CHAPTER XI[12]

THE COMMITTEE FOR THE CONSTITUTION.

[12: There is a great hiatus in this chapter, due to my not

mentioning the discussions and resolutions relating to _general

principles_. Many of the discussions were fairly thorough, and most

of the resolutions were tolerably wise and even courageous. Most of

the revolutionary and socialistic raptures of the time were

combated in them. We were prepared and on our guard on these

general questions.]

I now change my subject, and am glad to leave the scenes of the civil

war and to return to the recollections of my parliamentary life. I wish

to speak of what happened in the Committee for the Constitution, of

which I was a member. This will oblige us to retrace our steps a little,

for the appointment and work of this committee date back to before the

days of June; but I did not mention it earlier, because I did not wish

to interrupt the course of events which was leading us swiftly and

directly to those days. The nomination of the Committee for the

Constitution was commenced on the 17th of May; it was a long

performance, because it had been decided that the members of the

committee should be chosen by the whole Assembly and by an absolute

majority of votes. I was elected at the first time of voting[13]

together with Cormenin, Marrast, Lamennais, Vivien, and Dufaure. I do

not know how often the voting had to be repeated in order to complete

the list, which was to consist of eighteen members.

[13: I received 496 votes.]

Although the committee had been nominated before the victory of June,

almost all its members belonged to the different moderate sections of

the Assembly. The Mountain had only two representatives on it: Lamennais

and Considerant; and even these were little worse than chimerical

visionaries, especially Considerant, who would have deserved to be sent

to a lunatic asylum had he been sincere--but I fear he deserved more

than that.

Taking the Committee as a whole, it was easy to see that no very

remarkable result was to be expected from it. Some of its members had

spent their lives in conducting or controlling the administration during

the last government. They had never seen, studied, or understood

anything except the Monarchy; and even then they had, for the most part,

applied rather than studied its principles. They had raised themselves

but little above the practice of business. Now that they were called

upon to realize the theories which they had always slighted or opposed,

and which had defeated without convincing them, they found it difficult

to apply any but monarchical ideas to their work; or, if they adopted

republican ideas, they did so now timidly, now rashly, always a little

at hap-hazard, like novices.

As for the Republicans proper on the Committee, they had few ideas of

any sort, except those which they had gathered in reading or writing for

the newspapers; for there were many journalists among them. Marrast had

edited the _National_ for ten years; Dornes was at that time its

editor-in-chief; Vaulabelle, a man of serious but coarse and even

cynical cast of mind, habitually wrote for its columns. He was the man

who, a month later, was himself vastly astonished at becoming Minister

of Public Worship and Instruction.

All this bore very little resemblance to the men, so certain of their

objects and so well acquainted with the measures necessary to attain

them, who sixty years before, under Washington's presidency so

successfully drew up the American Constitution.

For that matter, even if the Committee had been capable of doing its

work well, the want of time and the preoccupation of outside events

would have prevented it.

There is no nation which attaches itself less to those who govern it

than the French Nation, nor which is less able to dispense with

government. So soon as it finds itself obliged to walk alone, it

undergoes a sort of vertigo, which makes it dread an abyss at every

step. At the time I speak of, it had a sort of frenzied desire for the

work of framing the Constitution to be completed, and for the powers in

command to be, if not solidly, at least permanently and regularly

established. The Assembly shared this eagerness, and never ceased urging

us on, although we required but little urging. The recollection of the

15th of May, the apprehensions entertained of the days of June and the

sight of the divided, enervated and incapable government at the head of

affairs were sufficient inducement to us to hasten our labours. But what

especially deprived the Committee of its freedom of thought was, it must

be confessed, the fear of outside matters and the excitement of the

moment. It would be difficult to imagine the effect produced by this

forcing of revolutionary ideas upon minds so little disposed to adopt

them, and how the latter were being incessantly, and even almost

unconsciously, impelled much further than they wished to go, when they

were not pushed altogether out of the direction they desired to take.

Certainly, if the Committee had met on the 27th of June instead of the

16th of May, its work would have been very different.

The discussion opened on the 22nd of May. The first question was to

decide on which side we should tackle this immense work. Lamennais

proposed to commence by regulating the state of the communes. He had

proceeded in this way himself in a proposal for a Constitution which he

had just published, so as to make certain of the first fruits of his

discoveries. Then he passed from the question of sequence to that of the

main point: he began to talk of administrative centralization, for his

thoughts were incapable of sub-dividing themselves; his mind was always

wholly occupied by a single system, and all the ideas contained in it

adhered so closely together that, so soon as one was uttered, the others

seemed necessarily to follow. He therefore explained that a Republic

whose citizens are not clever and experienced enough to govern

themselves was a monster not fit to live.

Thereupon the Committee took fire: Barrot, who, amid the clouds of his

mind, always pretty clearly perceived the necessity for local liberty,

eagerly supported Lamennais. I did the same; Marrast and Vivien opposed

us. Vivien was quite consistent in defending centralization, for the

movement of administrative affairs was his profession, and moreover he

was quite naturally drawn towards it. He had all the qualities of a

clever legist and an excellent commentator, and none of those necessary

to a legislator or statesman. The danger in which he beheld the

institutions so dear to him inflamed him; he grew so excited that he

began to hold that the Republic, far from restraining centralization,

ought even to increase it. One would have said that this was the side on

which the Revolution of February pleased him.

Marrast belonged to the ordinary type of French revolutionaries, who

have always understood the liberty of the people to mean despotism

exercised in the name of the people. This sudden harmony between Vivien

and Marrast did not, therefore, surprise me. I was used to the

phenomenon, and I had long remarked that the only way to bring a

Conservative and a Radical together was to attack the power of the

central government, not in application, but in principle. One was then

sure of throwing them into each other's arms.

When, therefore, people assert that nothing is safe from revolutions, I

tell them they are wrong, and that centralization is one of those

things. In France there is only one thing we can't set up: that is, a

free government; and only one institution we can't destroy: that is,

centralization. How could it ever perish? The enemies of government love

it, and those who govern cherish it. The latter perceive, it is true,

from time to time, that it exposes them to sudden and irremediable

disasters; but this does not disgust them with it. The pleasure it

procures them of interfering with every one and holding everything in

their hands atones to them for its dangers. They prefer this agreeable

life to a more certain and longer existence, and say, "_Courte et

bonne_" like the _roues_ of the Regency: "A short life and a merry one."

The question could not be decided that day; but it was settled in

advance by the determination arrived at that we should not first occupy

ourselves with the communal system.

Next day, Lamennais resigned. Under the circumstances, an occurrence of

this sort was annoying. It was bound to increase and rooten the

prejudices already existing against us. We took very pressing and even

somewhat humble steps to induce Lamennais to reconsider his resolve. As

I had shared his opinion, I was deputed to go and see him and press him

to return. I did so, but in vain. He had only been beaten over a formal

question, but he had concluded from this that he would not be the

master. That was enough to decide him to be nothing at all. He was

inflexible, in spite of all I could say in the interest of the very

ideas which we held in common.

One should especially consider an unfrocked priest if one wishes to

acquire a correct idea of the indestructible and, so to speak, infinite

power which the clerical habit and method of thought wield over those

who have once contracted them. It was useless for Lamennais to sport

white stockings, a yellow waistcoat, a striped necktie, and a green

coat: he remained a priest in character, and even in appearance. He

walked with short, hurried and discreet steps, never turning his head or

looking at anybody, and glided through the crowd with an awkward, modest

air, as though he were leaving the sacristy. Add to this a pride great

enough to walk over the heads of kings and bid defiance to God.

When it was found that Lamennais' obstinacy was not to be overcome, we

proceeded with other business; and so that no more time might be lost in

premature discussions, a sub-committee was appointed to draw up rules

for the regulation of our labours, and to propose them to the Committee.

Unfortunately, this sub-committee was so constituted that Cormenin, our

chairman, was its master and, in reality, substituted himself for it.

The permanent power of initiative which he thus possessed, coupled with

the conduct of the debates which belonged to him as chairman, had the

most baneful influence upon our deliberations, and I am not sure if the

faults in our work should not be mainly attributed to him.

Like Lamennais, Cormenin had drawn up and published a Constitution after

his own idea, and again, like the former, he expected us to adopt it.

But he did not quite know how to put it to us. As a rule, extreme vanity

makes the timidest very bold in speaking. Cormenin's did not permit him

to open his mouth so soon as he had three listeners. He would have liked

to do as one of my neighbours in Normandy did, a great lover of

polemics, to whom Providence had refused the capacity of disputing _viva

voce_. Whenever I opposed any of his opinions, he would hurry home and

write to me all that he ought to have told me. Cormenin accordingly

despaired of convincing us, but hoped to surprise us. He flattered

himself that he would make us accept his system gradually and, so to

speak, unknown to ourselves, by presenting a morsel to us every day. He

managed so cleverly that a general discussion could never be held upon

the Constitution as a whole, and that even in each case it was almost

impossible to trace back and find the primitive idea. He brought us

every day five or six clauses ready drawn up, and patiently, little by

little, drew back to this little plot of ground all those who wished to

escape from it. We resisted sometimes; but in the end, from sheer

weariness, we yielded to this gentle, continuous restraint. The

influence of a chairman upon the work of a committee is immense; any one

who has closely observed these little assemblies will understand what I

mean. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that if several of us had

desired to withdraw ourselves from this tyranny, we should have ended by

coming to an understanding and succeeding. But we had no time and no

inclination for long discussions. The vastness and complexity of the

subject alarmed and wearied the minds of the Committee beforehand: the

majority had not even attempted to study it, or had only collected some

very confused ideas; and those who had formed clearer ones were ill at

ease at having to expound them. They were afraid, besides, lest they

should enter into violent, interminable disputes if they endeavoured to

get to the bottom of things; and they preferred to appear to be in

harmony by keeping to the surface. In this way we ambled along to the

end, adopting great principles explicitly for reasons of petty detail,

and little by little building up the whole machinery of government

without properly taking into account the relative strength of the

various wheels and the manner in which they would work together.

