The Sun.
London, England, 1852-01-17 00:00:00

THE SUN,

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.

TIMES.— The text of the French Constitution, which
we have now before us in a more complete form, enables
us to pursue the observations we have already made on
the proclamation by which it is accompanied, and on
the general tenour of these institutions. But even now
it must be remarked that this scheme is rather an out-
line than a complete work, and that much depends
on the various laws, decrees, and Senatus. Consults by
which the projsct is to be completed. Such a Constitu-
tion secures nothing, for it opposes no direct or insur-
emountable obstacle to any acts of the Executive Power,
though it might still, it liberally construed, leave a
greater latitude for the expression of opinion than the
declared adversaries of Parliamentary government had
desired. Oi the powers assumed by the President in
his own office little need be said, for they override
every other portion of the Government. We
remark, that while an oath of fidelity to the Consti-
tivion and the President is to be exacted from the
members of all goveruiug and legislative assemblies, no
oath is providers for the President himself ; but receM,-
ex,‘erienu has shown that moral restraints are power-
less on such men, and he has ceased to acknowledge any
legal obligation to the rights of the nation. The Minis-
ters aro to by mere clerks of the head of the Government,
and it is carefully provided that no such thing as a cot-
lectiie Administration is to exist. The President is
himself the whole Government, assisted in each depart-
ment by a Minister. The duration of the President's
office being limited by the terms of the pldhileite to ten

ears, there is, of course, no ostensible c.aim to any
hereditary dignity; but, by a singular provisier, it is
I.roppsed that Louis Napoleon should have the power
of leaking a tort of political " last will and testament"
to designate his own successor, in case of death,
a precaution which can hardly have been
tkeu against any natural termination of his life
and power. The most important and interesting section
of the Constitution is that which defines the powers and
composition of the Senate. Its members are to be irre-
movable, end named for life; the cardinals, admirals,
and marshals are to have seats of right; the functions of
members aro nominally gratuitous, though the President
may confer on them an income of 30,000 f. at his plea-
sure. hut, on the other hand, only eighty senators out
of 150 are to be appointed in the first year, so that the
Government retains the power of swamping all opposi-
tion by a fresh nomination. The sittings are secret,
and the proceedings unpublished. If such a body
were constituted with any view to political or per-
sonal independence, it is invested with powers which
might be used with advantage. Thus it is charged,
like the Supreme Court of the United States, to
oppose laws contrary to the Constitution, to the
liberty of worship, to the liberty of the person, to
inviolability of property, and to the permanency of the
magistracy. In this indirect form a species of sanction
is given to these principles, and the Senate would be
bound by law to defend them. But these powers in
the hands of a servile and dependent body may only be
turned to instruments of greater oppression. They su-
persede the control of the ordinary courts of justice,
and especially of the Court of Cessation, over constitu-
tional questions and public rights. Though placed, as
it were, between the Government and the nation, since
" the Senate maintains or annuls all the acts which may
be submitted to it as unconstitutional by the Govern-
ment, or denounced for the same cause in pe-
titions by the citizens," this semi-judicial power
loses all its weight in the grasp of men who have
no independence. The persons selected to fill the
station of senators may, indeed, raise the character of
such a body by their own rank, services, or talents,
and we await these nominations with interest. But
hitherto all contact with Louis Napoleon's Government
has been avoided by such men. M. do Montalembert
has literally been obliged to hide himself in a pretended
sick-room from the general indignation of society at his
political apostasy. The probability is, that the Senate
and the Council of State will be composed of men not
more eminent or independent than those whose names
have been madeto figure in the Consultative Commission.
The President is armed beforehand with the means of
giving or withholding from them a liberal income;
and, in short, nothing is wanting to convert such an
Assembly into the most pliant tools of despotism.
The Legislative Assembly is, however, the greatest
farce in this Constitution. It is to be elected by
ballot and by universal suffrage, in the proportion of one
deputy
to 35,000 inhabitants, and to sit for six years, not
ten, as was erroneously stated yesterday; but, as the
electoral law is not yet promulgated, we have yet to
learn under what limitations the suffrage is to bo exer-
cised. When elected, this body will have the sterile
privilege of discussing laws it cannot alter by way of
amendment, and of voting measures it cannot originate.
