24 Ethel Lee Howie 



tions and the oaths binding the votes of the nobles should be 

 declared null/*'^ It is stated by the Bulletins de I'assemblee nation- 

 ale that Target introduced the subject after two o'clock in the 

 afternoon with the twofold purpose of preventing an assembly of 

 the majority of the nobles and of stopping further protests.^"*' It 

 seems that several days before Target had announced his intention 

 of presenting such a motion/"^ but I find no evidence that he 

 made such a statement in the assembly. Biauzat, however, in his 

 letter of June 30, when he stated that the protests were to be con- 

 sidered after the verification of credentials, said: "I shall then 

 propose a motion which seems to me of urgent and indispens- 

 able necessity."^"^ Target, at the same time he presented his 

 motion, announced that Talleyrand wished to make the same 

 motion and would develop it more extensively.^"^ Talleyrand 

 then read a motion, which according to the Point du Jour'^'^^ was 

 as follows : " The national assembly considering that a bailliage 

 and especially a part of a bailliage, has only the right to concur 

 through its deputies and to form the general wish and not the right 

 to prevent this wish, or to sustain itself in this attitude declares 

 that all imperative clauses of a mandate which deprive the deputy 

 of the right of voting in the assembly or which order him to retire 



Sa vie et sa correspondance, II, 157; Duquesnoy, Journal, I, 161; Gazette 

 de Leyde, Sup. No. 56 (July 5). 



^^^ Journal de Paris, No. 186, 836 (July 5); Bulletins de I'assemblee 

 nationale, July 3; Gazette de Leyde, Sup. No. 56 (July 5). 



106 Bulletins de I'assemblee nationale, July 3. This also states that the 

 nobles had kept the keys of their chamber, thus preventing the bureaus 

 from meeting there. 



'^'^'^ Journal de Paris, No. 186, 836 (July 5) ; Point du jour, I, 100. 



If*® Biauzat, Sa vie et sa correspondance, II, 150. 



'^^^ Journal de Paris, No. 186, 836 (July 5) ; Duquesnoy, Journal, I, 161; 

 Biauzat, Sa vie et sa correspondance, II, 157. It is perfectly clear from 

 these sources that an agreement had been made between Target and 

 Talleyrand to bring the question before the assembly. 



iioFo/;!f du jour, I, 100; Bulletins de I'assemblee nationale, July 3. 

 None of the other sources give the wording of the motion, although Du- 

 quesnoy (I, 161), and the Assemblee nationale (I, 336), Biauzat (II, 157), 

 the Journal de Paris and Gazette de Leyde all speak of Talleyrand making 

 a motion on this day. 



306 



