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THE FIEST FEENCH EEPUBLIC 
 
 A STUDY OF THE ORIGIN AND THE CONTENTS OF THE DECLARATION 
 OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN, OF THE CONSTITUTION, AND OF 
 THE ADOPTION OF THE REPUBLICAN FORM OF 
 GOVERNMENT IN 1792. 
 
 HORACE MANN CONAWAY, 
 
 Sometime Fellow in European History in Columbia University. 
 
 SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS 
 FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 
 IN THE 
 
 Faculty of Political Science 
 Columbia University. 
 
 IWew 13orIi. 
 
 1002 . 
 

PREFACE. 
 
 \ 'V 
 
 
 , \ r- .j '/ :: 
 
 The present study is one of origins. Our object is to trace 
 from the beginning the gradual development of the Declaration 
 of the Rights of Man, of the first written constitution in France, 
 and to follow the movement which led to the abolition of monar¬ 
 chy and to the adoption of the republican form of government. 
 In view of the complex phenomena of the French Revolutionary 
 period, it is advantageous to our understanding of that surpass¬ 
 ingly interesting era to view the various classes of facts from 
 different standpoints. The Revolution was social, religious, polit¬ 
 ical, and economic. While the study of any one of these phases 
 necessarily involves the others, the best results will be secured 
 by considering the movement now as social, now as religious, now 
 as political, and now as economic. This paper is an investigation 
 of the early Revolution from the political point of view. Whence 
 arose in the minds of the French the idea of a Declaration of the 
 Rights of Man ? Where did they derive the principles therein 
 contained ? How were they led to feel the need of a written con¬ 
 stitution ? Through what series of events were they brought to 
 suspect, to denounce and to renounce royalty, and to accept the 
 idea of an elective executive ? Such questions as these are of in¬ 
 terest to the student of political history. 
 
 Though the primary sources for the investigation of this subject 
 are limited in our American libraries, enough has been found to 
 lead to an interpretation suggestive and, we believe, correct. 
 
 Recently two important books upon the French Revolution 
 have appeared. M. A. Aulard published last year his Histotre 
 politique de la Revolution fran^aise. In this work he has re¬ 
 examined, in the light of the voluminous material at hand in 
 France, these same questions. Prof. William M. Sloane, of Co¬ 
 lumbia University, has treated the Revolution primarily in its 
 ecclesiastical aspects in his Fre7ich Revolution and Religious Re¬ 
 form. The manuscript of this thesis was practically completed 
 
 ( 5 ) 
 
 /I 1 
 
 - 
 
 
6 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 before either of these works came into the writer’s hands. It did 
 not seem advisable, therefore, to make any modifications in the 
 conclusions herein reached ; they are, however, in the main in 
 accord with those arrived at by these two authors. The Declara¬ 
 tion of the Rights of Man and the origin of the idea of a written 
 constitution are here more fully discussed than by these writers. 
 
 H. M. C. 
 
 Sheffield, Pa., August 5, 1902. 
 
THE DECLARATION OF THE RIGHTS OF MAN. 
 
 The first question that naturally suggests itself in studying 
 the Declaration of the Rights of Man is, whence did the French 
 derive the idea of such an instrument ? It has been asserted, and 
 an attempt has been made to prove, that both the notion of 
 such a Declaration and its content were borrowed from the early 
 American State Constitutions.* This question, however, really 
 resolves itself into a double inquiry, i. e., whence did the French 
 receive their notion of the guaranty of individual rights against 
 governmental intrusion, and how far did^he ideas contained in 
 the Declaration of the Rights of Man represent the political tradi¬ 
 tions and current thought of Franc^ Only a study of the abuses 
 and of the political theories of pre-revolutionary France and of 
 the facts relative to this document, as they are revealed in the 
 writings of contemporaries and in the records of the Constituent 
 Assembly, can at all satisfactorily answer these inquiries. 
 
 The sympathetic relation between France and the colonies 
 during and after the American Revolution, the interest in Amer¬ 
 ica of some of the more radical French political theorists, such as 
 Mably and Condorcet, and the community of ideas existing be¬ 
 tween the two countries, shown by the Jeffersonian school in 
 America, and by the publication of American writings in France, 
 are facts well known. Hence it may be inferred that, when a few 
 of the cahiers asked for a Declaration, their framers were ac¬ 
 quainted with and influenced by the American Bills of Rights.’ 
 
 * Ritchie, Natural Rights, p. i; M. Charles Borgeaud, Atablissement et Revision 
 des Constitutions en Amlrique et en Europe, 240-242; Dr. Geo. Jellinek, Die 
 Erkldrung der Menscken-und Biirgerrechte, p. 10. 
 
 2 Two requests for a Declaration of the Rights of Man came from Paris, intra 
 muros ; one from the Nobility, Archives parlementaires, v, 271 ; the other from the 
 Third Estate, Ibid., v, 281. The latter cahier contains a formulated Declaration of 
 thirteen articles. The general cahier of Rennes, Arch. Pari., v, 538, that of the Third 
 Estate of Annonay, Arch. Pari., ii, 50, and that of the Third Estate of Nemours, Arch. 
 Pari., iv, 161, ask for the Declaration of Rights. 
 
 ( 7 ) 
 
8 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 But not until the States General had assumed the r 61 e of a Con¬ 
 stitutional Convention were the proposals of Declarations numer¬ 
 ous. Then it was that the Frenchmen gave abundant proof of 
 their fondness for formulating political documents. 
 
 On Julj- 9, 1789, M. Mounier, who had been charged by the 
 Constituent Assembly with the preparation of a scheme for a con¬ 
 stitution, presented a report in behalf of the committee, the first 
 article of which reads; ‘ ‘ Tout gouvernement doit avoir pour unique 
 but le maintien des droits des hommes; d’ou il suit que pour rap- 
 peller constamment le gouvernement au but propose, la constitu¬ 
 tion doit commencer par la declaration des droits naturels et im- 
 prescriptibles de I’homme.” * July ii, Lafayette proposed the 
 form of a Declaration of Rights, containing twelve articles, and 
 pointed out the advantages of such an instrument.’' M. Lally 
 Tollendal approved this project, but argued that it was dangerous 
 to adopt any such articles separate from the Constitution; he at the 
 same time called the attention of the Assembly to the great differ¬ 
 ence between a new-born colonial people, who were breaking with 
 a distant government, and an old nation extending over an im¬ 
 mense territory, one of the first nations of the world, which for 
 eight centuries had obeyed the same dynasty and had cherished 
 the royal power when it had been tempered by custom. This 
 nation, he said, will idolize this power when it shall be regulated 
 by laws.® M. Lally Tollendal certainly believed that they were 
 following the American example. 
 
 July 14, Lafayette’s motion was discussed. Some thought the 
 Declaration should be put at the head of the Constitution, in order 
 permanently to secure the rights of man before establishing those 
 of society; others thought it should be placed after the Con¬ 
 stitution. It was decided at this session that the Constitution 
 should contain a Declaration, but its position was left for later 
 decision.‘ Sieyes read his exposition of the Rights of Man, on 
 July 10, to the Constitutional Committee, and on July 21, to the 
 Assembly.^ On July 17, M. Target presented a scheme of thirty- 
 one articles for a Declaration, and M. Mounier one of sixteen 
 
 ' Arch. Pari., viii, Zl6. 
 ’ Ibid., 221 et seq. 
 
 Ibid., 230-231. 
 
 * Ibid., 221-222. 
 5 Ibid. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 9 
 
 articles.' On July 31, M. D. Servan, advocate to the Parlement 
 of Grenoble, presented a project of thirteen articles. August i, 
 a long debate occurred upon the position to be given to the Decla¬ 
 ration in the Constitution. M. Thouret also offered a scheme for 
 a Declaration. The debate continued. On August 4, M. Camus 
 proposed that the Assembly make a declaration of the rights and 
 duties of man and of a citizen; but this motion was defeated by a 
 vote of 570 to 433.’ However, at the same session, it was decided 
 almost unanimously that the Constitution should be preceded by 
 the Declaration. On August 12, Abbe Sieyes offered a project of 
 a Declaration of forty-two articles.^ 
 
 During discussion in the Assembly, August i, M. Champion de 
 Cice, Bishop of Auxerre, opposed a declaration as useless at that 
 time, and said that the example of North America was not con¬ 
 clusive, as that country only contains proprietors, cultivators, and 
 citizens all on the same social footing. M. De la Luzerne, Bishop 
 of Langres, also asserted that the Con.stitution of an empire did 
 not need a Declaration. M. Malouet, in making strong protest 
 against their placing the Declaration at the head of the Constitu¬ 
 tion, portrayed the contrast between the situation of France and 
 that of America.’ M. Delandine spoke in agreement with M. 
 Malouet. 
 
 On August 12, two projects for a Declaration of Rights were 
 offered to the Assembly; one of seventy-one articles, by Gonges- 
 Carton of Quercy, and one of twenty-four articles, by the Sixth 
 
 ^ Arch. Pari., 
 
 ’ Ibid., 422. 
 
 ’ “ Convertions nous en acte I^gislatif cet expose m^taphysique, ou pr6senterons 
 nous les principes avec leur modification dans la constitution que nous allons faire ? 
 Je sais que les Amdricains n’ont pas pris cette precaution ; ils ont pris I’liomme dans le 
 sein de la nature, et le pr^sentent a I’univers dans sa souverainetd primitive, mais 
 la socidtd Amdricaine nouvellement formde, est compossee, en totalitd de propridtaires 
 ddji accoutumds ^ I'dgalite, dtrangers au luxe ainsi qu’il I’indulgence, connaissant ^ 
 peine le joug des impots, des prdjuges qui nous dominent, n’ayant trouvd sur la terre 
 qu’ils cultivent aucune trace de fdodalitd. De tels hommes dtaient sans doute prd- 
 pards i recevoir la libertd dans toute son energie ; car leurs goflts, leurs moeurs, Uuri 
 position les appelaient it la ddmocratie. Mais, nous, Messieurs, nous avons pour con- 
 citoyens une multitude immense d’ hommes sans propridtds, qui attendent, avant toute 
 chose, leur subsistence d’un travail assurd, d’une police exacte, d’une protection con. 
 tinue, qui s’irritent quelquefois, non sans de justes motifs, du spectacle du luxe et de 
 I’opulence,” etc. Arch. Pari., viii, 322. 
 
10 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 Bureau of the Assembly. On August 13, a committee of five, 
 consisting of Desmeuniers, Bishop of Langres, M. Tronchet, 
 Count Mirabeau and M. Rhedon, was chosen to receive the drafts 
 of a Constitution and to recast these into one form.* August 14, 
 Mirabeau, on behalf of the committee, reported a scheme of a 
 Declaration containing nineteen articles. In speaking of the aim 
 of the committee, he said, that from the score of plans offered 
 them, they had sought, like the Americans, to construct a Decla¬ 
 ration not of abstract and scientific principles, but one of political 
 truths that would readily be comprehended by the popular mind.’ 
 In the debate of August 18 upon the Declaration, M. Rabaud 
 de Saint Etienne said that the Declaration of Rights had been 
 adopted because the cahiers had asked it, and that the cahiers had 
 asked it because the Americans had set the example, but that this 
 was no reason why the Declarations should be similar, for the 
 circumstances of the two nations were different.’ 
 
 August 19, the Assembly decided to discuss first the Declara¬ 
 tion of the Sixth Bureau.* On August 21, after some debate, the 
 Assembly adopted the preamble of the plan, somewhat modified, 
 presented by the committee of five. M. Mounier then proposed 
 three articles, which were adopted. August 21, on the proposal 
 of M. Alexander de Eameth, articles four, five, and six, after dis¬ 
 cussion, were adopted. 
 
 August 21, M. de Boislander proposed a plan of seventy-four 
 articles. August 22, after divers proposals had been made and 
 
 * Arch. Pari., viii, 434. 
 
 ’ “ Nous avons cherch6 cette forme populaire qui rapelle au peuple, non ce qu’on a 
 6tudi6 dans les livres ou dans les meditations abstraites, mais ce qu’il a lui meme 
 6prouve. . . . C’est ainsi que les Ameticains ont fait leur declaration de droits; 
 
 ils en ont ^ dessein ecarte la science ; ils ont presente les veritSs politique qu’ils 
 s’agissait de fixer sous une forme qui pQt devenir facilement celle du peuple, a quj 
 seul la liberie importe, et qui seul peut la maintenir.” Arch. Pari., viii, 438-440. 
 
 ^ Arch. Pari., viii, 452 et seq. 
 
 * A comparison of the Declaration offered by the Sixth Bureau with the Bill of 
 Rights of the Revolutionary Constitutions of Massachusetts and of Virginia, shows 
 that the Bill of Rights of the Virginia Constitution contained sixteen articles, that of 
 the Massachusetts thirty, and that of the Sixth Bureau, twenty-four. The same gen¬ 
 eral ideas are found in all three, but they are couched in different words, that of the 
 Sixth Bureau being the least extreme. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 11 
 
 discussed, articles seven, eight, and nine were adopted.' August 
 23, after many proposals and lengthy debate, article ten was 
 agreed upon. August 24, a liberal discussion of the phraseology 
 resulted in the adoption of articles eleven, twelve, and thirteen.’ 
 August 26, after some discussion, articles fourteen and fifteen 
 were accepted; later in the same day, articles sixteen and seven¬ 
 teen were agreed upon.’ Then the Assembly resolved that the 
 consideration of further articles should be postponed until the 
 Constitution should be completed.* October 2, the articles pre¬ 
 viously adopted were presented to the Assembly, with article four 
 changed from “ La liberte consiste a faire tout ce qui ne nuit pas a 
 autrui,” to “La liberte consiste a pouvoir faire tout” etc. The 
 change was accepted. The whole Constitution was presented to 
 the king September 13, 1791, and accepted by him. In the As¬ 
 sembly, September 14, the king swore to obey the constitution.’ 
 
 These are the facts of historical data relating to the formation 
 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man purposely set forth in 
 detail and in chronological order. What conclusions may we 
 draw from them ? The frequent reference to the American Bill 
 of Rights, the number of Declarations proposed in cahiers and 
 before the Assembly, differing in form and in length, but agreeing 
 in fundamental principles, the discussions, the selections and the 
 modifications to which this raw material was subjected in the 
 process of constructing the Declaration finally adopted, warrant 
 these two inferences; (i) the notion of a Declaration of Rights, 
 separate from the Constitution proper, was suggested to the 
 French by the American State Constitutions ; (2) the contents of 
 the articles and the language in which they were couched were 
 original. 
 
 A study of the separate articles of the Declaration in the light 
 of contemporary conditions gives additional reason for thinking 
 that the ideas therein contained were not foreign to France. For 
 convenience of consideration in the present study, the articles of 
 the Declaration may be divided into two classes; the first class 
 consists of those articles that were in the main reactive against 
 certain abuses under which the French suffered; the second class 
 
 * Arch. Pari., viii, 470 et seq. 
 
 ’ Ibid., 483-484. ’ Ibia., 487, 489. ‘ Ibid., 492, 
 
 Histoire ParUmcntaire, 395-402. 
 
12 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 comprises those articles which contained principles more especi- 
 all}' theoretical. Less proof, perhaps, is necessary for deciding 
 upon the originality of the former class than upon that of the 
 ’ ■' We shall treat these classes in the order named. 
 
 Art. 7. No person shall be accused, arrested or imprisoned 
 
 except in the cases and according to the forms prescribed b}^ law. 
 An)" one soliciting, transmitting, executing, or causing to be exe¬ 
 cuted any arbitrary order shall be punished. But any citizen 
 summoned or arrested in virtue of the law shall submit without 
 delay, as resistance constitutes an offense. 
 
 Art. 8. The law shall provide for such punishments only as are 
 strictly and obviously necessar)", and no one shall suffer punish¬ 
 ment except it be legally inflicted in virtue of a law, passed and 
 promulgated before the commission of the offence. 
 
 Art. 9. As all persons are held innocent until they shall have 
 been declared guilty, if arrest shall be deemed indispensable, all 
 severity not essential to the securing of the prisoner’s person shall 
 be severely repressed by law.” 
 
 That these three articles were aimed at no imaginary or very 
 distant wrongs is evident from a cursory survey of the adminis¬ 
 tration of the laws of France, and from the protests of French 
 authors. Lettres de cachet, arbitrary imprisonments, retroactive 
 laws, and cruelly exaggerated penalties were not uncommon. 
 Mirabeau and Voltaire had both .suffered under arbitrary laws and 
 had painted the injustice of such laws in lurid colors. Mirabeau’s 
 Lettres de cachet and his Essai stir le despotisme bristle with pro¬ 
 tests against the abuses of the old regime. The following grue- 
 .some picture is a suggestive statement of the way in which justice 
 was administered in France in the eighteenth century: 
 
 ” The disproportion of crimes and of penalties was flagrant. A 
 house thief was hung in 1733; an ecclesiastic, guilty of having 
 found fault with the expulsion of the Jesuits, was also hung in 
 1762. The procedure was unjust and inhuman. The accused, 
 assumed to be guilty in advance, ignorant of the crime with which 
 he was charged, without counsellor or advocate, interrogated d 
 huis clos, submitted to the preparatory question, was judged 
 secretly. Once condemned, he was tortured before undergoing 
 his punishment. And what punishment ! For imprisonment, 
 transportation or hanging was in vogue. The burning at the 
 stake had fallen into desuetude, but the lash, branding with red- 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 13 
 
 hot iron, the galleys, quartering, the rack, still did their savage 
 work.” ‘ 
 
 Protests against these enormities were raised by the philoso¬ 
 phers, and later by enlightened magistrates, such as Montesquieu, 
 Servan, Linguet, and Malesherbes. In 1780, the “preparatory 
 question” was abolished.^ 
 
 Mirabeau, in denouncing retroactive laws, says: “ Nulle puis¬ 
 sance humaine, ni surhumaine ne pent justifier I’effet retroactif 
 d’aucune loi.” ’ 
 
 “Art. 10. No one shall be disquieted on account of his opinions, 
 including his religious views, provided their manifestation does 
 not disturb the public order established by law.” 
 
