THE POLITICAL STATE OF FRANCE.

Southland Times, Issue 1211, 18 February 1870, Page 3

THE POLITICAL STATE OF FRANCE.

The news by the last two English mails as to the political state of Prance has created a desire for futher information on this most interesting subject. In order to supply this, we have much pleasure in reproducing from the Scotsman two lectures delivered before the Edinburgh Philosophical Institution by M. PrevostParadol. Of this distinguished Frenchman, the journal we have already quoted says : — " M. Prevost-Paradol possesses the firefc qualification for speaking to the people of Edinburgh on 'the Political State of France' — he knows intimately that of which he speaks. For who could be more conversant with the political forces that , are there at work, with the hopes of the • parties that are out of power, and with the vulnerable parts of Imperialism, than the man whose pen has helped to create some of these forces, who is the mouthpiece of the most reasonable, though not the noisiest, of these hopes, and who has proved that he knows the weak points of Imperialism, since hi 3 probing has, as is confessed, inflicted most pain? "Where can one approach nearer to truth than in an autobiography? and in speaking of the political state of France, in relating how that country came to be what it is, and what efforts are being made by enlightened Frenchmen to improve their Government, M". Prevost-Paradol was giving excerpts from his autobiography. He was speaking of things of which he had been ' a great part.' But does he possess the second qualification — ability to pick out of his ample stores of knowledge respecting the political life of France, the facts which the people of this country at present, and for the last twenty years, desire to learn ? Can he throw himself into our position? Sympathising with our imperfect knowledge and interest, can he sink little details which concern Frenchmen, but which neither interest nor enlighten, but only bewilder Englishmen ? And can he put into our hands a clue of principles guided by the thread of which we may find our way through the crowd of contemporary facts, the distracting abundance of which helps to make men ignorant of French politics ? His audience probably agreed that he has thi3 ability. For he supplied answers to the chief problems that are uppermost in the minds of all of us who think of France All of us would learn, if possible, how it has come to pass that, while to the people of this country the idea of a revolution ! is only half intelligible, to be heard of in books, as we might hear of slavery or earthquakes, revolution is familiar to a people separated from us only by a few miles ; and why, while we think of a GoI vernment as possessed of the everlasting stability of the hills, the French think of it as a tent to be struck every few years. This difference does not at once suggest its explanation. Frenchmen, of course, are aware of the mischievous effects of these changes — mischievous by that which they actually inflict, and still more by the vague apprehensions and feeling of insecurity which haunt a society that has repeatedly witnessed street-fighting and the overthrow of rulers. The best of them are sceptical about the efficacy of change of G-overnments to better mankind. They hunger for repose. Yet no stoppage in the work of disintegration : the very men who say ' Let well alone,' are, not unlikely, busy with pickaxes at the work of demolition." M. Prevost-Pabadol, who on rising was loudly cheered, began by stating that he regarded speaking before such an audience at once as a great honor and a difficult trial. When the flattering offer of the Philosophical Institution reached me — h e sa id — I -was as much afraid of coming as tempted to come. I am, indeed, rather known as a friend of "British institutions, and perhaps more familiar with them than many of my countrymen, and I felt sure of a kind welcome amongst you ; but, on the ather hand, was it not presumptuous, and even bold, to lecture to you in your own language on a subject of that importance ? Of all the faces which surround me not one was known to me before my coming here ; the language I use is unfamiliar to me, and every word that I utter is, by its defective pronunciation, an appeal to your indulgence. I feel, however, more secure when I think of your far-famed love for knowledge, of your hospitable spirit, and also when I bear in mind the great nation which you have welcomed in my person, and which, apart from the general interest, it excites among all the peoples of the earth, is perhaps nearer to you than to any other by many old ties and everlasting sympathies. I come here, to your calm and happy land, as the representative of a disturbed country and agitated times, like those travellers who, coming into temperate climates and under clement skies, talk of the earthquakes and storms of tropical regions. The policidcal state of France, as regards its legal institutions, is not more steady than the state of the sky or of the sea. To describe the present political institutions of my country would be as useless and ungrateful a task as if I enlarged upon the weather which was prevailing when I left Paris. Who knows if, in the very moment when I describe a quiet and regular state of things, a tempest will not break forth and give the lie to my words ? Since the Empire has sprung up again amongst us, it has unceasingly remodelled its own constitution, and by the side of that continuous change exists, the daily possibility of a violent and sweeping, revolution. Therefore, instead of attempting to describe here that wavering and fickle aspect of our institutions and our laws, I shall try to draw the less uncertain picture of the moral state which brings forth those very institutions and laws, and by which their unsteadiness is explained. The lecturer then proceeded to refer to the sudden and complete change effected by the French Eevolution

