The following letter, the first of a series, on the

political con- troversy now raging in Switzerland, throws a clearer light on the whole subject than any other production, whether of the Eng- lish or the French press, that has fallen under our notice. The writer is distinguished by qualities of the first order as an inves- tigator—by love of truth, calmness of judgment, industrious re- search, ability and experience in weighing evidence ; he went to Switzerland almost for the express purpose of informing himself; and he had abundant access to the best sources of knowledge. With these advantages, our correspondent is likely to have formed

very valuable opinions on every branch of the SWISS question. They will probably be found to differ on some points from opinions that we have expressed : no matter for that—we desire to know and abide by the truth, and our present duty is to yield a confiding attention to the teachings of one whom we can trust.

LETTER I.

Of the numerous travellers who during the course of every summer visit the magnificent scenery of Switzerland, there are not many who in- terest themselves in the political or social condition of the people. But in the present year, this latter topic has stood to an unusual degree in the foreground ; and the proceedings of the Diet, which has been sitting at Berne for the last two months, have attracted more notice than ever that assembly received before, not merely from visiters, but from the general public of Europe. guch increased notice is indeed abundantly justified by the serious character which Swiss politics have now assumed, and-hythe open collision, seemingly but one degree removed from actual hostilities, of a majority and minority in the Diet. On the 20th of last month, a majority, including twelve Cantons and two Half-Cantons, came to the important vote, that the separate league of seven Centeno, called the Sonderbund, was a contravention of the Federal Pact; directed its dissolution; and threw upon the Cantons- composing it the responsi- bility of all the consequences of disobedience. Those Cantons—Lucerne, Friburg, Schwytz, Unterwaltlen Uri, Zug, and Yalais--have not only protested against this decision, and refused to obey it, but,have even per- sisted, and are still persisting, in military preparations,_ for the purpose of repelling any attempt on the part of the mejotity,of the Diet to enforce its decision by arms. As yet, no proposition for forcibly executing the sentence has been submitted to the Diet, whose sentence of condemnation against the Sonderbund has been formally proclaimed, but remains unexe- cuted. It has been followed up only by one or two other resolutions against the Sonderbund, adopted by the same majority. A supply of arms and ammunition, sent by the Austrians from Lombardy to the Cantons of the Sonderbund, but detained by the inhabitants of Tessin is its passage through that Canton, has been placed under sequestration by order of the Diet in the hands of the Government of Tessin : the Cantons of the Sonderbund have been formally admonished to discontinue their military preparations : moreover, a Commission has been nominated to examine and communicate with such officers of the Federal mili- tary force as hold commissions under the refractory Cantons; and a resolution has been passed by the Diet to dismiss them , from the former unless they voluntarily renounce the latter. Still, no real pro- gress is made towards the dissolution of the Sonderbund; which continues inflexible—obstinate, and even insolent in the language of its Deputies—and unremitting in its warlike preparations. Presently, the Diet will also pass a resolution, by the same, majority, directing the ex- pulsion of the Jesuits from the Canton of Lucerne : but this resolution will meet with the same angry opposition, and the same proclaimed dis- obedience, as the others.