 Since the sixteenth century, France had been wrestling with the 
 problem of how to adjust two hostile faiths to each other. Far¬ 
 ther to complicate the matter, a schism occurred in the seven¬ 
 teenth century within the Catholic Church, which aroused be¬ 
 tween Jesuits and the Jansenists a feeling of intolerance, well- 
 nigh as violent and determined as that which already existed 
 between the Catholics and the Huguenots. Even in the eigh¬ 
 teenth century intolerance, held in partial abeyance, frequently 
 broke out in overt acts, which displayed the vindictiveness of 
 the hostile parties. The philosophers, more interested in human¬ 
 ity than in the prejudices of any faction, championed in the name 
 of tolerance the party persecuted. The new spirit gained sup¬ 
 port. The writings of the latter half of the eighteenth century 
 abound with denunciations of intolerance and with pleas for 
 tolerance.* By and by the movement was fruitful, and on January" 
 
 * Lavisse et Rambaud; Histoire Generale, vii, 360. 
 
 ’ Ibid., vii, 360. 
 
 ’ Diet. Universelle, under Retroactif. 
 
 ‘Three friends of tolerance were Voltaire, D’Argenson and Turgot. Voltaire in 
 his Discourse Historique et Critique placed as an introduction to the tragedy Les 
 Guebres {Oeuvres, by M. Beuchet, ix, 26, Paris, 1831), and in his Traiti sur la tol 
 Irance, written upon the death of Jean Galas, 1763 {Oeuvres, ix, 141 and 243 et seq.'), 
 pleads for tolerance. For d’Argenson’s views on tolerance in 1744, see Roequain, 
 L'esprit rtvolutionaire, 116 and 138, and d’Argenson, Memoires, v, 328 et seq. 
 Turgot in a letter to an ecclesiastic, his schoolmate at the Sorbonne, expressed him¬ 
 self in 1753 in favor of tolerance; another letter of the year following was of like 
 import. His Conciliateur was printed about the same time. Oeuvres, ii, 353 et seq., 
 Paris, 1808. June, 1755, he presented a Memoir to the king on “Toleration, or Re¬ 
 ligious Equality.” Life and Writings of Turgot, by W. Walker Stephens, 256 et seq. 
 
H 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 ig, 1788, the Parlemenf oi Paris registered a decree giving civil 
 rights to Protestants.' 
 
 “ Art. II. The free communication of ideas and opinions is one 
 of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, 
 accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be 
 responsible for the abuse of this freedom as shall be defined by 
 law. ’ ’ 
 
 Here too is an attempt to secure permanently that for which a 
 long struggle had taken place. Two powers, the Church and 
 Royalt5'^, had labored, now singly and uow together, to regulate 
 the expression 01 ideas. The writing and the writer had been 
 equally the object of royal inclemency—the one being consigned 
 to the flames, the other to prison. But in spite of royal decrees, 
 public sentiment gravitated towards liberty of expression. In 
 1776, Malesherbes secured the opening of the prisons of Vincennes 
 and the Bastille for the release of prisoners held under Lettres de 
 cachet^ Again, in 1784, in response to Mirabeau’s "'Lettres de 
 cachet'’’ the dungeons of Vincennes were opened.® 
 
 “ Art. 12. The security of the rights of man and of the citizen 
 requires a public force. This force is, therefore, established for 
 the good of all and not for the personal advantage of those to 
 whom it shall be entrusted.” 
 
 This twelfth article was at the same time the expression of a 
 political theory and reactionary against past practices. It was 
 the theory of the framers of the Declaration of the Rights of Man 
 that the nation was supreme, the monarch only an hereditary 
 administrative agent. To maintain this status, the power of mili¬ 
 tary force must be employed only for the advantage of the nation. 
 d’Argenson, in 1754, had complained that ‘‘Le roi n’ emploie 
 plus ses forces que contre ses sujets.” * In 1771, when the obstin¬ 
 ate parlement had been replaced by the Grayid Conseil, troops were 
 used to guard this substitute which was designated ” Maupeou’s 
 parlement,” and the people considered the whole procedure as 
 contrary to the French Constitution.® Mirabeau had also de- 
 
 ' Rocquain, U esprit rev., p. 463. ^ Ibid., 336. 
 
 ® Rocquain, L'esprit, riv., 412, For a list of the books condemned, see Rocquain, 
 Ibid., 489-535. 
 
 * Quoted in Rocquain, L'esprit riv., 178, and in Mimoires, viii, 248. 
 
 * Rocquain, H esprit riv., 286. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 nounced the royal army in these plain words: “Je dis que les 
 troupes reglees sont 1’instrument du despotisme, comme leur insti¬ 
 tution en fut le signal. L’exemple de nos voisins n’est pas une 
 preuve concradictoire; et ne voit on pas en efFet que toute consti¬ 
 tution en Europe est degeneree en arbitraire et s’accelere vers le 
 despotisme; Les troupes reglees ont ete et seront toujours le fleau 
 de la liberte; mais ce fleau est intolerable quand il devient le 
 rempart des depredations.” ‘ 
 
 The people in several of the cahiers manifested fear lest the 
 monarch might endanger, by the use of an army, the national 
 rights, and consequently asked for the dismissal of foreign troops, 
 for a new constitution for the army, and for the destruction of in¬ 
 ternal forts.^ 
 
 ‘‘Art. 13. A common contribution is essential for the mainten¬ 
 ance of the public forces and for the cost of administration. This 
 should be equitably distributed among all the citizens in propor¬ 
 tion to their means.” 
 
 The inequality of taxes was, in France, an abuse recognized 
 and condemned for centuries. Bodin, in his Republique, written 
 in the sixteenth century, criticised the exemption of the clergy 
 and of the nobility.’ Already under Louis XIII., throughout two- 
 thirds of France, where the taille was a personal tax, 2,000,000 of 
 richer persons were exempt from the taille, while 8,000,000 were 
 taxable. D’Avenel says that the workmen paid under Louis 
 XIII. four and a half times as much as to-day, though they earned 
 much less.* The grievous exemptions continued so that the 
 Third Estate during the eighteenth century supported the chief 
 burden of royal taxes and was subjected to onerous feudal dues 
 besides.® 
 
 * Essai sur le despotisme. Oeuvres, viii, ill et seq., Paris, 1835. 
 
 ’The cahier of the Nobility of Sisteron asked: “ Qu’il sera fait des reglements, et 
 pris des precautions pour que les troupes necessaires au maintient de la tranquilite 
 ginerale ne puissent jamais servir opprimer le citoyen et i enchainer la liberte 
 publique.” Arch. Pari., iii, 364. The cahier of the Nobility and the Third Estate 
 of Peronne asked : “ Que ... les officiers et les soldats, en prgtant le serment 
 de fidelite au Roi, le prStent aussi k la nation et jurent d n’executer aucun ordre qui 
 soit contraire aux lois constitutionelles.” Arch. Pari., v, 356. 
 
 ’ Jean Bodin, De Republica. Libre vi, chap. ii. 
 
 ‘ Hist. Gin., v, 362. 
 
 * Rtat de la France en lySg, Paul Boiteau, ch. xiv, Paris, 1861. 
 
i6 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 The Physocrats advocated as a remedy for this injustice a S5'S- 
 tem which should make the taxes proportionate to each one’s 
 productive riches. Turgot, taking the first step towards the 
 realization of this idea, said, in defense of his proposal for the 
 abolition of corvees, February, 1776: “The expenses of govern¬ 
 ment having for their object the interest of all, all should contrib¬ 
 ute to them; and the more one enjoys the advantages of society, 
 the more one should regard himself honored in sharing the ex¬ 
 penses.’’ ' But his efforts were vain; for the privileged classes 
 esteemed their exemptions too highly to submit tamely to a bur¬ 
 densome reform; hence they stubbornly persisted in their resist¬ 
 ance to innovations in the customary methods of collecting taxes. 
 Nevertheless there was a growing sentiment in favor of reform;’ 
 so that when the cahiers of 1789 were prepared, the majority of 
 those of the higher orders acceded to an equal partition in the 
 burdens of the fisc.’ 
 
 “ Art. 14. All the citizens have a right to decide, either person¬ 
 ally or by their representatives, upon the necessity of the public 
 contribution; to grant this freely; to know to what uses it is put, 
 and to fix the proportion, the mode of assessment and of collec¬ 
 tion, and the duration of the taxes.’’ 
 
 The French monarch, as in other European countries, from the 
 time that the royal domains were found insufficient to meet the 
 governmental expenses, was engaged in a continual struggle with 
 the nation over the right to grant subsidies. The nation asserted 
 only sporadically and incoherently its right to vote these supplies. 
 For the French did not manifest that persistent and determined 
 resistance to appropriations, unrequited by redress of political 
 grievances, which their English neighbors exhibited so often 
 and in such a marked degree. Nevertheless, during a minority 
 or under a weak monarch, when able popular leaders flourished, 
 the cause of the people was more stubbornly maintained. The 
 States General claimed this guardianship in earlier days; but in 
 the two centuries previous to the Revolution it was the Parlement 
 of Paris that contended with increasing vigor and obstinacy 
 against the arbitrary exactions of the king. As a final re.sort, it 
 
 * Alfred Neymarck, Turgot et ses Doctrines, i, 257 et seq., 2 vols., Paris, 1885. 
 
 * Hist. GSn., vii, chap. xii. 
 
 3 For instances of the abuses at which Art. 13 aimed, see De Tocqueville, DAncien 
 rigime, trans. by Plenry Buor, notes 32-38, pp. 271-273. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 n 
 
 asserted, July 30, 1787, that “ le principe constitutionnel de la 
 tnonarchie fran9aise etait que les imp6ts fussent consentis par ceux 
 qui devraient les supporter.” ‘ The continued and inextricable- 
 confusion of finances -was the immediate cause of the calling of the: 
 Notables, and later of the States General. So far had the public 
 sentiment reacted against the actual fiscal mismanagement, that 
 the cashier were well-nigh unanimous in seeking for the nation 
 the right to grant subsidies.’ 
 
 ‘‘Art. 15. Society has a right to require of every public agent 
 an account of his administration.” 
 
 Article 15 was both theoretical and reactionary against actual 
 abuses. If the nation was to be supreme over all of its agents, it 
 could only hope effectually to maintain that superiority by hold¬ 
 ing all its functionaries strictly accountable. Practical experience 
 under the monarchy in the collection and the expenditure of 
 finances had impressed an effective lesson upon the French people 
 of the abuses incident to irresponsible officers. The Cour des 
 Aides, in its noteworthy remonstrance of 1775, reviewed the status 
 of the financial administration. The injustice of the feme, the 
 arbitrariness of the beaureacracy, the complexity of the system, 
 the failure of popular petitions to reach the throne, and the need 
 of thorough reform, were clearly set forth.’ Then, too, Necker, 
 by the publication of his Compte rendu (1781) and L'Administra¬ 
 tion des fi 7 ia 7 ices (1785), had afforded the nation a glimpse of pub¬ 
 lic finances imperfect, yet in the highest degree stimulating to its 
 curiosity.* As an illustration of the status of public opinion, the 
 
 ' Rocquain, L'esprit rev., 448. 
 
 ’ For the part taken by the States General in granting subsidies, see Henri Hervieu, 
 Recherches sur les premiers iltats ghieraux, Paris, 1879; G. Picot, Hist, des Ptats 
 Glniraux Paris, 1885, 5 vols.; Ch. V. Langlois, Ptats genlraux in La Grande En. 
 cyclopidie; for that of the parlenients, see Rocquain, L'esprit riv., and Ch. Gomel, 
 Les Causes financilres de la revolution francaise. 
 
 ’ Protest of the Cour des Aides of Paris, April 10, 1775, in Translations and Re¬ 
 prints from the Original Sources of European History, edited by James Harvey 
 Robinson, Ph. D., with an English version by Grace Read Robinson. 
 
 * Gomel in Les Causesfinancilres de la rlvolution francaise, p. 113, gives the fol. 
 lowing quotation from a contemporary writer: “ Le livre de Necker sur L'adminis¬ 
 tration des finances produisit autant d’effet que si I’auteur avail encore dirige celles 
 du royaume. . . . Des magistrals, des juriconsultes, des militaires, des pr^lats 
 I’etudieraient, non pour devenir administrateurs, mais pour se rendre des censeurs rc- 
 doubtables de I’administration. 
 
i8 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH RUPUBLIC 
 
 Notables in 1787 demanded that some report of receipts and ex¬ 
 penses should be published annually, and that capable men, for¬ 
 eign to the administration, should be called to the conseil des 
 Ji^iances for reviewing the work.' Here, too, the cahiers were 
 practically a unit in their demands. 
 
 “ Art. 17. Since property is an inviolable and sacred right, no 
 one shall be deprived thereof except where public necessity, 
 legally determined, shall clearly demand it, and then only on 
 condition that the owner shall have been previously and equitably 
 indemnified.” 
 
 Private property under the ancien regime was not sacred. De 
 Tocqueville cites the following, which may serve us for illustra¬ 
 tion of the condition: ‘‘A royal declaration was made, suspending 
 in time of war repayment of all loans contracted by towns, vil¬ 
 lages, colleges, communities, hospitals, charitable houses, trade 
 corporations and others, repayable out of town dues by us con¬ 
 ceded, though the instrument securing the said loans stipulates 
 for the payment of interest in the case of non-payment at the stip¬ 
 ulated time. Thus not only is the obligation of repayment at the 
 stipulated terms suspended, but the security itself is impaired.” ’ 
 This article, seventeenth, was also reactive against the grievous 
 and burdensome corvees, military convoys, and forced transporta¬ 
 tion of convicts." 
 
 The remaining seven articles are more theoretical, covering the 
 doctrines of liberty, equality, natural and inalienable rights, 
 national sovereignty, the social contract and the separation of 
 powers. The views expres.sed were, in the main, accepted at 
 least in theory in the American States. France was not, however, 
 indebted to the colonies for them; although their germinal ideas 
 had been introduced from the teachings of foreign writers, notably 
 from the English, they had grown up in France largely as a home 
 product. 
 
 The doctrine of national or popular sovereignty was no new 
 conception for the French nation. It had been appealed to by the 
 Church to check the secular power, and by the Empire to check 
 
 ' Rocquain, L'esprit riv., 444. 
 
 HAncien Reg, trans by Henry Reeve, note 39, p. 273. 
 
 5 A. Babeau, La Ville sous 1 'ancien rigime, ii, 9 ; Reeve’s translation of De Tocque- 
 •ville, Ancien riginie, notes 60-62, pp. 286, 287. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 19 
 
 ecclesiastical encroachments. Thomas Aquinas, the oracle of the 
 Church, had recognized the popular will as a limitation upon the 
 royal power, and had commended the elective form of monarchy.* 
 Marsilio of Padua, in his Defensor Pads, was even more pro¬ 
 nounced in favor of popular .sovereignty. “The sovereignty of 
 the State,’’ he said, “ rests with the people; by it properly are the 
 laws made and to it they owe their validity. From the nation 
 itself proceeds all rights and powers, it is the authoritative law¬ 
 giver among men.’” In the sixteenth century the Calvinists and 
 the Teague alternately made use of the theory of popular sover¬ 
 eignty.® This theory was revived in the eighteenth century and 
 popularized by Rousseau and his disciples. 
 
 The doctrine of natural rights has not so remote an origin for 
 France. De Tocqueville rightly pointed out the distinction be¬ 
 tween liberty, regarded as “the enjoyment of a privilege’’ and 
 liberty considered as “the exercise of a universal right’’; he also 
 showed that the Romans and the feudal aristocracy figured their 
 liberties to themselves under the former type; and that it was 
 not till the eighteenth century that the French nation began to 
 conceive of liberty as a natural right.* 
 
 This transformation of the theory of liberty from a privilege to 
 a natural right was chiefly accomplished after 1734. Boulainvil- 
 liers, in L'Histoire de I'ancien gouvernement de la France, published 
 (1727) in Holland after his death, asserted as its fundamental 
 thought: “ Le gouvernement feodal est le chef d’oeuvre de I’esprit 
 humain.’’ To the author, all progress of royal, civil, or municipal 
 authority is an usurpation of the rights of the nobility, who were 
 the only heirs of the early Franks, conquerors of the Gauls.® 
 This champion of the feudal aristocracy was not answered in the 
 name of democracy, but of privileged rights. Abb^ Dubois, the 
 secretary of the French Academy, replied in “ the name of Roman 
 Gaul, semi-municipal and semi-monarchical.’’ This reply, en¬ 
 titled, "Histoire critique de i'etablisse 7 nt 7 it de la nionarchie f 7 a 7 i- 
 
 ' Poole, Illustrations of the History of Mediaeval Thought, p. 242. 
 
 ^ Ibid., p. 267. 
 
 * E. d’Eichthal, souveraineti du peuple, 37-40 
 
 ^Memoirs, Letters and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville, i, pp. 254-260, 2 vols. 
 London, 1861. 
 
 * M.artin, Histoire de France, vol xv, 334. 
 
20 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 (aise" (1734), denied the Frankish conquest and asserted that the 
 French monarchy had succeeded in a peacable way to the rights 
 of the Roman Empire over the Gauls, and that the feudal system 
 had been established by usurpation several centuries later. Public 
 opinion and the judgment of 'Cae. savants, says Martin, pronounced 
 in favor of Dubois.‘ 
 
 Saint Pierre, d’Argenson, and Montesquieu contributed to the 
 political literature of the century, but did not formulate a new 
 theorj' of rights. The Physiocrats applied the natural law to 
 economic problems, but not specifically to political questions; 
 this was reserved for Rousseau. In the Genevan philosopher’s 
 writings, natural rights and kindred democratic ideas were treated 
 in such a popular style that they were able to revolutionize the 
 French political theories in a generation. 
 
