The people do not disperse. The soldiers open fire, there are deaths. The findings of an inquest on those killed come before a coroner's jury which establishes the facts in each case. If the jury decides that the intervention of the armed forces was not justified by the circumstances, it brings in a verdict of premeditated murder against all the participants, including therefore the civilian official who gave permission for the intervention of the troops, the officer who gave the order to fire, and all the soldiers who actually opened fire. If the civilian official did not give permission for intervention, the consequence is merely that he does not figure in the verdict.
Matters remain unaltered as far as the officers and soldiers are concerned.
This verdict of premeditated murder is a formal indictment, on the basis of which criminal proceedings are instituted before the regular courts with their juries. In Prussia things are quite different. In Prussia the soldier declares that his immediate superior gave him the order to fire, and this frees him from all punishment. In Prussia, and likewise in France, the official is assured of complete impunity for every violation of the law when he can prove that the order for it had come from his proper superior in the proper hierarchical way.