The King of Prussia has, we think, at last violated
the Consti- tution in form as well as spirit. By a Royal decree dated the 19th inst. he orders that the estimate rejected by the Diet shall serve as a regulation for the administration of the finances for the year,—which is, we believe, legal, provided the expenditure is within the taxes voted when the Parliament was free. But he also assigns a sum of 75,0001. for the construction of heavy cast- steel guns for the fleet—a new expenditure which require; Parlia- mentary sanction. This indeed must be the intention of the order, as had the King intended to pay the money out of the naval budget, he would have done so without the formality of a decree. His Ministers also have violated the Constitution on another point. It concedes the right of meeting, yet they have prohibited a Liberal banquet to be given at Cologne, which the Liberals, for once sure of their constitutional ground, have nevertheless deter- mined to hold. A similar blunder cost Louis Philippe his throne, but then the Prussians are not Frenchmen.
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