FRANCE. 



343 



ter, took the chair as senior member. His 

 speech was remarkable for the fact that it 

 contained an honorable mention of the Presi- 

 dent's message of December 14, 1877, in which 

 he had shown that he was not a tool of the 

 ministers of the 16th of May. In the Cham- 

 ber of Deputies, M. Desseaux took the chair. 

 In addressing the House, he made an allusion 

 to the death of M. Ducamp, a deputy of the 

 Left, recalling the fact that the deceased had 

 been transported to Algeria in 1852, and add- 

 ing that he was a victim of a detestable regime. 

 M. Paul de Cassagnac here interrupted the 

 speaker with the observation, "It is the re- 

 public which is ignoble." For this he was 

 called to order. The election of the presi- 

 dents and vice-presidents took place on the 

 10th. The Senate as well as the Chamber re- 

 elected their presidents of 1877. The Cham- 

 ber at once proceeded to consider the elections 

 of many of the Conservative members, and 

 quashed a large number of them. On the 21st, 

 after two elections had been declared illegal, 

 a resolution was presented by Admiral Fou- 

 chard, signed by all the members of the Right, 

 providing that in future a two-thirds majority 

 should be necessary to invalidate any election. 

 M. Gambetta, however, moved the previous 

 question, which was finally adopted by a large 

 majority. 



An election for a life-Senator, to fill the va- 

 cancy caused by the death of General de Pala- 

 dines, took place on the same day. The first 

 ballot resulted in 128 votes for the Duke De- 

 cazes, the candidate of the Right, 129 for 

 Victor Lefranc, the candidate of the Left, and 

 15 scattering. The election was then post- 

 poned. A second ballot was taken on the 24th, 

 but again without success, and the election was 

 again postponed. Ballots on February 7th and 

 16th were again ineffectual ; but on the 19th M. 

 de Carayon Latour, of the Right, was finally 

 chosen. The Chamber of Deputies adopted by 

 a large majority, on January 24th, a bill grant- 

 ing amnesty for all press offenses committed 

 from May 16 to December 14, 1877. The de- 

 bate which preceded the passage of the bill 

 was very animated. M. Goblet, the reporter on 

 the bill, stated that while the Duke de Broglie 

 was in power there had been 3,271 political 

 prosecutions and 2,709 convictions. That, he 

 considered, represented an excessive and im- 

 moderate zeal on the part of the public prose- 

 cutors, and it was certainly not equaled at any 

 other period of their political history. M. 

 Rouher then delivered a speech on amnesties 

 in general, glorifying in particular the amnes- 

 ties of the Second Empire, and defending the 

 system of officinl candidatures. M. Dufaure, 

 in reply, declined to be led away into any con- 

 sideration of amnesties in general. This bill 

 was a special exceptional measure, to remedy 

 as far as might be a frightful calamity with 

 which Franco had been afflicted for six months. 

 The Marshal, who till May 16th was univer- 

 sally respected, had been exposed to attacks 



because the ministers illegally put him forward 

 to cover their own responsibility. He now 

 approved the present bill, which was necessary 

 to repair the wrong and affirm true constitu- 

 tional principles. M. Talandier, of the Ex- 

 treme Left, said that, while he entirely ap- 

 proved of a scheme of pardon for all political 

 crimes, such a proposal must come from the 

 Left, and he looked with suspicion upon any 

 proposal for an amnesty which emanated from 

 the authors of a coup d'etat. M. de Fourtou. 

 who was present, remained silent. 



Two important bills were passed by the 

 Chamber on February 8th. The h'rst provided 

 that a state of siege can not be proclaimed 

 without the consent of the Chamber, while 

 the other accorded free license to hawk news- 

 papers and similar printed matter in the pub- 

 lic streets. On the 18th the Chamber consid- 

 ered the estimates of the Ministry of Public 

 Worship, in which the report of the Commit- 

 tee proposed numerous reductions. M. Bara- 

 gnon defended the Catholic party from the at- 

 tacks made upon it, and denied that the clergy 

 had transgressed the laws of the state. M. 

 Boysset, the Budget Committee's reporter, 

 contended that Catholicism in its modern form 

 was incompatible with the republic ; that the 

 subsidies for conflicting creeds were absurd ; 

 that disestablishment must be aimed at ; and 

 that it was time to repudiate a concordat in- 

 herited from a despot. M. Gambetta remarked 

 that the inheritance must be preserved as long 

 as policy required. With this the discussion 

 closed, M. Bardoux intimating that the Govern- 

 ment would state its views, if necessary, when 

 the votes were considered seriatim. The esti- 

 mates of the ministry were then agreed to. 



On February 25th the Senate began the dis- 

 cussion of the colportage bill. This was the first 

 of the four Government bills designed to pre- 

 vent the recurrence of the reactionary measures 

 of the previous year by expressly prohibiting 

 those strained interpretations of the law which 

 were accepted by subservient judges during 

 the crisis of 1877. The bill simply enacted 

 what the National Assembly of 1875 intended 

 to enact. The press law of that year provided 

 that prefects should not deprive any particular 

 newspaper of the right of outdoor sale, but 

 should only be entitled to deprive all newspa- 

 pers of that right. The De Broglie Cabinet, 

 however, evaded this stipulation by withdraw- 

 ing the license of any hawker who refused to 

 discontinue the sale of any particular journal. 

 This course was taken under the colportage 

 laws of 1834 and 1849, under which a hawk- 

 er's license could be rescinded without any 

 ground being assigned. The new bill sought 

 to prevent this evasion by declaring that those 

 laws do not apply to the hawking of newspa- 

 pers, and that any person may hawk them on 

 making a simple declaration to the municipal 

 or sub-prefectoral authorities, and obtaining a 

 written acknowledgment of that declaration. 

 The bill was bitterly opposed by the Right, 



