A quick-witted mayor—A model Republican prefect—The Duc de Penthièvre—The Orléans family at Eu—Local popularity of the Comte and Comtesse de Paris—Norman grievances, old and new—A Protestant movement in Normandy—American associations with Broglie, La Brède, and Val Richer—Mr. Bancroft on the ministers of Louis Philippe—The 'military council' of Royalist officers in the Revolution—Louis Philippe and Thiers—The rights of property under the Second Empire—The seizure of the Orléans property—The Jacobin levelling of incomes—The reformer Réal as an opulent count—The Orléans property restored in 1872, as a matter of 'common honesty'—What the princes recovered, and what they presented to France—The 'wounded conscience' of a nation—The daughter of Madame de Staël—The present Duc de Broglie and the anti-religions war—The Conservative republic made impossible—The Radical Jacobins rule the roast—'The Republic commits suicide to save itself from slaughter'—Floquet the master of Carnot—The war against God—Two statesmen of the South—Nîmes and M. Guizot—The religious wars in Languedoc—The son of M. Guizot at Uzès—Politics in the Gard—Catholics and Protestants fighting side by side—The late M. Cornelis de Witt—The hereditary principle in Holland—What the United States learned from the Netherlands and from England—How the Duke of York missed an American throne—A Protestant monarchist in the Lot-et-Garonne—The plums of Agen and the apricots of Nicole—Cœur de Lion and Bertrand de Boru—The home of Nostradamus—Why the Germans beat the French—The barber bard of Languedoc—Scaliger and the Huguenots—Nérac and the Reine Margot—The 'Lovers' War'—The Revocation and the Revolution—The ruin of property in 1793—Decline of the wealth of France—The monarchists of the Aveyron—A banquet of monarchist mayors—The need of a man in France—'A bolt out of the blue'—How the Duc d'Orléans demoralised the government—The young conscript at Clairvaux—Carnot surrenders to the Commune—A Russian verdict on the republican blunder—The 'Prince' of the people—How the Government has helped the Comte de Paris—Irregularities of republican taxation—Corsica and the Corrèze—France the most heavily taxed country in the world—Steady and enormous increase of taxation—Cost of collecting the revenue—Political dishonesty on the stump—The persecution of candidates—Invasion of private life—Bullying the magistrates—Public servants ordered to the polls—Curés fined for preaching religious duty—The Conférences du Sud-Ouest—M. Princeteau at Bordeaux—The fête of the Bastille at Bordeaux and Nîmes—A 'Fils de Dieu' at Nîmes—Socialism at Alais—The suppression of inheritances—'Property a privilege to be abolished'—'Opulence an infamy'—The Socialists and the Government—Persecution of the Protestants—'Pray, what is God?'—Strength of Socialism in South-eastern France—Two typical departments—Socialism in the Bouches-du-Rhône—Historic France in the Calvados—Boulanger at Marseilles—A Socialist coachman at Arles—A great Catholic employer of labour at Marseilles—The largest glycerine works in the world—Church candles and dynamite—Taxing industries to death—Dutch competition with France—A Christian corporation in Marseilles—'An economical kitchen'—An uphill fight for law and order—The Christians of the 4th and of the 19th centuries—The Radicals hold the bridle—Shall France be Christian or Nihilist?—Ernest Renan on the situation in 1872—Jules Simon on the situation in 1882—The 'civic duties' of man and the guillotine—What will the situation be in 1892? | 437-515 |
| MAP OF FRANCE at end of book | |
Errata
P. 24, 11 lines from top, for rival read rural.
P. 64, line 1, for de Royes read de Royer.
P. 91, line 6 from top. M. Spuller, Prefect of the Somme in 1880, was the brother of the present Minister of Foreign Affairs, not the Minister himself.
