THE DEFEAT OF COMMUNISM IN FRANCE.
NEXT to the defeat of Opportunism, the most momentous result of the French Elections is undoubtedly the collapse of Communism. That the Socialists should be at a disadvantage in rural districts lies in the nature of things, for not even an English squire has a keener sense of the rights of property, or is less disposed to share his possessions with the multitude, than a French peasant ; but that the avalte's.should be so completely out of the running in their very head-quarters, that they should have failed to secure the return of a solitary member of their party for all Paris, is a fact whose significance there is no mistaking. We are not, of course, speaking of Liberals with Socialist leanings, but of combatant Communists, pur sang, like Eudes, Valliant, Joffrin, Lessagaray, and Felix Pyat, the most favoured of whom did not receive 40,000 votes, while Pyat had less than 10,000. The Anarchists make no show whatever, perhaps because they fol- lowed the advice of M. Elisee Reolus, who strongly urged them to enter a silent protest against the 'existingorder by taking no part in the General Election. But it beirig a notorious fact that the Anarchists are the smallest of the fractions into which the Socialist Party is divided, it is not likely that though they had voted to a man the outcome would have been materially or even perceptibly different. On the other hand, it is equally notorious that in times past the workmen of Paris did hold ex- treme Communistic opinions, and on two memorable occasions, in 1849 and 1871, they risked their lives and shed their blood in the vindication of their theories. We have a right to infer, then, that some appearances to the contrary notwith- standing, a great change has taken place in the views, and there- fore in the character, of the populace of Paris. In support of this 'conclusion, other and perhaps still more significant facts than those we have already mentioned, may be adduced. In 1849, Felix Pyat was elected by 116,185 votes ; in 1871 he received 145,872 ; in 1885 less than 10,000. Gambon, who had 136,249 votes in 1871, got only 50,116 on October 4th ; while Rochefort, despite 'his popularity with the masses and the influence he wields as editor of the Intransigeant, received S1,000 fewer votes in 1885 than in 1871. On the other hand, Floquet, who had only 93,579 votes in 1871, won on Sunday week last with 263,722, while Lockroy's record rose from 134,583 to 272,850,1314menceau's from 95,144 to 202,443, and Brisson's from 115,594 to 215,813. The register at the two periods in question, it may be well to observe, shows no great difference, the numbers borne thereon being 547,858 in 1871 and 563,438 in 1885. Another curious and equally significant fact is mentioned by the Paris Correspondent of the Gazette de Lausanne, in a letter written on October 5th, when the result was still in doubt. This gentleman "assisted," in the French sense, at the °omit- ing' of the ballots in several quarters of the capital, and these are his observations thereupon :—"In each arrondissement the polling-places were much frequented, and though none of the candidates of the Right should succeed, they will come very near it, for everywhere except in districts exclusively popular, the number of Conservative balloting-papers found in the urns is considerable. These papers were, for the most part, intact, without any names struck out and replaced by others, whereas the Republican lists were frequently altered by the reabstitation of the names of less advanced candidates." It would Urns appear that many reputedly Socialist and Radical voters gave -their support to candidates of more moderate views than those whose names figured in theefficird lists of theirrespeotive parties. And their motives in so acting must have been quite as much distrust of Communism as hostility to the policy of expediency and-ex- peditions which has involved the country in so inanymisfortunes, since to that policy Radicals, Socialists, and Conservatives are equally opposed. Fot the moment, at least, the Opportunism of M. Ferry is as dead as the Del gratia theories of the late Count de Chambord. It is, therefore, a safe inference that in Paris, as well as in the country at large, Communism has lost much of the influence it once unquestionably possessed, and that the inherent conservatism of the Democracy is prevailing against the wild theories of dootrinaire Jacobins and the sub- versive proposals of fanatical philanthropists. This result is, no doubt, in great part due to the violence with which revolutionary Socialists have urged their views, and to the irreconcilable differences of opinion which have split them up into warring factions. They never have a meeting that does not end either in a fiasco or a fight ; and a party rent by domestic strife is a party foredoomed to failure and discredit. But the decay of Socialism revealed by the recent elections must be ascribed in still greater measure to the freedom of the