 A critical student cannot attribute complete originality to 
 Rousseau; the similarity of his views to those of Eocke is too 
 striking. He borrowed from his English predecessor psychologi¬ 
 cal, philosophical and political conceptions.” The Contrat Social 
 (1762), however, according with the nascent political Zeit-Geist of 
 France, found conditions favorable to the ready acceptance of its 
 ideas. The philosophers had shaken the authority of dogma, 
 humanitarian views were gaining prominence, men were tired of 
 arbitrary imprisonments and of useless privileges, moreover, the 
 long struggle between the monarch and the parlements was still 
 unsettled, the theory of the right of parlement to refuse to record 
 decrees was found to need a firmer basis than custom. The sym¬ 
 pathies of even the nobles were awakened in behalf of the peas¬ 
 ants and the curates. The Physiocrats hoped for tax reform, to 
 be effected by a strong sovereign, though, when attempted by 
 Turgot, it had failed. Amid such conditions the Contrat Social 
 
 * Martin, Histoirt de France, 355. 
 
 ’ R. L. Corwin, Entwicklung und Vergleichung der Erziehungslehren von John 
 Locke und Jean Jacques Rousseau, Heidelberg, 1894; Vasille Saftu, Ein Vergleich 
 der physicken Erziehung bet Locke und Rousseau, Bucarest, 1889; David G. 
 Ritchie, The Social Contract, in vi. vol. of Pol. Sc. Quart.; Jaeger, Geschickte der 
 socialen Bewegung und der Socialismus in Franckereich, \o\. ii, 342, Berlin, 1890; 
 Prof. J. Horning, Les idles politiques de Rousseau, in J. J. Rousseau jugi par les 
 Genevois d'aujourd'hui, p. 135 et seq. ; also M. Jules Vuy in Bulletin de L’Institut 
 National Genevois for j 88 j, pp. 273-344; Rousseau et Locke, Henri Marion ; J. 
 Locke, Sa Vie et son Oeuvre d'apris des documents nouveaux, Paris, 1893. 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 21 
 
 was being read. Its striking, stimulating apothegms furnished 
 apt quotations. Its effect was revolutionary. Even philosophers 
 and magistrates were not insensible to its stimulus.* When the 
 nation was called to speak, on the eve of the Estates General, in 
 pamphlets and in cahiers, the influence of Rousseau was patent. 
 The speeches made in the National Assembly were constantly 
 interlarded with quotations and ideas from Contrat Social.^ 
 
 After this general introduction to the political theories of the 
 Revolution, we are ready to examine the remaining articles of the 
 Declaration of the Rights of Man. We shall place in parallel 
 with these some quotations from the Contrat Social that will serve 
 to indicate the similarity of their ideas. 
 
 “ I. Men are born and remain free and 
 equal in rights. Social distinctions may 
 only be founded upon the general good.” 
 
 “ 2. The aim of all political associations 
 is the preservation of the national and im¬ 
 prescriptible rights of man. These rights 
 are liberty, property, security, and resist¬ 
 ance of oppression.” 
 
 “ It is agreed that anything of power or 
 property or liberty which is alienated by 
 the social compact, is only a part of all 
 the use of which is of importance to the 
 community.” ’ 
 
 “ To find a form of association which 
 shall defend and protect with the public 
 force the person and property of each 
 associate, and by means of which each, 
 uniting with all, shall obey however only 
 himself, and remain as free as before; 
 such is the fundamental problem of which 
 the Social Contract gives the solution.”^ 
 
 * Voltaire in a letter of April 2, 1764, wrote : “ Tout ce que je vois jete les semences 
 
 d une revolution qui arrivera immanquablement, et dont je n’aurai pas le plaisir d’etre 
 teimoin. . . . Les jeunes gens sont bien heureux : ils verront de belles choses.” 
 
 Quoted in Martin, Hist, de Fr., vol. xvi, 136. Malesherbes, in speaking to the king 
 as the organ of parlement in 1770, said : “ You hold your crown. Sire, from God 
 alone; but you will not refuse yourself the satisfaction of believing that, for your 
 power, you are likewise indebted to the voluntary submission of your subjects. There 
 exist in France some inviolable rights, which belong to the nation.” Quoted from 
 Remontrances de la Cours des Aides, 1770, by De Tocqueville ; Mlmoires, etc., i, 
 259--60. For Rousseau’s literary influence, see Joseph Texte, Jean Jacques Rous, 
 sec^iet les Origines du Cosmopolitisme Litteraire, Liv. ii, Paris, 1895. 
 
 * K pamphlet of 17891 “ Lettre d’un Cure de Picardie k un ev^que sur le droit des 
 cur6s d’assister aux assemblies du clerge et aux Etats-generaux,” etc., illustrates how 
 the curates applied the natural rights doctrine : “ Les droits des hommes reunis en 
 sociiti ne sont point fondis sur leur histoire mais sur leur nature. II ne peut y avoir 
 de raisons de perpituer les etablissements faits sans raisons, 3 p.” In vol. 84 of French 
 Revolution Collection of the Pennsylvania Historical Society. 
 
 ® Contrat Social, Livre ii, ch. iv. 43. * Ibid., Livre i, ch. vi, 20. 
 
22 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 “ 3. The principle [principe] of all sov¬ 
 ereignty resides essentially in the nation. 
 No body nor individual may exercise any 
 authority which does not proceed directly 
 from the nation.” 
 
 “4. Liberty consists in being able to do 
 everything which injures no one else; 
 hence the exercise of the natural rights of 
 each man has no limits except those which 
 assure to the other member of the society 
 the enjoyment of the same rights. These 
 limits can only be determined by law.” 
 
 “ 5. Law can only prohibit such actions 
 as are hurtful to society. Nothing may 
 be prevented which is not forbidden by 
 law, and no one may be forced to do any¬ 
 thing not provided for by law.” 
 
 “ 6. Law is the expression of the general 
 will. Every citizen has a right to partici¬ 
 pate personally or through his representa¬ 
 tives in its formation. It must be the 
 same for all, whether it protects or pun¬ 
 ishes. All citizens, being equal in the 
 eyes of the law, are equally eligible to all 
 dignities and to all public positions and 
 occupations, according to their abilities 
 and without distinction except that of 
 their virtues and talents.” 
 
 “ I say then that the sovereignty, being 
 only the exercise of the general will, can 
 never alienate itself, and that the sover¬ 
 eign, who is not a collective being, can be 
 represented only by himself; power can 
 transmit itself, but not will.” * 
 
 “ Any service that a citizen can render 
 the State is due from him whenever the 
 sovereign demands it; but the sovereign, 
 for his part, cannot place any burden upon 
 his subjects which will not be useful to the 
 community; he can not even desire to do 
 so, for, under the law of reason as under 
 the law of nature, there is nothing done 
 without a purpose.” ’ 
 
 “ When 1 say that the object of laws is 
 always general, I mean that the law con¬ 
 siders subjects in a body, and actions as 
 abstract; a man is never considered as an 
 individual nor an action as an individual 
 action.” • 
 
 “ By whatever path we return to the 
 principle, we always reach the same con¬ 
 clusion ; that the social compact estab- 
 li.shes among citizens such an equality 
 that they all engage under the same 
 conditions, and should enjoy the same 
 rights. Thus by the nature of the agree¬ 
 ment, an act of sovereignty, that is, any 
 authentic act of the general will, obliges 
 or favors equally all citizens; so that the 
 sovereign knows only the body of the 
 nation and distinguishes no one of those 
 composing it.* 
 
 The Physiocrats also had, in a measure, advocated these prin¬ 
 ciples. Both Quesnay and Turgot expressed themselves unc :[ui- 
 vocally for the protection of private property* Let it be asst^ ed 
 with the strongest emphasis that these six articles were,:] ot 
 
 1 Contrat Social, Livre II, ch. I, 35. ’ Ibid., LiVre II, ch. IV, 43-44. 
 
 • Ibid., Livre II, ch. VI, 54-55. ^ Ibid., Livre II, ch. IV, p. 46. 
 
 * Quesnay said: “ The security of property is the essential foundation of the economic 
 order of society.” Maximes ginirales au gouverntment, Physiocrates, ii, 83, Paris, 
 1846. Turgot, writing of the omnipotence of the State, said: “This principle that 
 
THE RIGHTS OF MAN 
 
 23 
 
 merely the expression of theories. They had an intensely prac¬ 
 tical genesis, for they were the slowly-matured product of a reac¬ 
 tion against a long-felt vexatious regime. That regime had in¬ 
 terfered with private property and with individual action in such 
 ways as to be grievous, yes, intensely grievous to the people. 
 
 “Art. 16. A society in which the observance of the law is not 
 assured, nor the separation of powers defined, has no constitution 
 at all.” 
 
 The theory of the separation of powers was one idea taught by 
 Montesquieu * that had been gradually accepted by his country¬ 
 men. He was studied by the would-be-publicists of the Revolu¬ 
 tionary era, and much stress was put upon this constitutional 
 principle. The Constitution which they formed is the best ex¬ 
 ample of the thorough application of this impracticable doctrine.’ 
 
 In this discussion we have shown that while the suggestion of 
 a Declaration of Rights came from the early American State Con¬ 
 stitutions, its content was French. Its internal resemblance to 
 the American instruments is attributable to the fact that the 
 abuses to be feared and the recognized political theories were the 
 same in both countries. In truth, France had greater reason to 
 apprehend the return of the long-endured abuses, from which she 
 was even then endeavoring to extricate herself, than had Amer¬ 
 ica. Likewise the fact that each country had derived its demo¬ 
 cratic views from a common source—the teachings of the English 
 Puritans—largely explains the identity of the existing political 
 theories. 
 
 nothing should limit the rights of society upon the indiridual, save the greater good 
 of society, appears to me false and dangerous. Every man is born free, and this lib¬ 
 erty can never be limited unless it degenerate into license, that is to say, ceases to be 
 liberty. . . . It is forgotten that society is made for the individual, that is, insti¬ 
 
 tuted only for protecting the rights of all, by assuring the accomplishment of all mutual 
 duties.” Quoted by M. E. Daire, Physiocratis, ii, Introd., xxi, xxii. 
 
 * Esprit dis Lois, Liv. xi. 
 
 > Saint Girons, Droit public francais, treats thoroughly the question of separation of 
 powers. Mirabeau in referring to the separation of powers, in a speech delivered in 
 the Assembly July 16, 1789, pointed out the general misapprehension of this theory: 
 “ Nous aurons bientdt occasion d’exaniiner cette th^orie des trois pouvoirs, laquelle 
 exactement analys^e montrera peut fitre la facility de I’esprit humain i prendre des 
 mots pour des choses, des formules pour des arguments et a. se routiner vers un certain 
 ordre d’id^es sans revenir jamais a examiner I’intelligible definition qu’il a prise pour 
 un axiome.” Arch. Pari., VIII, 243. 
 
CONSTITUTION. 
 
 The States-General which met at Versailles, May 5, 1789, as¬ 
 sumed in the following June the name of National Assembly, and 
 undertook the formulation of a written constitution. According 
 to the current views, this epochal transformation was either a 
 political freak of an old monarch}^, newly leavened with demo¬ 
 cratic ideas, or a manifestation of the rare phenomenon of a 
 nation’s being carried sympathetically in the wake of a distant 
 and new-born republic. But a careful consideration of the events, 
 institutions, and conditions of France previous to the action of the 
 National Assembly proves conclusively that the traditional in¬ 
 terpretations are not correct. 
 
 It is foreign to the province of the present paper to explore 
 minutely the shadowy historical region, whence arose the politi¬ 
 cal institutions of monarchical France, or to analyze exhaustively 
 those institutions themselves. It is sufficient to note that already 
 at the beginning of the XVII. century there had developed cer¬ 
 tain institutions with a normal mode of procedure, that may justly 
 be called a constitution, not embraced in written documents, but 
 one implied in the institutions and usages. The leading features 
 of that constituted government were four:U;he King, the States- 
 General, the Conseil d'Etat and the Parlement^ 
 
 The king was not only the exeeutive, but the initiator of laws, 
 and the source of justice. 
 
 The States-General, judged by precedents, was an advisory 
 body to the king, about which there existed much uncertainty as 
 to its composition, its powers and its period of assembling. It 
 was dependent upon the monarch for convocation, and for the 
 promulgation of the results of its deliberations.* 
 
 The Conseil d'Etat, composed of the nobility, was, in a narrower 
 sense, the permanent advisory council of the king. In this body 
 the laws originated, and under its supervision the administration 
 
 * G. Picot, Histoire des Alats generatix; Ch. Langlois, Atats gentraux in La 
 
 Grande Encyclopidie, 
 
 (24) 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 25 
 
 was accomplished. It also had judicial functions, being superior 
 to the Parlement as a cour de cassation in civil cases. 
 
 The duties of the Parlements were primarily judicial, but in 
 addition the Parlement of Paris possessed legislative functions, 
 inasmuch as the laws were sent to it for registration. The Parle¬ 
 ment by custom had come to make use of remonstrances to the 
 king in case of laws distasteful to them. Though some monarchs, 
 as Louis XI., XII., and Henry IV., had paid some regard to these 
 remonstrances,' yet even in the sixteenth century the remonstrance 
 did not stop the determined monarch, but the court was forced to 
 yield to the royal wish in the lit de jiisticei^ There existed, there¬ 
 fore, a singular balance of power between the Conseil d'Etat and 
 Parlement. The Conseil d'Etat, as a cour de cassation, might 
 annul the parliamentary remonstrance, and, inversely, the Parle¬ 
 ment might, in virtue of its power to register, check the laws origi¬ 
 nating from the Conseil d'Etat. It is worthy of remark, however, 
 that even at this period, this normal distribution of functions w'as 
 not so balanced and guarded as to avoid abnormal procedure. 
 Neither the States General nor the Parlement was put wholly be¬ 
 yond the control of the executive. 
 
 D’Avenel, expressing a view not uncommon in the earlier days 
 of the Revolution of 1789, asserts in his remarkable book, Richelieu 
 et la monarchie absolue, that France had a constitution before the 
 ministry of the politic Richelieu, yet not thereafter,’ but it is dif¬ 
 ficult to defend such a declaration. It may be admitted that the 
 States-General were no longer convoked after 1614, that the per- 
 S 07 i 7 tel of the nobility was altered, that the Parle 77 ie 7 it \vas now and 
 then forced into acquiescence to the royal will; nevertheless the 
 two bodies, the Conseil d' Etats and the Parleme 7 it, continued to 
 function very nearly as before, and at times the Parle 77 ie 7 it emerged 
 from its submissiveness and haughtily asserted its pretensions. 
 
 In a series of conflicts between the court and the Parle 77 ient, 
 into which we have not space to go exhaustiveljq the idea of fun¬ 
 damental or constitutional laws, of which the Parleme 7 it declared 
 itself the guardian, was repeatedly asserted; in the later period of 
 
 1 Jules Flammermont, Remontrances du Parlement de Paris au XVIII. siicle, 
 Introd., XCII. 
 
 ^ Dictionnaire Nouvelle, Parlements. 
 
 » T. i, 78, 266. 
 
26 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 this constitutional struggle, partly from the inability of the Parle- 
 7 ne 7 it to maintain its pretensions and partly from the development 
 of the ideas of natural rights, of the rights of the people and of 
 the rights of the nation, the desire for some more distinct defini¬ 
 tion of the power of the executive and the rights of the nation 
 became manifest. The Parlement, composed of an aristocracy 
 whose office was an hereditary possession, was naturally alert 
 to extend its political influence; this extension of necessity 
 brought it into conflict with the absolutism of the monarch. 
 When a vigorous monarch, or skillful, energetic minister was at 
 the head of affairs, the Parlement was driven to humble obedience; 
 but where there was a regency, a weak monarch, or a crisis, 
 financial or administrative, the legal aristocracy reasserted and 
 extended their pretensions. By a decree of February 21, 1641, 
 Richelieu declared that the parlemenis had been established only 
 for granting justice, forbade any modification of decrees, ordered 
 that in financial matters they might remonstrate once, but in ad¬ 
 ministrative matters no remonstrance was allowed. During the 
 remainder of Louis XIII’s reign they were obedient; but on the 
 death of the king they immediately manifested their vitality by 
 breaking his will and fixing the regency.' 
 
 The Fronde was the acme of the parliamentary resistance of this 
 period. Louis XIV. did not forget this high-handed opposition, 
 and consequently by two decrees he reduced this recalcitrant body 
 to a strictly subordinate position for the last forty years of his 
 reign.’ But on the death of the Grand Monarch, the Parlement 
 showed its old spirit, annulled the will of the dead king concern¬ 
 ing the regency, and for twenty years solemnly reiterated its 
 
 * Martin, Histoire dt France, xi, 543. 
 
 * These two decrees, one 1667, the other 1673, are given in substance in Jules 
 Flammermont, Remontrances, Intro, i and ii. The second was tie more sweeping r 
 ‘‘ D6s que les gens du Roi auraient repu les ordonnances, 6dits, declarations ou lettres- 
 patents, ils devraient dorenavant les presenter tout de suite aux cours toutes chambres 
 assembiees, qui auraient h les enregistrer purement et simplement sans aucune modifi¬ 
 cation, restriction, in autres clauses qui en pussent surseoir ou empecher la pleine et 
 entiere execution. Dans le cas oil les cours auraient des remontrances i presenter 
 elles ne pourraient plus le faire qu’apres que I’arret d’enregistrement aurait ete donne 
 et separement redige. Mais que le Roi donn6it suite ou non k ces remontrances, qui 
 devaient 6tre dressee dans la huitaine apres I’enregistrement, les cours ne devaient 
 pas faire d’iteratives remontrances.” 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 27 
 
 vag^e constitutional claims in elaborate remonstrances. To this 
 period of activity succeeded a time of comparative submission, 
 in which the remonstrances are less prompt, haughty, and in¬ 
 sistent. 
 
 In 1748, the struggle renewed itself, and soon each side showed 
 an ardent determination to conquer. The monarch resorted to 
 lits de justice, to exile, and to the institution of irregular courts in 
 order to provoke the magistrates to obey, while they answered 
 with iterative remonstrances and with refusals to dispense justice. 
 From these remonstrances we are able to ascertain the pretensions 
 of the Parlement, and to trace, though with much vagueness and 
 incoherence, those principles which they called constitutional and 
 fundamental. On the other hand, the responses of the king re¬ 
 veal the persistent claims of absolutism as to the royal source of 
 law. 
 