Even the reports of its
proceedings are to be confined to
the minutes of the journals, for it is evidently the inten-
tion of the President to stifle all political eloquence and
to shut up the feeble debates of such assemblies within
the four walls
of' one of his palaces. The President and
Vice-President of the Chamber aro to be named by the
Government and salaried by decree. No petition can
be addressed to the body which represents the
people, nor indeed are the people to have any
mode of ascertaining what the actual conduct
of their representatives may be. And, after all,
upon the first act of opposition this Assembly may
be dissolved or prorogued, and the Senate will
provide in the interim " all that is necessary for carry-
ing on the government." Such a body has, there!ore,
no original powers at all, and the pretended powers
which aro speciously confer d upon it may be trans-
ferred on the least show of resistance to a more docile
instrument. We know not to what extent the expecta-

Lions of those who have judged most severely of the re-
cent
,acts and future policy of Louis Napoleon Bona-
parte may have carried them; but for ourselves we cer-
taenly anticipated nothing more fetal to the liberties of
Franco and to the whole theory of Parliamentary go-
vernment than this Constitution. It gives to the nation
no hold upon its representatives, and to its representa-
tives no hold upon the Government. Yet tho systematic
Bonapartist policy, both of the uncle and of the nephew,
has been to keep in the foreground the principles of the
revolution end the authority of the people; while, in
reality, nothing is retained of the more generous
and enlighteuLd maxims of 1789 but the destruc-
tive consequences to which they unhappily led,
and nothing is required of the authority of the
people but to sanction the impostures practised in its
name. The first step to the perpetration of such mea-
sures was the destruction of that publicity which is the
guardian of all other liberties. From the moment that
the press was suspended the nation ceased to know the
events of its own history. Society is groping
in the
dark, unable to meet, to discern the course of the times,
or to combine the most ordinary expression of opinion.
Even now, it is only beyond the frontiers of France that
the ci iticisin of a document which vitally concerns the
French nation can commence; and even beyond its own
frontiers the Government has endeavoured to tamper with
the organs of public opinion, which it dreads. The effect
produced even in France by the late decrees of banishment
and deportation has for the first time shaken the conti-
deuce of the Dictator and his accomplices. Several of
the renons- proscribed by thet edict have not yet been
sent out of Paris; and a second list of proscriptions,
containing a large number of public writers and men of
Parliamentary families, has been suspended by the in-
fluence of M. de Morny, The Government seems to rely
for support among the educated classes only on the
lavish distribution of its degrading honours;or on its un-
scrupulous persecutions. It rules men by their cupidity
or by their tears ;
and, to the honour of the great ma-
jority of the upper classes in Paris, it must be told that
its failure in the salons has been equal to its success in
the streets.. It was one of the Imperial practices
to crowd every drawing-room with spies, to watch
every grade in society, and to bunt into ba-
nishment the women who still braved a greater man
than Louis Napoleon. That system is already exten-
sively renewed, and no private meeting of hall-a-dosen
guests in Paris is now considered secure. Yet, it is in
vain to banish freedom from the political constitution,
from the press, and the public assemblies of a nation,
until it has sunk and expired in the hearis of men. A
Government that promulgates an act denying all the
rights and political usages endeared to the country by
thirty years of independence founds its power in de-
fiance of all that is most vigorous and energetic among
the educated classes in France; and this Constitution,
though it be accepted now by those who sink alike
under every form of government or oppression, will
one day be thought as degrading as the fears in which
it has taken its origin.