of '89, which, by one and the same magicstroke, destroyed the political state of France and overturned its society. But while the new social order had proved immovable and above transformation, except by the slow course of nature, political change and destruction had been constant, leaving behind nothing as yet but ruins. French history since '89 had been one long endeavour to find a good government. All attempts to shake the social Jorder had failed, even when made from the most opposite directions; but every serious attempt to overthrow a Government had succeeded. Of all the [Republics and Monarchies, old and new, that had been tried, only one, that of Orleans, had not been put on its trial twice. The frequency of political revolutions had induced among the French a peculiar moral state, not easy to be understood by any one who had not lived in it and felt it. Thought- \ ful men had come to regard revolutions i without much fear, but alao without any desire to put their hands to such work, j When revolution is apprehended, the great majority of the people remain passive. In these circumstances, the French nation is like a man who might feel mysteriously bound to attempt at certain times to fly into the air, and who puts his foot on the window without much dread, as well as without any enthusiasm, knowing well on the one side that the experiment will fail, but feeling sure on the other that he will, as before, find himself on his feet, not too much damaged by the fall. Hence revolutions were made by a handful of men, who were looked on by their countrymen with more curiosity than passion, as the mere executors of some natural law, the coming application of which was instinctively known to all. And revolution had become an idea so familiar to the French mind that the most Conservative of Frenchmen almost unconsciously gave utterance, from time to time, to the most revolutionary doctrines. M. Prevost-Paradol then proceeded to consider how, amidst such perpetual unsteadiness, the present Government had lasted so long, and still stood with apparent solidity amidst rising agitation. This relative steadiness he ascribed to three facts, which were not observable under former monarchical Governments. The first was that the Imperial constitution was lawfully open to any modification indicated by the popular will — imperfectly enough, but yet with sufficient effect to remove in time serious subjects of complaint. As an example of the working of this provision of the constitution, the lecturer adduced the recent pacific revolution which has reestablished in France responsible Ministers and Parliamentary Government, which he described as having been effected by a hesitating Emperor and a reluctant Senate under the pressure of a limited minority in the elective assembly. These reforms M. Prevost-Paradol regarded as proofs that the Emperor will never recoil before any sacrifice of opinions, nor before any change of conduct, to take a popular grievance out of the hands of his enemies, and to conquer the good-will of the country. The second fact favourable to the maintenance of order was the increasing familiarity of the French people with universal suffrage, and of the power of numbers as intimated by a significant vote. The third fact was the exaggerated fear of socialism, deeply felt by the middle and upper class — a fear now comparatively visionary, but an^ ungrounded fear is a fear still. Socialism was but a new word for a very old thing, and the hope of levelling the inequality of human conditions, in which it had its rise, was easily understood, if one believed that this inequality was produced by a wrono 1 construction of human society, ratheiHhan by the necessary operation ! of a natural law. The contrast of conditions in modern society provoked painful feelings, and oppressed a benevolent heart by its dark and cruel problems. To mend such a state of things only two ways were O p en — liberty and charity. Charity must be always at work, and liberty was a debt of the law which the poor man was much more in want of than the rich. In this respect the law in France had been improved, . but socialism still put forth wide and inequitable claims. It maintained a candid confidence in State power, as a sort of magic wand which in truly socialist hands would bring universal peace, absolute equality, and perfect happiness, not to France only, but to the whole world. And with this profession it united a formidable faith in the efficacy of revolutionary enterprise. Though fears of socialism might be exaggerated, there was ample room to foresee some violent commotion in France if the life of the Emperor be long enough to allow him to reap the results of many faults. Personal government had been so far a necessity for the Emperor; but personal government has in itself an ever-working and never-failing cause of ruin. Parliamentary government and responsible Ministries were a safety-valve to a State, which personal government shut up, leaving one man facing perpetually the nation, whiie grievances, which the best government could not avoid, accumulated and pressed ! every day more and more upon one head. Even Aristides tired out his country by deserving too long to be called " the Just.' ' i In France, personal government did not run the risk of displeasing by its excess of wisdom and virtue, but it could not escape displeasing in a fixed time by the mere fact of its existence. Dissatisfaction had now arisen, and among all whom it had displeased, discontent had been excited, and invidious questions as tQ ; tlie very origin of the Government had been revived against it with renewed and unexpected strength. Popular and cheap accounts of the coup d'etat were in France the first result of the freedom of the press Turning, however, from a difficult inquiry into a dark future, the lecturer invited his hearers rather to mark the main features of changes most likely to come. The main idea, he said, of tße liberal and

