TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE IDEA IN THE REVOLT.
THE Revolt, having mastered Paris, has put forth its pro- gramme. On this day week, Admiral Saisset, having been appointed by the Government to the command of the National Guard, entered Paris in order to estimate his forces. He found the Moderate Battalions still holding the region of which the Bourse is the centre, but dispirited by the quiescence of the Assembly, angry at the emigration of Ministers to Versailles, and afraid of the soldiers who had joined the Red Battalions under the orders of the Central Committee. He found that upwards of 100,000 armed men obeyed the orders of the military leaders of the Revolt ; that they were directed by Bergeret, Henri, and Assi, three men with some military ability; that their main positions were protected by barricades and defended by cannon ; and that within his own command there were no battalions which could be implicitly relied on, and no artillery- men at all. He found that within the Red ranks there were fanatics enough to fight a battle on a great scale, and he withdrew in disguise to tell the Ministry at Versailles that they must either yield to Paris or conquer her, and that to conquer her would take an army of 100,000 men. Just before his departure he issued an order author- izing all the Moderate Battalions to disband themselves, and the departure was immediately followed by the occu- pation of their quarter. The Red stream flowed all over Paris, and by Sunday the only authority in the capital was that of the Red Central Committee. This body, willing, like all despots, to legalize its authority, had resolved to call a Parliament for Paris, and on Sunday the elections for the Commune were held in perfect order. The Respectables abstained from voting, the workmen voted in a body, and of the ninety members elected nine-tenths were Reds and more than half Communists of different shades. The Commune was proclaimed on Tuesday amidst the roar of artillery and the shouts of 100,000 National Guards, the Assembly declined to call its election null and void, the Central Committee dissolved itself, to reappear with smaller numbers as the Military Committee of the Commune, and Paris was for the moment constituted a Republic, with a separate Legislature, Executive, and Army, the latternumbering 25,000 "active " men, and 100,000 nationals, with 400 or 500 guns and mitrailleuses.
That—the constitution of Paris as a separate State—was up to Friday night the net result of the Revolt, and it was the intentional result. It appears to be certain that the group of men who direct the movement, of whom Blanqui is said to be the chief, though there may be a chief behind him, have decided to strive for a completely new organization of France. Weary of the yoke of the peasants, which for twenty years has been pressed upon the necks of the great cities, they are deter- mined to make of the great cities States in the American sense, States in Federal alliance with France, but not in subor- dination to her. In their own language, the ten great cities are to make permanent arrangements for alliance with the nation. In all their proclamations this idea reappears, now in a demand that the autonomy of the cities shall be recognized by the Assembly, again in a suggestion that it shall be inserted in the Charter, which is to be the fundamental law of the country, and anon in some proposal more or less wild for "a treaty of peace with France. The idea, as yet vague though distinct, like a shadow rather than a figure, is reported to be due to Assi, who has read but one book in his life, Edgar Quinet's Revolutions of Italy," and has been fascinated by the descriptions of the Italian Republics ; but there can be little doubt that a Federalizing policy of some kind, in which the Federal States would be small, has been enter- tained for some years by the extreme Reds, who hopeless of defeating the peasant proprietors, trust by this device to break or neutralize their power. It is the favourite idea of the Russian Reds, the most determined fanatics in the ranks of the cosmopolitan revolution ; it crops up in Italy whenever order is disturbed ; it suggests itself naturally to every Swiss ; it was formally proposed in the only reasonable Fenian manifesto we ever read ; it was adopted by the International Society in their meeting at Geneva ; and it derives great strength from the approval of that influential class among revolutionists, the Reds who have resided in America and become permeated with American ways of thought. It is approved by the Reds because it gives them pieds-a-terre in which their principles may triumph, by the ,Communists because they think Socialism more manageable within limited areas—just the idea of the
' American Fourierists—and by ordinary Republicans because it. would emancipate city life from the control of the peasants' nominees. Whether they intend that each city should govern% the province round it, as Florence governed Tuscany, or that each city should be a State in itself, leaving each province to be- come a State too, is not clear either to us or, as we suspect,. to the insurgent chiefs ; but one point is sufficiently distinct.. The city vote in the Central Assembly is to balance or over- come the vote of the country districts,—a condition which. could not be observed, unless the city in some form or other was despotic over its surrounding terrain.
Is it conceivable that such a plan as this should succeed in. establishing itself in the most centralized of all European countries? We cannot tell, for we cannot say how far the provinces would be as willing to rid themselves of the citiar as the cities are to rid themselves of the provinces, to what extent the German army will remain neutral, or how far the wickedness of men like the "Home Secretary of the- Commune," men who preach the assassination of princes afe a religious duty, may interfere with the policy of saner chiefs. Nor can we as yet perceive how far the Communists propose- to carry their special ideas, whether they will content them-- selves with a poor law and an imp& progressif, as Louis Blanc; would, or whether by some direct attack on property, such as.. the exaction of the German indemnity by a forced loan, they will compel the property-holders to shake off their cowardice and appeal to military force. But we do think it clear that it in the struggle between Paris and Versailles, Versailles goes. down, a determined effort will be made to recast France on a. Federal basis, with the cities as separate cantons, and we feet no security whatever that Versailles will not go down. The Assembly does not deserve either the affection or the respect or the soldiery, and we question greatly if it has obtained either.. M. Thiers sits there emitting sanguine proclamations, and counselling patience, and gathering troops ; but he displays: little decision, no nerve, and no adequate sense of the forces- which oppose him. His policy, we presume, is to temporize in order that the Commune may be forced by want of money, or it may be of food, to attack, and so give him the advantage of acting on the defensive, or possibly with German troops in ; but he has no proof that his troops will not refuse to fire, or that his regime may not be overthrown by a single. night attack. The Commune evidently believes in the frientl- liness of the soldiery • day and night its emissaries pass among- the regiments ; the officers have no hold whatever on their men-, and worst sign of all, one of those strange bursts of noble but feminine sentiment which sometimes attack the French when- gathered in masses is said to have struck the soldiery. They will not, they say, after flying before the Prussians, kill their countrymen. They may at the last moment recollect that their duty to their country is above their duty to their countrymen ; but if they do not, if they fraternize or stand, aloof, the majority in the Assembly will fly, the minority will decree the Charter drawn up by Blanqui, and France- will be once more thrown into the crucible, to emerge- a changed land. We doubt if the moment of crisis can be long deferred. The Commune must have money or submit,. and it cannot get money until it has upset the Assenibly,_ which, for its part, can do nothing till Paris is reduced to. order. One side or the other must act, and as the Commune is pressed and the Assembly is not, as Assi has energy and Thiers has none, and as, above all, the tradition of Revolution. is in favour of the step, we incline to believe that the Commune- will march upon Versailles.
We should add that the success or failure of the movement. in Marseilles or Lyons will not affect its result one straw. If Paris is defeated Lyons will yield ; if Paris wins Lyons will follow ; and for any form of preparatory action there will be no time. Whether the Revolt shall end or become Revolution depends on a collision between " General " Bergeret and. General Vinoy, which cannot be averted many days.
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