How long such open dissension can continue, or by what steps it

will be brought to a close, no reasonable man will venture to pro- nounce. But it is most certainly grave and menacing : it is pregnant with the possibility, not to say more, of civil war in Switzerland, and with the further possibility of foreign interference in that country. As- stiming even that such interference does not take place, the sympathies of Europe are of no mean account in reference to every individual cdtititry ; and it is therefore worth while to form some rational estimate of the di- rection which those sympathies ought to take. The causes of what hap- pens in a Swiss Diet are not a little complicated : for that assembly repre- sents the result of what has been done and felt in each of the twenty-two Cantons—each a little political world, distinct from, though sympathizing with, the rest. Switzerland consists of twenty-two Cantons, each having one vote in the Diet, though there is the greatest inequality between them in wealth and population; Berne containing about 430,000 inhabitants, and Zurich about 250,000, while Uri comprises only 15,000. Each Canton is independent and sovereign, except in so far as it is bound by the provisions of the Federal Pact, or by resolutions of the Diet in fulfil- ment of and in conformity with the Pact. Indeed, even this multiplicity of elements does not represent the full complexity of Swiss political affairs : for three out of the twenty-two Cantons—Bale, Appenzell, and linter- walden—are divided each into two Half-Cantons, each Half-Canton sove- reign and independent, subject to the restriction above-mentioned. The two sections of Bale (town and country) and of Appenzell (Inner-Rhoden and Ausser-Rhoden) not only differ from each other on the most material .points, but are almost always politically opposed; and whenever they are so opposed, their votes are neutralized in the Diet. So multiform are the elements—not to mention the many and important differences of race, re- ligion, language, wealth, civilization, habits, residence in mountain, plain, town, or country, &o.—which go to form political society among the 2,400,000 inhabitants of Switzerland: of whom about 900,000 are Ca- tholics, the remainder Protestants.

To trace the working of these various causes, which have cotiperated more or less to form the majority called Radical, and the minority called Conservative, in the present Diet, is no very easy problem even for a na- tive : a foreigner can only seize the principal and prominent circumstances. There is, however, one source of error which especially deserves to be pointed out, and of which more will be said presently—that of estimating the character and tendencies of Swiss parties by the names which they -bear of Radical and Conservative. These names have now got a foot- ing in every language of Europe, and have very strong feelings of esteem or hatred associated with them ; they are altogether incorrect as desig- nations of the present parties in Switzerland : yet foreigners easily transfer to that country the established sentiments or established in- terests which they have contracted towards the parties so called at home. This is especially necessary to be borne in mind when we read the speeches delivered by M. Guizot in the French Chamber, or the articles in the Journal des Debuts, which have so wide a cir- culation in Europe. Whoever judges of Switzerland from these sources, will carry away an impression not merely partial and inaccurate, but in many respects the direct reverse of real truth. M. Guizot speaks from the French tribune the language of an exaggerated Swiss party politician : omit the name and translate his speech into German, it might pass for one of the bitter invectives of M. Meyer, the Deputy of Lucerne in the Swiss Diet, against Radical spirit and aggressions. The Journal des Debuts and other French journals are written in the same vein : to them, as well as to M. Guizot, it is sufficient if they find an opportunity of in- flaming their readers against Radical principles, and of impressing upon them the dignity of Conservative politics sanctified by religious zeal. With M. Guizot, probably, such discourses are more than an ebullition of feeling : they are also a useful manoeuvre in reference to his own position in France. For he owes that position not to any esteem or confidence entertained towards him by the French people—still less to any hopes which they feel of progress or improvement under his Ministry; but chiefly to the fears which the French electoral body have been taught to entertain of Eadicalism. And the menaces, so offensive and indecent in the month of any foreign power, which he addresses to the Swiss Diet, are intended to tell quite as much upon French Conservatives and French Radicals as upon Lucerne and Berne. Two points deserve particular notice in the bitter animadversions which M. Guizot and the French Conservative journals pour forth against the recent course of Swiss politics.

First, they dwell continually, and almost exclusively, upon two facts in the recent history of that country,—the invasion of the Canton of Lu- cerne, in the end of 1844 as well as in the beginning of 1845, by bands of volunteers from the other Cantons, called the Corps Francs ; and the separate league of seven Cantons, called the Sonderbund, which is repre- sented as a consequence of this unjust invasion, and resorted to only as a means of defence.