 The magistrates based their shadowy claims upon different 
 grounds. Frequently they appealed to precedent; as in 1718, the 
 Parlement of Paris declared that the most absolute kings, specific¬ 
 ally Louis XIV., had continually made use of the Parlement for 
 registration.‘ Justice and expediency were also invoked in their 
 support. 
 
 Already in the period of the regency, following closely after 
 their submissiveness under Louis XIV, we find a hazy but gen¬ 
 eral distinction between statutory and constitutional laws: 
 “While we recognize. Sire, that you alone are lord and master 
 and the sole lawgiver, and that there are laws which changing 
 times, the needs of your people, the maintenance of order and the 
 administration of your kingdom may oblige you to modify, sub¬ 
 stituting new ones according to the forms always observed in this 
 state, we nevertheless believe it to be our duty to call to your 
 attention the existence of laws as old as the monarchy, which are 
 permanent and invariable, the guardianship of which was com¬ 
 mitted to you along with the crown itself. . . . It is by reason of 
 the permanence of such laws that we have you as lord and mas¬ 
 ter. It is this permanence which leads us to hope that the crown, 
 having rested upon your head during a long, just, and glorious 
 reign, will pass to your posterit}’^ for all time to come. In recent 
 times [the Parlement adds] it has been clearly shown how much 
 
 * Flammermont, Remontrances, 95. 
 
28 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 France owes to the maintenance of these original law'S of the state, 
 and how important it is in the service of your Majesty that your 
 Parle77ie7it, which is responsible to you and to the nation for their 
 exact observations, should assiduously guard them against any 
 encroachment.” * Here then is found in embryo the programme 
 which the magistrates pursued in their legislative.opposition to 
 the crown. Nevertheless there is, judging from a comparison of 
 these earlier remonstrances and those emitted later, some progress 
 in the distinction of organic and of statutory law, and in the 
 enumeration of the fundamental principles. 
 
 The Parlevie7it of Brittany, in a remonstrance of July, 1771 , 
 said: ‘ ‘ There is an essential difference between the transitory 
 regulations which vary with the times, and the fundamental laws 
 upon which the Constitution of the monarchy rests. In respect 
 to the former [that is the transitory regulations] it is the duty of 
 the courts to direct and enlighten the ruling power ( 1 ’autorite), 
 although their opinions must, in the last instance, yield to the 
 decision of your wisdom, since it appertains to you alone to regu¬ 
 late everything relating to the administration. To administer 
 the state is not, however, to change its constitution. ... It is, 
 therefore, most indispensable to distinguish or to except the cases 
 where the right of expostulation suffices to enlighten the ruling 
 power in an administration which, in spite of its wide scope, still 
 has its limits, and those cases where the happy inability [of the 
 monarch] to overstep the bounds established by the constitution 
 implies the power necessary legally to oppose what an arbitrary 
 will cannot and may not do.” ’ To determine accurately the con¬ 
 tent of the lois fonda7ne7itales of which the Parle77te7its asserted 
 themselves to be protectors, is difficult. The Parlements them¬ 
 selves did not deem it expedient, either for their own claims or for 
 those of the monarch, to attempt a too explicit formulation of 
 these laws; vagueness was regarded a political virtue. A remon¬ 
 strance of the coiir des co777ptes, aides et fina7ices of Normandy, 
 openly admitted the disadvantage of such an enumeration: 
 ‘‘ Deign, Sire, to examine for yourself to what the decree of De- 
 
 • Cited in Prof. J. H. Robinson’s very suggestive article, The Tennis Court Oath 
 {^Political Science Quarterly, Sept., 1895) ; from the Itkratives Remontrances sur la 
 Refonte des Monnaies, July 26, 1718, Flammermont’s Remontrances, 94, 95. 
 
 ’ Cited by Prof. Robinson, The Tennis Court Oath, 467. 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 29 
 
 cember tends ; it seems destined to draw the line between the 
 power of the sovereign and the liberty of his subjects; this line 
 always undetermined, which no hand has been bold enough to 
 fix, which a salutary veil covers with useful shadows; the tender¬ 
 ness of princes for their people and the love of the people for their 
 princes draw or withdraw these shadows according to the times 
 or the reigns. Those who dare to-day to fix these limits and to 
 say to France: There ends the legitimate liberty of the people, 
 serve your interests badly, even politically.” ‘ 
 
 The most precise formulation of the organic law of the French 
 monarchy which I have found is the protest of the princes, 
 signed April 4 , 1771 , and directed against the Mat/peou Parlement: 
 “We, the undersigned, consider that the French monarchy 
 has been sustained, together with the glory, the splendor, and the 
 power which it has enjoyed for so many centuries only by the 
 maintenance of the primitive laws which are inherent in it, and 
 form its title (droit) and essence; that the liberty belonging to 
 every Frenchman, the title and the ownership of his property, 
 that of inheriting from fathers or of receiving from relatives or 
 friends, without being able to be deprived or hindered, otherwise 
 than by the legal application of law for some crime previously 
 and competently judged, and not by arbitrary and absolute will, 
 are not the only rights of the nation and of the subjects nor the 
 only fundamental laws of the monarchy; that the right of 
 Frenchmen, one of the most useful to the monarch and one of the 
 most precious to his subjects, is to have certain bodies of citizens, 
 perpetual and irremovable, acknowledged in all times by the 
 kings and by the nation, who under whatever form and name 
 they have existed, concentrated in themselves the general right 
 of every subject to invoke the laws, to demand their rights, and 
 to have recourse to the Prince; whose most important func¬ 
 tions have always been to be charged with watching over the 
 maintenance of the established laws, to weigh in new laws their 
 utility or the dangers of contradictions which might occur with 
 the old laws, to verify them, and to represent to the sovereign all 
 that is prejudicial to the rights of his subjects or to the primordial 
 and constitutive laws of his kingdom. . . . ; that this necessary 
 
 * Jules Flammermont, Le Chancelier Alaupeou et Us ParUments, Paris, 1885, 
 370 PP. 
 
30 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 surety cannot exist without irremovability of the title of those to 
 whom are confided so important functions, that they have always 
 been regarded as one of the principal safeguards of public liberty 
 against the abuse of arbitrary power; that they are an integral 
 part of the constitution of the State, and are found as much as 
 any other law in the order of the fundamental laws of the mon¬ 
 archy.”' However, the apparent attempt to be explicit here 
 originates primarily, not in a desire to state distinctly the consti¬ 
 tutional law, but rather to protect the prerogatives of the Parle- 
 merits by coupling them with certain principles generally recog¬ 
 nized as inviolable. 
 
 The Parleme7iis, in their resistance to the royal power, showed, 
 as early as the Fronde, a tendency to support each other, but it is 
 particularly in the period of the Maupeou Parlement that the 
 claims to unity and indivisibility became prominent." These 
 remonstrances, as well as the royal responses, were not withheld 
 from the public, as the ordonnances which imposed upon the 
 magistrates the duty of keeping their deliberations secret im¬ 
 plied, but were hawked about the streets and eagerly welcomed by 
 the people. Since in times of opposition, each Parlement aroused 
 the sympathies of the citizens under its jurisdiction, their combi¬ 
 nation for mutual support against the crown extended the area oi 
 popular agitation. This exciting literature, issuing from the dif¬ 
 ferent courts, had, therefore, an educative effect upon the popular 
 mind, rather in emphasizing the need of some limitation to royal 
 power than in developing distinct and well-defined notions ot 
 political laws.” The Parlement, while professing exemplary obe¬ 
 dience to the king, said that there were moral limits to their 
 obedience.* That also took a popular turn, in professing to repre- 
 
 ' Flammermont, Le Chancelier Maupeou et les Parleme 7 its, 380, 381. 
 
 Ibid., 117. 
 
 ’ Barbier has left record of how intimate was the sympathy of the people with the 
 Parle 7 )ie 7 it in the struggle over Jansenism: “ Le bonne Ville de Paris est jansdniste 
 de la t€te aux pieds. . . . Tous degres de Paris, hommes, femmes, petitfes enfants, 
 
 tiennent pour cette doctrine, sans savoir la matidre, sans rien entendre h ces distinctions 
 et interpretations, par haine centre Rome et les j^suites, tout ce monde est entSt 
 comme un diable. Les femmes, femmelettes et jusqu’ aux femmes de chambre s’y 
 feraient hocher.” Cited in Aubertin, I'Esprit public au XVIII siicle, 263, 264. 
 
 * “ Votre parlement s’est toujours fait gloire de leur donner I’exemple de I’ob^issance. 
 II vous a toujours prouv6 par sa conduite que, si I’obeissance due ^ la Majesty du Roi 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 31 
 
 sent the nation or the people in the absence of the States General. 
 The remonstrance of the cour des aides, probably drawn up by 
 Malesherbes, in February, 1771 , indicates these popular preten¬ 
 sions. “The courts are to-day the only protectors of the feeble 
 and the unfortunate: there have existed for a long time no States- 
 General and in the greater part of the kingdom no provincial 
 estates; all the bodies, except the courts, are reduced to a mute 
 and passive obedience. No individual in the provinces would 
 venture to expose himself to the vengeance of a commatidant, of a 
 commissaire du conseil, and still less to those of a minister of Your 
 Majesty. The courts are then the only ones to whom it is still 
 permitted to raise a voice in favor of the people, and Your Majesty 
 does not wish to take away this last resource from distant pro¬ 
 vinces. But this decree, exiling the Parlement of Paris, tends to 
 render this resource illusory.’’ ‘ 
 
 Notwithstanding this avowed guardianship of the national 
 rights, the feeling gradually grew that these ill-defined funda¬ 
 mental laws were too vague, that the Parlemetits, though persist¬ 
 ent, stopped short of pertinacity, and that an aristocratic magis¬ 
 tracy was not the real representation of the nation. 
 
 The first expression, so far as I have noted, of the need of a 
 more definite political rampart against the crown was that of the 
 Marquis de Mirabeau and his brother. In 1754 , the Marquis 
 wrote to his brother: “The more I consider the abuses of society 
 and their remedy, the more I return to what you said to me five 
 years ago, . . . that twelve principles established in twelve lines, 
 once written in the head of the Prince or of his minister, and 
 exactly followed in details, would correct and regenerate every- 
 
 etait perdue, elle se retrouverait dans sa cour de parlement. Mais s’il y a des occasions 
 oil son attachement inviolable aux lois et au bien public semble ne pouvoir pas s’allier 
 avec une obeissance sans bornes, alors il serait criminel envers vous nieme et envers 
 I’Etat d’oublier ce que lui disait en 1567 un chancelier de France : Vous avez jur6 
 degarder tous les communs elements du Roi, bien de garder les ordonnances qui sont 
 ses vrais comniandenienls. Ou ce qu’il disait lui-nieme en 1604 au Souverain ; Si 
 c’est desobeissance de bien servir, le Parlement fait ordinairement cette faute, et 
 quand il se trouve conflit entre la pui.ssance absolue du Roi et le bien de son service, 
 il juge I’un pr6f6rable 4 I’autre, non par d6sob6issance, mais pour son devoir, a la 
 ddcharge de sa conscience.” Grandes Eevionlratices, April 9, 1753; Flamniermont. 
 Remontrances, 529. 
 
 * Flammermont, Le Chancelier Maupeou, 269. 
 
32 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 thing.” ‘ But this was only a solitary voice crying in the wilder¬ 
 ness; it neither found a response in the people, nor became the 
 determined policy of its enunciator. 
 
 The people, however, were awakening at least to the abuses of 
 the ancien regime, and were groping after a remedy. Books, 
 dealing with the right of insurrection, of the superiority of the 
 nation to the crown, and with the refutation of divine rights and 
 passive obedience, were written, read and discussed.’ Humanitar¬ 
 ian views, the theory of natural rights, and, consequently, a sense 
 of the importance of the third estate, gained ground by degrees. 
 Meanwhile the contest between the king and his Parlements con¬ 
 tinued. The Notables, called in 1787, affirmed that the impre¬ 
 scriptible right to determine fiyiancial questions belonged only to the 
 representatives of the natio 7 i.^ The States-General were called for 
 1789.* Owing to the failure of the monarch or minister, pur¬ 
 posely or otherwise, to take the initiative, the radical element of 
 the nation were able to secure almost universal suffrage and the 
 union of the orders in one body. Judging from the cahier and 
 the pamphlets of 1788 and 1789, we infer that the consciousness 
 of the inadequacy of the old French Constitution was general.*’ 
 The cahiers, upon the question of the French Constitution, were 
 moreover divided ; some desired the preservation of the old Con¬ 
 stitution, some a declaration of the rights of the nation, some a 
 charte, while one formulated a new, complete constitution; on the 
 whole, a majority favored a more careful guarantee of the nation’s 
 
 1 Les Mirabtaus, i. i8i. This refers to constitutional ideas, not to a written con¬ 
 stitution. 
 
 * Aubertin, 391, 392: Voltaire complained in the ’6o’s of being tired of people^ 
 “ qui gouvernaient les fetats du fond leurs greniers.” Rocquain, L'esprit riv., 244. 
 
 ® Gomel, 334. 
 
 * The calling of the Etats g6n6raux had been suggested by la Rochefoucauld, 1774 ; 
 by d’Espremenil, 1775, and in remonstrances of the cour des aides of Paris and the 
 Parlement of Besamjon 1775 and 1781, and in the Assembly of Notables by Lafayette 
 in 1787. 
 
 * The contents of the cahiers are difficult to tabulate, owing to their various modes 
 of expression. The following summary will, however, give an approximate idea of 
 their import upon constitutional questions : Of 448 primary and secondary cahiers ex¬ 
 amined, 305 demanded or implied a constitution; 194, the monarchy; 401, periodic 
 fetats g6n6raux; 372, granting of taxes by the fitats g6n6raux ; 269, legislation by the 
 £tats g6n6raux; 331, ministerial responsibility ; and 366, proportional taxation. 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 35 
 
 rights.' The cahiers, it must be remarked, show a more perfect 
 and uniform programme of civil reform than of political. 
 
 ■ The cahier of the nobitity of the bailliageof Aumont asked: “ Que I’ancienne con¬ 
 stitution fran(;aise est monarchique, que les lois fondamentales du royaume subsisteront 
 dans leur integrity et qu’elles ne pourront etre changees par les deputes aux Etats 
 g6n6raux, Que la formation des .^tats generaux fait partie de la constitution.” . . . 
 
 Arch. Pari., i, 766. Somewhat similar views are found in the cahiers of the clergy 
 of Lectoure, Ibid., ii, 66; of the clergy of Auten, ii, too; of the clergy of Aval, ii, 137 • 
 of the clergy of Carcassonne, ii, 257 ; of the clergy of Blois, ii, 376; of the nobility of 
 Guyenne, ii, 394; of the clergy of Chalons-sur-Marne, ii, 582; of the clergy of Cler¬ 
 mont-Ferrand, ii, 766 ; of the third estate of Comte de Comminges, iii, 26; of the 
 nobility of Constances, iii, 52; of the clergy of Etampes, iii, 279; of the nobility of 
 Libourne, iii, 506; of the nobility of Timoux, iii, 577; of the nobility of Macon, iii, 
 623 ; of the nobility of Gevaudan, iii, 754; of the third estate of the parish of Ferrifires 
 en Brie, iv, 545 ; of the nobility of Brovins and Monterau, v, 448; of the nobility of 
 Touraine, vi, 39; of the clergy of Vermandois, vi, 134; of the clergy of Villers- 
 Catterels, vi, 187; of the clergy of Vitry le Francais, vi, 207; of the nobility of 
 Besan<;on, vi, 516. Some wished to re-establish in more definite terms the old con¬ 
 stitution. The cahier of the clergy of Auxerre asked : “ Que les Etats g6n6raux 
 s’occuperont d’abord de reconnaitre, conserver, fixer irr^vocablement, et rendre pub- 
 liques les lois constitutionnelles de la monarchie, les droits du Roi et ceux de la nation,” 
 ii, III. Of similar import were the cahiers of the clergy of Argenois, i, 675 ; of the 
 third estate of Albert, i, 704; of the third estate of Alen^on, i, 716 ; of the third estate 
 of Exemes, i, 727 ; of the nobility of Pont-i-Mousson, ii, 229; of the nobility of Cas- 
 Ires, ii, 566; of the clergy of Caux, ii, 573; of the nobility of Caux, ii, 575; of the 
 nobility of Chalons-sur-Saone, ii, 604; of the clergy of Chateauneuf en Thimerais, ii, 
 639; of the nobility of Launes, iii, 94; of the nobility of Evreux, iii, 295; of the third 
 estate of Province of Forez, iii, 385 ; of the clergy of Pays de Labourt, iii, 424; of the 
 nobility of Montagres, iv, 20; of the Parish of Clermont-Mendon, iv, 440; of the third 
 estate of Agenois, i, 687. A smaller number of the cahiers asked for a new consti¬ 
 tution. The cahier of the third estate of Paris intra muros presented a model consti¬ 
 tution, essentially similar to the one actually framed, v, 581. The Parish of Tous- 
 susle Noble, of Paris, hors des murs, instructed that: Les deputes demanderont une 
 nouvelle constitution nationale, la suppression de toutes les lois, qui, jusqii’ a present, 
 ont 6t6 consideries constitutionnelles, comme illegalement etablies et n’ayant pas re^u 
 I’approbation de la nation, v, 138. The third estate of Mont de Morsan said: II est 
 temps qu’on pose les regies fixes, et qu’on assure ^ la F'rance une Constitution qni 
 garantisse les droits naturels et imprescriptibles des hommes, iv, 34. The third estate 
 of Etampes, after referring to the abuses, said: Nos premiers voeux doivent naturelle- 
 ment se porter sur ce qui doit former I’avenir la constitution du royaume. Le an- 
 ciens monuments nous offrent si peu de conformity et de certitude, que nous devons 
 profiter deslumi^res actuelles pour op^rer un plus grand bien, iii, 283. The nobility 
 of Blois said: Le malheur de la France vient de ce qu’elle n’a jamais eu de consti¬ 
 tution fixe, ii, 379. 
 
