357] "^^^ PLEBISCITE IN THE FRENCH REVOLUTION 59 



In consequence of this decree Pope Pius VI, through 

 Cardinal Rezzonico, sent a protest to the Catholic Powers 

 of Europe, opposing the incorporation as " a manifest viola- 

 tion of the law of nations," condemning the revolutionary- 

 character of the theories involved in such plebiscites and ex- 

 pressing criticism of the result of the votes. This protest 

 ran in part as follows : 



As far as the supposedly free wish of the rebels is concerned it is 

 clear that it could absolutely not be accorded without disturbing 

 general peace [repos]. Will it then be permitted henceforth to 

 everybody to choose a new master in accordance with one's pleasure? 

 [d'apres le gre de son caprice?]. For such would be the consequence 

 of the principle adopted by the National Assembly. ... 



What the Assembly calls the free and solemn vote of the city of 

 Avignon, which before the revolt had 30,000 inhabitants, is nothing 

 but the signature of about 1000 citizens, extorted under the menace 

 of death, for that only is the actual number of those who, together 

 with a horde of brigands which established itself in the city after 

 the emigration of the nobility and the majoritj-- of the respectabte 

 people, form all the commune. The rest was forced to leave the 

 country through fear of the satellites in the pay of the National 

 Assembly. . . . The inhabitants of the Comtat [Venaissin] were 

 forced the same way into this supposedly free vote, by the most 

 fearful pillages. . . . This free and solemn vote, on which the decree 

 of Sept. 14 is based, is the result of all these cruelties. ... 



Was it not necessary that also the astonishing number of emi- 

 grants from Avignon and from the other communes of the Comtat 

 [Venaissin] . . . cast their vote if it was a free and general con- 

 sensus of the entiLe province that was desired? Why then were they 

 not consulted?. . .^^ 



19 Freudenthal, pp. 3-4; Martens, vol. vi, pp. 402-410; Arch, pari., 

 ser. I, vol. XXX, pp. 641-644. Another papal protest, addressed to 

 all the European powers, is found in the same volume, pp. 439-400. 

 Condorcet, defending France's annexation of these Papal territories, 

 stated in the National Legislative Assembly on April 20, 1792. that 

 " what the Pope possessed in this land was the emolument [salairc] 

 of the government functions," that "the people, in depriving him 

 of these functions, have made use of a power which a long servitude 

 had suspended, but which it had not been able to destroy," and that 

 "the indemnity proposed by France was not even required in jus- 

 tice" (Arch, pari., ser. I, vol. xlii, p. 212). On the same occasion 

 Condorcet refers to the indemnities offered by France to certain 

 German princes for the relinquishment to revolutionary France of 

 their feudal rights in the territories of .Msace, over which France 

 had gained sovereignty in the Treaty of Minister, in 1648. This re- 

 linquishment was enforced in consequence of one of the first acts 

 of the French revolution decreeing, on .\ug. 6, 1789, the abolition 

 of feudalism : " L'Assenihlee nationale detruit entitTemeiit le regime 

 feodal ; clle decrete que, dans les droits et devoirs, tant feodaux 

 que censuels, ceux qui tienncnt i la main morte reelle ou pcrsonncllc, 