Secondly, they depict the present majority of twelve Cantons and two Half-Cantons, which has just pronounced the Sonderbund to be uncon- stitutional and directed its dissolution, as a majority bent upon complete subversion of the cantonal independent action throughout Switzerland, and upon the transfer of the twenty-two separate governments now ex- isting, to one central and united republic at Berne. To add to the terrors of this impending republic, it is described as likely to become aggressive and formidable to all its neighbours; since the 2,400,000 souls which the whole country contains would be so immensely strengthened (we are told) by this concentration, that they would forthwith overstep their own rights and limits, for the purpose and with the power of imposing unjust conditions on others.

• Such are the two points principally insisted upon by M. Guizot, and many of the leading critics on Swiss affairs. In regard to the first of the two, they mislead by isolating one single event and presenting it apart from its preceding and accompanying circumstances : in regard to the second, they mislead yet more, by imputing to a great party in Swit- zerland, designs which none of those who really represent that party have given the least ground for suspecting, and by holding forth as likely to be accomplished a centralization to which all present tendencies stand irrevocably opposed.

That there may be persons in Switzerland, and those too not among the least patriotic of her citizens, who wish that such a centralization or something approaching to it could be established, is probable enough : and it is not easy to see why any impartial foreigner, who desires nothing but the tranquillity, happiness, and improvement of the country, should denounce them for it, although it may suit the purpose of a French Minister, who wishes to see Switzerland at all times open to attack, to

foment the maximum of disunion. Among the 2,400,000 people who dwell between the Lakes of Constance and Geneva, there are now twenty- five independent establishments, each fitted up (better or worse) for the complete execution of all the purposes of government. In the time of Aristotle, and with his political experience, such minute subdivision would have appeared an indispensable condition of freedom and respon- sibility : but in the present state of political knowledge, it is surely neither crime nor folly to conceive that all the great purposes of society might be better fulfilled by locally-chosen governing bodies subordinate to one common centre. And this is the ground actually taken by some of the French Opposition journals against M. Guizot : they seem to ad- mit that the Swiss political leaders do contemplate an entire subor- dination of the cantonal to the central government, and defend them in this supposed project. Both the attack and the defence are here founded on the same mistaken supposition : still the defence is perfectly well grounded to this extent—that if the Swiss leaders really did enter- tain the project imputed to them by the French Minister, and were striving to bring their own people to the same view, they would in nowise deserve those bitter denunciations which be has poured forth against them, though the particular circumstances of the case might render it inadmissible and impracticable.

Wise or foolish as the conception of a single or unitary government, embracing all Switzerland, may be in itself, it is not the conception entertained either by the leading politicians or by any one of the

leading Cantons in that country. Revision of the Federal Pact is indeed what they strongly insist upon : but to revise the Pact is one thing—

to constitute an unitary or single government for the administration of all Switzerland, is another. It may safely be pronounced that a revision of the Pact, in such manner as to give too much power to the central government and to weaken the cantonal governments too much, is of all

contingencies the most improbable; there are so many French and English critics who represent this as a plan already organized by an oppressive majority in Switzerland, and only to be arrested by foreign interference. Of the two extreme and opposite political changes con- ceivable—first, complete fusion of the cantonal governments into one common and unitary government, or secondly, complete disruption of

the Pact and formation of several governments out of it, completely distinct from each other—the latter is decidedly the least improbable: nay, if we look at the present unyielding temper and excitement of the Swiss parties, it might almost appear the least improbable solution of all, in a problem so essentially embroiled.

The tendencies of the present time, indeed, are not to strengthen the authority of the Diet. over the Cantons, but to reduce it still lower—

from extreme weakness down to absolute nullity. The conduct of the recusant minority in this present affair of the Sonderbund, and still more the arguments by which they justify that conduct, amount to nothing less than a complete nullification of all imperative authority in the Pact, even as to its most positive and specific provisions. Assuredly, if there is to be any federation at all, one of its most essential provisions must be, that the members shall contract no separate alliances among themselves injurious or dangerous to the entire confederacy. The sixth article of the Federal Pact distinctly says—" No alliance shall be formed among the several Cantons, detrimental either to the general confederacy or to the rights of other Cantons " : so that, under the terms of this article, the competence of the Diet to entertain and pronounce upon the legality of the Sonderband cannot be impugned except by arguments which go

to deny its competence universally. Now a majority of the Diet has pronounced the Sonderbund to be illegal and an infringement of the

