The Sun.
London, England, 1871-02-07 00:00:00

THE ELECTIONS IN FRANCE.

The Times considers that it is premature to discuss the
ultimate form of Government in France, except so far as
the views which are put forth upon it illustrate the
intellectual and political capacity of the several com-
petitors for power. The Duc D'Aumale locks fondly
back on a Constitutional Monarchy. The civic
mobs who support M. Gambetta would proclaim a Re-
public by Divine right, while the conspirators of Brussels
declare that in a restoration of the Empire is the only
chance for the salvation of France. It is difficult
to repress some feeling of scorn for those who dispute
over these forms of popular sovereignty, some
feeling of despair for France when these are her
best advisers. Starting from the premises that a Re-
public is nothing more than the government of a people
by itself, we may easily see that all these proposed
schemes of national organisation are in essence Republican.
The Empire itself was a Republic, subject to these great
defects that it was founded in violence, and that
an act of violence was necessary to enforce that
responsibility of the Emperor to the people
which was its leading idea. These blots ought
to prevent its ever being again established. A political
system which cannot be changed except by a revolution
is self-condemned. For the same reasons, that Demo-
cratic Republic which M. Gambetta, by his arbitrary de-
crees, confesses cannot exist except by the disfranchise-
ment of large masses of the nation, ought to be rejected.
M. Gambetta's Republic would begin, as it would end,
in violence. But why should there be any struggle
between a Constitutional Monarchy and a Republic where
the nation is governed by an elective representative
Legislature and an Executive holding office only while
possessing the confidence of the Legislature ? A Constitu-
tional Monarchy is nothing more nor less than this last,
with a head either hereditary or elective, and time con-
ception of such a Republic has been familiar to all
French political thinkers since the discussion on the
" amendement Grery" in 1819. It is a very good thing
to inherit a Constitutional Monarchy, or to have slowly
reduced an autocracy to this shape, but to attempt to set
up such an artificial machinery afresh is to violate the
active political tendencies of France, and thus to pave the
way for a fresh revolution.
'rue Teleyraph says : France is about to hold her elec-
tions in the midst of such gloom as falls upon nations
only once or twice in the course of their history. There
is an extraordinary muster of candidates. Legitimists,

Orleanists, Bonapartists, and Republicans are all soliciting
election. If the Dictator's thcree be annulled, the
National Assembly will afford the fairest represen-
tation of France exhibited by any Parliament since
that of 1848. If Gambetta, would only stay his hand,
there would now be so complete a change that all political
parties would rush into the field and jostle each other for
the mastery. The sleepy headquarters even of the Comte
de Chambord are said to display feverish activity. The
Due d'Aumale and the Prince de Joinville have
come forward to represent the House of Orleans.
For the first time since the Coup d'Etal the fight
in Paris will be waged by the Orleanists and the Republi-
cans, instead of by the Republicans and the Bona-
partists. The Moderate 'Republicans are, no doubt,
still the dominant party, and such men as M.
Jules Favre, M. Jules Simon, and M. Ernest
Picard may be expected to head the poll. But
the Orleanists have manifestly become formidable
opponents, even in the Democratic capital. Through-
out the North the prospects of that party are
still brighter; for the comfortable manufacturing
towns have always betrayed a strong leaning towards the
family of Louis Philippe and a monarchical form of
government. The Republicans of the North, however,
are also stirring, and the United Committees of the
Seine Inferieure have issued a proclamation in which
they declare that their party alone has never com-
promised its duty ; since " alone during the in-
famous period which ended at Sedan did it hold high and
steadfastly the national honour." As for the Bonapartists,
their sole hope lies in that great and inscrutable mass of
peasantry which has never forgotten the glories of the
First Napoleon, and from which, it is said, significantly
pathetic inquiries have come respecting le paurre Empfreur
who is now a captive in Germany. The peasants, there can
be no doubt, hate a man who has laid waste their fields,
and taken away their sons to die by the walls of Paris or
the banks of the Loire. They have no love for the Repub-
lic ; they know little or nothing of the Orleanists ; and
it is far from improbable that, if the contest were really
free, they would once more place the Bonapartists at the
head of the poll.
The Standard observes :—The deliberations of such an
Assembly as M. Gambetta aims at would be a farce.
It would have no anthotity to represent France, its
decisions for peace or war would not speak the desires
of the people, and would have no effect upon the
determination of the question, unless they should be
unconditional submission to the German terms, however
harsh they might be. M. Gambetta, if successful in this
assertion of his own authority, will find that he has
sacrificed France and destroyed all chance of that ultimate
success in the war which he professes to still cherish by
his insensate conduct. If an Assembly, fairly elected,
had rejected, as it must have done, terms of peace like
those which were at first announced, the most energetic
efforts on the part of the whole nation to continue
the war might have 'been relied upon. But now, no
matter what the terms of peace, the vote of the National
A- sembly, if it should be composed as M. Gambetta
designs, will count for nothing with the nation, and the
most passionate declarations for a continuance of the war
will find no echo except in the South. The North will
make no further efforts to continue a struggle which
is carried on by those in power, not to save France, but
to preserve the Republic and their own authority. The
parts of the country which have borne the brunt of the
war, and must be the sufferers if it should continue, will
repudiate the right of the hot-headed Republican
mobs of the South, who have made no sacrifices,
to condemn them to a struggle which under
such conditions must be a hopeless one. Who
could honestly give his voice for a renewal of the war,
however hard the terms of peace, if the direction of it
must be left in the hands of a man who has shewn that it
is not the freedom and the honour of France, but the
triumph of a faction and the gratification of miserable
personal and political hatreds for which he demands the
continuance of resistance, and to which he would sacrifice
so ninny thousands of his countrymen?