In the moments of repose which interrupted this fine work, Marrast, who

was a Republican of the Barras type, and who had always preferred the

pleasures of luxury, the table and women to democracy in rags, told us

little stories of gallantry, while Vaulabelle made broad jests. I hope,

for the honour of the Committee, that no one will ever publish the

minutes (very badly done, for that matter) which the secretary drew up

of our sittings. The sterility of the discussions amid the exuberant

fecundity of the subject-matter would assuredly provoke surprise. As for

myself, I declare that I never witnessed a more wretched display in any

committee on which I ever sat.

Nevertheless, there was one serious discussion. It referred to the

system of a single Chamber. As a matter of fact, the two parties into

which the Committee was silently divided only came to an issue on this

one occasion. It was even less a question of the two Chambers than of

the general character to be given to the new government: Were we to

persevere in the learned and somewhat complicated system of

counterpoises, and place powers held in check, and consequently prudent

and moderate, at the head of the Republic? Or were we to adopt the

contrary course and accept the simpler theory, according to which

affairs are placed in the hands of a single power, homogeneous in all

its parts, uncontrolled, and consequently impetuous in its measures, and

irresistible? This was the subject-matter of the debate. This general

question might have cropped up as the result of a number of other

clauses; but it was better contained than elsewhere in the special

question of the two Chambers.

The struggle was a long one and lasted for two sittings. The result was

not for a moment in doubt; for public opinion had pronounced strongly in

favour of a single Chamber, not only in Paris but in nearly every

department. Barrot was the first to speak in favour of the two Chambers;

he took up my thesis and developed it with great talent, but

intemperately; for during the Revolution of February, his mind had lost

its equilibrium and had never since been able to recover its

self-possession. I supported Barrot and returned time after time to the

charge. I was a little surprised to hear Dufaure pronouncing against us

and doing so with a certain eagerness. Lawyers are rarely able to escape

from one of two habits: they accustom themselves either to plead what

they do not believe or to persuade themselves very easily of what they

wish to plead. Dufaure came under the latter category. The drift of

public opinion, of his own passions or interest, would never have led

him to embrace a cause which he thought a bad one; but it prompted him

with a desire to think it a good one, and that was often sufficient. His

naturally vacillating, ingenious and subtle mind turned gradually

towards it; and he sometimes ended by adopting it, not only with

conviction but with transport. How often have I not been amazed to see

him vehemently defending theories which I had seen him adopt with

infinite hesitation!

His principal reason for voting this time in favour of a single Chamber

in the Legislative Body (and it was the best, I think, that could be

found) was that, with us, the Executive Power wielded by one man

elected by the people would most certainly become preponderant if there

were placed beside him only a legislative body weakened by being divided

into two branches. I remember that I replied that that might be the

case, but that one thing was quite certain, and that was, that two great

powers naturally jealous of one another, and placed in an eternal

_tete-a-tete_ (that was the expression I used), without ever having

recourse to the arbitrament of a third power, would at once be on bad

terms or at war with one another, and would constantly remain so until

one had destroyed the other. I added that, if it was true that a

President elected by the people, and possessing the immense prerogatives

which in France belong to the chief of the public administration, was

sometimes able to curb a divided legislative body, a President who

should feel himself to possess this origin and these rights would always

refuse to become a simple agent and to submit to the capricious and

tyrannical will of a single assembly.

We were both in the right. The problem, thus propounded, was insolvable;

but the nation propounded it thus. To allow the President the same power

that the King had enjoyed, and to have him elected by the people, would

make the Republic impossible. As I said later, one must either

infinitely narrow the sphere of his power, or else have him elected by

the Assembly; but the nation would hear of neither one nor the other.

Dupin completed our defeat: he defended the single Chamber with

surprising vigour. One would have thought that he had never held another

opinion. I expected as much. I knew him to possess a heart that was

habitually self-interested and cowardly, though subject at times to

sudden leaps of courage and honesty. I had seen him for ten years

prowling round every party without joining any, and attacking all the

vanquished: half ape and half jackal, constantly biting, grimacing,

gambolling, and always ready to fall upon the wretch who slipped. He

showed himself in his true colours on the Committee of the Constitution,

or rather he surpassed himself. I perceived in him none of those sudden

leaps of which I have just spoken: he was uniformly commonplace from

beginning to end. He usually remained silent while the majority were

making up their minds; but as soon as he saw them pronounce in favour of

democratic opinions, he rushed to place himself at their head, and often

went far beyond them. Once, he perceived, when he had gone half-way,

that the majority were not going in the direction he had thought;

whereupon he immediately stopped short with a prompt and nimble effort

of the intelligence, turned round, and hurried back at the same run

towards the opinion from which he had been departing.

Almost all the old members of Parliament pronounced in this way against

the dual Chamber. Most of them sought for more or less plausible

pretexts for their votes. Some pretended that a Council of State would

provide the counterpoise of which they acknowledged the necessity;

others purposed to subject the single assembly to forms whose slowness

would safeguard it against its own impulses and against surprise; but in

the end the true reason was always given. On the committee was a

minister of the Gospel, M. Coquerel, who, seeing that his colleagues of

the Catholic clergy were entering the Assembly, wanted to appear there

too, and he was wrong: from the much-admired preacher that he was, he

suddenly transformed himself into a very ridiculous political orator. He

could hardly open his mouth without uttering some pompous absurdity. On

this occasion he was so naive as to inform us that he continued to

favour the dual Chamber, but that he would vote for the single Chamber

because public opinion was pushing him on, and he did not wish, to use

his own words, to fight against the current. This candour greatly

annoyed those who were acting as he did, and mightily delighted Barrot

and myself; but this was the only satisfaction we received, for, when it

came to voting, there were only three on our side.

This signal defeat disinclined me a little to continue the struggle, and

threw Barrot quite out of humour. He no longer appeared except at rare

intervals, and in order to utter signs of impatience or disdain rather

than opinions.

We passed on to the Executive Power. In spite of all that I have said

of the circumstances of the time and the disposition of the Committee,

it will still be believed with difficulty that so vast, so perplexing,

so novel a subject did not furnish the material for a single general

debate, nor for any very profound discussion.

All were unanimous in the opinion that the Executive Power should be

entrusted to one man alone. But what prerogatives and what agents should

he be given, what responsibilities laid upon him? Clearly, none of these

questions could be treated in an arbitrary fashion; each of them was

necessarily in connection with all the others, and could, above all, be

only decided by taking into special account the habits and customs of

the country. These were old problems, no doubt; but they were made young

again by the novelty of the circumstances.

Cormenin, according to his custom, opened the discussion by proposing a

little clause all ready drawn up, which provided that the head of the

Executive Power, or the President, as he was thenceforward called,

should be elected directly by the people by a relative majority, the

minimum of votes necessary to carry his election being fixed at two

millions. I believe Marrast was the only one to oppose it; he proposed

that the head of the Executive Power should be elected by the Assembly:

he was at that time intoxicated with his own fortune, and flattered

himself, strange though this may seem to-day, that the choice of the

Assembly would fall upon himself. Nevertheless, the clause proposed by

Cormenin was adopted without any difficulty, so far as I can remember;

and yet it must be confessed that the expediency of having the President

elected by the people was not a self-evident truth, and that the

disposition to have him elected directly was as new as it was dangerous.

In a country with no monarchical tradition, in which the Executive Power

has always been feeble and continues to be very limited, nothing is

wiser than to charge the nation with the choice of its representative. A

President who had not the strength which he could draw from that origin

would then become the plaything of the Assemblies; but with us the

conditions of the problem were very different. We were emerging from the

Monarchy, and the habits of the Republicans themselves were still

monarchical. Moreover, our system of centralization made our position an

unique one: according to its principles, the whole administration of the

country, in matters of the greatest and of the smallest moment, belonged

to the President; the thousands of officials who held the whole country

in their hands were dependent upon him alone; this was so according to

the laws, and even the ideas, which the 24th of February had allowed to

continue in force; for we had retained the spirit of the Monarchy, while

losing the taste for it. Under these conditions, what could a President

elected by the people be other than a pretender to the Crown? The office

could only suit those who hoped to make use of it in order to assist in

transforming the Presidential into Royal powers; it seemed clear to me

then, and it seems evident to me now, that if it was desired that the

President should be elected by the people without danger to the

Republic, it was necessary to limit prodigiously the circle of his

prerogatives; and even then, I am not sure that this would have

sufficed, for his sphere, although thus confined in point of law, would,

in habit and remembrance, have preserved its former extent. If, on the

other hand, the President was allowed to retain his power, he should not

be elected by the people. These truths were not put forward; I doubt

whether they were even perceived in the heart of the Committee. However,

Cormenin's clause, although adopted at first, was later made the object

of a very lively attack; but it was attacked for reasons different to

those I have just given. It was on the day after the 4th of June. Prince

Louis Napoleon, of whom no one had thought a few days before, had just

been elected to the Assembly by Paris and three departments. They began

to fear that he would be placed at the head of the Republic if the

choice were left to the people. The various pretenders and their friends

grew excited, the question was raised afresh in the Committee, and the

majority persisted in its original vote.

I remember that, during all the time that the Committee was occupied in

this way, my mind was labouring to divine to which side the balance of

power would most generally lean in a Republic of the kind which I saw

they were going to make. Sometimes I thought that it would be on the

side of the Assembly, and then again on that of the elected President;

and this uncertainty made me very uneasy. The fact is, that it was

impossible to tell beforehand. The victory of one or other of these two

great rivals must necessarily depend upon circumstances and the humours

of the moment. There were only two things certain: the war which they

would wage together, and the eventual ruin of the Republic.

