XLVIII. from the different parties of the parliament had not CHAP. succeeded. There was no unity of views, no leading spirit. During the hundred days, when the first Napoleon was hampered by the Constitutionalists, he expostulated, and observed that the country remained uncertain and dispirited, because "it did not feel the old arm of the Emperor." Louis-Napoleon now repeated the phrase by saying that "France, amidst the general confusion and inertness of direction, sought for the hand and the will of the elect of the 10th of December.". The name of Napoleon, he added, meant order, authority, religion, and the well-being of the people. He said not a word of liberty. Up to this period, such men as Thiers had hoped in the new President.* But the ministry and the manifesto now completely dispelled the illusion. However discontented the Monarchists might be at the choice of persons which the President had made for the offices of the ministry, they had no reason to complain of the spirit of the government or of the laws introduced. Some of these went to conciliate the clergy, to whom was restored its supremacy especially over primary education. The schoolmasters appointed under the influence of Carnot and his laws were found to have taught Socialist in lieu of religious doctrines. They were got rid of, and teachers were subjected to the approval of the prefect. The judges, who had been declared removable by the Republicans, were restored to the old fixed tenure of place. The laws respecting the appointment of mayors were equally Conservative. This manifest reaction not only exasperated the Socialists but displeased that now very feeble body, the middle classes and shopkeepers of Paris. These last were disgusted, especially with the new enactments relative to the National Guard, and an opportunity was *Véron says that a Thiers and Molé ministry formed the prospect of the time, for the appointment of which the President had given hopes. CHAP. XLVIII. given them, too, for displaying it. The members of the Assembly implicated in the events of June having been expelled, elections were necessary to replace them. Three seats for Paris were vacant. The Parisians returned three decided Socialists, Carnot, Vidal, and De Flotte. The adherence to Socialism was not confined to the middle class; men who had before scouted it now rallied to Socialism, as the strongest auxiliary to the Republic. Michel de Bourges, the orator, Émile de Girardin, the journalist, gave it their support. As did Marrast and Cremieux. The President was seriously alarmed at this reapparition of Socialism, which not only had gained some of the middle class in the capital but was making progress under the name of communism in rural districts, especially in the poor and ignorant ones. He immediately retraced his steps, and having sought to govern for several months without the parliamentary chiefs, he summoned them to council at the Elysée. The elections were fixed for the 18th of March, 1850. The meeting of political chiefs at the palace took place on the 14th. These were Molé, Berryer, De Broglie, Thiers, and others. "What is to be done to put down Socialism?" asked the President. Montalembert, as the youngest, spoke first, and he proposed a new ministry composed of all the Monarchist chiefs. Molé and Thiers neither approved nor contradicted. But the Duc de Broglie was decidedly against it. Men of such different opinions could never agree, he said. So thought the President. He had merely convoked them to soften their opposition, and get them to pass more stringent laws against Socialism. There is no event during the three years' tenure of his President's office by Louis-Napoleon which more fully than this proves how little fixed were his plans from the first, and how ready he was to coalesce with any of the great Moderate or Conservative parties that would have frankly joined him. After breaking with the majority in October 1849, he recurred to it in the March following, and accepted their remedy for Socialism, although it was inimical to his own interests, as well as to his views, if he had any. The remedy proposed by the Monarchist chiefs was a restoration of three years' residence, instead of one of six months, as requisite for the enjoyment of the suffrage. As the lower orders in Paris form a very floating population, it was calculated that the new law would exclude the rabble from the faubourgs. Whether it did or not, it certainly swept away, not thousands, but millions, of those rural voters, who knew no other name than Napoleon. The law was passed by a large majority on the 31st of May, from which date it took its name. The Monarchists and Moderate Republicans did not, however, rally to the President, notwithstanding his appeal and obsequiousness to them. The increase of the dotation from 25,000l. a year to 124,000l., demanded by ministers, was only voted by a majority of four. And when the Assembly adjourned, it appointed a standing commission of Monarchists, Changarnier amongst them, to watch over the security of the Republic against any attempts of the executive. Flung by these acts back into his isolated position, and at the same time in antagonism to the Assembly, Louis-Napoleon resolved on a tour through the provinces. His first reception was at Lyons, where at a banquet he alluded to the rumour that he meditated a coup d'état. "He that has been elected by 6,000,000 of votes need make no coup d'état. He had but to execute the will of the people, not betray it. Should culpable pretensions, however, threaten to disturb the repose of the country, he should know how to render them powerless." This was an allusion to the new course adopted by the Monarchists. Instead of continuing to waive their old allegiance, they reproclaimed it by the СНАР. XLVIII. XLVIII. CHAP. Legitimists going to do homage to Henry the Fifth at Wiesbaden, and the Orleanists taking advantage of the death of Louis-Philippe to pay their devoirs at Claremont. By these antagonistic movements, the chiefs of the parliamentary majority broke with the President so completely that the war between them, it was evident, would break out in a wider field than the four walls of the Assembly. They saw in the President's speeches the threat of dissolving and over-ruling them by an appeal to the people. They therefore rallied round General Changarnier, whom they engaged to defend them. He had authority for this in the command of the National Guard, and the troops around Paris, confided to him by the President. The first open symptom that he gave of his hostility was a prohibition to the troops to cry Vive Napoléon. They had done so frequently. The war minister, Hautpoul, did not disapprove of this manifestation; but General Changarnier conceived it as preluding to the Empire. He therefore forbade the troops to utter a word, and they marched past the President in ominous silence. He enquired the cause, learned it, and resolved to dismiss Changarnier. He took his time, and in the message which opened the session of 1851, some weeks previous to the commencement of that year, he demanded the revision of the constitution. One of its articles forbade the existing president to be re-elected. This he considered unfair at a moment when hostile parties were putting forward the candidature of the Prince de Joinville, and demanding the abrogation of the law of exile, in order to permit that prince to return to France, and to stand candidature for supreme power. The Orleans family was indeed not zealous or decided for such a step. The Duke of Nemours openly deprecated it, and preferred accomplishing a fusion with the Legitimists. But ere this question of the revision of the constitu tion could come under the consideration of the Assembly, СНАР. XLVIII. |