P. 96, line 5 from top, for Montauban read Montaudon.
P. 105, line 4 from bottom, for being read long.
P. 395, 3 lines from top, for Abbeys read Abbaye.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
As I have not wished to swell the bulk of this book by references, and as many statements made in it concerning men and things of the first Republic may seem to my readers to need verification, I subjoin a brief list of authorities consulted by me in this connection. It is incomplete, but will be found to cover every material point concerning the epoch to which it refers.
Biré, E. La Légende des Girondins.
Campardon, Emile. Le Tribunal Révolutionnaire à Paris d'après les Documents Originaux.
Dauban, C. A. La Démagogie à Paris en 1793.
Dauban, C. A. Les Prisons de Paris sous la Révolution.
Dauban, C. A. Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, de Buzot et de Barbaroux.
Dauban, C. A. Mémoires de Madame Roland. Etude sur Madame Roland.
Lettres en partie inédites de Madame Roland.
De Barante. Histoire de la Convention Nationale.
De Lavergne, L. (de l'Institut). Economie rurale de la France depuis 1789.
De Montrol, F. Mémoires de Brissot, publiés par son fils.
De Pressensé, Edmond. L'Eglise et la Révolution Française.
Doniol, H. Histoire des Classes Rurales en France.
Du Bled. Les Causeurs de la Révolution.
Durand de Maillane. Histoire de la Convention Nationale.
Feuillet de Conches. Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette et Madame Elisabeth.
Forneron, H. Histoire Générale des Emigrés.
Gallois, Léonard. Histoire des Journaux et des Journalistes de la Révolution Française.
Goncourt, Edmund et Jules. Histoire de la Société Française pendant la Révolution.
Granier de Cassagnac. Histoire des Girondins et des Massacres de Septembre.
Guillon, l'Abbé. Les Martyrs de la Foi pendant la Révolution Française.
Hamel, Ernest. Histoire de Robespierre.
Jefferson, Thomas. Memoirs and Correspondence.
Laferrière (de l'Institut). Essai sur l'histoire du Droit Français.
Mallet du Pan. Mémoires et Correspondance.
Masson, Frédéric. Le Département des Affaires Etrangères pendant la Révolution.
Morris, Gouverneur. Diary and Letters.
Mortimer-Ternaux. Histoire de la Terreur, 1792-1794, d'après des documents authentiques et inédits.
Rocquain, F. L'Esprit Révolutionnaire avant la Révolution.
Tissot, P. F. Histoire complète de la Révolution Française.
Vatel, Ch. Charlotte Corday.
Young, Arthur. Voyages en France pendant les années 1787-89.
Traduction de M. Le Sage; Introduction par L. de Lavergne.
INTRODUCTION
I
This volume is neither a diary nor a narrative. To have given it either of these forms, each of which has its obvious advantages, would have extended it beyond all reasonable limits. It is simply a selection from my very full memoranda of a series of visits paid to different parts of France during the year 1889.
These visits would never have been made, had not my previous acquaintance with France and with French affairs, going back now—such as it is—to the early days of the Second Empire, given me reasonable ground to hope that I might get some touch of the actual life and opinions of the people in the places to which I went. My motive for making these visits was the fact that what it has become the fashion to call 'parliamentary government,' or, in other words, the unchecked administration of the affairs of a great people by the directly elected representatives of the people, is now formally on its trial in France. We do not live under this form of government in the United States, but as a thoughtless tendency towards this form of government has shown itself of late years even in the United States and much more strongly in Great Britain, I thought it worth while to see it at work and form some notion of its results in France.
Republican Switzerland has carefully sought to protect herself against this form of government. The Swiss Constitution of 1874 reposes ultimately on the ancient autonomy of the Cantons. Each Canton has one representative in the Federal Executive Council. The members of this Council are elected for three years by the Federal Assembly, and from among their own number they choose the President of the Confederation, who serves for one year only—a provision probably borrowed from the first American Constitution. The Cantonal autonomy was further strengthened in 1880 by the establishment of the Federal Tribunal on lines taken from those of the American Supreme Court. There is a division of the Executive authority between the Federal Assembly and the Federal Council, which is yet to be tested by the strain of a great European war, but which has so far developed no serious domestic dangers.
