that all this delay in settling Constitutional principles is tell-
It may be carried, or it may not, for mortal man cannot ing in favour of the party which places all Constitutions tell what this Assembly may or may not do, but in either at the mercy of a ruler elected by a mass vote. It is for case the result will be the same. The people will be irritated Canarism that the Legitimists, the Orleanists, and, we fear, to the last degree, and will cast about for some agency, some some of the Conservative Republicans, are, consciously or uncon- form of government under which such proposals shall be scioualy, striving with all their might. Day after day, month morally impossible,—a Government which, however bad, will after month, their course is always the same. Themselves not mock them by conceding self-government with one hand the product of universal suffrage, they cannot let universal while taking it back with the other, which will not admit the suffrage rest, for fear the electors should insist on the Repub- moral right of universal suffrage, and then declare that wealth lic, and in their persistent efforts to mutilate it, create as without character has a right to override it. They know often as they move new adherents for the party which, while perfectly well that in the Republic they will have such an resolute to maintain that suffrage, proclaims itself also implae- agency, and if a Dissolution were voted, they would, we believe, ably opposed to the disorder which the Left are believed try it ; but they have some doubt whether that agency, by all timid and wealthy men secretly to favour. The with its intestine divisions, is quite strong enough to secure Bills proposed by the majority seem drawn with a distinct their desires,—to beat down privilege completely, yet maintain wish to irritate the people for whom they are prepared. external order with a hand of iron. They want equality, Even in England, where the spirit of social deference is peace, and order ; and only one of the two forms of Democracy, still so strong, the new Bill for municipal reform would the Republic or the Omar, can, they think, secure them all. overthrow any Government which attempted to pass it, and in Either would do, but they would prefer the Republic, if it France it is enough almost to provoke a revolution. Its were not for a doubt, always lingering in the French mind, essential principle is that in every commune, large or small, whether a Republic can be permanent; and for a natural, though the few rich shall be considered the superiors of the many most disastrous, impatience of the inability of the Republicans poor, shall have a direct veto on their resolves, and outweigh to force on the Assembly the necessary preliminary to a Repub- their influence on all subjects of municipal concern. They are lie—a Dissolution—without a previous change in the great elevated into Peers merely by their wealth, and this not by electoral law. It is the certainty that this law will be preserved by covert means, such as a high qualification, but by direct, the Camara, which turns the people towards the Napoleons, or crude, almost insolent, legal recognition. The Municipal that and the lingering fascination of the name. That fascination Council is elected by universal suffrage, and then is should have ended at Sedan, but we do not know certainly that it paralysed by the introduction of an equal number of has. France endured the Bourbons for a thousand years ; the Councillors self-nominated in right of their own wealth. Napoleonic legend is deeply fixed in the peasants' mind ; and It is almost incredible that such a Bill should ever there is a whole mass of evidence to prove that had Napoleon, have been presented to a French Assembly, but it is the even after Sedan, returned to Paris, made peace, and in one of his fact that whenever the proposal before the Council requires fatally frank proclamations admitted and repented his errors, the expenditure of fresh money, or the sale or exchange of his son would at this moment be Emperor of the French. Communal property, or the raising of a loan—that is, when- His heir has lost no Sedan, and in spite of every ever the proposal is of any importance at all—the largest tax- conviction, or predilection, or prejudice we entertain, we payers, in their capacity of taxpayers, are to become Councillors, cannot avoid the doubt whether France, irritated beyond and to vote and debate by the side of the elected representa- bearing with the powerless plotters of the Assembly, fives. They are to be equal in number to the Councillors, with a regime of repression intended for the benefit of a and if they are women, minors, corporations, or persons inter- family they have rejected, with the long suspense so fatal to dieted from managing their own property, they are authorised their fortunes, and with the difficulty of securing the Republic, to vote by proxy as if they were present, a provision which may not turn once more towards the family which, after twice will seem to French minds to give to the inanimate property bringing the invader in triumph to Paris, still retains a hold itself the right of governing the people. Even in England, over the popular imagination such as no other is able to Conservatives have never attempted to go this length, would, acquire. It is for the Bonapartes that the Assembly which to do them justice, resist a proposal to go this length as desires the Bourbons is accumulating hates upon its head, and heartily as Liberals. They might demand a previous assent unless it will depart, unless it will suffer the electors to make from the Home Secretary before an important tax was imposed, one more effort before they give way in despair, it is a and in fact, through the system of Private Acts, do demand Napoleon to whom they will restore the right of again bringing some kind of Parliamentary assent, and they do give magis- misfortune upon France. If they do not, it will be due to trates ex officio seats on Boards of Guardians, Highway Boards, M. Gambetta alone,—that is, to the man whom the majority and some other representative bodies ; but then the magistrates most detest.
are not merely rich, are not self-appointed, are, in theory, at all events, persons picked by the Crown for their capacity, THE CHANCES OF THE BONAPARTISTS. and liable to summary removal for any act of malfeas-
FINGLISHMEN habitually make too much of the "scenes" in ance. The Lord Chancellor can dismiss them at will, the French Assembly. They are but little more violent than and a vote of either House would at any moment com- the " scenes " which occur in any Assembly debating matters pel the removal of any Magistrate. The French Bill makes of vital interest to the Members, and have never yet ended, of the well-to-do an avowedly superior caste, and this in we believe, in the entire history of French legislative conflicts, communes where the well-to-do are indistinguishable from in a physical struggle. Congress was before the War of their fellows, where, in fact, the right will constantly in- Secession often more disturbed, the German Reichsrath has volve a trade advantage enjoyed by a successful shopkeeper once or twice lately become a scene of uncontrollable excite- or publican over an unsuccessful one. The nominees will not meat, and our own House of Commons every now and then be selected, need not be educated, can seldom be distinguished, escapes for a few minutes from the control of the Speaker. The are, in fact, merely a privileged caste, privileged to spend or suppression of Mr. Auberon Herbert, when supporting Sir to save their fellow-citizens' money,—for mind, the great Charles Dilke's motion about the Civil List, was quite as violent municipal tax of France, the Octroi, falls first upon the poor,— as the rush on M. Levert, the Bonapartist Deputy and ex-Prefect ; merely because they own a few acres more than the rest, or and the stampede by which the County Members compelled the make a few hundred francs a year more, it may be by more Treasury to pay for their losses by the cattle-plague, was much unscrupulous trading. There is not the faintest guarantee more discreditable than any vote yet passed even by M. de for character, intelligence, or even conduct. One large tax- Broglie's first majority. Considering the absence of orators, payer may be a De Tocqueville and the next the com- for M. Thiers seldom attends, M. Gambetta seldom speaks, M. mon debauches of the place, and both are equally em- Louis Blanc sits usually self-effaced, and M. Ledru Rollin powered to over-rule the vote of the majority. Never was has lost much of his ancient fire, the Assembly debates privilege established on so disgustingly sordid a basis, and well, and gets through its actual work much more quickly never was privilege conferred so opposed, not only to the ideas, and much more thoroughly than the House of Commons. but to the very instincts of all Frenchmen, who, whatever The "scenes " do not signify, except so far as they annoy their faults, have certainly not risked all for eighty years in the electors, who want decisions rather than debates, but the incessant revolution in order to anoint successful wine-shop outcome of those "scenes " is, we fully admit, deplorable. Eng- keepers with the holy oil of privilege. How any group of lishmen, with that curious political instinct which seems so Frenchmen can even consider such a Bill we cannot conceive, independent of their brains, which makes up to them for any but there it is before the Assembly and the country as a lack of knowledge or any power of expression, judge rightly Government proposal.
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