34 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 The pamphlets of the day, being the expression of the convic¬ 
 tions of individuals, reveal more clearly the political thought of 
 the radical element. Count de Mirabean’s Letires de cachet, pub¬ 
 lished in 1783, may be regarded as among the earliest of such 
 personal expressions. Its attitude was rather negative than con¬ 
 structive. It attempted to show that a despotism depended not at 
 all upon the character of the particular sovereign, but on the 
 absence or insufficiency of laws; that France without a veritable 
 constitution was only a despotic state, and that there is no mean 
 between an absolute despotism and the absolute reign of law.* 
 In 1787, the Count declared, “What is necessary is a constitu¬ 
 tion; France is ripe for the Revolution.’’ ’ 
 
 Other pamphlets of 1788 and 1789 indicate a tendency to discuss 
 constitutional law from the historical and crudely comparative 
 standpoint, and to apply the conclu.sions to the present conditions, 
 but in the attempt to formulate their results, they are less clear 
 and coherent. One of the.se drawn up in 1789 devotes one hun¬ 
 dred and thirty-seven pages to the discussion of the influence of 
 Montesquieu in the pre.sent Revolution, and denounces him for 
 not dec aring boldly that France was a despotism. It concluded 
 that France has in reality no constitution.’ 
 
 How far the king meant that the States-General should possess 
 a constitutional character is difficult to determine. The Letter of 
 Summons repeatedly asserts the desire to affect a “fixed and con- 
 .stant order in all parts of the administration.’’ * Mirabeau claimed 
 that the king himself had recognized “the necessity of giving 
 
 * Roequain, L’Esprit, 405, 406; Lettres de cachet, ch. viii, edition of 1820. 
 
 ’ Cited in Roequain, L'Esprit, 457. 
 
 * Qu'est ce que done qu’une Constitution, si ce n’est I’ordre, la distribution des deux 
 grands pnuvoirs politiques et de leur separation dans difierentes mains, et leur exercise 
 ou differentes formes : le tout sanctionne et constitue, cest k dire statue avec la nation 
 a.ssemblee, representant regalement la volonte geiierale, et voulant librenient pour 
 I’interet commun ? Si Ton recherche en France ces deux pouvoirs, ou les trouve, par 
 le fait, reunis dans la meme main, sans qu'on puisse voir I’apparence d’un droit con- 
 traire qu'en remontant vers les ages tenebreux de I’ignorance et de la servitude. Or 
 la collection de ces pouvoirs ne peut former que I’autorite arbitraire d’un despote; ce 
 qui exclut toute idee de Lois fondamentales et constitutionnelles: aussi n’en trouve-t- 
 on en assume. Done point de Constitution, Vol. 87 of Fr. Rev. Col, of Penn. 
 Hist. Soc., 114, 115. 
 
 ^ Arch. Pari., i, 513, 544. 
 
CONSTITUl ION 
 
 35 
 
 France a fixed method of government,” ‘ and La Marck confirmed 
 this declaration.’ We shall perhaps have attributed sufficient 
 meaning to these hazy avowals if we say that Louis XVI., partly 
 from his paternal spirit, and partly from a desire for relief from 
 financial crises, meditated, in his more liberal moods, granting the 
 nation some sort of a charier, in the formulation of which he 
 wished the assistance of the States-General. This resuscitated 
 institution convened at Versailles, May 5, 1789. 
 
 The first months were occupied in the disputes over the verifi¬ 
 cation of the powers of the deputies. On May 28, a representative 
 of the nobility, Count de Crillon, said that ‘‘he was of the firm 
 opinion that it was less for maintaining than for establishing the 
 Constitution that they were called together.” ’ On June 15, Abbe 
 Siey^s announced that those whose powers had been verified rep¬ 
 resented ninety-six per cent, of the nation, and suggested as a 
 fitting name, "Assentblee des representants." Mirabeau, at the 
 same session, offered a series of resolutions that provoked much 
 discussion, one of which affirmed that their first duty was “to 
 agree upon and to fix legally the principles for the regeneration of 
 the kingdom, to assure the rights of the people, to adopt the basis 
 of a wise and useful constitution, and, to .secure these rights from 
 all attempts, they shall be put under the safeguard of the legi.sla- 
 tive power of the king and of the National Assembly.” Rabaudde 
 Saint Etienne, in another series of resolutions, expre.ssed the same 
 conviction.* Two days later, the name ‘‘National Assembly” 
 was adopted and an oath taken ‘‘ to fulfill w'ith zeal and fidelity 
 the duties which devolve upon us.”^ Debarred from the place 
 usually occupi d by the Assembly by the carpenters who w'ere at 
 work upon it, the members of the third estate held their meeting, 
 
 * Hist. Pari., i, 445. 
 
 ’ He said of Mirabeau : “ Nous n’avons I’un et I’autre enlrevu riende mieux pour 
 la France qu’un gouvernement monarchique constilutioiinel. De If us les rois, I.ouis 
 XVI. 6tait le plus propre i rfisondre le problSnie. ... II croyait le gouvernemer.t 
 conslilutionnel plus convenable, et il le ddsirait; et je puis le dire avec autani de ctr- 
 titude que conviction, la reine partageait 4 cet 6gard les opinions et les penchants de 
 Louis XVI.; les materiaux qui sont dans nion portefeuille rendent ces assertions inct O- 
 testables.” Correspont/ence entre Mirabeau et La Marck, i, 67, 95. 
 
 ^ Arch. Pari., viii, 55. 
 
 ^ Ibid., 113. 
 
 * Ibid., 127. 
 
THE FIRS 7 FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 36 
 
 June 20, in the Tennis Court at Versailles, and there adopted the 
 resolution which declared the National Assembly a Constitutional 
 Convention, and subscribed to the following, known as the Tennis 
 Court Oath : “ The National Assembly, regarding itself as called 
 upon to establish the Constitution of the kingdom, effect a regen¬ 
 eration of the state and maintain the true principles of the mon¬ 
 archy, may not be prevented from continuing its deliberations in 
 whatever place it may be forced to take up its sittings. It further 
 maintains that wherever its members are assembled, there is the 
 National Assembly. The Assembly decrees that all its members 
 shall immediately take a solemn oath never to be dissolved and 
 to come together whenever circumstances may dictate, until the 
 Constitution of the kingdom shall be established and placed upon 
 a firm foundation.”* It is beyond the sphere of our inquiry to 
 follow this Constituent Assembly in their arduous and complex 
 task of formulating a constitution, and of legislating at the same 
 time for the kingdom, while exposed to court intrigues and popu¬ 
 lar intrusion. 
 
 Therefore, to conclude this chapter as we began, we have shown 
 that the resolution of June 20 was neither a political freak, nor an 
 act of imitation of a foreign nation. The example of the Ameri¬ 
 can Republic may have given stimulus and precision, yet the 
 Tennis Court Oath must be regarded as the logical consequence 
 of a transformation, which had been in progress for more than 
 sixty years. 
 
 Arch. Pari., viii, 138. 
 
/ 
 
 THE ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC. 
 
 Louis XVI., in 1789, was praised by the mass of the French 
 nation as the best of monarchs, and as the restorer of national 
 liberties; his name was coupled with that of Henry IV, a king about 
 whom tradition had thrown a halo of glory. But, on September 
 21, 1792, the newly-chosen Convention abolished the monarchy. 
 So rapid is the transition from the one phase of the national feel¬ 
 ing to the other, that it occasions a surmise either that the pro¬ 
 fessed loyalty to the monarch in 1789 was not sincere, or that the 
 action of the Convention was the work of a coterie of radicals, who 
 misrepresented the popular feeling. A review of the period in¬ 
 tervening between 1789 and 1792 shows that both of these suppo¬ 
 sitions are unwarranted, and confirms the conclusion that there 
 was a progressive development of hostility, first to Louis XVI. 
 and the royal family, and then to the monarchical government. 
 
 Previous to 1789, the term Republic is used by French publicists 
 or agitators, but it is either in a sense so qualified as to be consist¬ 
 ent with the monarchy, or as a form of government unsuited to 
 France with its actual traditions and conditions.* The very nearly 
 unanimous feeling and judgment in 1789 w’as that the monarchy 
 was the best form of government for France, and that the chief 
 need was to regenerate it. We have said that one hundred and 
 
 * D’Argenson in 1752 said: “Quant i moi je tiens pour I’av^nement du second 
 article et mfeme du rfepublicanisme.” He meant Republicanism not in the modern 
 sense, but in the sense of a monarchy with democratic local institutions. Aubertin, 
 VEsprit ptiblic, 278, 279. Even the Esprit des Lois gave some sanction to a 
 Republic as an ideal form of government when it recognized virtue as t he temper of 
 society required for this form of government. Voltaire, friend of the nnonarchy and 
 critic of Rousseau as he was, wrote: “ Le plus tolerable des gouverne.’ments est le 
 ripublicain, parce.que c’est celui qui rapproche le plus les hommes de I’^galitS natur- 
 elle.” He also compared the frequency of crimes under a monarchy with their infre¬ 
 quency under republics. Martin, Histoire de France, xvi, 136. Mably held that 
 France should pass by degrees from a monarchy to a republic. Ibid., 149 et seq., 
 Cerutti, the coadjutor of Mirabeau at a later date, had published a book on Republics. 
 This book had been generally attributed to Rousseau. Dictionnaire Universelle. 
 
 ( 37 ) 
 
THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 38 
 
 iiinet3"-fonr cahicrs specificallj’ asked for the retention of the mon¬ 
 archy; the silence of the others upon this question must not be 
 construed to mean that their authors were indifferent or opposed 
 to the monarchy, but rather that they believed it unnecessary to 
 ask for w'hat they already had, and against which there was no 
 strong movement. As Paris maj’’ rightly be considered the source 
 of the anti-inonarchical agitation, the attitude of the third estate 
 in this city at the opening of the Revolution may justly be taken 
 to represent the feeling of the radical element toward the monar¬ 
 chy. In their cahier they said: “In the French monarchy, the 
 legislative power belongs to the nation conjointly with the king; 
 to the king alone belongs the executive power.’’' The sub-cahiers 
 from the districts of the city expressed the same idea.’ lu truth, 
 in not a single ra/zzVr examined do we find a hint of any opposition 
 to the monarchy. Hence, it is to be inferred that, if any individ¬ 
 uals had Republican inclinations, these inclinations were not shared 
 by any appreciable part of the nation. A few men of the reform 
 party, Lauragnais, Lally-Tollendal, and Montlosier, ventured to 
 say that the French monarchy had originally been elective and 
 that the elective monarchy would consequently be not an innova- 
 
 * Arch. Pan., v, 282. 
 
 ^ The cahier of the district of Abbey Saint Germain desPr^s said: II sera arrel6 
 qu’h la nation assemblee, r6unie au Roi, appartient le droit de faire les lois de royaumei 
 Arch. Pari., v, 306; that of Saint Gervais : Le pouvoir ligislatif appartient conjointe- 
 ment au Roi et a la nation. . . . Le pouvoir ex6cutif appartient au Roi, comme 
 
 chef supreme et premier magistrat de la nation. Ibid., 308; that of Saint Louis de-la. 
 Culture: Qu’il soit reconnu que I’etat est monarchique, que la couronne est h6r6ditaire 
 en ligne masculine, etc., AJzV., 311 ; that of Theatins: Le Roi en (of the army) 
 aura la discipline et le commandement general, Ibid., 316; that of Sorbonne: 
 that the States-General and the king jointly make the laws; that of Filles de Sainf 
 Thomas: that the nation and the king make the laws, and that the executive power 
 be guaranteed to the king and to the reigning family without restriction or division ; 
 that of Bonn? Nouvelle: that the laws should be made by the States-General and 
 announced by the king; that of Saint Joseph Quartier des Halles: that laws be made 
 by the nation and king jointly; that of Sainte Elizabeth : that the nation make the 
 laws and the king sanction them ; that of Enfants Rouges: that the laws be made by 
 the nation arid the king jointly; that of Blancs Manteaux :' that France should have 
 an hereditary' monarchy in the male line of the reigning house, laws made by the 
 nation and s^mctioned by the king, and that the executive power should belong to the 
 monarch ; tbiat of Capucins du Marais : that the laws be made by the nation and the 
 king jointly ; that of Minimes de la Place Royale : that the laws be made jointly by 
 the nation ;and the king. Chassin, Les Election et Cahiers de Paris, ii, ch. xvi-xviii. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 39 
 
 tion, but a restoration of their earlj^ system;' but the adherence 
 of these men to the monarchy in the early days of the Constituent 
 Assembly is conclusive that by the elective monarchy they did not 
 not mean the Republic of 1792. 
 
 The Constituent Assembly, having been formed out of the 
 States-General, had to formulate a constitution for the regenera¬ 
 tion of France, and was obliged, therefore, to specify the divisions 
 of government, designate the organs and the functions of each di¬ 
 vision, prescribe their powers, limitations, sources and transmission; 
 hence the debates and decrees of this national body may be taken 
 as indicative of the public sentiment tow’ard the monarch. Here 
 may be traced the changes worked in the public mind, the censure 
 or the eulogy of persons and institutions. As this national assem¬ 
 bly itself became transformed by the withdrawal of the more con¬ 
 servative elements, it reflected rather faithfully the change that 
 was taking place in the minds of the radical classes of France. 
 
 This Assembly frequently gave expression of its satisfaction 
 with the monarch and with the monarchy. Near the close of the 
 famous session of August 4, 1789, when feudalism had been so 
 enthusiastically renounced by its own favored sons, M. Lally- 
 Tollendal proposed that they should proclaim “Louis XVI. the 
 Restorer of French liberty.’’ “The proclamation,’’ we are told, 
 “ was made immediately by the deputies, by the people, and by all 
 those who were present, and the National Assembly resounded 
 for a quarter of an hour with the cries ‘ Vive le roi; vive Louis 
 XVI., restaitratetir de la liberte fran(aise.' ’’ As early as July 4, 
 1789, Gouverneur Morris, a careful observer of the French spirit 
 and movements, wrote: “ They wish an American Constitution, 
 with a king in the place of a president.’’ ’ On August 28, 1789, 
 Mouuier presented a project of the monarchical element of the 
 Constitution, and a member made the following statement, the 
 verity of w’hich was not disputed: “ Here we should reflect upon 
 the national spirit. For fourteen centuries the French, free to 
 direct themselves by the republican spirit, preferred the peaceful¬ 
 ness of the monarchic government to the storms of a republican 
 government. . . . Louis XVI. is no more upon the throne by the 
 
 • Chassin, Les Elections et Cakiers, i, 453. 
 
 'Arch. Pari., viii, 350. 
 
 • Quoted in A. Saint Girons, Droit, public francais, 129. 
 
40 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH BE PUBLIC 
 
 chance of birth, he is there by the choice of the nation; it has 
 raised him there, as formerly our brave ancestors raised Phara- 
 mond upon the shield. No one contests the monarchical govern¬ 
 ment. All the cahiers are certainly clear . . . we cannot avoid the 
 conclusion, the only government which is suitable to our manners 
 {vioetirs), to our climate, to the extent of our provinces, is the 
 monarchical government.”* Other speeches made on the same 
 occasion are indicative of the strong monarchical spirit that pos¬ 
 sessed the Assembly at this stage of its history. 
 
 Twenty days later, M. de Baron de Juigne proposed to conse¬ 
 crate the principles of the heredity of the crown and the inviola¬ 
 bility of the king’s person. Scarcely were these principles an¬ 
 nounced, than the Assembly proclaimed them by an unanimous 
 movement.’ These principles were embodied in the decree of 
 September 17, 1789.’ 
 
 From these citations, we are warranted in the inference that the 
 members of the Constituent Assembly in its earlier period re¬ 
 garded the monarchy as the natural and the most suitable form 
 of government for France. On the question of the division of 
 powers, the number of chambers, the elective or hereditary king- 
 ship, the absolute or limited veto, there were differences of opinion; 
 but national tradition and personal attachment to Louis XVI. 
 were of sufficient force to bar any discussion of other possible 
 forms for the executive branch. 
 
 The first strong manifestation of personal displeasure toward 
 the king reflected in the Assembly, was aroused by his attempt to 
 escape from the country with the ro}^al family, on June 20 and 21, 
 1791. Fearing to be held longer as a hostage by the revolutionary 
 party and to be supplanted by the invading emigres, the king 
 with his family sought to reach the eastern frontier and there to 
 be free to act independently of both factions; but at Varennes 
 he was arrested and brought back to face the enraged Paris¬ 
 ians. It is then that words of displeasure were first heard in the 
 Assembly. What shall be done with the royal fugitive? was then 
 the living question. Some contended that he was inviolable and 
 could not be called to account; others, that his inviolability ex¬ 
 tended only to public actions, not to private; while still others 
 
 Arch. Pari., viii, 505. 
 ^ Ibid., 642. 
 
 ® Ibid., ix, 26. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 41 
 
 maintained that he had, by his treason, forfeited his inviolability. 
 The agitation which reigned without found some expression 
 within the Assembly. A committee reported, July 13, that the 
 flight of the king was not a constitutional offense, that the prin¬ 
 ciple of inviolability did not permit Louis XVI. to be put on trial. 
 For three days the discussion over the king’s inviolability was 
 carried on. Petion, Putraink, Vadier, Robespierre, Prieur, Gre- 
 goire, Buzot spoke again.st, and Larochefoucault, Liancourt, 
 Prugnou, Duport, Goupil de Prefeln, Salles and Barnave for the 
 inviolability. Only Condorcet attempted to show the fitness of 
 France for a Republic.' The people were astir without; they met 
 on the squares, in the public places, crowded around the Assembly, 
 and urged the dethronement of the king or the reference of the 
 <juestion to the people of the eighty-three departments. Petitions, 
 posters, and ardent declamations were instruments by w’hich the 
 radicals sought to turn public opinion their way.’ On July 16, 
 1791, a decree of the Assembly defined the acts whereby the king 
 should be considered as no longer inviolable. Should he, having 
 taken the oath to the Constitution, violate it: or should he put 
 himself at the head of an arni)' against the nation, or should he 
 fail to oppose such an act on the part of his generals, he should 
 be considered to have abdicated, and might be brought to trial 
 like any ordinary citizen. His executive functions, suspended 
 June 25, were not to be restored till the completion of the Consti¬ 
 tution.’ I 
 
 The Constitution was completed and reviewed, and on Septem¬ 
 ber 14, 1791, the king went to the Constituent Assembly, accepted j 
 the Constitution, and, amid prolonged applause, subscribed to this ) 
 new instrument that was to give liberty to France. He was 
 escorted back to the Tuileries by the entire A.ssembly. The flight 
 of the monarch seemed forgotten or forgiven.* 
 
 On September 30th, the monarch made the closing speech to 
 the Assembly and was greeted with repeated shouts of Vive le Roi. 
 The President responded to the royal speech by an eulog}^ upon 
 the monarch and a compliment upon the form of government in- 
 
 > Arch Pari., xxviii, 336-338. 
 