ADVERTISER.—We yesterday published an outline
of the new French Constitution, deferring the expression
of any opinion on the character of the document, until it
should be fully before us. We now give it in ertenso ;
and we must say that we aro grievously disappointed
with this new French Constitution, if it be not a misno-
mer to call it by the name. It never can give satis-
disposal,thaendraneoan;
firtion to the people of France. If they acquiesce in it
without resistance, or without remonstrance, it must be
becaus,
of the positive their
of resistance are no longer at
to them. We medium for remonstrance is accessible
tvere disposed to make great allowances
for Louis Napoleon's coup ddtat, solely in consideration
that the majoete
Constitution assurances. given us by the Government,
itr: the Assembly meant to resort, on
tßhueteafomrosduacyh,
atyo
d'itat against the President.
now proclaimed, itution as that which he has
It is Louis there Napoleon can
ll be no excuse whatever.
supreme power in France over.
It throws the
completely
hands of the President hiniseleetely into the
of affairs in that: country, instead of
opat the state
the people, or, on the iLegislature, dependdep"iding on
on the personal character of the individual wlao entirely
to fill the presidential office. A chief magistrate,
pereonally favourable to freedom, ma-
y so adminis'tereituhge
chairs of the country, us to insure practical liberty to
the people of France ; but if, on the other hand, the
President be a man despotically disposed, the new Con-
stitution will enable him to gratify his tyrannical pro-
pensities to his heart's content. The President of tho
French Republic is to be nominally responsible to the
people, but there will be no reel responsibility. Louis
Napoleon has so contrived to render himself indepen-
dent of the popular will, that France will be powerless
any good purpose, while he
furwill be all powerful for
purposes of evil. One of the most objectionable pro-
visions of this new Cunstitution is, that which
reduces the number of Deputies to 260. This
exceedingly limited number will render the Chamber
at all times
subservient to the President's plea-
sure. The Chamber will be a mere instrument of his
will. It will be as senile as any of those so-called
legislative bodies which are conft seedly mere ma-
chines in the halide of the absolute Governments
of the Continent. Where the number is so small, the
means of influencing the majority will always be at
hand, no matter how despotic soever the purposes
of the ruler may be. We know not on what
pretext Louis Napoleon has reduced the number
of the representative body
to 260. The very
fact of sobeing
eepiug a reduction -
determined on is,
we fear, of evil augury as to the Way in which
ho wears

LONDON,

, to govern France. We cannot reconcile the idea of a
liberal and enlightened administration of public cffeirs
with a reduction of the representative body from 750 to
260 members. The number of deputies, amounting as
they did under the Provisional Government to 900, may
have been too great tor that calm and methodical appli-
cation to business, which is so necessary to the legislative
affairs of a great country bring properly transacted; but
surely there could be no necessity for leaping to the other
extreme, and reducing the Chamber to 260 members.
And then the Deputies are (to be deprived of some
of the most important privileges appertaining to the
legislative character. They are not to have the right
of taking the initiative with regard to the measures to
be discussed. The President reserves to himself the
sole right to do that. Nor will their opinion weigh
much with regard to the more important parts of the
Preeidentiel policy. lnetween the, powers which they
President reserves to himself—the authority vsstecl in
the Sentite—ihe rremberehip tor which, tey in our House
of Lords, is to be for life—and the various restric-
tions under which the Chamber will have to exercise
its functions, the Chamber of Deputies will be liole
better than a mockery in the new Constitution of France.
Tho legidetive debates, too, are not to be reported,
except uneer the supervision of the President of the
Chamber. They aro to be officially drawn up end
copies forwarded to the various journals. What sort
of reporting this will be it needs no ghost to tell
us. Whatever is favourable to the President
and his Government will doubtless obtain due prowl-
nency, while that which is the reverse will never be
permitted to ace the light. The readers of the Parisian
journals, under this state of things, will find everything
us smooth and favourable to the existing powers as the
most devoted of the President'. supporters could desire.
