The Express.
London, England, 1863-02-09 00:00:00

EXPRESS FROM PARIS.

(PROW 0171 OWN

PARIS, SUNDAY EVEIIIIIG,

The warning given by the .Moniteur that the
journals will be prosecuted if they continue to give
the commentaries upon the debates which they
have been in the habit of doing without molesta-
tion for the last two years is the most reactionary
measure that we have seen since the Emperor's
decree of November, 1860, brought the word
"liberty" into fashion. This tyranny is illogical
on the part of a government which has ceased to
garble the reports, and proclaimed the principle
that the speeches of the senators and deputies are
to be published as spoken. It is paltry, petulant,
vexatious, irritating, but withal ridiculous and im-
potent tyranny. The foolish resolution was taken
at a solemn council held at the Tuileries yesterday
afternoon, at the breaking up of which the black man
was sent round immediately to the newspaper
'offices. The thing was done in a panic occasioned
by M. Jules Favre's exposure of the Jecker
business in Mexico. All ideas of consistency were
thrown to the winds, the Emperor's recently
expressed admiration of liberty was forgotten, and
M. de Persigny's formal and deliberate promise
that the press should be free except when it
attacked the dynasty was flagrantly violated for
the wretched object of preventing certain journals
from presenting to their readers, in a leading
column, and in a short and perspicuous form, the
substance of those speeches of Jules Fevre, which
are reported at length in the third and fourth
pages for anybody to read who has leisure.
The text, as well as the spirit, of the
constitution is violated by this childish
interdiction. Everybody knows the difference be-
tween a report (e,ompte rendu) and a criticism upon
a debate. The intention of the imperial constitu-
tion was to prevent the newspapers from publishing
private "reports" which, when the press was free,
were often, in some of the least respectable journals,
unfairly done. Therefore it was that one official
report was prepared, and all the journals were
bound to take that, and that alone, if they wished
to report the debates. The habit has been to copy
these reports, but at the same time to make some
comments upon them in a leading article, carefully
avoiding always any false quotation of the words
of any speaker. M. Troplong himself, the greatest
legal authority in France, admitted lately in
the Senate that this course was wholly
unobjectionable in a constitutional point of
view. Now, all this is to be changed, and the
journals gagged by a simple administrative act. The
Emperor's speeches may be commented upon, but not
a word must be said about the speech of any senator
or deputy. The "acts" of ministers, as we have
lately been told over and over again, are fair sub-
jects for criticism, but the speeches of the ministers
without portfolios are sacred things. A journal
may print at length speeches affirming totally op-
posite things, but if it attempts to dissect the
debate and suggest an opinion as to which aide
the truth lies, it is to be prosecuted, fined, and
perhaps suppressed. Not always, however ; for,
with that love of unfairness that habitual
use of two weights and two measures—
that systematic denial of all individual
rights which is of the essence of the imperial
system of home government—a journal
will be quite safe as long as it praises the minis-
ters and abuses the opposition. The Temps points
out to-night that since the officious warning was
given yesterday the government journals have
railed at M. Jules Fevre, on account of his
speeches, in the most insulting way. They have
accused him of want of patriotism, of firing upon
the French flag, of hurling poisoned javelins against
the French honour, and so forth. What would
have happened it any independent journal had
dared to say a tenth part as much about M. Bil-
lault ? The Opinion Nationale laments that by the
announcement in the Moniteur the ground gained
two years ago has been lost. Even the France pro-
tests against the insane measure, and not a single
government journal has yet been hardy enough to
say a word in praise of or excuse for it.