Of all the ideas which I have expounded, not one was sifted by the

Committee; I might even say that not one was discussed. Barrot one day

touched upon them in passing, but did not linger over them. His mind

(which was sleepy rather than feeble, and which was even able to see far

ahead when it took the trouble to look) caught a glimpse of them, as it

were, between sleeping and waking, and thought no more of them.

I myself only pointed them out with a certain hesitation and reserve. My

rebuff in the matter of the dual Chamber left me little heart for the

fight. Moreover, I confess, I was more anxious to reach a quick

decision, and place a powerful leader at the head of the Republic, than

to organize a perfect republican Constitution. We were then under the

divided and uncertain government of the Executive Committee, Socialism

was at our gates, and we were approaching the days of June, as we must

not forget. Later, after these days, I vigorously supported in the

Assembly the system of electing the President by the people, and in a

certain measure contributed to its acceptance. The principal reason

which I gave was that, after announcing to the nation that we would

grant it that right, which it had always ardently desired, it was no

longer possible to withhold it. This was true. Nevertheless, I regret

having spoken on this occasion.

To return to the Committee: unable and even unwilling to oppose the

adoption of the principle, I endeavoured at least to make its

application less dangerous. I first proposed to limit in various

directions the sphere of the Executive Power; but I soon saw that it was

useless to attempt anything serious on that side. I then fell back upon

the method of election itself, and raised a discussion on that portion

of Cormenin's clause which treated of it.

The clause, as I said above, laid down that the President should be

elected directly, by a relative majority, the minimum of this majority

being fixed at two million votes. This method had several very serious

drawbacks.

Since the President was to be elected directly by the citizens, the

enthusiasm and infatuation of the people was very much to be feared; and

moreover, the prestige and moral power which the newly elected would

possess would be much greater. Since a relative majority was to be

sufficient to make the election valid, it might be possible that the

President should only represent the wishes of a minority of the nation.

I asked that the President might not be elected directly by the

citizens, but that this should be entrusted to delegates whom the people

would elect. In the second place, I proposed to substitute an actual for

a relative majority; if an absolute majority was not obtained at the

first vote, it would fall to the Assembly to make a choice. These ideas

were, I think, sound, but they were not new; I had borrowed them from

the American Constitution. I doubt whether anyone would have suspected

this, had I not said so; so little was the Committee prepared to play

its great part.

The first part of my amendment was rejected. I expected this: our great

men were of opinion that this system was not sufficiently simple, and

they considered it tainted with a touch of aristocracy. The second was

accepted, and is part of the actual Constitution.

Beaumont proposed that the President should not be re-eligible; I

supported him vigorously, and the proposal was carried. On this occasion

we both fell into a great mistake which will, I fear, lead to very sad

results. We had always been greatly struck with the dangers threatening

liberty and public morality at the hands of a re-eligible president, who

in order to secure his re-election would infallibly employ beforehand

the immense resources of constraint and corruption which our laws and

customs allow to the head of the Executive Power. Our minds were not

supple or prompt enough to turn in time or to see that, so soon as it

was decided that the citizens themselves should directly choose the

President, the evil was irreparable, and that it would be only

increasing it rashly to undertake to hinder the people in their choice.

This vote, and the great influence I brought to bear upon it, is my most

unpleasant memory of that period.

Each moment we came up against centralization, and instead of removing

the obstacle, we stumbled over it. It was of the essence of the Republic

that the head of the Executive Power should be responsible; but

responsible for what, and to what extent? Could he be made responsible

for the thousand details of administration with which our administrative

legislation is overcharged, and over which it would be impossible, and

moreover dangerous, for him to watch in person? That would have been

unjust and ridiculous; and if he was not to be responsible for the

administration proper, who would be? It was decided that the

responsibility of the President should be shared by the ministers, and

that their counter-signature should be necessary, as in the days of the

Monarchy. Thus the President was responsible, and yet he was not

entirely free in his own actions, and he was not able to protect his

agents in agents.

We passed to the constitution of the Council of State. Cormenin and

Vivien took charge of this; it may be said that they set to work like

people who are building up a house for themselves. They did their utmost

to make the Council of State a third power, but without success. It

became something more than an administrative council, but infinitely

less than a legislative assembly.

The only part of our work which was at all well thought out, and

arranged, as I think, with wisdom, was that which related to justice.

Here the committee felt at home, most of its members being, or having

been, barristers. Thanks to these, we were able to save the principle of

the irremovability of the judges; as in 1830, it held good against the

current which swept away all the rest. Those who had been Republicans

from the commencement attacked it nevertheless, and very stupidly, in my

opinion; for this principle is much more in favour of the independence

of one's fellow-citizens than of the power of those who govern. The

Court of Appeal and, especially, the tribunal charged with judging

political crimes were constituted at once just as they are to-day

(1851). Beaumont drew up most of the articles which refer to these two

great courts. What we did in these matters is far in advance of all that

had been attempted in the same direction during sixty years. It is

probably the only part of the Constitution of 1848 which will survive.

It was decided at the instance of Vivien that the Constitution could

only be revised by a Constituent Assembly, which was right; but they

added that this revision could only take place if the National Assembly

demanded it by an express vote, given three times consecutively by a

majority of four-fifths, which rendered any regular revision almost

impossible. I took no part in this vote. I had long been of opinion

that, instead of aiming to make our governments eternal, we should tend

to make it possible to change them in an easy and regular manner. Taken

all round, I thought this less dangerous than the opposite course; and I

thought it best to treat the French people like those madmen whom one

should be careful not to bind lest they become infuriated by the

restraint.

I noticed casually a number of curious opinions that were emitted.

Martin (of Strasburg), who, not content with being a Republican of

yesterday, one day declared so absurdly in the tribune that he was a

Republican by birth, nevertheless proposed to give the President the

right to dissolve the Assembly, and failed to see that a right of this

kind would easily make him master of the Republic; Marrast wanted a

section to be added to the Council of State charged to elaborate "new

ideas," to be called a section of progress; Barrot proposed to leave to

a jury the decision of all civil suits, as though a judiciary revolution

of this sort could possibly be improvised. And Dufaure proposed to

prohibit substitution in the conscription, and to compel everyone

personally to perform his military service, a measure which would have

destroyed all liberal education unless the time of service had been

greatly reduced, or have disorganized the army if this reduction had

been effected.

In this way, pressed by time and ill prepared to treat such important

subjects, we approached the time appointed for the end of our labours.

What was said was: Let us adopt, in the meantime, the articles proposed

to us; we can afterwards retrace our steps; we can judge from this

sketch how to fix the definitive features and to adjust the portions

among themselves. But we did not retrace our steps, and the sketch

remained the picture.

We appointed Marrast our secretary. The way in which he acquitted

himself of this important office soon exposed the mixture of idleness,

giddiness and impudence which formed the basis of his character. He was

first several days without doing anything, though the Assembly was

constantly asking to know the result of our deliberations, and all

France was anxiously awaiting to learn it. Then he hurriedly wrote his

report in one night immediately preceding the day on which he was to

communicate it to the Assembly. In the morning, he spoke of it to one or

two of his colleagues whom he met by chance, and then boldly appeared in

the tribune and read, in the name of the Committee, a report of which

hardly one of its members had heard a single word. This reading took

place on the 19th of June. The draft of the Constitution contained one

hundred and thirty-nine articles; it had been drawn up in less than a

month. We could not have been quicker, but we might have done better. We

had adopted many of the little articles which Cormenin had brought us in

turns; but we had rejected a yet greater number, which caused their

author an irritation, which was so much the greater in that he had never

had an opportunity of giving vent to it. He turned to the public for

consolation. He published, or caused to be published, I forget which it

was, in all the newspapers an article in which he related what had

passed in the Committee, attributing all the good it had done to M. de

Cormenin, and all the harm to his adversaries. A publication of this

sort displeased us greatly, as may be imagined; and it was decided to

acquaint Cormenin with the feeling inspired by his procedure. But no one

cared to be the spokesman of the company.

We had among us a workman (for in those days they put workmen into

everything) called Corbon, a tolerably right-minded man of firm

character. He readily undertook the task. On the next morning,

therefore, so soon as the sitting of the Committee had opened, Corbon

stood up and, with cruel simplicity and conciseness, gave Cormenin to

understand what we thought. Cormenin grew confused, and cast his eyes

round the table to see if anybody would come to his aid. Nobody moved.

He then said, in a hesitating voice, "Am I to conclude from what has

just happened that the Committee wishes me to leave it?" We made no

reply. He took his hat and went, without anyone interfering. Never was

so great an outrage swallowed with less effort or grimace. I believe

that, although enormously vain, he was not very sensitive to insults in

secret; and as long as his self-love was well tickled in public, he

would not have made many bones about receiving a few cuffs in private.

Many have believed that Cormenin, who from a viscount had suddenly

become a Radical, while remaining a devout Catholic, never ceased to

play a part and to betray his opinions. I would not venture to say that

this was the case, although I have often observed strange

inconsistencies between the things he said when talking and those he

wrote; and to tell the truth, he always seemed to me to be more sincere

in the dread he entertained of revolutions than in the opinions he had

borrowed from them. What always especially struck me in him was the

shortcomings of his mind. No writer ever to a greater extent preserved

in public business the habits and peculiarities of that calling. When he

had established a certain agreement between the different clauses of a

law and drawn it up in a certain ingenious and striking manner, he

thought he had done all that was necessary: he was absorbed in questions

of form, of symmetry, and cohesion.

But what he especially sought for was novelty. Institutions which had

already been tried elsewhere or elsewhen seemed to him as hateful as

commonplaces, and the first merit of a law in his eyes was to resemble

in no way that which had preceded it. It is known that the law laying

down the Constitution was his work. At the time of the General Election

I met him and he said, with a certain complacency, "Has anything in the

world ever been seen like what is seen to-day? Where is the country that

has gone so far as to give votes to servants, paupers and soldiers?