The outline map which accompanies this volume will show that my visits, which began with Marseilles and the Bouches-du-Rhône, upon my return from Rome to Paris in January 1889, on the eve of the memorable election of General Boulanger as a deputy for the Seine in that month, were extended to Nancy in the east of France, to the frontiers of Belgium and the coasts of the English Channel in the north, to Rennes, Nantes, and Bordeaux in the west, and to Toulouse, Nîmes, and Arles in the south. I went nowhere without the certainty of meeting persons who could and would put me in the way of seeing what I wanted to see, and learning what I wanted to learn. I took with me everywhere the best books I could find bearing on the true documentary history of the region I was about to see, and I concerned myself in making my memoranda not only with the more or less fugitive aspects of public action and emotion at the present time, but with the past, which has so largely coloured and determined these fugitive aspects. Naturally, therefore, when I sat down to put this volume into shape, I very soon found it to be utterly out of the question for me to try to do justice to all that had interested and instructed me in every part of France which I had visited.
I have contented myself accordingly with formulating, in this Introduction, my general convictions as to the present condition and outlook of affairs in France and as to the relation which actually exists between the Third Republic, now installed in power at Paris, and the great historic France of the French people; and with submitting to my readers, in support of these convictions, a certain number of digests of my memoranda, setting forth what I saw, heard, and learned in some of the departments which I visited with most pleasure and profit.
In doing this I have written out what I found in my note-books less fully than the importance of the questions involved might warrant. But what I have written, I have written out fairly and as exactly as I could. I do not hold myself responsible for the often severe and sometimes scornful judgments pronounced by my friends in the provinces upon public men at Paris. But I had no right to modify or withhold them. In the case of conversations held with friends, or with casual acquaintances, I have used names only where I had reason to believe that, adding weight to what was recorded, they might be used without injury or inconvenience of any kind to my interlocutors.
The sum of my conclusions is suggested in the title of this book. I speak of France as one thing, and of the Republic as another thing. I do not speak of the French Republic, for the Republic as it now exists does not seem to me to be French, and France, as I have found it, is certainly not Republican.
II
The Third French Republic, as it exists to-day, is just ten years old.
It owes its being, not to any direct action of the French people, but to the success of a Parliamentary revolution, chiefly organised by M. Gambetta. The ostensible object of this revolution was to prevent the restoration of the French Monarchy. The real object of it was to take the life of the executive authority in France. M. Gambetta fell by the way, but the evil he did lives after him.
He was one of the celebrities of an age in which celebrity has almost ceased to be a distinction. But the measure of his political capacity is given in the fact that he was an active promoter of the insurrection of September 4, 1870, in Paris against the authority of the Empress Eugénie. A more signal instance is not to be found in history of that supreme form of public stupidity which President Lincoln stigmatised, in a memorable phrase, as the operation of 'swapping horses while crossing a stream.'
It was worse than an error or a crime, it was simply silly. The inevitable effect of it was to complete the demoralisation of the French armies, and to throw France prostrate before her conquerors. A very well-known German said to me a few years ago at Lucerne, where we were discussing the remarkable trial of Richter, the dynamiter of the Niederwald: 'Ah! we owe much to Gambetta, and Jules Favre, and Thiers, and the French Republic. They saved us from a social revolution by paralysing France. We could never have exacted of the undeposed Emperor at Wilhelmshöhe, with the Empress at Paris, the terms which those blubbering jumping-jacks were glad to accept from us on their knees.'
The imbecility of September 4, 1870, was capped by the lunacy of the Commune of Paris in 1871. This latter was more than France could bear, and a wholesome breeze of national feeling stirs in the 'murders grim and great,' by which the victorious Army of Versailles avenged the cowardly massacre of the hostages, and the destruction of the Tuileries and the Hôtel de Ville.
