NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THEfate of the French Ministry was on Friday evening again trembling in the balance ; but the vote will not reach us in time. The subject of a debate in the Chamber con- tinued for three days, was a Bill proposed by Government to give them power to stop and punish the Anarchist Press. The Bill is drastic, one clause conceding the right of summary confiscation, if the Government conceives the language of a newspaper to be dangerous to the State; and it is resisted from many quarters. The Left denounce it as fatal to liberty, and the Right as useless, the true evils being either the spread of irreligion through the laicising policy of the Republic, or the weakness of the Cabinet in allowing revolutionary speeches and meetings among workmen. The debate was remarkable for the appearance of a new orator, M. Deschanel, who captivated the Chamber by a speech directed against Socialism, and for the great success of M. Loubet in the Tribune. The French Premier is obviously a man of unusual debating power; and his point that if a Ministry intends to oppress the Press, it will do it against law rather than through its agency, seems to have weighed heavily with the Chamber.
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