Confess that no one ever thought of it before." And rubbing his hands,

he added, "It will be very curious to see the result." He spoke of it as

though it were an experiment in chemistry.

PART THE THIRD

_MY TERM OF OFFICE_

_This part was commenced at Versailles on the 16th of September

1851, during the prorogation of the National Assembly._

_To come at once to this part of my recollections, I pass over the

previous period, which extends from the end of the days of June

1848 to the 3rd of June 1849. I return to it later if I have time.

I have thought it more important, while my recollections are still

fresh in my mind, to recall the five months during which I was a

member of the Government._

CHAPTER I

MY RETURN TO FRANCE--FORMATION OF THE CABINET.

While I was thus occupied in witnessing upon the private stage of

Germany one act of the great drama of the European Revolution, my

attention was suddenly drawn towards France and fixed upon our affairs

by unexpected and alarming news. I heard of the almost incredible check

received by our army beneath the walls of Rome, the violent debates

which followed in the Constituent Assembly, the excitement produced

throughout the country by these two causes, and lastly, the General

Election, whose result deceived the expectations of both parties and

brought over one hundred and fifty Montagnards into the new Assembly.

However, the demagogic wind which had suddenly blown over a part of

France had not prevailed in the Department of la Manche. All the former

members for the department who had separated from the Conservative Party

in the Assembly had gone under in the _scrutin_. Of thirteen

representatives only four had survived; as for me, I had received more

votes than all the others, although I was absent and silent, and

although I had openly voted for Cavaignac in the previous month of

December. Nevertheless, I was almost unanimously elected, less because

of my opinions than of the great personal consideration which I enjoyed

outside politics, an honourable position no doubt, but difficult to

retain in the midst of parties, and destined to become very precarious

on the day when the latter should themselves become exclusive as they

became violent.

I set out as soon as I received this news. At Bonn a sudden

indisposition obliged Madame de Tocqueville to stop. She herself urged

me to leave her and to continue my journey, and I did so, although with

regret; for I was leaving her alone in a country still agitated by civil

war; and moreover, it is in moments of difficulty or peril that her

courage and her great sense are so helpful to me.

I arrived in Paris, if I am not mistaken, on the 25th of May 1849, four

days before the meeting of the Legislative, and during the last

convulsions of the Constituent Assembly. A few weeks had sufficed to

make the aspect of the political world entirely unrecognizable, owing

less to the changes which had taken place in outside facts, than to the

prodigious revolution which had in a few days taken place in men's

minds.

The party which was in power at my departure was so still, and the

material result of the elections should, I thought, have strengthened

its hands. This party, composed of so many different parties, and

wishing either to stop or drive back the Revolution, had obtained an

enormous majority in the electoral colleges, and would command more than

two-thirds of the new Assembly. Nevertheless, I found it seized with so

profound a terror that I can only compare it with that which followed

February: so true is it that in politics one must argue as in war, and

never forget that the effect of events should be measured less by what

they are in themselves than by the impressions they give.

The Conservatives, who for six months had seen all the bye-elections

invariably turning to their advantage, who filled and dominated almost

all the local councils, had placed an almost unlimited confidence in the

system of universal suffrage, after professing unbounded distrust of it.

In the General Election which was just decided, they had expected not

only to conquer but to annihilate, so to speak, their adversaries, and

they were as much cast down at not attaining the absolute triumph which

they had dreamt of as though they had really been beaten. On the other

hand, the Montagnards, who had thought themselves lost, were as

intoxicated with joy and mad audacity as though the elections had

assured them a majority in the new Assembly. Why had the event thus at

the same time deceived the hopes and fears of both parties? It is

difficult to say for certain, for great masses of men move by virtue of

causes almost as unknown to humanity itself as those which rule the

movements of the sea. In both cases the reasons of the phenomenon are

concealed and, in a sense, lost in the midst of its immensity.

We are, at any rate, entitled to believe that the Conservatives owed

their rebuff mainly to the faults which they themselves committed. Their

intolerance, when they thought their triumph assured, of those who,

without sharing their ideas, had assisted them in fighting the

Montagnards; the violent administration of the new Minister of the

Interior, M. Faucher; and more than all, the poor success of the Roman

expedition prejudiced against them a portion of the people who were

naturally disposed to follow them, and threw these into the arms of the

agitators.

One hundred and fifty Montagnards, as I said, had been elected. A part

of the peasantry and the majority of the army had voted for them: it was

the two anchors of mercy which had snapped in the midst of the tempest.

Terror was universal: it taught anew to the various monarchical parties

the tolerance and modesty which they had practised immediately after

February, but which they had to a great extent forgotten during the past

six months. It was recognized on every hand that there could no longer

be any question, for the present, of emerging from the Republic, and

that all that remained to be done was to oppose the moderate Republicans

to the Montagnards.

The same ministers whom they had created and instigated they now

accused, and a modification of the Cabinet was loudly demanded. The

Cabinet itself saw that it was insufficient, and implored to be

replaced. At the time of my departure I had seen the committee of the

Rue de Poitiers refuse to admit the name of M. Dufaure to its lists; I

now saw every glance directed towards M. Dufaure and his friends, who

were called upon in the most pathetic manner to take office and save

society.

On the night of my arrival, I heard that some of my friends were dining

together at a little restaurant in the Champs-Elysees. I hastened to

join them, and found Dufaure, Lanjuinais, Beaumont, Corcelles, Vivien,

Lamoriciere, Bedeau, and one or two more whose names are not so well

known. I was informed in a few words of the position of affairs. Barrot,

who had been invited by the President to form a cabinet, had for some

days been exhausting himself in vain efforts to do so. M. Thiers, M.

Mole and the more important of their friends had refused to undertake

the government. They had made up their minds, nevertheless, as will be

seen, to remain its masters, but without becoming ministers. The

uncertainty of the future, the general instability, the difficulties and

perhaps the dangers of the moment kept them aloof. They were eager

enough for power, but not for responsibility. Barrot, repulsed on that

side, had come to us. He asked us, or rather he besought us, to become

his colleagues. But which among us to choose? What ministries to allot

to us? What colleagues to give us? What general policy to adopt? From

all these questions had arisen difficulties in execution which, till

then, seemed insurmountable. Already, more than once, Barrot had

returned towards the natural chiefs of the majority; and repelled by

them, had fallen back upon us.

Time passed amid these sterile labours; the dangers and difficulties

increased; the news became each day more alarming, and the Ministry were

liable at any moment to be impeached by the dying but furious Assembly.

I returned home greatly preoccupied, as will be believed, by what I had

heard. I was convinced that it only depended upon the wishes of myself

and my friends to become ministers. We were the necessary and obvious

men. I knew the leaders of the majority well enough to be sure that they

would never commit themselves to taking charge of affairs under a

government which seemed to them so ephemeral, and that, even if they had

the disinterestedness, they would not have the courage to do so. Their

pride and their timidity assured me of their abstention. It was enough

for us, therefore, to stand firm on our ground to compel them to come

and fetch us. But ought we to wish to become ministers? I asked myself

this very seriously. I think I may do myself the justice to say that I

did not indulge in the smallest illusion respecting the true

difficulties of the enterprise, and that I looked upon the future with

a clearness of view which we rarely possess except when we consider the

past.

Everybody expected to see fighting in the streets. I myself regarded it

as imminent; the furious audacity which the result of the elections had

imparted to the Mountain and the opportunity afforded to it by the Rome

affair seemed to make an event of this kind inevitable. I was not,

however, very anxious about the issue. I was convinced that, although

the majority of the soldiers had voted for the Mountain, the army would

fight against it without hesitation. The soldier who individually votes

for a candidate at an election and the soldier acting under pressure of

_esprit de corps_ and military discipline are two different men. The

thoughts of the one do not regulate the actions of the other. The Paris

garrison was very numerous, well commanded, experienced in street

warfare, and still filled with the memory of the passions and examples

which had been left to it by the days of June. I therefore felt certain

of victory. But I was very anxious as to the eventual results of this

victory: what seemed to others the end of the difficulties I regarded as

their commencement. I considered them almost insurmountable, as I

believe they really were.

In whichever direction I looked, I saw no solid or lasting stand-point

for us.

Public opinion looked to us, but it would have been unsafe to rely upon

it for support; fear drove the country in our direction, but its

memories, its secret instincts, its passions could scarcely fail soon to

withdraw it from us, so soon as the fear should have vanished. Our

object was, if possible, to found the Republic, or at least to maintain

it for some time, by governing it in a regular, moderate, conservative,

and absolutely constitutional way; and this could not allow us to remain

popular for long, since everybody wanted to evade the Constitution. The

Mountain wanted more, the Monarchists much less.

In the Assembly it was much worse still. The same general causes were

aggravated by a thousand accidents arising from the interests and

vanities of the party leaders. The latter were quite content to allow us

to assume the government, but we must not expect them to allow us to

govern. So soon as the crisis was passed, we might expect every sort of

ambush on their part.

As to the President, I did not know him yet, but it was evident that we

could not rely upon him to support us in his Council, except where the

jealousy and hatred were concerned with which our common adversaries

inspired him. His sympathies must always lie in an opposite direction;

for our views were not only different, but naturally opposed to one

another. We wanted to make the Republic live: he longed for its

inheritance. We only supplied him with ministers where he wanted

accomplices.

To these difficulties, which were in a sense inherent to the situation

and consequently permanent, were added passing ones which it was not at

all easy to surmount: the revolutionary agitation revived in part of the

country; the spirit and habits of exclusion spread and already rooted in

the public administration; the Roman expedition, so badly conceived and

so badly conducted that it was now as difficult to bring it to an end as

to get out of it; in fact, the whole legacy of mistakes committed by our

predecessors.

There were reasons enough for hesitation; and yet I did not hesitate.