enlightened part of the French people now is that deep political reforms are wanted, not so much in the external forms and springs of Government, as in its internal working and administrative organisation. Centralisation, lately the tendency qf almost all public men in France, was now entirely discredited. It was keenly felt that the Executive was | too .powerful in France, that it 3 overwheTpnng' privileges must be curtailed, liberty given to the Borough, and the Department freed from the arbitrary rule of | tße Prefects, or rather Pachas, which the firat Napoleon had instituted, with a maryelWus instinct for despotism ; and that neighboring Departments should unite for the election of members for the Upper House. With such reforms, provincial political life would be renewed, and the blood of intellectual France, now j dangerously confluent to the head of the country, would circulate freely and healthily throughout the whole body politic. (Cheers). French justice also demanded serious reforms, its system of criminal justice being specially unfair and inquisitorial. The system of promoting Judges from place to place, and from town to town, by the unscrupulous hand of the Executive, should also be swept away. It was a device of the First Napolepn, * and tended to prostitute the sacred : interests of justice to the ends of political despotism. In the audienceroom of the Minister of Justice as many Judges might be seen asking and suing for preferment as any other kind of officials in any other of the public offices. He remembered to have heard old Duke Pasquier, who died late under the Second Empire, after having served mauy Governments as a magistrate and a Minister of Justice, saying with sadly competent knowledge, "Do not mention as you do tribunals and courts of first instance, of appeal, and cassation ; say rather, if you mil speak exactly, the regiment of first instance, the regiment of appeal, and the regimen^ of cassation." The relations, too, between Church and State formed one of the greatest political problems of France, which must be solved, however difficult.. The concordat of Napoleon the 'First had. placed the material interests i of . the, Catholic Church in .France, under the hand of the State ; but^'- morally speaking, the French Church was more than ever under the command of the Pope, . and when the two powers were at war, the clergy did not know which, to obey. The Liberal party in the French Church, and the best portion of the Liberal party out of it, desired a peaceful separation of Church and State upon truly liberal and equitable terms ;, a noble work which he hoped the present generation would yet achieve. (Cheers.) Such, said the lecturer in conclusion, is the imperfect sketch of the administrative, judicial, and religious reforms which are the main parts of the programme of the French Liberal party, considered as a whole, independently of its internal divisions as to the Monarchical or .Republican form of government. We are iodebted indirectly, but unquestionably, for such a programme to the Second Empire; itself, because we have been taught by it a severe but useful lesson on the inconveniences of our administrative, judicial, and religious centralisation. To be sure, that excessive centralisation existed before, but under our various constitutional Governments its inconveniences were made lighter, and its dangers were veiled by Parliamentary interference and responsible Ministers. Nay, such excessive centralisation was considered by the majority of our public men as inherent to French political manners, and as necessary to French greatness. It was only in 1852, when all oup,public liberties disappeared in one night,, like the scenery of a theatre ; when Francer awakening from its slumber, found ijjftelfr given over, like a conquered land, tfc prefects, generals, and; irresponsible Ministers ; when no. tribune, no free press, qould interfere, as beforei {between the overwhelming power of the Administratiorijjand ' the unprotected liberty of the citizenrr-it was then only that every enlightened and liberal man. in the country was ; struck with the problem, and, looking at it closely, saw that excessive centralisation was at the root of the evil. And as to make the lesson more effective, and to impress it more deeply on the rudest mind, we have seen during eighteen years that wonderful power of a centralised Government used, like some irresistible weapon for electoral purposes, and succeeding in reducing to electoral submission almost the whole population of the empire. Then the lesson was complete, and we understood at last some words full of meaning which the Emperor himself had inserted into the preamble iof his Constitution of 1852, which .was only a slightly amended copy of the Consular and Imperial Constitution, well known under the name of Constitution of the year VIII. "I said to myself," wrote the Emperor in that preamble, " since France has been living till the present day with the administrative, judicial, and religious organisation of the First Empire, why should we believe that the political constitution of that time would not suit the country as well ?" The Emperor was quite right thus far, that the administrative system of the First Empire, which France had kept till then, was a fit and solid basis for a despotic, and not for a constitutional and liberal .Government ; and, indeed by his coup d'etat and Constitution of 1852, he re-established a full harmony between that basis'jand the more visible part of the building^,,, You. know how that building itself i^dipw crumbling down under the pressure' <jf public opinion, and how its ,very constructor is trying now to remove it peaceably from the ground. But that long arid painful experience has fixed our attention on the basis itself, and as we wish our liberty to stand and prosper, like your own, we are resolved to establish it now on the better foundation of administrative independence, religious freedom, and judicial integrity. (Cheers.) I have^ done now with the imperfect exposition of our present political state,

and of our hopes for a better future. Whatever that future may be, I entreat you to judge us not too hastily nor too severely, doing our duty, as we try to do, in the midst of difficulties and troubles which you cannot realise, so far are they from the happy condition of your own. political life. In those quiet islands political progress is going on hand-in-hand with public peace, and order and liberty are supporting each other under the light sway of a beloved and respected Sovereign. Not so in our distracted land. "We live still under the hard law of old times, that hard, unwritten, but unshaken law, which recites that man must earn his bread with his sweat and his liberty with his blood. Such deep differences between the conditions which rule in every country the difficult and holy work of civilisation and progress must be kindly considered and taken into great account by the enlightened minds of every nation when they are looking at the conduct of their neighbors, and tempted to pass judgment upon them. (Cheers.) For myself, I am rather inclined to consider the truly enlightened part of each people as a portion of a certain noble nation without a name, whose citizens, untied by blood, but united by spirit, are scattered all over the earth, with the duty of feeling always for each other, and of helping each other for good. (Cheers.) It is that comforting thought which has inspired me with the courage of addressing you, not as a foreigner, but rather as a fellow-citizen — (cheers) — in that anonymous but living nation of well- wishers to mankind, and of claiming your sympathy for my dear and longtried country. (Loud and continued cheering.)