Pact : to which the members of the Sonderbund reply by a protest and a peremptory refusal to obey. Such proclaimed resistance, by so many Cantons at once, is of itself the most fatal blow which has yet been aimed at the authority of the Diet : and the dissolving effect of this prac- tical measure is still farther enlarged by the arguments upon which it is made to rest. " We maintain," say the Cantons of this separate leagne or

Sonderband, " that our league is meat variance with the provisions of the

Pact: it is purely defensive, and has been rendered necessary by aggressions on the part of other Cantons or their citizens against the Government of Lucerne: we intend no evil to others, if they do not attack us; and we shall maintain our league as long as our own security seems to us to require." To employ such arguments as these while the question was under discussion in the Diet, and for the chance of influencing the deci- sion of that body, was their incontestible right : but they still continue to hold the same language, and act upon the same principle, even after the Diet has decided against them. When it is urged that to apply the general provisions of the Pact to a particular ease, and to decide whether the case does or does not fall under a rule clearly laid down, is among the most indispensable attributes of the Diet—the Sonderbuud meet this pros position by an unqualified negative. " We are sovereign Cantons," they say ; " and recognize no authority in the majority of the Diet to apply or interpret the Pact against a recusant minority. We admit no right to

interpret the Pact except by the unanimous decision of the twenty-two sovereign Cantons : we construe the sixth article of the Pact in a manner

perfectly consistent with our separate league, and we shall therefore, as sovereign Cantons, continue to act upon our own construction of it, though a majority of the Cantons may decide otherwise." Here we find

an act of avowed and unqualified resistance, sustained by arguments which amount to a complete negation of the authority of the Diet over in- dividual Cantons in any case whatever—to a complete nullification of the Diet as a body acting by its majority. For if the decision of the majority is not to hold good against that of one or a few Cantons, as to the appli- cation of a clear article of the Pact to a given particular case, it is plainly

of no binding authority on any question which may be conceived. The Federal Pact, in this reading, becomes a mere alliance of independent and sovereign states, each of them at liberty to put their own construction

upon it and break it whenever they choose—of course at the hazard of war, if contradiction or provocation assume a character sufficiently grave. Such is the state of public law in Switzerland, as proclaimed and now acted upon by one third of the twenty-two Cantons, and tacitly sanctioned by a minority, more or less considerable, in the others: and it is strange, in the face of this obvious fact, to bear the French Minister proclaim, that the power to be feared in Switzerland is, an overruling and oppressive in- terference on the part of the Diet, with an extinction of cantonal inde- pendence! Never before has the imperative competence of the Diet been so glaringly defied in practice, and so explicitly denied in theory, as in the present year; and this too by a very powerful minority. That minority, in the excitement of party contest, may perhaps in part really believe them- selves to be the defenders of cantonal rights unjustly assailed by their opponents: but among them there are those who, knowing the case too well to believe in the reality of such danger, also know that the pretence of such belief is the most popular of all topics in reference to Swiss feeling.