Again, we say, that the new Constitution will, for all
practical purposes, prove a gigantic fraud on the people
of France. It is, according to our English notions of
what Constitutions ought to be, a colossal fiction to call
it a Constitution at all. Louis Napoleon may, no doubt,
under it govern France, if he be so disposed, on the
most liberal and enlightened principles, but France will
not owe his doing so to the Constitution. They will
have to ascribe the circumstance to the fact of his being
personally better than the Constitution, in accordance
with whose provisions he is about to swear, that
he will administer the affairs over which he
presides. Another most objectionable provision in the
Napoleon Constitution is that which denies the people
the right of voting by ballot. Without the right of
secret voting there cannot, in such a country as France,
be any proper exercise of the franchise at all. Univer-
sal suffrage, without the ballot, will be, in that country,
a glaring anomaly. Nor can we withhold our most un-
qualified condemnation from that part of the Constitu-
tion which places it in the power of the President either
to pay or not, as he thinks fit, the members of the Senate
for their services. The hope 'of receiving their 30,000
francs each will make that body the veriest slaves on
earth. The name of a Republic is still to be preserved,
but, in the presence of the fact, that Louis Napoleon
takes to himself the title of Prince President, the
thing becomes a contradiction. If he takes the title
of Prince President, how can he withhold from the
nobility the titles which they enjoyed previous to
the Revolution of 1848? The thing is an utter absur-
dity. The new Constitution would have worn a sombre
enough aspect of itself. It would have been considered
a document which boded no good to France, even had it
not been ushered into existence amid ugly antecedents.
But when we remember that it was preceded by a sus-
pension of the liberty of the press—by the establishment
of a rigorous censorship, which it is understood is in-
tended to be permanent—when, which is still worse,
every man of any note who had, by speech or writing, or
in any other way, identified himself with the cause of
freedom, has been either sent to a penal colony, or been
exiled from France—when we reflect on these facts, we
cannot divest our minds of the apprehension that Louis
Napoleon has come to a determination to play the
despot. We shall be glad if events show that our ap.
prehensions are groundless. We shall be pleased to see
him turn out much better in practice than he promises to
do on paper. But if he does, he will prove an exception to
the great body of persons possessing supreme power. They
have generally promisee much, and done nothing. It
will be singular, indeed, if, while the President of
France can hardly be said to promise anything in the
new Constitution, he shall, in practice, prove himself the
friend of liberty. But we repeat, we do not anticipate
that. II ad he meant to administer the affairs of France
in a liberal and lenient spirit, he would have inaugu-
rated his new Constitution, by granting every exile for
political causes a full and free pardon, and a hearty
welcome back to his country. Elected by 7,500,000
votes, and having established the most perfect supre-
macy which the bead of a Government ever enjoyed,
ho could well have afforded to do a generous act of this
nature. With a fettered press, and no other means of
making their sentiments known to the people of France,
these proscribed persons could have caused no uneasi-
ness, bad they been permitted to return to France.
But that, instead of this, the proscription of political
opponents should still be the order of the day in
Paris—or at least was so a week ago—is a very de-
plorable fact, and one, we fear, which is sadly signifi-
cant of the state of mind in which Louis Napoleon will
apply himself to the administration of the affairs of
France.
POST.—The seven millions and a half of Frenchmen
who answered in the affirmative to the appeal of Louis
Napoleon, on the 21st December, conferred on him, it
must be recollected, not merely his position as Chiet of
the State, but the power of making a constitution on
certain bases, which were explicitly declared in the
proclamation of the 2d of December, and which have
been faithfully adhered to in the Decree of Fundamental
Law just promulgated. It follows, therefore, that the
character and provisions of this law rest, no less than
the authority of the President, on the declared arse! free
choice of the great majority of the nation. However the
Constitution may be canvassed elsewhere by the self-
elected and eager champions of the French people, it is
Theu
nel
President instrument may of
fairlyin France, and by the French tl.oaeselves, accepted as
theirth
eberettac means and
constituency as Solonidid of the Athenian democrats—" I
have given them not certainly the best laws
within
say of his vast
Government
possible, but the best that they are fit to live
ender." As might have been anticipated, no less from
the critical nature of the events in which it originated
than from the terms in which it was proposed, the Con-
stitution is neither an elaboration of any specific theories,