The idea of taking a post from which fear kept so many people off, and

of relieving society from the bad pass in which it had been involved,

flattered at the same time my sense of honour and my pride. I was quite

aware that I should only be passing through power, and that I should not

stay there; but I hoped to stay long enough to be able to render some

signal service to my country and to raise myself. This was enough to

attract me.

I at once took three resolutions:

First, not to refuse office if an opportunity offered;

Second, only to enter the Government together with my principal friends,

directing the principal offices, so that we might always remain the

masters of the Cabinet;

Third and last, to behave every day when in office as though I was to be

out of it the next day, that is to say, without ever subordinating to

the necessity of maintaining my position that of remaining true to

myself.

The next five or six days were wholly taken up in fruitless endeavours

to form a ministry. The attempts made were so numerous, so overlapping,

so full of small incidents--great events of one day forgotten the

next--that I find it difficult to retrace them in my memory, in spite of

the prominent part which I myself played in some of them. The problem

was undoubtedly a difficult one to solve under its given conditions. The

President was willing enough to change the appearance of his ministry,

but he was determined to retain in it the men whom he considered his

principal friends. The leaders of the Monarchical parties refused

themselves to take the responsibility of government; but they were not

willing either that it should be entrusted entirely to men over whom

they had no hold. If they consented to admit us, it was only in a very

small number and in second-rate offices. We were looked upon as a

necessary but disagreeable remedy, which it was preferable only to

administer in very small doses.

Dufaure was first asked to join alone, and to be satisfied with the

Public Works. He refused, demanded the Interior, and two other offices

for his friends. After much difficulty they agreed to give him the

Interior, but they refused the rest. I have reason to believe that he

was at one time on the point of accepting this proposal and of again

leaving me in the lurch, as he had done six months ago. Not that he was

treacherous or indifferent in his friendships; but the sight of this

important office almost within reach, which he could honestly accept,

possessed a strange attraction for him. It did not precisely cause him

to abandon his friends, but it distracted his thoughts from them, and

made him ready to forget them. He was firm, however, this time; and not

being able to get him by himself, they offered to take me with him. I

was most in view at that time, because the new Legislative Assembly had

just elected me one of its vice-presidents.[14] But what office to give

me? I only thought myself fit to fill the Ministry of Public

Instruction. Unfortunately that was in the hands of M. de Falloux, an

indispensable man, whom it was equally important to the Legitimists to

retain, of whom he was one of the leaders; to the religious party, who

saw in him a protector; and finally to the President, of whom he had

become the friend. I was offered Agriculture, and refused it. At last,

in despair, Barrot came and asked me to accept the Foreign Office. I

myself had made great efforts to persuade M. de Remusat to accept this

office, and what happened on this occasion between him and me is so

characteristic that it is worthy of being retold. I was very anxious

that M. de Remusat should join the ministry with us. He was at once a

friend of M. Thiers and a man of honour, a rather unusual combination;

he alone was able to assure us, if not the support, at least the

neutrality of that statesman, without infesting us with his spirit.

Overcome by the insistency of Barrot and the rest of us, Remusat one

evening yielded. He had pledged us his word, but the next morning he

came to withdraw it. I knew for certain that he had seen M. Thiers in

the interval, and he confessed to me himself that M. Thiers, who was

then loudly proclaiming the necessity of our accepting office, had

dissuaded him from joining us. "I fully saw," he said, "that to become

your colleague would not be to give you his assistance, but only to

expose myself to be quarrelling with him before long." Those were the

sort of men we had to deal with.

[14: 1 June 1849, by 336 votes to 261.]

I had never thought of the Foreign Office, and my first impulse was to

refuse it. I thought myself unsuited to fill an office for which nothing

had prepared me. Among my papers I have found a trace of these

hesitations, in the notes of a conversation which took place at a dinner

which some of my friends and I had at that time....

I decided at last, however, to accept the Foreign Office, but I made it

a condition that Lanjuinais should enter the Council at the same time as

myself. I had many very strong reasons for acting as I did. In the first

place, I thought that three ministers were indispensable to us in order

to acquire the preponderance in the Cabinet which we needed in order to

do any good. I thought, moreover, that Lanjuinais would be very useful

to keep Dufaure himself within the lines I wished to follow. I did not

consider myself to have enough hold over him. Above all, I wanted to

have near me a friend with whom I could talk openly of all things: a

great advantage at any time, but especially in such times of suspicion

and variableness as ours, and for a work as hazardous as that which I

was undertaking.

From all these different points of view Lanjuinais suited me admirably,

although we were of very dissimilar natures. His humour was as calm and

placid as mine was restless and anxious. He was methodical, slow,

indolent, prudent, and even over-scrupulous, and he was very backward to

enter upon any undertaking; but having once entered upon it he never

drew back, and showed himself until the end as resolved and stubborn as

a Breton of the true stamp. He was very slow in giving his opinion, and

very explicit, and even candid to the verge of rudeness, when he did

give it. One could not expect from his friendship either enthusiasm,

ardour, or _abandon_; on the other hand, one need not dread either

faint-heartedness, treachery, or after-thoughts. In short, he was a very

safe associate, and taken all round, the most honourable man I ever met

in public life. Of all of us, it was he who seemed to me least to mix

his private or interested views with his love of the public good.

No one objected to the name of Lanjuinais; but the difficulty was to

find him a portfolio. I asked for him that of Commerce and Agriculture,

which had been held since the 20th of December by Buffel, a friend of

Falloux. The latter refused to let his colleague go; I insisted; and the

new Cabinet, which was almost complete, remained for twenty-four hours

as though dissolved. To conquer my resolution, Falloux attempted a

direct measure: he came to my house, where I lay confined to my bed,

urged me, begged me to give up Lanjuinais and to leave his friend Buffel

at the Ministry of Agriculture. I had made up my mind, and I closed my

ears. Falloux was vexed, but retained his self-control and rose to go. I

thought everything had gone wrong: on the contrary, everything had gone

right.

"You are determined," he said, with that aristocratic good grace with

which he was able to cover all his feelings, even the bitterest; "you

are determined, and so I must yield. It shall not be said that a private

consideration has, at so difficult and critical a period, made me break

off so necessary a combination. I shall remain alone in the midst of

you. But I hope you will not forget that I shall be not only your

colleague but your prisoner!"

One hour later the Cabinet was formed,[15] and Dufaure, who told me of

it, invited me to take immediate possession of the Foreign Office.

[15: The Presidential decree is dated 2 June 1849.]

Thus was born this Ministry which was so painfully and slowly formed and

which was destined to have so short an existence. During the long

childbirth that preceded it, the man who was at the greatest trouble in

France was certainly Barrot: his sincere love for the public weal

inclined him to desire a change of cabinet, and his ambition, which was

more intimately and narrowly bound up with his honesty than might have

been believed, made him long with unequalled ardour to remain at the

head of the new Cabinet. He therefore went incessantly to and fro from

one to the other, addressing very pathetic and sometimes very eloquent

objurations to every one, now turning to the leaders of the majority,

now to us, now again to the new Republicans, whom he regarded as more

moderate than the others. And for that matter, he was equally inclined

to carry either one or the other with him; for in politics he was

incapable of either hatred or friendship. His heart is an evaporating

vase, in which nothing remains.

CHAPTER II

ASPECT OF THE CABINET--ITS FIRST ACTS UNTIL AFTER THE

INSURRECTIONARY ATTEMPTS OF THE 13TH OF JUNE.

The ministry was composed as follows:

Minister of Justice and }

President of the Council} Barrot.

Finance Passy.

War Rulhiere.

Navy Tracy.

Public Works Lacrosse.

Public Instruction Falloux.

Interior Dufaure.

Agriculture Lanjuinais.

Foreign Affairs Tocqueville.

Dufaure, Lanjuinais and I were the only new ministers; all the others

had belonged to the previous Cabinet.

Passy was a man of real merit, but not of a very attractive merit. His

mind was narrow, maladroit, provoking, disparaging and ingenious rather

than just. Nevertheless, he was more inclined to be just when it was

really necessary to act than when it was only a question of talking; for

he was more fond of paradox than liable to put it into practice. I never

knew a greater talker, nor one who so easily consoled himself for

troublesome events by explaining the causes which had produced them and

the consequences likely to ensue. When he had finished drawing the most

sombre picture of the state of affairs, he concluded with a smiling and

placid air, saying, "So that there is practically no means of saving

ourselves, and we have only to look forward to the total overthrow of

Society." In other respects he was a cultured and experienced minister;

his courage and honesty were proof against everything; and he was as

incapable of vacillation as of treachery. His ideas, his feelings, his

former intimacy with Dufaure and, above all, his eager animosity against

Thiers made us certain of him.

Rulhiere would have belonged to the monarchic and ultra-conservative

party if he had belonged to any, and especially if Changarnier had not

been in the world; but he was a soldier who only thought of remaining

Minister for War. We perceived at the first glance his extreme jealousy

of the Commander-in-Chief of the Army in Paris; and the intimacy between

the latter and the leaders of the majority, and his influence over the

President, obliged Rulhiere to throw himself into our arms, and forcibly

drove him to depend upon us.

Tracy had by nature a weak character, which was, as it were, enclosed

and confined in the very precise and systematic theories which he owed

to the ideological education he had received from his father.[16] But,

in the end, contact with every-day events and the shock of revolutions

had worn out this rigid envelope, and all that remained was a wavering

intelligence and a sluggish, but always honest and kindly, heart.

[16: Antoine Louis Claude Destutt de Tracy, 1754-1836, the

celebrated ideologist, Condillac's disciple.--A.T. de M.]

Lacrosse was a poor devil whose private affairs were more or less

involved. The chances of the Revolution had driven him into office from

an obscure corner of the Opposition, and he never grew weary of the

delight of being a minister. He gladly leant upon us, but he endeavoured

at the same time to make sure of the good-will of the President of the

Republic by rendering him all sorts of little services and small

compliments. To tell the truth, it would have been difficult for him to

recommend himself in any other way, for he was a rare nonentity, and

understood nothing about anything. We were reproached for taking office

in company with such incapable ministers as Tracy and Lacrosse, and not

without justice, for it was a great cause of ruin: not only because they

did their work badly, but because their notorious insufficiency kept

their succession always open, so to speak, and created a sort of

permanent ministerial crisis.

