31 OCTOBER 1874, Page 4

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

PRINCE JEROME NAPOLEON'S BID.

ONLY one event could make a manifesto by Prince Napoleon of importance to, the world, but then that one would make it so very important that his utterances deserve more than a passing comment. Although he is perhaps the ablest, and on one point, the most determined Jacobin in Europe, a Prince in France and Italy, a great orator, and full of experi- ence in affairs, he will never be for himself the head of a great party. The priests dread him, the Monarchists hate him, the Bonapartists are jealous of him, and the Republicans will none of him. He is a mere voice, which summons all parties, which all parties hear, but which none of them will follow. The death, however, of Louis Napoleon, still a lad, and not a very strong one, would at once make his cousin Jerome one of the most formidable personages in Europe. Nothing can be more strange, but nothing is more true, than that the founder of the Empire contrived to impress his Family Law deeply on the imagination of his people. That law had absolutely nothing to justify it except the will of the great conqueror. It was con- trary to all usual laws of succession, for it gave the preference to the descendants of the younger sons of Charles and Letitia Bonaparte; it was contrary to the democratic feeling of which the family professes to be the executive hand, for it confined the succession to the Bonapartes born in the purple ;' and it was contrary to the radical idea of Ca3sarism, for it left the people no free choice. Nevertheless, it succeeded. All kinds of stories have been circulated about the legitimacy of some of the Napoleons ; all kinds of men have appeared within the family ; all kinds of ambitions have been known to be enter- tained, but from the death of the Due de Reichstadt the French, so far as they are Bonapartists, have never swerved from their adherence to the family law, have never given to any Bonaparte unnamed in it any political position, have never regarded any but the heir as a serious pretender. So strong is the feeling, that even in Corsica, where Napoleonism is a religion, a word from the legal heir, though a lad living in exile and in England, struck his cousin, with all his popular opinions, out of the Council-General ; and the journals, not only of the Imperialist party, but of all parties, denounce the angry letter which followed as an act of treason. All Prince Jerome's professions of Jacobin opinions, all his endeavours to found a faction, all his undoubted ability, were as nothing when weighed against the wish of a lad, whose title to wish is that he is not the nearest relative but is the legal repre- sentative of a Founder from whom he, nevertheless, does not descend. If the Prince Imperial had been Napoleon L's grandson, such a condition of feeling would have been natural enough, but he is no whit nearer to him than his rival, or rather, he is one degree farther off. Nevertheless, that rival has no chance whatever. In vain does he declare, in his manifesto to the electors of Ajaccio, that he always coun- selled the Emperor wisely, that he resisted the expedition to Mexico and the declaration of war, that the Dictatorship is no longer necessary, that France should accept peace without barren recriminations, that the Government should be democratic and reforming, that taxation should be modified in the interest of the greatest number—a direct bid for the peasants—that priests should have no rights except in church, that education should be compulsory, that the liberty of the Press and the right of association should be guarded by the State. The Corsicans adhere to the Prince of whom they know nothing, and in all France no effective party will seriously regard the ablest and most Jacobin of living Bonapartes.

It is all his character, say our contemporaries. That is precisely what we doubt. If it were so, his utterances would not deserve study, for he would never have a chance of putting his ideas in force, but we doubt the accu- racy of the conclusion. If Prince Louis were to die, Prince Jerome would be the heir, and the exigencies of the great Bonapartist ' party would compel it to accept him with little more than a momentary demur. They could not afford to split into two factions. They could not run an un- known Bonaparte who had no sort of legal claim. They could not submit the rivalries to the judgment of the people, and so exchange hereditary Csesarism for Cresarism vested in such descendant of Charles Bonaparte as a plebiscite would select. That would be to restore the days of the Valois, when a Child of France was sacrosanct, and perhaps of all men in France the one most liable to be killed by the assassin. They must accept Prince Jerome, and they would. It is nonsense to talk of the Empress. The Empress is only powerful as guardian of her son. It is useless to speak of M. Rouher as disliked by the Jerome family. Half the Princes of history have ruled through agents they detested, or feared, or despised. Are the Hohenzollerns so fond of Bismarck ? It is vain to talk of the suspicion existing in the Army. These accusations of cowardice are made against enemies for ever—they were made against Wellington and Napoleon—and are usually absurdly false, five men in six, when Sovereigns, being able to meet danger with all requisite composure. Even when they are true, as appears to have been the ease with Vladimir the Great, James L, and Louis XIV., they make no real difference in the estimation of mankind, who ask of their kings' qualities other than those which make them capable of leading forlorn- hopes. A new legend would gather about Napoleon V. at once, with just as little basis as the old one ; his manner, which has cost him more friends than his supposed dislike to shot, woul4 be declared natural in a King—it must be very like the manner of Louis XVDI.—and his remarkable intelligence would give him the ascendancy over the kind of men—the vivid men—whom Napoleon lit. never could endure. Incapacity would be a rear difficulty in a Casa; but Prince Jerome, of all men alive, and in politics, is one of the least incapable. He might do as much mischief as every one of his race has done, except Napoleon II., who never had the opportunity, but it would not be from want of brains. The obstacles in his path are Republicanism and the Prince Imperial, not himself, or the " chiefs " whom he denounces with so much injudicious temper.

Supposing Prince Jerome then, ever to mount the throne., what kind of policy does his letter to the electors of Ajaccis foreshadow,—of policy, that is, different from that of Napoleon ILL? We should say just none at all. He would be, as Emperor, just as different from himself as aspirant, just as closely hemmed-in by circumstances, and just as unable to break with old policies, as Crown Princes when they mount the throne always prove themselves to be. He would obey " tha- law of his being," as the physicists call it, as much as anybody else. The Dictatorship, he hints, would end ; but if a Dictator- ship is not wanted, why is a Napoleon I—not to mention that a Jacobin Bonaparte is the most dictatorial personage one can well imagine. He would keep the peace he says, and we do not doubt him, till a strong cry arose in France for war, in which ease war would be declared. He says he would re- organise the Army on a democratic basis, and so he would, as far as the Army would let him, which is a very little way. He would, he pledges himself, confine the priest to the sanctuary; but as the sanctuary is just the place whence the priest derives his power, he would ultimately have to arrive, like Napoleon DI., at some modue vivendi with the Church. Hewould, he promises, modify taxation to the benefit of the many, but as he would have to get in his taxes, and as "the rich" could not pay ninety millions a year, and as indirect taxes do not benefit the many, he would have to tax property once more, and in France property is held by almost the whole people.. His special promises, even if he attained power, could amount to nothing, for to keep himself at the top he must repress, and keeping himself at the top would seem to him, as to other kings, the first of political duties. He does not promise a free representative government, and without that any chief of the Executive in France who wants to found a dynasty will pursue the same course. If he really seeks to democratise and reform all institutions, his business is to support the Republic, which in France can do that work best, and the best measure of sup- port would be to efface himself. It is only as the possible chief of the Bonapartes that he is important, and the mere fact that he feels his importance and makes bids proves that it is his capacity as potential Emperor of which he still thinks. He is a potential Emperor, but it is not in virtue of promises of which, should he succeed, he will never be able to fulfil one.