FRANCE. 



In !"!V I 



1: pi-op. 



the Constitutional Committee of Thirty lai<l 



before tin- Nati-mal .\--.mbly the draft of the 

 lav.- .in tin- (iovermui'iit of France. 

 |n-o|i..-..-.|, in iiri-ordaiieo with tho wishes of 



tin- I'ri vdriit, th<- eivrtiuii of a First Chamber, 

 .-iit the right to dissolve the 



Second Chamber, even without the consent of 



mad.- the- 1'ivsident personally re- 



;!>le lor high-treason, while the ministers 



-umo the responsibility for all acts 



i>f tho Covornment. In case of the death or 

 i it i.>n of MacMahon, the Senate and 

 iber of Deputies are to decide conjointly 



on tho future form of government. 



An important discussion took place on July 



18th, on a motion by Casimir Perier to pro- 

 claim the republic as tho definite form of 

 government for France. Tho motion had, on 

 .'line 15th, been declared urgent by the Na- 

 tional Assembly, and referred to tho Constitu- 

 tional Committee, which now reported on it ad- 

 versely. General Cissey, in the name of the 

 Government, also declared against it; the 

 country expected at present the organization 

 of the powers of the President, and the Gov- 

 ernment expected that its rights be defined ; 

 in future, the country would bo at liberty to 

 dispose of its destinies. In accordance with 

 tho declaration of the Government, the As- 

 sembly rejected the motion by 874 votes 

 against 883. A motion by Maleville, declaring 

 the National Assembly dissolved, was also re- 

 jected by 369 against 340. On July 31st, a reso- 

 lution was adopted to adjourn from August 6th 

 to November 30th. The Minister of the Inte- 

 rior declared on this occasion that the Govern- 

 ment engaged during the adjournment of the 

 National Assembly to oppose any plot against 

 the powers of the President. Motions for 

 raising or suspending the state of siege where 

 it still existed were rejected. In the standing 

 committee, which was to represent the Assem- 

 bly during the adjournment, all parties were 

 represented except the Bonapartists. 



Shortly before the adjournment, a partial 

 modification of the ministry had taken place. 

 Tho Minister of Finance, Magne, on July 15th, 

 offered . his resignation because the Assembly 

 had rejected, by 362 against 265 votes, a mo- 

 tion by Goulart for doubling the salt-tax, 

 which he warmly recommended, and because 

 all his efforts for covering the deficit of 500,- 

 000,000 francs by additional taxes had failed. 

 He was followed, on July 17th, by Fonrtou the 

 Minister of the Interior, and like himself a 

 representative of the Bonapartist party. Their 

 places were filled by the appointment of M. 

 Mathieu-Bodet as Minister of Finance and of 

 General Chabaud-Latour as Minister of War. 

 General Chabaud-Latour, who belongs to the 

 Right Centre, is a Protestant and a friend of 

 the Princes of Orleans, and the choice of a 

 military man as head of the home office, was 

 regarded as an indication of a policy of firm- 

 ness on the part of the Government. M. 

 Mathieu-Bodet occupies in the Assembly a po- 



sition between the Right Centre and Left 



('ritiv, anil belongs to the group of member* 



led over by M. Target, whose inll 

 was decisive in the event of May 24, 1878, 

 when M. Thiers was overthrown. All parties 

 in the Assembly agreed that the appointment 

 of the new Ministers of the Interior and Fi- 

 nance waa a blow to tho cause of the Bona- 

 partists. 



On August 16th the Bonapartists obtained 

 another great victory at a supplementary elec- 

 tion for the National Assembly in the depart- 

 ment of Calvados. Of the 77,286 electors 

 who voted for the Bonapartist candidate, M. lo 

 Provost de Launay received 40,794 votes ; M. 

 Aubert, Republican, 27,272 ; and M. de Fon- 

 tette, Monarchist, 8,978. In 1872 the number 

 of voters was 63,000. M. Paris, the deceased 

 Republican deputy, obtained 28,000 votes; M. 

 Fournist, Legitimist, 17,000; M. Jorel Desclo- 

 sieres, Orleanist, 15,000 ; and M. de Colbert 

 Chapannais, Bonapartist, 3,000. A compari- 

 son of these electoral statistics shows that, 

 while the strength of the Republicans has re- 

 mained about the same, the Bonapartists have 

 almost wholly absorbed the two other mo- 

 narchical parties. 



During a tour which President MacMahon 

 made in August and September through 

 Brittany and the northwestern provinces, he 

 was everywhere warmly received. In his 

 replies to the addresses with which he was 

 welcomed, he strictly adhered to the policy 

 which he had consistently pursued during the 

 session of the National Assembly, and carefully 

 avoided expressing a preference for any perma- 

 nent form of government. He eagerly showed 

 his personal devotion to the Catholic religion, 

 without, however, giving any encouragement 

 to the political publications of the bishops. 



At a supplementary election held in the de- 

 partment of Marne and Loire, on September 

 19th, the candidate of the Republicans was 

 elected over the monarchical candidate, in 

 whose support all the other parties had united. 

 The elections for the French Councils-General 

 took place on October 4th and llth. Of the 

 members elected 1,436 in number 673 are 

 Republicans, 604 Monarchists, and 158 Bona- 

 partists. The result was, like that of nearly 

 all the supplementary elections, favorable to 

 the Republicans and the Bonapartists, the for- 

 mer gaining 30 and the Bonapartists 53 seats. 

 Through these elections the Republicans at- 

 tained a majority in 38 Councils-General and 

 the Monarchists in 44. In three departments 

 namely, Aude, Ardeche, and Gard the Re- 

 publicans and Monarchists are equally di- 

 vided. Among the prominent men who were 

 not reflected to their seats was Prince Napo- 

 leon. In consequence of the attitude assumed 

 by him toward the Prince Imperial and the Em- 

 press, the Bonapartist members of the General- 

 Council of Corsica, who had elected him to 

 the presidency of the Council, were so in- 

 censed against him that they absented them- 



