THE RADICAL SCHISM IN FRANCE.
Wdo not feel at all sure that the split between the Republicans and the Irreconcilables, even if it has occurred, will injure either M. Gambetta or the party of which
he is the head. At present there is no proof that it has occurred. Three prominent men among the Ultras—M. Louis Blanc, M. Naquet, and M. Montjau—have, it is true, pro- claimed that the Constitution is too Conservative, that the powers of the President are too Monarchical, and that the people do not retain enough authority in their own hands ; but we have yet to learn that they have carried with them any great number of followers in the Assembly, or that the followers they have are bitter enough to vote against the Left in Constitutional debates. That is, for politicians, and with the present Assembly, the practical point at issue. So far as ordinary business is concerned, the Irreconcilables are not wanted, or the Liberals either, for the Conservatives will give the Government a majority for any defensible step ; and when constitutional diffi- culties arise, the Irreconcilables must either vote with M. Gambetta or, by denouncing him, bind the Left Centre, and perhaps a part even of the Right Centre, more firmly to his side. All that the moderate Conservatives in this Assembly want to bind them together behind M. Gambetta is a solid guarantee that his rule does not mean the rule of the " blood-drinkers," and if the respectable Reds, like M. Louis Blanc, will only just demand his head, his party will be already formed. For example, on the test-question of the scrutin de liste, M. Gambetta, supported by the Left Centre, the Left, and the Irreconcilables, would, it is calculated, have a majority against Government, which, if the Irreconcilables deserted him, he would lose. But if the Irreconcilables abstain on a question like that, they risk their seats at the election, while if they vote with M. Buffet, the half of the Right Centre which always sways towards the Left Centre will at once perceive that the scrutin de liste is not so formidable after all. M. Gambetta can make election, either to the Chamber or the Senate, much easier for the Right Centre if he pleases, and they need before all an excuse for joining that party--the Conservative-Republican—which they see must win, and to which their real leaders, the Orleanist Princes, wish them temporarily to adhere. It is the same with the
1 greater question of Dissolution. M. Naquet, be he as sus- picious or angry as he pleases, must vote for Dissolution, or stand suspected, and his vote is not the less valuable because it is preceded by an invective on M. Gambetta. The vote will tell on the result, while the invective will, as far as the Assembly is concerned, be waste of breath, the opinions
of the Irreconcilables having there no kind of power. The Assembly, whatever its faults— and we quite admit they are as numerous as its virtues—is entirely beyond the influence of idealogues ; and even M. Louis Blanc, who has character, eloquence, and the confidence of moderate Socialists, could not turn a vote. M. Naquet would empty the House, and M. Montjau is regarded as a sort of eccentric who has a right to speak, but who is scarcely a serious politician. Within the present Assembly, we question if the secession of the Ultras will be a loss at all.
But we shall be told, and most heartily admit, that the split in the ranks of the Deputies is only a part, and a very small part, of the greater question at issue. M. Naquet and his friends are not addressing the Assembly, but the country; do not expect or desire to influence the representatives, but the electors, who in December will be called upon to send up a new set. If they can be persuaded that M. Gambetta has betrayed them from the -best of motives, and that they have not got the Republic, and that the President wields powers inconsistent with the dignity of the people, they may return so many Ultras that the Republican party will go to pieces, and the new Chamber either be powerless, or too Conservative fioni fear of the new men, or even, as an extreme possibility, so Red- as to make a coup d'e'tat possible. All Gambetta's moderation will then have been of none effect, and the " sad de- stiny of France," always to see her most hopeful parties destroyed by their own excesses, will be once more worked out, and be once more bemoaned in most excellent and inapplicable English. Well, all that may happen, as anything else may happen, but let us see what reason there is to suppose it will happen. M. Naquet and his friends, we may take for granted, will have no influence outside the great cities and the South, and what can they do there? They cannot stir up riots against M. Gambetta, for he is not in power, and Govern- ment will certainly not stir up disturbance by repressing them for attacking its only dangerous foe. Their object must be to secure seats for men of their own opinions, and how is that effort, unless they succeed, to be made a dangerous one? There is no such force of Conservatism in the Red districts that the secession of the Ultras will let in a Legitimist or Bonapartist, and as their speeches will drive all Conservatives into a fury of apprehensiveness, they will force upon the majority the only candidate sure of success,—the Thiera- Republican, who will follow M. Gambetta as a practical and energetic politician. They will, in fact, swell the majority of the candidates they repudiate, by compelling all Conservatives to vote for them as their best defence. But they may succeed, as they did when they put forward M. Barodet in Paris ? Cer- bainly they might, if M. Gambetta were in power, or had mowed down the citizens by artillery, or had executed two or three thousand Communists, or had sent ten or twelve thousand more to New Caledonia. But then M. Gambetta has done none of these things, has incurred no hatred from the populace, has done nothing except secure that official acknowledgment of the Republic which to most French Ultras. and especially to ignor- ant Ultras, seems the first necessity. There is not substance enough in this charge to cause a rebellion of the ballot-box against a man who in Paris is still the Dictator who almost saved her, and in the South has the special power which arises from community of race and sympathy. The Irrecon- cilables, it must be remembered, have not the great lever, the hatred of the Church, to work on, for M. Gambetta attacks the Church in theory as fiercely as they, and has never been compelled in practice to make those concessions to which every ruler of France, whatever his opinions, must sooner or later stoop. We do not believe that the Irreconcilables will be able anywhere to secure new majorities, and if their success is less than that, they can but seat, by unexpectedly heavy votes, the very men whose perversity has driven them to rebellion.
We say this of the great cities, but France is governed by her peasantry, and in the rural districts the rebellion of the
Ultras is just the very incident needed to give the Republican cause momentum. It will weaken all opponents and embolden all friends. The monarchical minority may be as Conservative
as they please, but they cannot fight a man whom Ultras are denouncing as heartily as they can a man whom Ultras are supporting. It is not in human nature to do it, and least of all in human nature in France, where parties are so bitter, and the fear of political spectres so vivid and unreasonable. The Legitimist might curse M. Naquet, even if he had fought for France ; but to curse M. Gambetta, who did fight, while M. Naquet is reviling him, will be too high an effort of pure and
unfruitful principle. The majority, on the other hand, have accepted the Republic, subject to evidence that it can exist with- out being Red, and what better evidence could there be of that than that the Reds are denouncing it as too arbitrary and Conser- vative? If they praised it indeed, if the local orators exulted in it, and if the idealogues proclaimed it perfect, the peasants might feel distrust ; but when M. Buffet and M. Gambetta are united under a deluge of Red vituperation, this distrust must necessarily be removed. The electors are not wanting ideal constitutions, but an orderly Government, under which citizens shall be equal, and the Legislature elective, and the Executive liable to change without a revolution, and they see perfectly well that under M. Gambetta's leadership they have obtained all these things. Parisians and Englishmen habitually decry the intelligence of the French peasantry, and forget that like the rest of mankind they follow leaders who know much more than themselves, and who are quite capable of perceiving that a Red Republic would but precede a victory for Bonapartism. M. Gambetta's organ is perfectly right in not attacking the Ultras. If they will reconsider themselves, the way is still left open for their return ; and if not, the mass of quiet people will soon perceive that M. Gambetta is no longer trusted by the Irreconcilables, and therefore no longer to be distrusted by sane politicians.
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