With what 'mandate,' and by whom conferred, M. Thiers went to Bordeaux in 1871, is a thorny question, into which I need not here enter. What he might have done for his country is, perhaps, uncertain. What he did we know. He founded a republic of which, in one of his characteristic phrases, he said that: 'it must be Conservative, or it could not be,' and this he did with the aid of men without whose concurrence it would have been impossible, and of whom he knew perfectly well that they were fully determined the Republic should not be Conservative. He became Chief of the State, and this for a time, no doubt, he imagined would suffice to make the State Conservative.
He was supported by an Assembly in which the Monarchists of France predominated. The triumphant invasion and the imminent peril of the country had brought monarchical France into the field as one man. M. Gambetta's absurd Government of the National Defence, even in that supreme moment of danger when the Uhlans were hunting it from pillar to post, actually compelled the Princes of the House of France to fight for their country under assumed names, but it could not prevent the sons of all the historic families of France from risking their lives against the public enemy. All over France a general impulse of public confidence put the French Conservatives forward as the men in whose hands the reconstitution of the shattered nation would be safest. The popular instinct was justified by the result.
From 1871 to 1877, France was governed, under the form of a republic, by a majority of men who neither had, nor professed to have, any more confidence in the stability of a republican form of government, than Alexander Hamilton had in the working value of the American Constitution which he so largely helped to frame, and which he accepted as being the best it was possible in the circumstances to get. But they did their duty to France, as he did his duty to America. To them—first under M. Thiers, and then under the Maréchal-Duc de Magenta—France is indebted for the reconstruction of her beaten and disorganised army, for the successful liquidation of the tremendous war-indemnity imposed upon her by victorious Germany, for the re-establishment of her public credit, and for such an administration of her national finances as enabled her, in 1876, to raise a revenue of nearly a thousand millions of francs, or forty millions of pounds sterling, in excess of the revenue raised under the Empire seven years before, without friction and without undue pressure. In 1869, the Empire had raised a revenue of 1,621,390,248 francs. In 1876, the Conservative Republic raised a revenue of 2,570,505,513 francs. With this it covered all the cost of the public service, carried the charges resulting from the war and its consequences, set apart 204,000,000 francs for public works, and yet left in the Treasury a balance of 98,000,000 francs.
It is told of one of the finance ministers of the Restoration, Baron Louis, that when a deputy questioned him once about the finances, he replied, 'Do you give us good politics and I will give you good finances.' It seems to me that the budget of 1876 proves the politics of the Conservative majority in the French Parliament of that time to have been good. The Maréchal-Duc de Magenta was then president. M. Thiers had resigned his office in 1873, in consequence of a dispute with the Assembly, the true history of which may one day be edifying, and the Assembly had elected the Maréchal-Duc to fill his place.
I have been told by one of the most distinguished public men in France that, in his passionate desire to prevent the election of the Maréchal Duc, M. Thiers was bent upon promoting a movement to bring against the soldier of Magenta an accusation like that which led to the condemnation of the Maréchal Bazaine, and that he was with difficulty restrained from doing this.
Monstrous as this attempt would have been, it hardly seems more monstrous than the abortive attempt which was actually made, under the inspiration of M. Gambetta and his friends, to convict the Maréchal Duc and his ministers, 'the men of the 16th of May,' of conspiring, while in possession of the executive power, to bring about the overthrow of the Republic and the restoration of the Monarchy.
M. Gambetta and his party having formed in 1877 what is known as 'the alliance of the 363,' determined to drive the Maréchal-Duc from the Presidency, to take the control of public affairs entirely into their own hands, and to reduce the Executive to the position created for Louis XVI. by the revolutionists of the First Republic, before the atrocious plot of August 10, 1792, made an end of the monarchy and of public order altogether, and prepared the way for the massacres of September. Whether the Maréchal-Duc might not have resisted this revolutionary conspiracy to the end it is not worth while now to inquire. Suffice it that he gave way finally, and, refusing to submit to the degradation of the high post he held, accepted M. Gambetta's alternative and relinquished it.