As to Barrot, he adhered naturally to us from feeling and ideas. His old

liberal associations, his republican tastes, his Opposition memories

attached him to us. Had he been differently connected, he might have

become, however regretfully, our adversary; but, having him once among

us, we were sure of him.

Of all the Ministry, therefore, only Falloux was a stranger to us by his

starting-point, his engagements, and his inclinations. He alone

represented the leaders of the majority on the Council, or rather he

seemed to represent them, for in reality, as I will explain later, he

represented, besides himself, nothing but the Church. This isolated

position, together with the secret aims of his policy, drove him to seek

support beyond us; he strove to establish it in the Assembly and with

the President, but discreetly and cleverly, as he did everything.

Thus constituted, the Cabinet had one great weakness: it was about to

govern with the aid of a composite majority, without itself being a

coalition ministry. But, on the other hand, it possessed the very great

strength which ministers derive from uniform origin, identical

instincts, old bonds of friendship, mutual confidence, and common ends.

I shall doubtless be asked what these ends were, where we were going,

what we wanted. We live in times so uncertain and so obscure that I

should hesitate to reply to that question in the name of my colleagues;

but I will readily reply for myself. I did not believe then, any more

than I do now, that the republican form of government is the best suited

to the needs of France. What I mean when I say the republican form of

government, is the elective Executive Power. With a people among whom

habit, tradition, custom have assured so great a place to the Executive

Power, its instability will always be, in periods of excitement, a

cause of revolution, and in peaceful times, a cause of great uneasiness.

Moreover, I have always considered the Republic an ill-balanced form of

government, which always promised more, but gave less, liberty than the

Constitutional Monarchy. And yet I sincerely wished to maintain the

Republic; and although there were, so to speak, no Republicans in

France, I did not look upon the maintenance of it as absolutely

impossible.

I wished to maintain it because I saw nothing ready or fit to set in its

place. The old Dynasty was profoundly antipathetic to the majority of

the country. Amid this flagging of all political passion, which was the

result of the fatigue of the revolutions and their vain promises, one

genuine passion remained alive in France: hatred of the Ancien Regime

and mistrust of the old privileged classes who represented it in the

eyes of the people. This sentiment passes through revolutions without

dissolving in them, like the water of those marvellous fountains which,

according to the ancients, passed across the waves of the sea without

mixing with or disappearing in them. As to the Orleans Dynasty, the

experience the people had had of it did not particularly incline them to

return to it so soon. It was bound once more to throw into Opposition

all the upper classes and the clergy, and to separate itself from the

people, as it had done before, leaving the cares and profits of

government to those same middle classes whom I had already seen during

eighteen years so inadequate for the good government of France.

Moreover, nothing was ready for its triumph.

Louis Napoleon alone was ready to take the place of the Republic,

because he already held the power in his hands. But what could come of

his success, except a bastard Monarchy, despised by the enlightened

classes, hostile to liberty, governed by intriguers, adventurers, and

valets?

The Republic was doubtless difficult to maintain; for those who favoured

it were, for the most part, incapable or unworthy of governing it, while

those who were fit to conduct it detested it. But it was also rather

difficult to pull down. The hatred borne for it was an easy-going

hatred, as were all the passions which the country then entertained.

Besides, the Government was found fault with, but no other was loved in

its place. Three parties, mutually irreconcilable, more hostile to one

another than either of them was to the Republic, contended with each

other for the future. As to a majority, there was no such thing.

I thought, therefore, that the Government of the Republic, having

existence in its favour, and having no adversaries except minorities

difficult to coalesce, would be able to maintain its position amid the

inertia of the masses, if it was conducted with moderation and wisdom.

For this reason, I was resolved not to lend myself to any steps that

might be taken against it, but rather to defend it. Almost all the

members of the Council thought as I did. Dufaure believed more than I

did in the soundness of republican institutions and in their future.

Barrot was less inclined than I to keep them always respected; but we

all wished at the present time firmly to maintain them. This common

resolution was our political bond and standard.

So soon as the Ministry was formed, it repaired to the President of the

Republic to hold a Council. It was the first time I had come into

contact with him. I had only seen him at a distance at the time of the

Constituent Assembly. He received us with politeness. It was all we

could expect from him, for Dufaure had acted vigorously against him, and

had spoken almost outrageously of his candidature no longer than six

months ago, while both Lanjuinais and myself had openly voted for his

opponent.

Louis Napoleon plays so great a part in the rest of my narrative that he

seems to me to deserve a special portrait amid the host of

contemporaries of whom I have been content to sketch the features. Of

all his ministers, and perhaps of all the men who refused to take part

in his conspiracy against the Republic, I was the one who was most

advanced in his good graces, who saw him closest, and who was best able

to judge him.

He was vastly superior to what his preceding career and his mad

enterprises might very properly have led one to believe of him. This was

my first impression on conversing with him. In this respect he deceived

his adversaries, and perhaps still more his friends, if this term can be

applied to the politicians who patronized his candidature. The greater

part of these, in fact, elected him, not because of his merits, but

because of his presumed mediocrity. They expected to find in him an

instrument which they could handle as they pleased, and which it would

always be lawful for them to break when they wished to. In this they

were greatly deceived.

As a private individual, Louis Napoleon possessed certain attractive

qualities: an easy and kindly humour, a mind which was gentle, and even

tender, without being delicate, great confidence in his intercourse,

perfect simplicity, a certain personal modesty amidst the immense pride

derived from his origin. He was capable of showing affection, and able

to inspire it in those who approached him. His conversation was brief

and unsuggestive. He had not the art of drawing others out or of

establishing intimate relations with them; nor any facility in

expressing his views. He had the writer's habit, and a certain amount of

the author's self-love. His dissimulation, which was the deep

dissimulation of a man who has spent his life in plots, was assisted in

a remarkable way by the immobility of his features and his want of

expression: for his eyes were dull and opaque, like the thick glass used

to light the cabins of ships, which admits the light but cannot be seen

through. Careless of danger, he possessed a fine, cool courage in days

of crisis; and at the same time--a common thing enough--he was very

vacillating in his plans. He was often seen to change his direction, to

advance, hesitate, draw back, to his great detriment: for the nation had

chosen him in order to dare all things, and what it expected from him

was audacity and not prudence. It was said that he had always been

greatly addicted to pleasures, and not very dainty in his choice of

them. This passion for vulgar enjoyment and this taste for luxury had

increased still more with the facilities offered by his position. Each

day he wore out his energy in indulgence, and deadened and degraded even

his ambition. His intelligence was incoherent, confused, filled with

great but ill-assorted thoughts, which he borrowed now from the examples

of Napoleon, now from socialistic theories, sometimes from recollections

of England, where he had lived: very different, and often very contrary,

sources. These he had laboriously collected in his solitary meditations,

far removed from the contact of men and facts, for he was naturally a

dreamer and a visionary. But when he was forced to emerge from these

vague, vast regions in order to confine his mind to the limits of a

piece of business, it showed itself to be capable of justice, sometimes

of subtlety and compass, and even of a certain depth, but never sure,

and always prepared to place a grotesque idea by the side of a correct

one.

Generally, it was difficult to come into long and very close contact

with him without discovering a little vein of madness running through

his better sense, the sight of which always recalled the escapades of

his youth, and served to explain them.

It may be admitted, for that matter, that it was his madness rather than

his reason which, thanks to circumstances, caused his success and his

force: for the world is a strange theatre. There are moments in it when

the worst plays are those which succeed best. If Louis Napoleon had been

a wise man, or a man of genius, he would never have become President of

the Republic.

He trusted in his star; he firmly believed himself to be the instrument

of destiny and the necessary man. I have always believed that he was

really convinced of his right, and I doubt whether Charles X. was ever

more infatuated with his legitimism than he with his. Moreover, he was

quite as incapable of alleging a reason for his faith; for, although he

had a sort of abstract adoration for the people, he had very little

taste for liberty. The characteristic and fundamental feature of his

mind in political matters was his hatred of and contempt for assemblies.

The rule of the Constitutional Monarchy seemed to him even more

insupportable than that of the Republic. His unlimited pride in the name

he bore, which willingly bowed before the nation, revolted at the idea

of yielding to the influence of a parliament.

Before attaining power he had had time to strengthen his natural taste

for the footman class, which is always displayed by mediocre princes, by

the habits of twenty years of conspiracy spent amid low-class

adventurers, men of ruined fortunes or blemished reputations, and young

debauchees, the only persons who, during all this time, could have

consented to serve him as go-betweens or accomplices. He himself, in

spite of his good manners, allowed a glimpse to pierce through of the

adventurer and the prince of fortune. He continued to take pleasure in

this inferior company after he was no longer obliged to live in it. I

believe that his difficulty in expressing his thoughts otherwise than in

writing attached him to people who had long been familiar with his

current of thought and with his dreamings, and that his inferiority in

conversation rendered him generally averse to contact with clever men.

Moreover, he desired above all things to meet with devotion to his

person and his cause, as though his person and his cause were such as to

be able to arouse devotion: merit annoyed him when it displayed ever so

little independence. He wanted believers in his star, and vulgar

worshippers of his fortune.

This was the man whom the need of a chief and the power of a memory had

placed at the head of France, and with whom we would have to govern.