 ’ Hist. Pari., x, 449 et seq., and xi, 20 et seq. 
 
 ^ Arch. Pari., xxviii, 377. 
 
 * Ibid., XXX, 635, 636. 
 
42 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 augurated under the Constitution.’ Though the Constituent 
 Assembly had not laid sacrilegious hands upon the time-honored 
 monarchy of France further than to divest it of some of its privi¬ 
 leges and prerogatives, though the storm of displeasure, incurred 
 bj’ the ill-advised flight of June 20th, had apparently subsided and 
 the Assemblj' and the king had exchanged expressions of mutual 
 esteem, and had sworn to preserve the great document so labori¬ 
 ously wrought out by the French Lycurguses, yet the leaven had 
 been engendered which, under favorable circumstances, would 
 leaven the whole lump and transform the limited monarchy into 
 a republic. Ideas have their origin in individual minds, are ad¬ 
 vocated by these individuals, and by and by the nucleus of devo¬ 
 tees has grown into a party that serves as an organ of propagation 
 and makes use of the instrumentalities of their age for the dissem¬ 
 ination of their views and for the moulding of public opinion into 
 conformity thereto. If the conditions are favorable, the new ideas 
 secure acceptance and are embodied in institutions ; but if the 
 conditions are hostile, the conceptions are rejected and relegated 
 to that vast repository where are accumulated the world’s Utopias; 
 thence some ardent soul may bring forward the idea at a time 
 which is propitious, and the Utopia may become a practical real¬ 
 ity. It is our task to endeavor to discover the notion of a repub¬ 
 lic for France as it was conceived and promulgated by those indi¬ 
 viduals who may be called the precursors of French republicanism, 
 to trace the formation of an organic body for its promulgation, 
 and to find the means used in the formation of a public opinion 
 sufiiciently strong to secure the adoption of the Republic of 1792. 
 
 There were already in 1789 a few ardent natures enthusiastic 
 over the transformation to be wrought in France, who harbored a 
 vague desire to see the monarchy abolished and a more liberal 
 government instituted. Whence had come this hazy notion which 
 wrought up their feelings may only be conjectured. Perhaps the 
 
 * “ Convaincue que le gouvernement qui convient le niieux aux prerogatives respect¬ 
 ables du tr6ne avec les droits inalienables du peuple, elle a done i I’Etat une consti¬ 
 tution qui garantit egalement et la royauie et la liberte Rationale. . . . Et vous, 
 
 Sire, deji vous avez presque tout fait. Votre Majeste a fini la Revolution par Son 
 acceptation si loyale et si franche de la Constitution. Elle a porte au dehors le 
 decouragement, ramene au dedans la confiance, rdtabli par elle le principal nerf du 
 gouvernement et prepare I’ulile aclivite de I’administration.” Arch, Pari., xxxi 
 688, 689. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 43 
 
 classic studies upon which the Jesuits and Oratorians nourished 
 their pupils had made them familiar with the Greek and Roman 
 Republics.* Either the Social Contract, or the example of the 
 American colonies, may have given them their republican notions. 
 
 Camille Desmoulins, an ardent, impetuous son of liberty, gave 
 unequivocal expression of republican sentiments as early as 1789, 
 and even asserted that the republican form of government was best 
 suited for France.’ In May, 1793, in two addresses, made in an¬ 
 swer to Brissot, he confirms his early preference for republicanism. 
 He said; “ In the month of July, 1789, the number of Republicans 
 in Paris did not probably exceed ten; and this it is which crowns 
 with eternal glory those old members of the Club of Cordeliers, 
 who began building the edifice of the republic with such slight 
 materials.”’ In June, 1790, he used the term Congress of the 
 Republic of France in speaking of the Constituent Assembly, 
 and said that only four republicans had had the courage to resist 
 the royal budget of 25,000,000 voted upon in the Assembly. 
 Again in the Jacobin Club, October 21, 1791, at the time wheu 
 France was big with hope that the new Constitution would work, 
 Desmoulins pointed out its imperfections and favored republican in¬ 
 stitutions. Here then was one mind already thinking of a republic 
 
 ' It is noteworthy that the French had not followed the history of their own devel¬ 
 opment. “ Pendant toute la dur^e de la monarchie, tandis que le peuple n’apprenait 
 presque rien les hautes classes, en general, apprenaient mal. Leur ignorance de 
 I’histoire nationale explique pourquoi, au moment de la Revolution, on ne put se 
 rendre un compte exact des fails sociaux et politiques que nous leguait I’ancien regime, 
 pourquoi on detruisit pele-mele ce qu’il y avail de bon et de mauvais dans les institu¬ 
 tions du passe, pourquoi, lorsqu’il s’agit de constituer une nation moderne, le nation 
 francaise, on n'eut a. la bouche que des exemples empruntes it I’antiquite, a Athenes, i 
 Sparte, i Rome. Cette instruction incomplete, cette fausse education classique etait, en 
 somme, une mediocre preparation au metier de legislateurs, si nouveau pour nos peres 
 de la Revolution.” M. Alfred Rambaud, Histoire de la Civilisation fravfaise, ii, 
 280. An English lady who was traveling in France writes in August, 1792: “Their 
 studies are chiefly confined to Rollin and Plutarch, the deistical works of Voltaire and 
 the visionary politics of Jean Jacques. Hence they amuse their hearers with allusions 
 to Cassar and Lycurgus, the Rubicon and Thermopylae. Hence they pretend to be 
 too enlightened for belief, and despise all governments not founded on the contrat 
 social or the profession de foi. . . . They talk familiarly of Sparta and Lace- 
 
 demon.” A Residence in France during ijgB-gg, London, 1797. 
 
 * La France Libre, 1789, 60-61 pp. 
 
 * Collection of Pamphlets in Columbia Library, 94404, Book M, 292. 
 
44 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 and claiming that in the Cordelier Club there were others who, at 
 that early period, shared his opinions. Who these were he does 
 not say.' The district of the city called the Cordeliers had 
 formed a popular society which manifested a severely critical 
 spirit toward the monarchical and aristocratic legislation. This 
 district clamored for liberty of the press,' and championed the 
 political rights of passive citizens.® It took the side of the sixty dis¬ 
 tricts which kept up their popular electoral assemblies and which 
 continued to meet in the interim of elections, as against the 
 forty-eight sections, which convened only for elections. The 
 ardent opposition of the Cordeliers to the Assembly and to the 
 municipality doubtless provoked the enactment of the law which, 
 on May 27, 1790, transformed these districts into the sections.* 
 Then forming the Club of Cordeliers^ the Society of the Rights of 
 Mayi and of Citizens, this district continued its policy of aggres¬ 
 sion upon the conservatives, until their more democratic pro¬ 
 gramme became an accomplished fact. Here then was a company 
 of men, having a common interest in extreme radicalism, meeting 
 frequently and fanning into fuller heat by their addresses the 
 embers of opposition. This society, anti-aristocratic, anti-mon¬ 
 archical, occasionally uttered republican sentiments and indulged 
 in the word republic. They remarked the inconsistency between 
 the principles contained in the Declaration of the Rights of Man 
 and an hereditary monarchy, resting upon the divine right of 
 
 • Camille Desmoulins’ La France Libre contained three striking utterances. 
 “ For forty years philosophy had undermined all the parts of the foundations of des¬ 
 potism ; and as Rome before Caesar was already enslaved by its vices, France before 
 Necker was already freed by its intelligence,” 56. In various parts of this article of 
 1789 he speaks of a republic as being the best suited to France. “ Before the Royal 
 Sitting I regarded Louis XVI. with admiration, for he had some virtues, as he walked 
 not at all in the steps of his fathers, was not at all a despot, and had convoked the 
 States-General. While in the province I read in the his beautiful speech: 
 
 ‘ What does it matter that my authority suffer provided my people should be happy ?’ 
 We have, I said to myself, a greater king than the Trojans, the Marcus Aurelius, the 
 Antonines, who did not at all limit their power. Personally I loved Louis XVI.; 
 but the monarchy was not less odious,” 60-61. “ I declare then boldly for dem¬ 
 
 ocracy,” 64. 
 
 ’ Hist. Pari., ii, 353, and iv, 295. 
 
 ^ Ibid., iii, 433. 
 
 ■* Hist. Gen., viii, 104. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 45 
 
 kings.* On June 22, 1791, the Club of Cordeliers issued an ad¬ 
 dress to the Assembly showing its republican proclivities, much 
 to the displeasure of the Jacobins. They said: “We conjure you, 
 in the name of the country, either to declare immediately that 
 France is no more a monarchy, that it is a republic, or at least to 
 wait until all the departments, until all the primary assemblies, 
 have expressed their wish upon this important question, before 
 thinking of replacing a second time the most fair Empire of the 
 world in chains and in the limits of monarchism.’’ ^ The flight of 
 the king was the occasion that called for this expression of ani¬ 
 mosity to the monarchy and the preference for a republic. Even 
 before the attempted escape, another newspaper had joined with 
 Desmoulins in his strong anti-monarchical views and in the sug¬ 
 gestion of a more suitable form of government for France. Prud- 
 homme, the publisher of booklets and pamphlets of the liberal 
 party previous to, and during the Revolution, had established a 
 paper devoted to the new ideas, the Revolutions de Paris. The 
 experienced publisher had discovered the practical sagacity and 
 the sincere democratic proclivities of a young advocate from 
 Bourdeaux, recently come to Paris, Eoustallot, who had already in 
 1789 proved himself a good pamphleteer for the reformers. These 
 two men began the issue of their sheet July 12, 1789. In its earlier 
 numbers the slavery of the Frenchmen to the aristocracy was bit¬ 
 terly censured, but the king is not treated so much with hostility 
 as with pity for his weakness.^ Whether Eoustallot would have 
 
 ‘See Condorcet’s speech on the question of the kingship, July 15, 1791. Arch. 
 Pari., xviii, 33&-338. 
 
 * Hist. Pari., x, 416-418. It seems to have been the Cordeliers who planned for 
 the public signing of the petition upon the altar of the country, July 17, 1791, on the 
 Champs de Mars. This petition prayed the Assembly to accept the abdication of the 
 king, and to convoke a new constituent power for the trial of the guilty and for the 
 replacing and organization of a new executive power. Hist. Gen., viii, too; Hist. 
 Pari., xi, 115. Six thousand petitioners had signed this instrument. 
 
 •Henry Morse Stephens, The French Revolution, \, et seq. The number of 
 February 4, 1790, contained these words: “ II est impossible dans de pareils moments 
 de se livrer ft aucunes reflexions: il faut Stre tout i sentir. Nous dirons done seulement 
 
 ’ 9 
 
 et du fond du coeur: Puisse cette journee etouffer la discorde qui r^gnoit entre les 
 citoyens, et ramener k la nation ceux qui ne vouloient pas reconnoitre ses droits: Et 
 nous, patriotes, faisons au bien de la paix tous les sacrifices qui peuvent s’allier avec 
 la liberte, soyons dignes d’etre fibres, soyons dignes d’etre les sujets d’un tel roi.’’ 
 Rlv. de Paris, Vol. 3, No. 31. In referring to a company about to go to Ohio, the 
 
46 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 continued to advocate liberal monarchical views had he lived/ we 
 sliall not venture to say; but in the spring of 1791/ the paper had 
 changed its spirit toward the king. The issue of April 21-30 
 gave notice of a decree proposed to the National Assembly advo¬ 
 cating the abolition of royalty. After citing a long list of consid¬ 
 erations, chiefly of the evils of kings and of the inconsistency of 
 such an institution with the rights of vian, twenty-one articles 
 were given proposing the abolition of royalty and the substitution 
 of a President." Subsequent numbers continued to discuss favor¬ 
 ably the abolition of the monarchy. In No. 91 a letter was printed 
 which suggested the placing of a ballot-box in each of the churches 
 to receive the vote of the people upon the question at issue. 
 The writer shows himself friendly to the change. Another 
 friend of the proposal, in a letter printed in No. 92,* opposed this 
 mode of voting, lest the monarchists should take advantage of it. 
 Instead, he proposed that the vote should be collected viva voce, 
 a list made of those voting ; this list should be sent to the Assem¬ 
 bly, yet care should be taken to keep a duplicate in order to avoid 
 any surprise. No. 96 contained an article upon “The White 
 Elephant,” advocating, in a facetious manner, similar ideas. The 
 same number entered into an examination of these three proposi¬ 
 tions, the first two of which it decided affirmatively, the last one 
 
 editor would dissuade them by saying: “ Nous allons en jouir par une constitution 
 plus heureusement concue que celle des Etats-Unis.” Vol. 3, No. 32. In No. 52 of 
 July, 1790, former kings are calumniated and Louis XVI. was praised. The last 
 number of 1790 paid its respects to the king in laudable terms. “ Louis tu as pris, 
 comme par instinct, le parti le plus sage. Tu as cesse d’etre I’oint du Seigneur, pour 
 devenir le fils ain6 de la patrie. Notre mfire commune t’a confirme dans ta place, 
 la lete de la grande famille. Dis n'est il pas plus doux de presider des frfires, que de 
 fouler aux pieds des sujets?” No. 77. 
 
 ' He died September, 1790. 
 
 ’ March 26-April 2. 
 
 * I. La nation ne reconnolt pour chef supreme de I’empire que le president de son 
 assembl6e representative et permanente. II. On ne pourra etre eiu president avant 
 ga cinquantieme annee, ni pour plus d’un mois, ni plus d’une fois en sa vie. . . . 
 
 XIX. La nation supprime, abolit et annulle k jamais les titres de roi, de reine, de 
 prince du sang royal, ces mots cesseront d’avoir un sens dans la langue francaise. . . 
 XXI. A Timitation de la paque des Hibreux, il sera institute une fete commemora¬ 
 tive qui tombera le premier juin, jour de I’expulsion des Tarquins it Rome, et con- 
 sacre.i a ce ebrer I’abolition de la royaute le plus grand des fleaux dont I’espece hu- 
 maine ait e e la victime. No. 90. 
 
 ‘ May 7-14, 1791. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 47 
 
 negatively. I. Whether the elements and the principles of our 
 Constitution are not in continual opposition to the form of our 
 government. II. Whether every hereditary delegation is not a 
 violation of rights and a contradiction in principles. III. Whether 
 the illustrious citizen of Geneva is mistaken when he says that the 
 monarchy is a government contrary to nature. 
 
 But the most venomous assault upon the king and upon royalty 
 appeared in the number of June 18-25, which reported the king’s 
 flight. Denunciatory epithets were heaped upon the faithless 
 monarch. “Julius Caesar, poigniarded by the Romans; Charles 
 I., decapitated by the English, were innocent, if we compare them 
 to Louis XVI. ... If the President of the National Assembly 
 had put to vote upon the question whether we should have a 
 republican form of government, in the Place de Greve, in the 
 Garden of Tuileries and in the Palace of Orleans, France would 
 no more be a monarchy.” Such w’ere some of the contents of 
 this liberal Parisian paper.' The next issue (No. 103) found 
 fault with the National Assembly for not dealing severely with 
 the king, and said that, inasmuch as war would come anyway, 
 it had better come under a republic than under a monarch or 
 
 1 The picture which the editor gives of the feeling in Paris after the flight of Louis 
 shows him to be an extreme radical, and that the people of the city were greatly 
 aroused by the escape. “ L’opinion dominante dtait une antipathic pour les rois, un 
 mdpris pour la personne de Louis XVI., qui se manifesterent jusque dans les plus 
 petits details. A la Greve, on fit tomber en morceaux le buste de Louis XVL, 
 qu’dclairait la celdbre lanterne, TefTroi des ennemis de la revolution. Quand done le 
 peuple se fera t-il justice de tous ces rois de bronze, monuments de notre idolatrie? 
 Rue Saint-Honord, on exigea d’un marchand le sacrifice d’une teie de plat re, a. la 
 ressemblance de Louis XVL ; dans un autre magasin, on se contenta de lui poser sur 
 les yeux un bandeau de papier; les noms de roi, reine, royale. Bourbon, Louis, eour, 
 monsieur, frire du roi furent efiac6.s par tout ofi on les trouva Merits sur tous les tab¬ 
 leaux et en.seignes des magasins et des boutiques. Le Palais royal tsl aujourd’hui le 
 Palais d’Orl6ans. Les couronnes peintes furent nignie proscrites, et le jour de la FSte- 
 Dieu on les couvrit d’un voile sur les tapisseries ou elles se trouvoient, afin de ne 
 point souiller par leur aspect la saintetd de le proce.ssion. . . . Un piquet de cin- 
 
 quante lances fit des patrouilles jusque dans les Tuileries, portant pour banni^re un 
 ^criteau, avec cette inscription : 
 
 Vivre libre ou mourir, 
 
 Louis XVL, s’expatriant, 
 
 N’existe plus pour nous.” 
 
 No. 102. 
 