It appears to me that the true aim of the Republicans (who had carried the elections of 1877 by persuading France that Germany would at once invade the country if the Conservatives won the day) is sufficiently attested by the fact that they chose, as the successor of the Maréchal-Duc, a public man chiefly conspicuous for the efforts he had made to secure the abolition of the Executive office!
M. Grévy had failed to get the Presidency of the Republic suppressed when the organic law was passed in 1875. He was more successful when, on January 30, 1879, he consented to accept the Presidency. When he entered the Elysée, the executive authority went out of it. The Third French Republic, such as it now exists, was constituted on that day—the anniversary, by the way, oddly enough, of the decapitation of Charles I. of England at Whitehall.
That is the date, not 'centennial,' but 'decennial,' which ought to have been celebrated in 1889 by the Third French Republic. In his first Message, February 7, 1879, M. Grévy formally said: 'I will never resist the national will expressed by its constitutional organs.' From that moment the parliamentary majority became the Government of France.
Something very like this French parliamentary revolution of 1879 to which France is indebted for the Third Republic as it exists to-day, was attempted in the United States about ten years before.
In both instances the intent of the parliamentary revolutionists was to take the life of a Constitution without modifying its forms. The failure of the American is not less instructive than the success of the French parliamentary revolution, and as all my readers, perhaps, are not as familiar with American political history as with some other topics, I hope I may be pardoned for briefly pointing this out.
Upon the assassination of President Lincoln in April 1865 the Vice-President, Andrew Johnson, became President. He was a Southern man, and as one of the Senators from the Southern State of Tennessee he had refused to go with his State in her secession from the Union. To this he owed his association on the Presidential ticket with Mr. Lincoln at the election in 1864. He was no more and no less opposed to slavery in the abstract than President Lincoln, of whom it is well known that he regarded his own now famous proclamation of 1863 freeing the slaves in the seceded States, as an illegal concession to the Anti-Slavery feeling of the North and of Europe, and that he spoke of it with undisguised contempt, as a 'Pope's bull against the comet.' Like Mr. Lincoln, Andrew Johnson was devoted to the Union, but he was a Constitutional Democrat in his political opinions, and the Civil War having ended in the defeat of the Confederacy, he gradually settled down to his constitutional duty, as President of the United States, towards the States which had formed the Confederacy. This earned for him the bitter hostility of the then dominant majority in both Houses of Congress, led by a man of unbridled passions and of extraordinary energy, Thaddeus Stevens, a representative from Pennsylvania, a sort of American Couthon, infirm of body but all compact of will. It was the purpose of this majority to humiliate and chastise, not to conciliate, the defeated South. Already, under President Lincoln, this purpose had brought the leaders of the majority more than once into collision with the Executive. Under President Johnson they forced a collision with the Veto power of the President, by two unconstitutional bills, one attainting the whole people of the South, and the other aimed at the authority of the Executive over his officers. In the policy thus developed they had the co-operation of the Secretary at War, Mr. Stanton, and during the recess of Congress in August 1867 it became apparent that with his assistance they meant to subjugate the Executive. President Johnson quickly brought matters to an issue. He first, during the recess, suspended Mr. Stanton from the War Office, putting General Grant in charge of it, and upon the reassembling of Congress in December 1867 'removed' him, and directed him to hand over his official portfolio to General Thomas, appointed to fill the place ad interim. Thereupon the majority of the House carried through that body a resolution of impeachment, prepared, by a committee, the necessary articles, and brought the President to trial before the Senate, constituted as a court for 'high crimes and misdemeanours.' Two of the articles of impeachment were founded upon disrespect alleged to have been publicly shown by the President to Congress. The President, by his counsel, among whom were Mr. Evarts, since then Secretary of State, and now a Senator for New York, and Mr. Stanberry, an Attorney-General of the United States, appeared before the Senate on March 13, 1868. The President asked for forty days, in which to prepare an answer. The Senate, without a division, refused this, and ordered the answer to be filed within ten days. The trial finally began on March 30, and, after keeping the country at fever-heat for two months, ended on May 26, in the failure of the impeachment. Only three out of the eleven articles were voted upon. Upon each thirty-five Senators voted the President to be 'Guilty,' and nineteen Senators voted him to be 'Not guilty.' As the Constitution of the United States requires a two-thirds vote in such a trial, the Chief Justice declared the President to be acquitted, and the attempt of the Legislature to dominate the Executive was defeated. Seven of the nineteen Senators voting 'Not guilty' were of the Republican party which had impeached the President, and it will be seen that a change of one vote in the minority would have carried the day for the revolutionists. So narrow was our escape from a peril which the founders of the Constitution had foreseen, and against which they had devised all the safeguards possible in the circumstances of the United States. What, in such a case, would become of a French President?