It would be difficult to imagine a more critical moment in which to

assume the direction of affairs. The Constituent Assembly, before ending

its turbulent existence, had passed a resolution, on the 7th of June

1849, prohibiting the Government from attacking Rome. The first thing I

learnt on entering the Cabinet was that the order to attack Rome had

been sent to the army three days before. This flagrant disobedience of

the injunctions of a sovereign Assembly, this war undertaken against a

people in revolution, because of its revolution, and in defiance of the

terms of the Constitution which commanded us to respect all foreign

nationalities, made inevitable and brought nearer the conflict which we

dreaded. What would be the issue of this new struggle? All the letters

from prefects of departments that were laid before us, all the police

reports that reached us were calculated to throw us into great alarm. I

had seen, at the end of the Cavaignac Administration, how a government

can be supported in its visionary hopes by the self-interested

complaisance of its agents. This time I saw, and much more closely, how

these same agents can work to increase the terror of those who employ

them: contrary effects produced by the same cause. Each one of them,

judging that we were uneasy, wished to signalize himself by the

discovery of new plots, and in his turn to supply us with some fresh

indication of the conspiracy which threatened us. The more they believed

in our success, the more readily they talked to us of our danger. For it

is one of the dangerous characteristics of this sort of information,

that it becomes rarer and less explicit in the measure that the peril

increases and the need for information becomes greater. The agents in

that case, doubting the duration of the government which employs them,

and already fearing its successor, either scarcely speak at all or keep

absolute silence. But now they made a great noise. To listen to them, it

was impossible not to think that we were on the edge of an abyss, and

yet I did not believe a word of it. I was quite convinced then, as I

have been ever since, that official correspondence and police reports,

which may be useful for purposes of consultation when there is question

of discovering a particular plot, only serve to give exaggerated and

incomplete and invariably false notions when one wishes to judge or

foresee great movements of parties. In a matter of this kind, it is the

aspect of the whole country, the knowledge of its needs, its passions

and its ideas, that can instruct us, general _data_ which one can

procure for one's self, and which are never supplied by even the best

placed and best accredited agents.

The sight of these general facts had led me to believe that at this

moment no armed revolution was to be feared: but a combat was; and the

expectation of civil war is always cruel, especially when it comes in

time to join its fury to that of pestilence. Paris was at that time

ravaged by cholera. Death struck at all ranks. Already a large number of

members of the Constituent Assembly had succumbed; and Bugeaud, whom

Africa had spared, was dying.

Had I entertained a moment's doubt as to the imminence of the crisis,

the aspect alone of the new Assembly would have clearly announced it to

me. It is not too much to say that one breathed the atmosphere of civil

war in its midst. The speeches were short, the gestures violent, the

words extravagant, the insults outrageous and direct. We met for the

present in the old Chamber of Deputies. This room, built for 460

members, had difficulty in containing 750. The members, therefore, sat

touching, while detesting, each other; they pressed one against the

other in spite of the hatred which divided them; the discomfort

increased their anger. It was a duel in a barrel. How would the

Montagnards be able to restrain themselves? They saw that they were

sufficiently numerous to entitle them to believe themselves very strong

in the country and in the army. Yet they remained too weak in Parliament

to hope to prevail or even to count there. They were offered a fine

occasion of resorting to force. All Europe, which was still in

commotion, might with one great blow, struck in Paris, be thrown into

revolution anew. This was more than was necessary for men of such savage

temper.

It was easy to foresee that the movement would burst forth at the moment

when it should become known that the order had been given to attack Rome

and that the attack had taken place. And this was what in fact occurred.

The order given had remained secret. But on the 10th of June, the

report of the first combat became current.

On the 11th, the Mountain burst into furious speech. Ledru-Rollin made

an appeal from the tribune for civil war, saying that the Constitution

had been violated and that he and his friends were ready to defend it by

every method, including that of arms. The indictment was demanded of the

President of the Republic and of the preceding Cabinet.

On the 12th, the Committee of the Assembly, instructed to examine the

question raised the day before, rejected the impeachment and called upon

the Assembly to pronounce, where it sat, upon the fate of the President

and Ministers. The Mountain opposed this immediate discussion and

demanded that documents should be laid before it. What was its object in

thus postponing the debate? It was difficult to say. Did it hope that

this delay would complete the general irritation, or did it in its heart

of hearts wish to give it time to calm down? One thing is certain, that

its principal leaders, those who were more accustomed to speaking than

to fighting, and who were passionate rather than resolute, displayed

that day, amid all the intemperance of their language, a sort of

hesitation of which they had given no sign the day before. After half

drawing the sword from the scabbard, they appeared to wish to replace

it; but it was too late, the signal had been observed by their friends

outside, and thenceforward they no longer led, but were led in their

turn.

During these two days, my position was most cruel. As I have already

stated, I disapproved entirely of the manner in which the Roman

expedition had been undertaken and conducted. Before joining the

Cabinet, I had solemnly declared to Barrot that I declined to take any

responsibility except for the future, and that he must himself be

prepared to defend what had up to that time been done in Italy. I had

only accepted office on this condition. I therefore kept silent during

the discussion on the 11th, and allowed Barrot to bear the brunt of the

battle alone. But when, on the 12th, I saw my colleagues threatened with

an impeachment, I considered that I could no longer abstain. The demand

for fresh documents gave me an opportunity to intervene, without having

to express an opinion upon the original question. I did so vigorously,

although in very few words.

On reading over this little speech in the _Moniteur_, I cannot but think

it very insignificant and badly turned. Nevertheless, I was applauded to

the echo by the majority, because in moments of crisis, when one is in

danger of civil war, it is the movement of thought and the accent of

one's words which make an impression, rather than their value. I

directly attacked Ledru-Rollin. I accused him with violence of only

wanting troubles and of spreading lies in order to create them. The

feeling which impelled me to speak was an energetic one, the tone was

determined and aggressive, and although I spoke very badly, being as

yet unaccustomed to my new part, I met with much favour.

Ledru replied to me, and told the majority that they were on the side of

the Cossacks. They answered that he was on the side of the plunderers

and the incendiaries. Thiers, commenting on this thought, said that

there was an intimate relation between the man they had just listened to

and the insurgents of June. The Assembly rejected the demand for an

impeachment by a large majority, and broke up.

Although the leaders of the Mountain continued to be outrageous, they

had not shown any great firmness, so that we were able to flatter

ourselves that the decisive moment for the struggle had not yet arrived.

But this was a mistake. The reports which we received during the night

told us that the people were preparing to take up arms.

On the next day, in fact, the language of the demagogic papers

proclaimed that the editors no longer relied upon justice, but upon a

revolution, to acquit them. All of them called either directly or

indirectly for civil war. The National Guard, the schools, the entire

population was summoned by them to repair, unarmed, to a certain

locality, in order to go and present themselves in mass before the doors

of the Assembly. It was a 23rd of June which they wished to commence

with a 15th of May; and, in fact, seven or eight thousand people did

meet at about eleven o'clock at the Chateau-d'Eau. We on our side held

a Council under the President of the Republic. The latter was already in

uniform, and prepared to go out on horseback so soon as he should be

told that the fighting had commenced. For the rest, he had changed

nothing except his clothes. He was exactly the same man as on the day

before: the same rather dejected air, his speech no less slow and no

less embarrassed, his eye no less dull. He showed none of that sort of

warlike excitement and of rather feverish gaiety which the approach of

danger so often gives: an attitude which is perhaps, after all, no more

than the sign of a mind disturbed.

We sent for Changarnier, who explained his preparations to us, and

guaranteed a victory. Dufaure communicated to us the reports he had

received, all of which told of a formidable insurrection. He then left

for the Ministry of the Interior, which was the centre of action, and at

about mid-day I repaired to the Assembly.

The House was some time before it met, because the President, without

consulting us, had declared, when arranging the Order of the Day on the

evening before, that there would be no public sitting on the next day, a

strange blunder which would have looked like treachery in anyone else.

While messengers were being despatched to inform the members at their

own houses, I went to see the President of the Assembly in his private

room: most of the leaders of the majority were there before me. Every

face bore traces of excitement and anxiety; the contest was both feared

and demanded. They began by vehemently accusing the Ministry of

slackness. Thiers, lying back in a big arm-chair, with his legs crossed

one over the other, sat rubbing his stomach (for he felt certain

symptoms of the prevailing epidemic), loudly and angrily exclaiming, in

his shrillest _falsetto_, that it was very strange that no one seemed to

think of declaring Paris in a state of siege. I replied gently that we

had thought of it, but that the moment had not yet come to do so, since

the Assembly had not yet met.

The members arrived from every side, attracted less by the messages

despatched to them, which most of them had not even received, than by

the rumours prevalent in the town. The sitting was opened at two

o'clock. The benches of the majority were well filled, but the top of

the Mountain was deserted. The gloomy silence which reigned in this part

of the House was more alarming than the shouts which came from that

quarter as a rule. It was a proof that discussion had ceased, and that

the civil war was about to commence.

At three o'clock, Dufaure came and asked that the state of siege should

be proclaimed in Paris. Cavaignac seconded him in one of those short

addresses which he sometimes delivered, and in which his mind, which was

naturally middling and confused reached the level of his soul and

approached the sublime. Under these circumstances he became, for a

moment, the man of the most genuine eloquence that I have ever heard

speak in our Assemblies: he left all the mere orators far behind him.

"You have just said," he exclaimed, addressing the Montagnard[17] who

was leaving the tribune, "that I have fallen from power. That is not

true: I retired voluntarily. The national will does not overthrow; it

commands, and we obey. I add--and I want the republican party always to

be able to say so with justice: I retired voluntarily, and, in so doing,

my conduct did honour to my republican convictions. You said that we

lived in terror: history is observing us, and will pronounce when the

time comes. But what I say to you myself is this, that although you have

not succeeded in inspiring me with a feeling of terror, you have

inspired me with a feeling of profound sorrow. Shall I tell you one

thing more? You are Republicans of long standing; whereas I have not

worked for the Republic before its foundation, I have not suffered for

it, and I regret that this is so; but I have served it faithfully, and I

have done more: I have governed it. I shall serve nothing else,

understand me well! Write it down, take it down in shorthand, so that it

may remain engraved upon the annals of our deliberations: _I shall serve

nothing else_! Between you and me, I take it, it is a question as to

which of us will serve the Republic best. Well then, my regret is, that

you have served it very badly. I hope, for the sake of my country, that

it is not destined to fall; but if we should be condemned to undergo so

great a blow, remember--remember distinctly--that we shall accuse your

exaggerations and your fury as being the cause of it."