48 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 a regent. Here also appeared an announcement of the propa- 
 gandism of liberty, of which the Girondists spoke so enthusiastic¬ 
 ally a year later.* A few numbers later, an article censured the 
 indifference of the people in regard to the elections for the coming 
 Legislative A.ssembly, saying that upon the composition of this 
 body would depend the safety of the republic. The Constituent 
 Assembly is not spared criticism for making the Constitution 
 unalterable by the Legislative Assembly.’ In subsequent num¬ 
 bers of the autumn of 1791, the monarchical features of the Con¬ 
 stitution w'ere pointed out and criticised.® Later on, the republic 
 was mentioned less frequently, nevertheless royalty was still at¬ 
 tacked. The issue which gave an account of the events of August 
 10, 1792, the determination of the Legislative Assembly to sus¬ 
 pend the king and to call a National Convention to determine the 
 nature of the executive office, referred to the king as “Louis 
 XVI., whom we shall call no more the king of the French.’’ 
 The number following advised the members of the convention 
 that their finst work should be to dethrone the monarch, but a 
 republic was not explicitly recommended.* That this paper exer- 
 
 1 “ II ne nous faut qu’un seul chef du pouvoir exdcutif, mais un chef a, temps, un chef 
 impuissant par lui meme, qui n’ait d’autorite que celle de la loi. II est temps, il est 
 plus que temps de frapper un grand coup : que la tete de Louis tombe ; ou bien qu’on 
 le dddaigne, elle est assez mdprisable; que le trOne et tous les pompeux hochets de la 
 royaut6 soient livrds aux flammes; que I’assemblee nationale de la monarchic fasse 
 place au s6nat de la rfipublique ; que celui-ci adresse un manifesta k tous les tyrans de 
 I’Europe ; qu’il invite tous les peuples ^ la liberte; qu’k la premiere hostility d’immenses 
 legions de nos nouveaux r^publicanes aillent exterminer tous les despotes, et planter 
 le drapeau de la liberty jusque dans le fond de I’Allemagne; nous serons fibres alors, 
 nous pr^viendrons la guerre qu’on vent apporter chez nous, et la France aura la gloire, 
 inconnue jusqu’ k ce jour, devoir non pas conquis I’Europe i la France, mais conquis 
 I’univers k la liberty, en le purgeant des rois, empereurs, et tyrans de touts espies.’ 
 No. 103. 
 
 ’ T, 8, 606 et seq. 
 
 ’In No. 115, September 17-24, reference was made to the prize offered by the 
 Jacobin Club for an Almanac to be distributed among the people teaching the advan¬ 
 tages of the constitution, but the editor suggests that they had better offer a prize for 
 an almanac revealing the defects of the constitution. 
 
 ’ “ II n’est pas besoin d’examiner I’abolition de la royautd. Le voeu de la nation’ 
 sans doute, est assez prononed; sans doute ceux-mfimes qui prdtendaient que les 
 adresses de tous les d^partements sur la ddchdance ne suffisoient pas k I’assembl^e 
 nationale avant le 10 aofit, sont k present convaincus que les Frangais ne veulent ni 
 d’un roi de leur nation, ni d’un dtranger.” Noting the weakness in the American 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 49 
 
 cised considerable influence in arousing hostility to the king and 
 to the monarchy, and in suggesting a republic, seems quite reas¬ 
 onable, when we remember that its weekly circulation reached 
 nearly two hundred thousand copies.* 
 
 We have deemed it advisable to follow the Revolutions de Paris 
 through to the proclamation of the republic, in order to give a 
 connected account of the direction in which this popular publica¬ 
 tion attempted to sway public opinion. Having noted that its 
 positive republicanism was manifest in April, two months before 
 Louis XVI’S unsuccessful attempt at exodus, we shall endeavor 
 to see what was the strength which this party possessed in the 
 summer of 1791. 
 
 Bonneville’s paper, Bouche de fer, in June, 1791, pronounced 
 against a monarchy, a protectorate, and a regency, and urged an 
 united declaration to the effect that they wanted no more of these.^ 
 A placard was posted at the door of the Assembly, July ist, an¬ 
 nouncing that a society of republicans had resolved to publish a 
 paper, Le Republican, for pointing out the abuses of monarchy and 
 for enlightening the minds of the people upon republicanism. This 
 was signed by Duchastellet.’ A few copies of this paper were 
 published within this month.* Montlosier mentions the existence 
 of a republican party after the flight of the king,® and Gouverneur 
 Morris wrote, July 13, 1791, what confirms the same fact. Here 
 is what he said : “ This step was a very foolish one. . . . His de¬ 
 parture changed everything, and now the general wish seems to 
 be for a republic, which is quite in the natural order of things.” ‘ 
 
 constitution which made it possible for one man, Washington or Adams, to acquire 
 too great power, the article urged that the French should imitate no country, but 
 should work out their own plan. However, this same number told of the first meeting 
 of the Convention and of the abolition of the monarchy. 
 
 ’ Stephens, The French Revolution, i, 102. 
 
 Hist. Tarl., X, 414. ^ Hist. Gin., x, 449. 
 
 ‘ E. Hamel, Hist, de Robespierre, i, 38S et seq., Paris, 1867. 
 
 ® Trois difierentes opinions partageaient done TAssemblSe et la France. La pre¬ 
 miere, de retablir le roi, et de maintenir la monarchie d’aprds les bases de la consti. 
 tution; la seconde, d’abolir la royau'e et d’dlever une r^publique; la troisieme 
 mitoyenne entre les deux autres, de retablir le roi ou de placer le dauphin sur le 
 tr6ne, mais de I'environner d’un conseil exdcutif indSpendant dont les membres 
 amovibles fussent dlus par le peuple.” Montlosier, Memoires, t, i, 467 et seq. 
 
 * Diary and Letters, i, 436. 
 
50 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 On the eve of the convening of the I^egislative Assembly, Sep¬ 
 tember 30, 1791, Morris wrote to Washington the following 
 explicit observations upon the status of the republican movement: 
 “The new Assembly, as far as can at present be determined, is 
 deeply imbued with republican or, rather, democratic principles. 
 The southern part of the kingdom is in the same disposition; the 
 eastern is attached to Germany and would gladly be united to the 
 empire; Normandy is aristocratical, and so is part of Brittany; 
 the interior part of the kingdom is monarchal. This map is (you 
 may rely on it) just, for it is the result of great and expensive in¬ 
 vestigation made by the Government.’’ * Brissot’s paper, Patriate 
 franfais, of June 25, 1791, in analyzing the proposals then made 
 for the executive department of the government, said: “ The first 
 opinion which has been presented to the public is decisive,—No 
 more kings, let us be republicans,—such has been the gry of the 
 Palais Royal, of some societies, of some writers.’” Thomas 
 Paine’s letter in response to Sieyes, published in the Patriate 
 /ranfais, }\.\\y ii, declares the American system of government 
 superior to every other, and closes the letter with these suggestive 
 words: “ Enfin c’est ^ tout I’enfer de la monarchic que j’ai declare 
 la guerre.’’® 
 
 From these accumulated statements, we infer that about Paris, 
 in the spring of 1791, especially after the 20th of June, there was 
 much agitation in favor of the dethronement of Louis XVI, some 
 for the change of the royal family, and a perceptible tendency in 
 favor of a republic. After the acceptance of the Const! ution by 
 the king and by the Legislative Assembly, the constitutional ques¬ 
 tion of the kingship is little discussed till in the summer of 1792. 
 Then the Legislative Assembly was frightened over the defeat of 
 the French army at Lille and at Tournay, the disastrous defeat 
 of Biron’s army at Mons, and the probable advance of the 
 Austrian army upon Paris. The king, following the advice of 
 Montmorin and Malouet, had sent Mallet du Pan on a mission to 
 the German courts to secure a manifesto of intimidation against 
 the factious Frenchmen.* The Austrian cammittee was denounced 
 boldly in the journals and in the Assembly.^ 
 
 ' Diary and Letters, i, 456 et seq. ’ Hist. Pari., x, 414 et seq. 
 
 5 Ibid., 452. * Ibid., xxv, 422 et seq. 
 
 ^ Hist. Cen., viii, 133-134; Hist. Pari., xiv, 278 et seq.-. Sore), LI Europe et la 
 Rev.fr., ii, 478. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 51 
 
 Incited by this array of reverses, royal intrigues, and threatened 
 invasion, the Assembly passed three decrees for the protection of 
 the country: May 27, the deportation of the non-juring priests; 
 May 29, the dismissal of the king’s guard; June 8, the formation 
 of a camp of 20,000 federes at Paris. The king opposed his veto to 
 the first and last of these. The Girondin ministry was dismissed 
 early in June.' The invasion of the Tuileries, June 20, was the 
 result of these aggravations. The petition presented to the Leg¬ 
 islative Assembly by the crowd on that day does not solicit the 
 establishment of a republic, but urges that the king should fulfill 
 his constitutional function of protecting liberty.^ The king con¬ 
 tinued to be disturbed by the people. The manifesto of the Duke 
 of Brunswick, July 27, greatly excited the Parisians, already 
 much aroused. Then from the sections of Paris, from adminis¬ 
 trative bodies, and from communes, addresses were sent in asking 
 for the suspension or the dethronement of the king." The signi¬ 
 ficant fact about this outcry for the removal of Louis is the silence 
 about what is to supersede him. The commune representing the 
 forty-eight sections of Paris, through Petion, presented at the 
 bar of the Assembly, August 3, a petition most vehement in its 
 denunciation of the faithless monarch and most startling in the 
 picture presented of the country’s danger; but this commune, the 
 most radical, perhaps, in France, invoked the Constitution in 
 praying for his dethronement.* 
 
 The Legislative Assembl}'^ hesitated to take upon itself the 
 work of deposition. The sections gave it till midnight of the 9th 
 of August to decide; if at that time the dethronement had not 
 been voted, the tocsin should sound and the ghierale should beat 
 for the insurrection. The Assembly adjourned at 7 o’clock with¬ 
 out deciding the question. The loth of August the King was 
 driven from the Tuileries, and took refuge in the Assembly. 
 
 * Hist. Pari., xv, 32 et seq. 
 
 ’ La liberty ne peut 5 tre suspendue; si le pouvoir ex^cutif n’agit point, il ne pent 
 y avoir d’alternatives, c’est lui qui doit I’filre : un seul homme ne doit point influencer 
 la volont6 de vingt-cinq millions d’hommes. Si, par egard, nous le maintenons dans 
 son poste, c’est & condition qu’il le remplira constitutionellement; s’il s’en 6carte, il 
 n’est plus rien pour le peuple framjais. Hist. Pari., xv, 139. 
 
 ’ Hist. Pari., 324 et seq. 
 
 Louis XVI. invoque sans cesse la Constitution: nous I’invoquons h notre tour, et 
 nous demandons sa d6ch6ance. Hist. Pari., xvi, 319. 
 
52 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 Even then the legislators only suspended the King until “the 
 National Convention should pronounce upon the measures which 
 it believes ought to be adopted for assuring the sovereignty of the 
 people and the reign of liberty and equality.” * 
 
 August II, the Assembly provided for the mode of election for 
 the members of the new Convention, and gave universal suffrage 
 to males over 21 years. Did it ask that the delegates should be 
 instructed to vote for the monarchy or the republic ? No; but they 
 were to be given “ unlimited confidence.” ’ M. Aulard has ana¬ 
 lyzed for us the powers given by the primary assemblies to the 
 electoral assemblies of the Departments and by the latter to the 
 deputies. He notes that almost universally the primary assem¬ 
 blies conformed to the advice to grant unlimited powers to the 
 departmental electors. At the final election of deputies, Septem¬ 
 ber 2, in thirty-four Departments the electors made no allusion to 
 what powers should be bestowed upon their representatives; in 
 thirty-six they gave them ‘ ‘ unlimited powers ” or “ unlimited con¬ 
 fidence;” in two Departments, the Lower Pyrenees and Somme, 
 the previous question was raised upon the powers to be given; in a 
 single one (Charente) they gave as mandate the oath taken by the 
 electors, “to maintain equality and liberty.” In three Depart¬ 
 ments, Aisne, Eure-et-Soir, and Paris, they gave full powers with 
 the restriction that the constitutional laws to be made shall be 
 submitted to the ratification of the people. Thus all either 
 ‘ ‘ inscribed the formula prescribed by the Legislature or omitted 
 it as useless and self-evident.” 
 
 Shall there be a monarchy or a republic ? What was the voice 
 of the departments upon this question ? Only one out of the 
 eighty-three Departments expressed a clear demand upon this 
 point. This one, that which includes Paris, asked for ‘ ‘ the 
 form of a republican government.” In the other eighty-two the 
 word republic was not pronounced. One Department, Jura, how¬ 
 ever, attempted to define in rather express terms the sort of 
 government to be formed, “A temporary executive power, re¬ 
 movable at the option of the people,” but it does not use the term 
 republic? Four Departments were pronounced against royalty. 
 
 Hist. Pari., xvii, 48. ‘‘Ibid., 44. 
 
 ’ From some Department of Jura there is some reason to believe a political club had 
 addressed a letter at the beginning of 1792 to the Jacobin Club in Paris, asking for 
 the establishment of a republic. Bir6, Diary of a Citizen, etc., i, 45. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 53 
 
 and swore eternal hostility thereto; these were Aube, Charente- 
 Inferieure, Jura, and Paris. No Department asked the continu¬ 
 ance of the monarchy, and only a few primary assemblies asked 
 this. These assemblies were in four Departments, i. e., five in 
 Allier, one in Ariege, three in the Gironde, and two in Dot-et- 
 Garoiine. 
 
 If we examine the proceedings of the Jacobin Club, we find that 
 this .society was devoted for some time to the King and to the 
 constitution.* No bitter opposition to the monarch is found till 
 after June 20, 1791. Then it was his violation of the constitution 
 that caused his denunciation. After the two famous vetoes, a 
 member proposed in the Club that they make use of Art. vi. Sec. 
 10, Chapt. 2, of the Constitution, “If the King puts himself 
 at the head of an army and directs the forces against the nation 
 ... he will be considered to have abdicated royalty.’’ ' The 
 printing of this discourse was urged on all hands. The Club fre¬ 
 quently mentioned the calling of a convention. Its sympathy 
 with the work of August 10 is evident,” and its hostility to the 
 monarchy is more pronounced from this period.* 
 
 A definite suggestion of the constructive scheme was made in the 
 Club, September 7 ; Chabot introduced the discussion of the form 
 of government, and referred to two kinds, (i) the federation of the 
 departments, and (2) a National Council, which should be pre¬ 
 sided over in turn by one of the deputies of one of the portions 
 of the empire. Chabot favored the latter.” Again returning to 
 
 * F. A. Aulard, La Sociiti des yacobins, i, Intro., XII, XIII, Paris, 1889. 
 
 * Ibid., iv, 80. 
 
 * The club decreed August 12: “ Qu’il sera fait une adresse aux Societes affili6s, 
 pour leur donner une connaissance exacte des ^venements du 10 Aout, les instruire 
 du courage et du patriotisme qu’ont d6ploye dans cette journ^e k jamais memorable 
 les f^d^r^s des quatre vingt-trois departments, qui avec leurs frdres d’armes de Paris, 
 ont sauve le patrie.” Aulard, La Sociili des yacobins, iv, 194, 195. August 22, an 
 address was sent to the affiliated society pointing out what class of men should be 
 chosen for the Convention. If they do not choose these, a new insurrection like that 
 of August 10 may be necessary. La Sociiti des yacobins. iv, 233-235. 
 
 ^ One of the speakers, M. Manuel, said, August 27 : “ Nous devons tous jurer, et y’en 
 fais le premier le serment, it quelque poste que Je me trouve plac6 tous mes efforts 
 seront diriges vers ce but important, de purger la terre de fleau de la toyaut6.” La 
 Sociiti des yacobins, iv, 238 et seq. 
 
 ‘ Ibid., iv, 259 et seq. 
 
54 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 the same question, September lo, Terrasson pronounced a prefer¬ 
 ence for the federation, and cited Rousseau as his authority and 
 America for a successful example.* Two days after, September 
 12, a letter was proposed and was adopted in the Jacobin Club of 
 Paris, to be sent to the affiliated societies. In it were contained 
 these three proposals, which may be regarded as setting forth the 
 policy of the democratic party of Paris ; the popular sanction or 
 popular revision of all the constitutional decrees of the National 
 Convention ; the total abolition of royalty, and the penalty of 
 death against those who proposed to re-establish it; the repub- 
 lican form of govern 77 ient.^ 
 
 The significance of this movement on the part of the parent 
 Jacobin Club must not be overlooked in tracing the progress of 
 republicanism. The affiliation of well nigh a thousand societies 
 in other parts of France with the parent society afforded a strong 
 and thoroughly organized means for concerted political action.* 
 The nominees of the popular societies were nearly everywhere 
 
 > Societi: des Jacobins, iv, 273 et seq. . 
 
 ’ “ La sanction ou la revision populaire de tons les d^crets constitutionnels de la 
 convention nationale; I’abolition absolue de la royautd et peine de mort centre ceux 
 qui proposeraient de la rdtablir; la forme d’un gouvernement r^publicain.” La So- 
 ciiti des Jacobins, iv, 281. A letter written by an English lady from Arras, Septem¬ 
 ber I, 1792, contains this statement: “ Mr. Thomas Paine . . . is in high repute here 
 —his works are translated-—all the Jacobins who can read, quote, and all who can’t, 
 admire him.” A Residence in France, i, 68. 
 
