Meeting of the Estates-General, 1789. QI 
unanimously agreed to the proposition that the deputation be 
invited to remain throughout the session® and it is stated that 
they were seated opposite the president’s desk, between the 
clergy and nobles.** Through this means, the actual workings 
of the assembly would be carried to the public in spite of the 
king’s prohibition of spectators and with a directness and force 
that no printing of the records could effect. This invitation 
might be a revolutionary act in the eyes of the government, but 
necessity justified the third estate in extending it to the repre- 
sentatives of the electoral assembly. 
This deputation had, after all, some pretense to legality, but 
the delegation from the citizens of Paris that came later in the 
day had not even a suspicion of legality about it. Under ordinary 
circumstances, doubtless, it would not have been admitted, but 
the necessity of having the public sentiment of Paris on its side 
was too urgent for the assembly to pass such an opportunity to 
secure it.84 As the idea of such an undertaking had originated 
in the Palais Royal, at the Cafés du Foy and Caveau,* so back to 
8° Procés-verbal des électeurs de Paris, 1, 101; Procés-verbal, No. 8, 6; Point 
du jour, I, 54; Assemblée nationale, I, 235; Courrier de Provence, Lettre XIV, 2; 
Jallet, 105. 
83 Assemblée nationale, I, 235. 
4 Boullé, Docs. inédits, Revue de la rév., XIII, 77; Etats-généraux, Extrait 
du journal de Paris, 1, 116. Both say this was the third deputation. Procés- 
verbal (No. 8, 20) and the Point du jour (I, 58) agree that this deputation was 
the third one that came, as does also the Assemblée nationale (I, 214). Biauzat 
(II, 145) makes but mere mention of it in a postscript. In the Procés-verbal 
des électeurs de Paris (I, 101, 102), Moreau de Saint-Méry reported on his 
deputation’s being seated and added: ‘‘ Un moment aprés, on a aunoncé et 
proposé d’introduire une autre députation de Paris, envoyée non par aucune 
corporation,” and Jallet (104) gives practically the same thing: ‘‘ Quelque 
moments aprés, une députation qui s’annoncait des citoyens de Paris . . . se 
presente.” Duquesnoy (I, 133-44) has it precede the deputation from the 
nobles and the entrance of the Archbishop of Paris. Courrier de Provence 
(Lettre XIV, 2) also treats this in connection with the electoral deputation 
before the nobles. So also does the Mercure de France: Journal Politique de 
Bruxelles, No. 27, 46. 
% Duquesnoy, I, 133; Bulletins d’un agent secret, No. 48, under date of 
June 26 (La révolution frangaise, XXIV, 73). The writer of this account, 
who was in Paris, says: ‘‘ La seconde était une députation directe du Palais 
Royal, marquée sous la dénomination des trois ordres.” Jallet, 104; Procés- 
205 