[17: Pierre Leroux.]

Shortly after the state of siege had been proclaimed, we learnt that the

insurrection had been extinguished. Changarnier and the President,

charging at the head of the cavalry, had cut in two and dispersed the

column which was making its way towards the Assembly. A few

newly-erected barricades had been destroyed, without striking a blow.

The Montagnards, surrounded in the Conservatoire of Arts and Crafts,

which they had turned into their head-quarters, had either been arrested

or taken to flight. We were the masters of Paris.

The same movement took place in several of the large towns, with more

vigour but no less success. At Lyons, the fighting lasted stubbornly for

five hours, and the victory was for a moment in doubt. But for that

matter, when we were once victorious in Paris, we distressed ourselves

very little about the provinces; for we knew that in France, in matters

both of order and of disorder, Paris lays down the law.

Thus ended the second Insurrection of June, very different to the first

by the extent of its violence and its duration, but similar in the

causes which led to its failure. At the time of the first, the people,

carried away less by their opinions than by their appetites, had fought

alone, without being able to attract their representatives to their

head. This time the representatives had been unable to induce the people

to follow them into battle. In June 1848, the army had no leaders; in

June 1849, the leaders had no army.

They were singular personages, those Montagnards: their quarrelsome

nature and their self-conceit were displayed even in measures which

least allowed of it. Among those who, in their newspapers and in their

own persons, had spoken most violently in favour of civil war, and who

had done the most to cover us with insults, was Considerant, the pupil

and successor of Fourier, and the author of so many socialistic dreams

which would only have been ridiculous at any other time, but which were

dangerous in ours. Considerant succeeded in escaping with Ledru-Rollin

from the Conservatoire, and in reaching the Belgian frontier. I had

formerly had social relations with him, and when he arrived in Brussels,

he wrote to me:

"My dear Tocqueville,

(Here followed a request for a service which he asked me to do for

him, and then he went on):

"Rely upon me at all times for any personal service. You are good

for two or three months perhaps, and the pure Whites who will

follow you are good for six months at the longest. You will both

of you, it is true, have well deserved what is infallibly bound to

happen to you a little sooner or a little later. But let us talk no

more politics and respect the very legal, very loyal, and very

Odilon Barrotesque state of siege."

To this I replied:

"My dear Considerant,

"I have done what you ask. I do not wish to take advantage of so

small a service, but I am very pleased to ascertain, by the way,

that those odious oppressors of liberty, the Ministers, inspire

their adversaries with so much confidence that the latter, after

outlawing them, do not hesitate to apply to them to obtain what is

just. This proves that there is some good left in us, whatever may

be said of us. Are you quite sure that if the position had been

inverted, I should have been able to act in the same way, I will

not say towards yourself, but towards such and such of your

political friends whom I might mention? I think the contrary, and I

solemnly declare to you that if ever they become the masters, I

shall consider myself quite satisfied if they only leave my head

upon my shoulders, and ready to declare that their virtue has

surpassed my greatest expectations."

CHAPTER III

OUR DOMESTIC POLICY--INTERNAL QUARRELS IN THE CABINET--ITS

DIFFICULTIES IN ITS RELATIONS WITH THE MAJORITY AND THE PRESIDENT.

We were victorious, but our real difficulties were only about to

commence, and I expected them. I have always held as a maxim, moreover,

that it is after a great success that one generally comes across the

most dangerous chances of ruin: so long as the peril lasts, one has only

his adversaries to deal with, and he triumphs; but after the victory,

one begins to have to reckon with himself, his slackness, his pride, the

imprudent security inspired by victory, and he succumbs.

I was not exposed to this last danger, for I never imagined that we had

surmounted our principal obstacles. I knew that these lay with the very

men with whom we would have to govern the country, and that the rapid

and signal defeat of the Montagnards, instead of guaranteeing us against

the ill-will of the former, would expose us to it without delay. We

should have been much stronger if we had not succeeded so well.

The majority consisted in the main, at that time, of three parties (the

President's party in Parliament was as yet too few in number and of too

evil repute to count). Sixty to eighty members at the utmost were

sincerely with us in our endeavours to found a Moderate Republic, and

these formed the only body we could rely upon in that huge Assembly. The

remainder of the majority consisted of Legitimists, to the number of

some one hundred and sixty, and of old friends or supporters of the

Monarchy of July, for the most part representing those middle classes

who had governed, and above all exploited, France during eighteen years.

I felt at once that of these two parties, that of which we could most

easily make use in our plans was the Legitimist party. The Legitimists

had been excluded from power under the last government; they therefore

had no places and no salaries to regret. Moreover, being for the most

part considerable land-owners, they had not the same need of public

functions as the middle class; or, at least, custom had not taught them

the sweetness of place. Although in principles more irreconcilable to

the Republic than the others, they were better able than most to accept

its duration, for it had destroyed their destroyer, and had opened up to

them a prospect of power; it had served at once their ambition and their

desire for revenge; and it only aroused against itself their fear, which

was, in truth, very great. The old Conservatives, who formed the bulk of

the majority, were much more eager to do away with the Republic; but as

the furious hatred which they bore it was strongly held in check by the

fear of the risk they would run in endeavouring prematurely to abolish

it, and as, moreover, they had long been accustomed to follow in the

wake of power, it would have been easy for us to lead them had we been

able to obtain the support, or even the mere neutrality of their

leaders, of whom the principal were then, as is known, M. Thiers and M.

Mole.

Appreciating this position of affairs, I understood that it was

necessary to subordinate all secondary objects to the principal end in

view, which was to prevent the overthrow of the Republic and especially

to hinder the establishment of the bastard monarchy of Louis Napoleon.

This was at the time the nearest threatening danger.

I thought first of guaranteeing myself against the mistakes of my

friends, for I have always considered as profoundly sensible the old

Norman proverb which says, "Lord, preserve me from my friends: I will

preserve myself from mine enemies."

At the head of our adherents in the National Assembly was General

Lamoriciere, and I greatly dreaded his petulancy, his imprudent

observations, and especially his idleness. I endeavoured to appoint him

to an important and distant embassy. Russia had spontaneously recognized

the new Republic; it was proper that we should resume the diplomatic

relations with her which had been almost interrupted under the last

Government. I cast my eyes upon Lamoriciere in order to entrust him with

this extraordinary and distant mission. He was, besides, a man cut out

for a post of this kind, in which few but generals, and celebrated

generals, succeed. I had some difficulty in persuading him, but the most

difficult thing was to persuade the President of the Republic. He at

first resisted, and told me on that occasion, with a sort of simplicity

which pointed less to candour than to his difficulty in finding words in

which to express himself (these very rarely gave utterance to his

thoughts, but sometimes permitted them to glimmer through), that he

wished to be represented at the principal Courts by ambassadors devoted

to himself. This was not my view of the matter; for I, who was called

upon to instruct the ambassadors, was quite determined to devote myself

only to France. I therefore insisted, but I should have failed if I had

not summoned M. de Falloux to my aid. Falloux was the only man in the

Ministry in whom the President at that time had confidence. He persuaded

him with arguments, of which I do not know the purport, and Lamoriciere

left for Russia. I shall say later what he did.

His departure reassured me as to the conduct of our friends, and I

thought of winning or retaining the necessary allies. Here the task was

more difficult on all points; for, outside my own department, I was

unable to do anything without the consent of the Cabinet, which

contained a number of the most honest minds that one could meet, but so

inflexible and narrow in matters of politics, that I have sometimes

gone so far as to regret not having rather had to do with intelligent

rascals.

As to the Legitimists, my opinion was that they should be allowed to

retain great influence in the direction of Public Instruction. This

proposal had its drawbacks, but it was the only one which could satisfy

them, and which could ensure us their support in return, when it should

become a question of restraining the President and preventing him from

upsetting the Constitution. This plan was followed. Falloux was given a

free hand in his own department, and the Council allowed him to bring

before the Assembly the plan of Public Instruction, which since became

law on the 15th of March 1850. I also advised my colleagues to all the

extent of my power to keep up good relations individually with the

principal members of the Legitimist party, and I followed this line of

conduct myself. I soon became and remained, of all the members of the

Cabinet, the one who lived in the best understanding with them. I even

ended by becoming the sole intermediary between them and ourselves.

It is true that my birth and the society in which I had been brought up

gave me great facilities for this which the others did not possess; for,

although the French nobility have ceased to be a class, they have yet

remained a sort of freemasonry, of which all the members continue to

recognize one another through certain invisible signs, whatever may be

the opinions which make them strangers to one another, or even

adversaries.

It so happened, therefore, that after annoying Falloux more than anyone

else had done before entering the Cabinet, I had no sooner joined it

than I easily became his friend. For that matter, he was a man worth

taking the trouble of coaxing. I do not think that during my whole

political career I ever met anyone of a rarer nature. He possessed the

two essentials necessary for good leadership: an ardent conviction,

which constantly drove him towards his aim without allowing itself to be

turned aside by mortifications or dangers, and a mind which was both

firm and supple, and which applied a great multiplicity and prodigious

variety of means to the execution of a single plan. He was sincere in

this sense, that he only considered, as he declared, his cause and not

his private interest; but otherwise very sly, with a very uncommon and

very effective slyness, for he succeeded, for the time being, in

mingling truth and falsehood in his own belief, before serving up the

mixture to the minds of others. This is the great secret which gives

falsehood all the advantages of sincerity, and which permits its

exponent to persuade to the error which he considers beneficial those

whom he works upon or directs.