 ^December 21, 1790, the Jacobin Club printed a list of 1,100 members; August 
 16, 1790, there were fifteen affiliated societies. These affiliations increased rapidly in 
 the spring of 1791, so that by June 16, there weie 406 affiliated and 14 corresponding 
 societies; by June, 1793, there were a thousand affiliated clubs. La SociHi 
 
 des Jacobins, i. Intro., xxxiii-xxxix. That these clubs knew how to make use of their 
 affiliations for political action is patent from the letter sent out among them, August 
 22, four days before the primary elections were held : “ C’est a nous a le soutenir ; et 
 nous le pouvons, en eloignant des assemblies electorales tous ceux qui ont protigi, 
 meme indirectement la cour et le sacerdoce, les emigres et leurs adherents. Notre 
 choix ne doit pas etre difficile; les patriotes font la majorite de la nation. Ils peuvent 
 done, s’ils savent se riunis, faire des choix favorables h leurs intirits. Les electeurs itant 
 payis a. trois livres . . il n’est plus nicessaire d’itre riche bourgeois, pritre, ou ci- 
 devant noble pour accepter cette noble mission; et, si la majoriti des ilecteurs est au 
 niveau de la rivolution du 10 Aoftt 1792 nos nouveaux dipules ne tarderont pas a, la 
 consolider et i sauver le peuple par une constitution conformi k la diclaration des 
 droits et k I’intiret du plus grand nombre.” SociHe ctes Jacobins, iv, 233, et seq. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 55 
 
 chosen to represent the provinces in the Convention.' In the list 
 of deputies from Paris appeared the names of pronounced repub¬ 
 licans and radical Jacobins who might be expected to take a 
 stand for a popular form of government.^ 
 
 The Convention held its first meeting in the Tuileries; 
 only 371 members were present. They verified their powers, 
 organized by choosing Petion as President, and by naming five 
 Secretaries. September 21, they occupied the place of the Legis¬ 
 lative Assembly in the Riding School. Here they had declared 
 in favor of the following measures suitable for allaying the fears 
 of disorder: (i) The National Convention declares that there can 
 only be a constitution when it is accepted by the people; (2) 
 that the security of person and of property is under the safe¬ 
 guard of the nation ; (3) that all laws not abrogated, and all 
 powers not revoked or suspended are maintained ; (4) that the 
 existing taxes shall be collected as in the past. 
 
 This effected, they were about to adjourn, when Collot d’Her- 
 bois ascended the tribune and said : “ You have just passed a wise 
 resolution, but there is one which you can not put off till to¬ 
 morrow, which you can not put off till this evening, which you 
 can not put off a single instant without being unfaithful to the 
 wish of the nation ; that is the abolition of royalty.” Unanimous 
 applause greeted this speech. M. Gregoire proposed that ‘‘by 
 a solemn law they sanction the abolition of royalty,” and the 
 
 ’Stephen’s French Rev., ii, 154; Babeau’s Hist, de Troyes pendant la Rev.,\, 
 527, 528. The following excerpt from A Residetice in France, 1792-95, described 
 in a series of letters from an English Lady, i, 93 : “ If the electors and elected of the 
 other departments be of the same complexion with those of Arras, the new Assembly 
 will not, in any respect, be preferable to the old one. I have reproached many of the 
 people of this place, who, from their education and property, have a right to take an 
 interest in the public affairs, with thus suffering themselves to be represented by the 
 most desperate and worthless individuals of the town. Their defense is that they are 
 insulted and overpowered if they attend the popular meetings, and by electing les 
 gueux et les scllirats pour dlputis, they send them to Paris and secure their own 
 local tranquillity. 
 
 ’ The twenty-four deputies from the city were Robespierre, Danton, Collot- 
 d’Herbois, Manuel, Billaud-Varenne, Camille Desmoulins, Marat, Lavicomterie> 
 Legendre the butcher, Raffron du Trouillet, Paris, Sergent, Robert, Dusaulx, Fr^ron’ 
 Beauvis de Preau, Fabre d'Eglantine the dramatist, Osselin, Augustine Robespierre; 
 David the great painter, Boucher, Laignelot, Thomas, the ci-devant Duke of Orleans’ 
 now democratically named Philippe figalit^. Stephen’s French Rev., ii, 155, 156. 
 
THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 56 
 
 entire Assembly by a spontaneous movement arose and voted tbis 
 proclamation by acclamation ; a brief discussion followed, and 
 then with loud bursts of applause they voted, “The National 
 Convention decrees that royalty is abolished in France.” For 
 some time the cr}' “ Vive la Nation" was prolonged. At this 
 juncture a company of 150 chasseurs were admitted to the hall 
 and swore upon their arms to return only after having triumphed 
 over all the enemies of liberty and equality. But as yet the word 
 Republic had not been mentioned in the new Convention. 
 
 At the evening session of that day the time was consumed in hear¬ 
 ing of the discourses of divers deputations that had come to congrat¬ 
 ulate the Convention upon the great work done that day. Two 
 of the.se spoke of the Republic as an already established fact,* 
 while on the streets, however, of the city the cry was resounding, 
 “ Vive la Republique." One orator spoke of nine battalions al¬ 
 ready sent to the front, and reported that another was on the 
 way. “They were coming,” he said, “to pray your blessing 
 upon their arms, when they learned on the way that they 
 were to fight no more for kings. They were happy to go to 
 save the Republic. When they were informed that all your 
 moments must be consecrated to it, they renounced the enjoy¬ 
 ment of receiving your blessing and went on their way. Our 
 Department is busy forming new battalions, in seeking to arm 
 them, and especially in inspiring them with republican man¬ 
 ners.” This was greeted with new applause. The section of 
 Quatre-Nations was represented by its orator, who said among 
 other things; “We have given three thousand men for the 
 
 frontier ; these are three thousand republicans.We 
 
 ask to defile through your midst. If arms are needed, speak, we 
 shall hasten to u.se them in the defense of the country, too happy 
 to pay with our blood for the Republic which you have decreed 
 for us.” Applause greeted this expression of devotion.^ The 
 newspapers signaled the decree of abolition in enthusiastic 
 
 1 The proclamation of the abolition of the monarchy filled Paris with joy. We cite 
 from the RH. de Paris, No. 167, 534 : “ Cette proclamation, parvenue dans les 48 
 sections de Paris, fut r6p6tee dans tons les carrefours au bruit des cors et au milieu des 
 applaudissements universelles. Tous les citoyens k I’envi illumin^rent le devant de 
 leurs maisons, comme k I’occasion d’un grande victoire remportee sur le plus puissant 
 de nos ennemis.” 
 
 ’ Hist. Pari,, xix, 6 et seq. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 57 
 
 descriptions, but only Brissot’s Patriote franiais proclaimed, 
 “ Royalty is abolished ; France is a Republic.” * 
 
 On the morrow early in the session, Billaud-Varenne moved, 
 and the Convention decreed, that ‘‘all public acts were to be 
 dated from the first year of the Republic.” A new seal of State 
 bearing the words ‘‘ Republique de France ” was decided upon and 
 national colors were proposed, but not adopted.' The journals 
 took little notice of this new name with which France had been 
 baptized. Nevertheless, the members of the Convention seemed 
 to take it as a matter of course and to make repeated use of the 
 term Republic. For instance, on September 22, it appeared in the 
 following decree: ‘‘The National Convention decrees that the 
 committees of the legislative assembly and the members of the 
 executive council shall render an account to the National Con¬ 
 vention of the state of their work and of the condition of the dif¬ 
 ferent parts of the French Republic . . . .” The report of the 
 Minister of the Interior, M. Gorsas, in the session of September 
 23, contained this report of the state of public opinion: ‘‘The w’ill 
 of the French is pronounced. Liberty and equality are their 
 supreme good; they will sacrifice all to preserve these. They 
 have a horror for the crimes of the nobles, the hypocrisy of the 
 priests, the tyranny of kings. Kings! they wish no more of 
 them, they know that outside of a Republic there is no liberty.” 
 Again on September 24, the Convention decreed ‘‘that there 
 shall be named six commissioners charged with rendering as 
 full an account as shall be possible, of the present state of the 
 Republic and that of Paris.” On September 25, the Convention 
 declared ‘‘ the French Republic is one and indivisible.” ' 
 
 Here we have pas.sed to the period in which the Republic had 
 become an accepted fact for France. Robespierre said truly that 
 it had ‘‘ glided in furtively among the factions,” and we may say 
 that to Frenchmen, interested in the national defence, it was a 
 welcome change. Gouverneur Morris is authority for this in a 
 note of October, 1792, in which he said: ‘‘These are the outlines 
 made use of on either side to convince the public that each is ex- 
 
 ' Hist. Pari., xix, 20, 21. 
 
 ’ Bir6, Diary ef a Citizen, i, 14; Aulard, Btudes et Ltfons sur la Rlv.fr., 109 
 et seq. 
 
 • Hist. Pari., xix, 35, 39, 105. 
 
58 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 clusively the author of a Republic which the people find them¬ 
 selves possessed of by a kind of magic, or at least, a sleight of 
 hand, and which, nevertheless, they are as fond of as if it were 
 their own offspring.” * 
 
 It would be interesting to know how completely this Parisian 
 enthusiasm was shared by the nation. Grave objections may have 
 been offered, but it soon came about that to be disloyal to the 
 Republic was to be a foe of liberty and equality, and, worse yet, 
 a traitor to France. So far as we are able to discover, the army 
 accepted the Republic with enthusiasm. On September 9, Gen¬ 
 eral Valence wrote to Dumouriez that he would run to the Rep 7 (blic 
 with transport. Prieur (de la Marne) awakened enthusiasm in 
 the army of the Ardennes by announcing to them on September 
 29, the news of the birth of the Republic.’^ And a report from 
 the camp of volunteers at Chalons speaks of a like worthy 
 sentiment.® 
 
 The.se are the facts about the growth of republican ideas in 
 Revolutionary France and of the proclamation of the Republic. 
 We can sum them up as follows: At the meeting of the States- 
 General in 1789 France was pronouncedly monarchic. A little 
 coterie of men became anti-monarchical; these developed the 
 Club of Cordeliers. In 1791, when Louis XVI showed his dis¬ 
 trust of the French people and tried to escape, hostility to the 
 monarch and also to the monarchy was strong. Even repub¬ 
 licanism was championed by an orator in the Assembly and by a 
 few newspapers; one of these journals, the Revolutions de Paris, 
 had a large circulation. The king however accepted the Consti¬ 
 tution in September, 1791, and the outcry against him and in 
 favor of the abolition of the monarchy subsided. Not until in the 
 summer of 1792 did the royal vetoes, the menacing manifesto of 
 the allies, the actual advance of the Prussian army toward Paris, 
 call lorth many petitions and requests for the suspension or for 
 the dethronement of the king, or for the abolition of the 
 monarchy. 
 
 Comparatively little was said, however, about the form to 
 be given to the executive. On August 10, the Legislative 
 
 • Diary and Letters, i, 596. 
 
 ’ Aulard, Rtudes et Lefons. 
 
 * Revolutions de Paris, ii, 68-76. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 59 
 
 Assembly only “suspended Louis XVI provisionally, until the 
 National Convention should pronounce upon the measures it 
 believed ought to be adopted for assuring the sovereignty of the 
 people and the reign of liberty and equality,’’ Clubs, sections, 
 journals, and provinces, and even radical democrats, are rather 
 silent about a substitute for the monarchy. When the abolition 
 came on September 21, it was received as the news of a national 
 victory; but at first the term Republic, used on the 22nd, was 
 little greeted by the nation. It however became the shibboleth of 
 the army and of the patriots. For this revival of republicanism, 
 Paris, and perhaps the army, are responsible. The Jacobin Club 
 of Paris also made use of its influential position to encourage 
 republican inclinations in the affiliated societies throughout 
 France, and, what was more important still, to secure the election 
 of anti-monarchical and of democratic deputies to the Convention. 
 
 A few questions remain to be answered. First among these is, 
 What was the relation between the republican movement of 1791 
 and that of 1792? The earlier movement must have had a ten¬ 
 dency to increase the number in France who perceived the incon¬ 
 sistency between individual rights and the equalit}^ of men on 
 the one hand, and the hereditary kingship on the other. It also 
 increased the number of those who believed a republic suited for 
 France and who, though they recognized that the realization of 
 their opinions was for the time being impo.ssible, yet were ready to 
 strive for its establishment when the circumstances should give 
 opportunity. To this group of men belongs the credit of having 
 secured an expression from Paris in favor of the Republic, and of 
 having secured its early recognition in the city on the abolition 
 of royalty. 
 
 A second question is. Why was there so much said in 1792 
 about the abolition of monarchy, and so little about the Republic 
 that should replace it ? Why were those of republican preferences 
 so slow to say it? This may be answered by the statement that 
 generally, in movements depending upon public opinion, the 
 people are more pronounced against an abuse or misuse which 
 they have experienced than about an untried theory; are more 
 capable to pronounce upon a destructive than upon a constructive 
 scheme, are more enlightened in their negative than in their 
 positive actions. The Constituent Assembly was happy in its 
 negative work of destroying the abuses of the old regime, but less 
 
6 o 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC 
 
 felicitous in its positive work of reconstruction. The French 
 people of 1792 were conversant with the vacillations of the king, 
 the treasonable intrigues and anti-popular feelings of the court, 
 but a Republic was as 5^et an untried and unproved expedient. 
 Under its name anarchy, or, what to the Parisians was little less 
 odious, federalisvi, might become the order of the day. Hence 
 the very friends of a strong united Republic hesitated to use the 
 word till the form of the institution should be shaped by the ten¬ 
 dency of affairs. The very friends of Republican government 
 might have remembered that their use of the word Republic in ’ 
 1791 had been fraught with bitter schismatic tendencies among 
 the friends of the Revolution; and how much more dangerous 
 such a schism in 1792, when the nation found itself called upon 
 to resist the humiliating invasion of its territory by the allies. 
 They also knew that to be a republican in 1791 had been unpopu¬ 
 lar,’ and were chary of exposing themselves to unnecessary odium, 
 knowing that the monarchy once abolished, they would be by 
 necessity under a liberal form of government, call it what they 
 might. 
 
 A third query is. Why did the Conventionalists choose the 
 republican government ? The question is easily answered by 
 another question, i. e., What other expedient was possible, con¬ 
 sidering the state of public opinion? Was it an aristocracy? 
 But the Revolution in its incipient stages was a revolt against an 
 aristocracy. Was it a regency ? But here the difficulty was to 
 find a regent who did not share the obloquy of the dethroned 
 monarch, or was not incapable of commanding the respect of the 
 nation. Was it under the protection of a foreign prince or power ? 
 Not so; the spirit of national independence was too strong to 
 suffer even a dispassionate consideration of this. What way 
 could the Constitutionalists turn ? Sorel has truly said: “The 
 abolition of royalty was the acknowledgment of a fact; the procla¬ 
 mation of the Republic was the recognition of a necessity. A gov¬ 
 ernment was necessary to France, and no other than a republican 
 government was possible.’’” And the Republic had existed in 
 
 * See Si6y6s disavowal, Hist. Pari., x, 451. Brissot’s Journal of Sept. 21, 1791, 
 said : “ Qui ne se rappellera pas avec quelque douleur, que le mot de republique etait 
 alors presque proscrit aux Jacobins mSme ; qu’ il fallait prendre des tournures oratoires 
 pour justifier le rdpublicanisme.” Hist. Pari., xix, 20, 21. 
 
 ^ L'Europe et la Rev, fr., iii, 67. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE REPUBLIC 6 1 
 
 fact in France for two short, but very critical periods. From 
 June 21 to September 14, 1791, the king had been suspended and 
 the Constituent Assembly had conducted through the ministry 
 the work of the executive. And again from August 10 to Sep¬ 
 tember 21, 1792, the same expedient was resorted to. But it may 
 be said that the Republic was not in accord with French national 
 traditions, and that, therefore, it could never be accepted by the 
 nation. True, France had been a monarchy for centuries, and 
 the history of her kings was dear to the people in 1789; but there 
 was a stronger tradition to which the people were more de¬ 
 votedly attached than to royalty, and now the king had forced 
 the issue between these two traditions, that is, the tradition of 
 the monarchy and the tradition of nationality and independence. 
 So soon as it seemed clear that the French must choose between 
 these, the choice was made by the abolition of royalty. 
 
 Royalty was thus abolished on September 21, 1792: the republic 
 was recognized by the Convention as its legitimate successor. 
 The name had been adopted, now a new constitution was neces¬ 
 sary : not one like that of 1791, a base accommodation of hered¬ 
 itary powers and democratic rights; but one consistently con¬ 
 structed. The Convention early appointed its Committee of Con¬ 
 stitution. The leader in the committee was Condorcet, and the 
 majority were Girondi.sts. Their work was ready to be reported 
 February 15 and 16, 1793. But by' this time the republicans 
 themselves had formed two antagonistic factions, the Girondists 
 and the Montagnards. The latter were the men of action, and 
 now held the power in the Convention. Condorcet’s Constitution 
 was not submitted to the nation. 
 
 On May 30, 1793, the Committee of Public Safety was aug¬ 
 mented by five members. These w’ere Couthon, Herault de 
 Sechelles, Mathieu, Ramel, and Saint Just. They lost no time in 
 the elaboration of a Constitution, and by June 22, were ready to 
 report. Herault de Sechelles made the final reading June 24. 
 Delegates were sent all over France to receive the vote of the 
 primary assemblies for the acceptance of the Constitutional Act; 
 1,801,918 votes were cast for its adoption. Their glowing report 
 was made August 9th by Gossuin, and the next day was fixed as 
 a national festival “ consecrated to the inauguration of the Con¬ 
 stitution of the Republic.” The artist, David, planned the cere¬ 
 monies. 
 
62 
 
 THE FIRST FRENCH RUPUBLIC 
 
 The glorious fundamental law was not, however, to reign in 
 France. France must be defended from invasion, civil war must 
 be subdued, and then the rest of Europe must be delivered from 
 political slavery. In just two months after this inaugural festi¬ 
 val, the Convention decreed that the provisional government 
 should be revolutionary till peace. When peace came, a new 
 monarch was enthroned. But these enthusiastic men of 1792 and 
 1793 had given France a name and an ideal; they had placed above 
 her horizon a star of hope. When oppression shall make them 
 weary, or when the popular spirits shall rise, they shall think of a 
 republic as the aim and end of political effort. 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE CHIEF WORKS. 
 
 Aquinas, Thomas, De Regimine Principium. 
 
 Archives parlementaires, 1st Series, vols. 1-50, Paris, 1868. 
 
 Aubertin, Charles, L'esprit public au 18 siicle, Paris, 1873, 
 
 Aulard, F. A., Hides et Lcfons sur la revolution franfaise, Paris, 1893. 
 
 Aulard, F. A., La Sociitl des Jacobins, 5 vols., Paris, 1889. 
 
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