nor a means of sustainingn,ho hope or the power of any
particular class or party. It is simply an instrument for
carrying on, under a great emergency, a Government
which circumstances have made it a task of immense
difficulty to administer. It had become clear to the
minds of the nation at large, that the restless, uncertain,
wavering relations of political and social life in France
had become a ruinous and intolerable evil, under which
every interest of the country was rapidly sinking. The
Executive had no strength to ordain the Democratic Le-
gislature, had no consistency to ensure, either progress
or permanence in the settlement of great principles—in
the security of important operations. From this feeling
and conviction has arisen the fact that, since 1848,
the whole current of feeling in the groat mass,
not of the populace, but of the people, has steadily
set in favour of the Executive personally, and of strong
anthority as a principle. The popularity of the Pre-
sident has risen on every occasion, in proportion, not as
he was disposed to concede, hut us he seemed deter-
mined to stand firm. The nation has long felt that the
wild and noisome growth of its half century of revolu-
tion could never be cleared sway by a weak and divided
power. The mighty energies of the great Napoleon
kept down the mischief; the rashness of Charles the
Tenth brought it into action; the cunning of the Citi-
zen King concealed, yet fostered it. The catastrophe of
1848 and its sequel exposed to the dismayed eyes of the
proprietary classes the enormous height to which the
dangers around them had arisen. The disasters which
threatened to arise out of the dissensions and want of
truth of those who guided the Assembly proved that a
new power must be formed, a new source of strength
created, to re-constitute that directing and control-
ling authority without which it was clear that France
could have no hope of effecting anything to pre-
serve, much less to advance, her own internal
prosperity. A long course of centralisation had accus-
tomed every class in France to rely on the Government
for the promotion of all its objects, yet the whole ten-
dency of the Parliamentary force had been to triple and
obstruct the Executive. When, in 1851, it became once
more necessary to choose between these rival forces, the
decision fell, not into the hands of the coteries of poli-
tical society—not into those of the secret societies and
the populace of the great towns—not into those of the
agents, the dupes, or the victims of selfish factions and
furious democracy. The choice was made by millions,
numbering among them the members of every class in
the State, and the result is, that Louis Napoleon is
the chief of the people—his Constitution the law of
the land. Between such an event and civil war there was
republican theorists on the
other, had reached a point at which a
largely trusted
clearly no alternative. The monarchic parties on the
one side, and the extreme repu
and concentrated supreme power could alone cope with
of whose t 'in-
to whom this power has been given d o
tliheree years' trial,
ciples and objects the nation has ha a
their ambition and repress their violence. The Prince
is
and on the strength of this test the people have been
content to make him the trustee of those politicalh privi-
legesrd a battle
has been fought on the field of France—for and liberal institutions for which so faor
which so
much has been said, and done, and suffered—for
such noble blood had flowed—such high intellects
struggled—about which such formed, in
which
dark crime has clustered.
The Constitution which the President has
obedience to this trust, on the model of the imperial sys-
tem, professes in its first chapter, to guard these
privileges and institutions on the basis established in
1789. How far it may do so—how far it may be
directed to satisfy or resist democracy, yet not weaken
or overstrain the ruling power, is la problem to be
solved by time, and to be worked out under the
direction of Providence. To assail tither:the Con-
stitution or its author with mere abuse is neither just
nor wise. There is much in this form of Government to
render a strong ruling power possible—nothing to forbid
the existence of an intelligent and forcible representation
of the people having a considerable practicable share in
the
government of the country. The main strength in
objectt
ave was
thatr s
theh direction of affairs certainly rests with the Chief of
I-ptreo.wvEai provisional Executive,
v ept that
powers siht inevitabletehde shouldihit:heia:itdnietonwtvia
as
constitu-
tional chosenbe
—it was with that view that he has been trusted. His
Head of the State, bound by certain
laws, and pledged to
govern through a certain system.
The Constitution is, however, merely political ; it
is pure legislative machinery. Important questions of
social relations and civil rights remain to be decided
between the State and the people. These have to the
settled by organic laws, and in them will be doubtless
foued the most difficult and hazardous points of the
President's task. The two great sources of alarm which
his bitterest opponents profess to entertain are, that he
will extinguish freedom at home, and light up war