It is in fact impossible to study attentively the march of Swiss affairs without seeing, that what really lies nearest to the hearts of the people is, their cantonal and 'communal system; and that, although on some par- ticular questions connected with Swiss Federal politics, there may be rare and temporary moments of excitement—although there is a growing desire, and a very rational desire, for better-assured nationality in the event of foreign danger—nevertheless the idea of interference on the part of the Diet in cantonal affairs is habitually unfamiliar and repulsive. This is not less true of the Cantons called Radical than of the Cantons called Con- servative—in both of them alike, the citizens look-for protection as well as for command to their own cantonal authority. Nothing can be more me- morable, throughout_ the history of the past years, than the uniform inde- cision and impotence of the Diet: indeed, one reason why so much• has been said about terrible projects of over-centralization at the present mo- ment is, that now, almost for the first time, a majority of the Diet has been found to take a decisive resolution on an important subject. Throughout the past history of the Diet, we find discussion after discussion without de- termination; no majority at all being found to agree in any—sometimes not even in a negative or vote of rejection. To prevail upon twelve Can- tons to agree in any positive vote, has been generally found a difficulty all but insurmountable. Among the many different questions put, those which are the most trying and important do not often obtain a majority, because several Deputies abstain altogether from voting, some reserving to them- selves the liberty of voting subsequently when they shall have asked and received instructions from their Canton. It is to be remarked that every Deputy present votes, not agreeably to any opinion of his own, but to instructions received from the Great Council, or supreme authority, in his own Canton.; which may sometimes, though this does not often happen, confer upon him plenary powers of self-decision upon some given subject : but, excepting in these cases, the instructions, pre- pared in each separate Canton, inolude conditions or adopt modifications different from each other, which usually prevent any number of Deputies from concurring in one substantive proposition. Speaking from his instruc- tions, as a counsel speaks from his brief, a Deputy may sustain his opinion by powerful arguments—and the speeches of some or them are eloquent and creditable; but his conclusion is prescribed to him before the meeting of the Diet. And in fact, the forms and language of the Diet consider each Deputy as an ambassador from his Canton: be is always styled "Der Gesandte des Standes—", by the President, when inviting the opinions of every one at the table seriatim, and most frequently so styled throughout the course of discussion: the relations of the Deputy to his Canton are doubtless those of a delegate; the relations of the Cantons towards each other being not those of independent states, but of states bound in confede- racy by the control of a solemn and common pact.

• What the Cantons mostly stand chargeable with is the feeling of can- tonal selfishness—each being careless of the interests of other Cantons as compared with its own: at least, the tendency to errcr,is almost uniformly in this direction. Thus, when we follow the discussions of the Diet, not upon the direct questions of Federal politics, but upon internal taxes, tolls, or commercial regulations in the various Cantons, which falls to a certain extent within its competence, we find this feeling of cantonal egoism not less prevalent in the Radical Canton of Vaud than in the Sonderbund Cantons of Lucerne and Valais. During the past winter and spring, the suffering from dearth and high prices of provision being very severe in all parts'of Switzerland, each of these three Cantons made regulations either prohibiting or impeding the export of provisions to other Cantons,—a pro- ceeding contrary to the Federal Pact. This subject being brought on for discussion in the Diet shortly after the passing of the vote to dissolve the Sonderbund, the Radical Deputy of Vaud (M. Druey, a coarse but ani- mated and emphatic speaker, not very unlike the late Mr. O'Connell) was found in the same line of defence as the Ultra-Catholic M. de Courten, Deputy of the Valais—the most outspoken and even insolent among all the persons assembled. Whoever imagines that the Radical Cantons are disposed to be liberal in the sacrifice of Cantonal independence to Federal iupremsey, would have been undeceived if he had listened to the speech of M. Druey—seasoned, moreover, with many sneers against free trade: be employed one familiar comparison which illustrates the relation of the Cantonal to the Federal feelings throughout Switzerland—" My shirt is nearer to me than my coat." In the course of another discus- sion, in which the Conservative Canton of Valais was proved to be up- holding a scheme of tolls not only at variance with the Pact, but also without that formal communication, in respect to tolls imposed, which every Canton is bound to furnish to the Federal authority, the Deputy of Valais, M. de Courten, went so far as to tell the Diet flatly—" Nous

y renoncerons jewels." So jealous and irritable is the sentiment of Cantonal independence on both sides, even in matters where the rights of conscience are noway concerned, and where the matter in dispute is no- thing greater than the raising of revenue in one way rather than in ano- ther. '1'o show the different cross-divisions among the Cantons, I may add, that Neufchatel, which is highly Conservative in general politics, and makes almost common cause with the Sonderbund, though not a member i of it, is at the same time extremely liberal and right-minded on questions of trade and transit.

