THE REPUBLICAN REVISIONISTS. T HERE is a party in France, little
noticed here, but with considerable influence at home, especially, we are told, among the bureaucracy, which desires the revision of the Constitution without desiring the rule either of a Bonaparte or a Bourbon. Its leaders, among whom M. Deschanel, the brilliant President of the Chamber, may one day be reckoned, think that, loyalty of the older type being dead in France, a Republic best meets her necessities, but that the present organisation of the Republic suits neither the circumstances of the time . nor the historic genius of the people. The former require that "authority "—the power of restraining and the right to initiate—should be as strong as in a Monarchy, because otherwise the social cleavages in France, the deep-seated jealousies of the social strata, might ultimately, or even speedily, produce a civil war. Moreover, the two colliding facts of France to which M. Dupuy recently pointed, the adoption at once of universal suffrage and of a universal conscription, require a strong hand to reconcile them, and keep the one from throttling. it may be even strangling, the other. The latter, that is. the inherent genius of the people, points to a strong desire among them, apparent throughout their history, for a visible chief of the State, a man to whom they can appeal for guidance in emergencies, in whom they can trust to put down all disorder, and who shall " represent " worthily on all occasions the brilliant and awe-inspiring being, with the history which never wearies us, who is in their thoughts whenever they speak, as they incessantly speak, of "France." The people were bred for generations under a. dynasty ; had it remained competent they would never have parted with it; and they seek even now, of ten unconsciously, for the chief of their dreams, who will lend them cohesion instead of oppressing them, who will bring them the external successes and the internal happiness to both of which they are devoted, and to whom in reward they will give all the magnificence and all the adulation he can wish. They long for a Henri Quatre holding his seat by their favour. The Republican Revisionists desire, therefore, that the President of the Republic should be chosen by the whole people; that he should be irremovable for ten years, and then be re-eligible ; that he should have all the powers of the American President, including the veto —which is not anti-Republican if the President repre- sents the whole people—and these powers in addition : that he should be represented in the Chambers for pur- poses of information and argument by Ministers respon- sible only to himself, and that he should have the right of dissolution. The Executive, they say, would then be permanent for long periods, the policy of France would be continuous and persistent, and yet the people, besides their right of free criticism, would be able to express all their wishes, and in great measure, through their ultimate control of the purse, would be able to enforce them. This, some Revisionists say,was the Constitution of which Thiers was dreaming, though for his own purposes, or through some distrust of the people, he spoiled it by leaving the election of the chief of the State to the Chambers, and making the Ministry responsible to their votes. The first blunder destroyed the Presidency, upon which the Chambers have ever since been encroaching, until it is now a mere Mayoralty ; while the second has produced that perpetual change of Ministers which, besides im- pairing all consistency of policy, has increased to a dangerous degree the hold of the permanent and irremovable civilians upon the springs of administration. France is really governed in detail by clerks of whose names no one ever heard, who are very badly paid, and who may not be, sometimes are not, insensible to gifts and smiles. We should greatly like to see this experiment tried, and fully believe that one day it will be, though at pre- sent the military element in France may prove too strong. Such a Republic is certainly more in accord with the genius of the nation than the present system, which has brought to the front neither genius nor energy, the " plain " President governing through "plain men," who weary France with their plainness with- out filling up her social cleavages or securing her against military revolt, and it is, of course, pos- sible to secure it without a revolution. The day M. Faure resigns the Chambers become a Convention with unlimited powers, and can remodel the Constitution in this way as in any other. We have no hope that they will, though apparently M. Deschanel has, for passions are too strong and the ring of the steel scabbard too audible; but we can see but three theoretical objections to the scheme. One is the difficulty of believing that any considerable Frenchman who could make himself visible to the whole population—a most difficult task for any one but a soldier—placed in so splendid a position, and in- vested with such vast powers, would not use both to found for himself a throne. The desire of the sovereignty, with its delicious gratifications to amour propre, is strong in all French hearts, and has produced in every dynasty con- cealed Pretenders. It is true the difficulty has never arisen in, or ever appeared likely to arise in, the United States ; but America is not France, Anglo-Saxon ambi- tions are not the ambitions of Frenchmen, and in the Union there is no third of the population always under military law. Even Marshal MacMahon, with his high sense of duty, was pressed to strike a coup d'etat, and a Marshal MacMahon will always be in France the most formidable candidate. Tile people feel the value of the soldier, which no doubt is great in a country subject to invasion, as they do not that of any civil quality or force. Then there is the danger that if the executive and the legislative powers are separated, they will either come to blows, or by their opposition bring the Constitution to a deadlock. That catastrophe, often imminent in the United States, has been hitherto avoided, but it has been by compromises which in France, where compromise is considered illogical, would be denounced as "transactions," and by the display of patience which to any race not of Teutonic blood is simply impossible. The French would make short work of a constitution which compelled them to wait four years for a chance of Legislature and Executive pulling to- gether, while a delay such as is now occurring at Washing- ton in the ratification of the Spanish Treaty would fill the streets of Paris with rioters. The Executive would, therefore, always be trying to govern the Chambers, and as the most promising method would probably manipulate the elections by processes from the possibility of which America is free. If the Executive succeeded in returning a "well-disposed "—that is, a, submissive—LPgislature, the President would be despotic, as Napoleon III. really 1911,8 while if it failed he would be discredited to a. degree that would almost destroy his usefulness. And lastly, the Executive in France, if really strong, might not be able to bear the Assembly's full control of the purse- strings. Not to mention that a great President might often wish to increase the Army or the Navy by decree, he would permanently wish to prevent that dissipation of resources for electoral purposes which is the first cause of the financial difficulties of the country. In this endeavour he would probably be beaten. The instinct of a demo- cracy is not to save, but to spend upon itself, and the first evil of the present Republic could not be cured by any Revision which left to the representatives of the people the control of the purse. Extravagance is feebly checked even in England, while there is not a real Monarchy in the world which would bear for a year that amazing Pension List which in America produces deficits, and which, in spite of incessant exposures, continually creeps up, each Representative in Congress fearing that if he votes against it he will at the election lose his seat. There is, however, no Constitution which has not its own defects, and of the one shadowed forth by Republican Revisionists we can at least say that it would secure order, would give the nation a leader with great powers, and would continue in spirit the history of France.
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