The American President is not elected by Congress except in certain not very probable contingencies, and when the House votes for a President, it votes not by members but by delegations, each state of the Union casting one vote. The French President is elected by a convention of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, in which every member has a vote, and the result is determined by an actual majority. The Senate of the United States is entirely independent of the House. A large proportion of the members of the French Senate are elected by the Assembly, and the Chamber outnumbers the Senate by nearly two to one. What the procedure of the French Senate, sitting as a High Court on the impeachment of a President by the majority of the Chamber, would probably be, may be gathered from the recent trial by that body of General Boulanger.
With the resignation of the Maréchal-Duc and the election of M. Grévy the Government of France, ten years ago, became what it now is—a parliamentary oligarchy, with absolutely no practical check upon its will except the recurrence every four years of the legislative elections. And as these elections are carried out under the direct control, through the prefects and the mayors, of the Minister of the Interior, himself a member of the parliamentary oligarchy, the weakness of this check might be easily inferred, had it not been demonstrated by facts during the elections of September 22 and October 6, 1889.
How secure this parliamentary oligarchy feels itself to be, when once the elections are over, appears from the absolutely cynical coolness with which the majority goes about what is called the work of 'invalidating' the election of members of the minority. Something of the sort went on in my own country during the 'Reconstruction' period which followed the Civil War, but it never assumed the systematic form now familiar in France. As practised under the Third Republic it revives the spirit of the methods by which Robespierre and the sections 'corrected the mistakes' made by the citizens of Paris in choosing representatives not amenable to the discipline of the 'sea-green incorruptible'; and as a matter of principle, leads straight on to that usurpation of all the powers of the State by a conspiracy of demagogues which followed the subsidized Parisian insurrection of August 10, 1792.
Such a régime as this sufficiently explains the phenomenon of 'Boulangism,' by which Englishmen and Americans are so much perplexed. Put any people into the machinery of a centralized administrative despotism in which the Executive is merely the instrument of a majority of the legislature, and what recourse is there left to the people but 'Boulangism'? 'Boulangism' is the instinctive, more or less deliberate and articulate, outcry of a people living under constitutional forms, but conscious that, by some hocus-pocus, the vitality has been taken out of those forms. It is the expression of the general sense of insecurity. In a country situated as France now is, it is natural that this inarticulate outcry should merge itself at first into a clamour for the revision of a Constitution which has been made a delusion and a snare; and then into a clamour for a dynasty which shall afford the nation assurance of an enduring Executive raised above the storm of party passions, and sobering the triumph of party majorities with a wholesome sense of responsibility to the nation.
There would have been no lack of 'Boulangism' in France forty years ago had M. Thiers and his legislative cabal got the better of the Prince President in the 'struggle for life' which then went on between the Place St.-Georges and the Elysée!