If we except the arrangements for the Federal military force, and for the few relations between Switzerland and foreign countries, on all other points the Cantonal Governments may be said to act without any interfe- rence on, the part of the Diet. Doubtless the Pact, with its solemn recog- nition of a common country and brotherly obligation between the Cantons, exercises a considerable moral influence over their proceedings, and the meetings of the Diet, in spite of the feebleness of its coerc.va sanction, are indispensably necessary to keep alive and strengthen this moral influence. That the Pact ought to be modified, so as to enlarge the attributions of the Diet and impart to the country a more efficient and better-protected na- tionality, has long been a widespread conviction in Switzerland, and seems as a general position not -denied even -by the Government of Lucerne; though that Canton, as well as the other Cantons of the Sonderbund, pro- tests against attempting to alter it at the present time and under present feelings. And the Diet itself has un several occasions entertained the ge- neral idea of revising the Pact, though no specific plan has ever found ap- proval: it has again in its present session, by the same majority which pronounced the Sonderbund to be illegal, decided that the Pact required alteration, and that a Committee should be appointed to make a report on the best means of attaining this end. It is remarkable, that every one of the Deputies who formed this majority disclaimed in the most emphatio manner the idea imputed to them, of surrendering cantonal independence and aiming at an unitary government in Switzerland. This Committee, composed of all the Deputies of the majority—it could hardly be other- wise composed, since the Deputies of the Sonderbund refused to take part in the proceeding—are now assembled; and it will remain to be seen whether they can agree in recommending any positive scheme of real im- portance and efficiency. One effect can hardly fail to ensue from their report—a complete refutation of that charge of anti-cantonal tendency which is so loudly urged against them by the Sonderbund and its foreign partisans. But whether these Deputies will all be able to concur in any specific plan of reform, with duo respect to this limit—still more, whether their respective Cantons, in each of which there is a Conservative minority ready to raise opposition on any plausible ground, and in many of which there are Catholics more or leas open to the intrigues of Lucerne, will all concur in adopting their recommendation— must remain for the future to decide: should matters proceed even so far as this, there will still remain the Sonderbund a large minority who will oppose anything and everything. Yet, assuming such unqualified repug- nance on the part of the Sonderbund for the present to continue, still, if the existing majority of Cantons, comprising four fifths of the population and more than four fifths of the intelligence and wealth of Switzerland, should agree in sanctioning any definite reform of the Federal Pact—above all, if a sentiment should grow up among them of deeper attachment and more willing submission to the Pact so improved, than that which is felt towards the Pact as it now stands—a great point will be gained for the future march, organization, and tranquillity of Switzerland. Berne and Zurich, the first and second among the Cantons in respect of population and power, are on this occasion in cordial cooperation,—a rare conjunction, fir jealousy between these two powerful Cantons is among the standing plitenornena of Swiss politics. And this increases materially the chance both of arriving at some definite result in respect to Federal reform, and of repressing disorderly ebullitions amidst the conflicting elements with which Switzerland is now disturbed.

In touching upon Swiss affairs, the first impulse of an impartial observer is to repel those false charges which M. Gnizot—with a looseness of speech alike intemperate and meddlesome, and altogether disgraceful in a states- man of his position—has advanced against the majority of the Diet. I shall in a future letter say something respecting that series of preliminary events, one growing out of another, which has brought about the present serious conflict of parties in Switzerland. Though it cannot for a moment be contended that all the right is on one side and all the wrong on the other, yet if we look for the great cause both of mischief in the past and of danger for the future, we shall find it in the statesmen, miscalled Conser-. vative, who are now at the head of the government of Lucerne. A. B.