Press, which, since the final downfall of Imperialism in the person of Marshal Ma,cMahon, has obtained in France. Without that freedom, and the other liberties by which it was accompanied and followed, the pretensions of Communism could not have been put forward in all their nakedness, nor its fallacies exposed. The license of language in which Social Revolutionists have indulged, their theory of pro- paganda by action—in other words by murder and pillage--openly advocated in popular publications, has both alarmed the moderate and alienated the masses. The average Paris workman may still have many Communistic notions ; but he no longer believes that he can better his condition by destroying the State, or bring about a social millennium by setting fire to the city in which he lives. As revolutions are bred by repression, so freedom is the surest antidote to error. The Government of Louis Philippe, which restricted 'the suffrage and muzzled the Press, ended in the Revolution of 1848, and was followed by the terrible rising of 1849; while the still more despotic regime of Louis Napoleon had its outcome in the yet more terrible cataclysm of 1871. On the other hand, after fourteen years of Republican govern- ment, and seven of complete freedom of the platform and the Press, universal suffrage peacefully pronounces the doom of a policy which has failed, and a party which it distrusts, and • millions of Frenchmen record their votes without a single act of violence or breach of the peace. No more striking instance of the enlightening effects of liberty, and the conservative tendency of popular institutions, has been witnessed by this generation. To see the old system of coercion and repression in operation, -and the effects it produces, we have only to turn to Germany and Austria. If Prince Bismarck would put down Social Democracy, let him unmuzzle the Press, and meet error with the only weapons by which it can be successfully en- countered—argument and discussion. To deny your opponents a hearing is a virtual admission that you are unable to con- front them ; and the "minor state of siege" has probably done more to recruit the ranks of Social Democracy than all the efforts of the police have done to deplete them. It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that Anarchism is completely quenched in France. It has still partisans, and they will doubtless continue to make themselves heard ; but eerutin de liste has practically given them a political death- stroke. Neither they nor their revolutionary allies of less advanced views are anywhere strong enough to put forward lists of their own with any hope of carrying their men, and under the system of list-voting an independent candidate has- not the least chance of success. On the principle of throwing a sprat to catch a -whale, the more advanced Republicans may on occasion include in their lists the names of two or three ordinary (not revolutionary) Socialists, in the hope of thereby inducing Socialist electors to vote the entire ticket. This is the case just now in Paris, -where Radicals of every shade are sinking their differences and closing up their ranks to meet the enemy by .whom their supremacy has been so rudely shaken. No more incongruous political team was probably ever got together. Barodet is coupled with 016mencean, Allain Targe with Respell. Ives Guyot, an orthodox econo- mist, whose books have been translated by the Cobden Club, is in the same boat -with Basly, a soi-disant workman who hot made a fortune by selling strong drink-to miners and organising strikes; and Dr. -Paul Bert, who has been a member of more than one Opportunist Ministry, is cheek-by-jowl with Roche- fort, who denounces Opportunists''the bane of the country, and protests that their leader, M. Ferry, deserves to lose his head. These gentlemen entreat Republicans of every sort to rally to their support, and vote the list, the whole list, and nothing but the list ; and there is little doubt that at to- morrow's balloting all the thirty-four comprised in the list will be elected, and that Paris, by an unanimous vote, will reject both militant Communism and Ferryan Opportunism. But be the result what it may, doctrinaire Jacobinism, of which Oppor- tunism is only a phase, as well as militant Communism, has suffered a reverse from the effects of which it is not likely soon to recover. The Radicals have declared against them, so have the Conservatives ; and men who the other day were applauding the policy of M. Ferry to the echo, are now the loudest in denouncing the ex-Premier and all his works. Whether the Democracy have saved the Republic time alone can tell ; but they have certainly saved the State from a great danger, and if the Republican majority do not profit by the lesson, and adopt a policy of peace, retrenchment, and moderation, they will have only themselves to blame for the further retribution which will be sure, sooner or later, to overtake them.
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