The New York herald., 1876-01-20
The Elections I'm France.


From the fragmentary indications of the
cable it is evident that there is a startling
surprise in store for somebody in the results
of the preliminary Senatorial elections; but
Just who will be most startled and who most
pleased cannot be determined without fuller
details of the event 1t is clear, however,
that the republicans have not succeeded so
well before the country as they did in the
coalitions of the Assembly 1t is unfortu-
nate that partly by their own want of ad-
dress, and partly by the adroitness of their
enemies, the republicans, who were the au-
thors of the constitution, and should have
gloried in their position as its supporters
and defenders, were presented to the coun-
try in the false light of its assailants. Ap-
parently the keynote of the canvass was
touched in MacNIahon's proclamation, which
contemplated the conflict as one for and
against the constitution, with the republicans
on the wrong side of the line. 1t is fact
that in a public declaration to the country,
signed by ATacMahon and Buffet, the repub-
lican party was denounced as the dangerous
element in national politics; and Say and
Dufaure, moderate republicans, seemed by
the retention of places in the Cabinet to as
sent to this declaration. Although M. Gam
beta, in a letter to counsellor of Cahors,
declared formally that the principle of the re-
publican party was the support of the consti-
tuition, yet the formal declaration, probably,
rested in very few minds while, apparently,
NJ Gambetta has gone very far in the vio-
lence of his assaults on the opponents of re-
publicanism for, in view of the moderate
spirit lately exhibited by authority generally,
it would not have ventured the questionable
step of forbidding the meetings that he was
engaged to address if he had not challenged
this by extreme virulence, But as the re-
publicSns have been beaten, who are the
conservatives" who have won ? 1t appears
that large number of them are the ing.-
NOUS gentlemen who are ready to assure
everybody that ''peta bonhomme UH encore"
They are Bonapartists, and the one moral
of the election is that it justifes the conf
dence that all members of that party have
always had in the ''dppel du peuple' for this
election was an appeal to universal suffrage
in their own style-that is, an appeal in
which an enormous advantage was given to
the country districts This may be seen by
the simplest examination of the origin of the
electoral bodies that are to choose Senators
There are 35. 7SS delegates from communes,
1920 councillors general 3, 491 councillors of
arrondissements and 742 deputies. In all
tbarafOra tho 0O5 Senators will ha obocar h,,
an aggregate vote of AZ, ,941, Of which FIVE
sixths will be delegates from communes.
Every commune sends one delegate There
are sixty-nine communes in France that have
upward of 10000 inhabitants each; say
1,3S0,000 people, with only sixty votes
for Senators. There are III communes that
have population between 10, 900 and 90 900.
Assume an average of Is, 500, and we have
1,755, 900 people with only III votes. Here,
therefore, is a population of 5000, ,000 max
ing up all the communes with population
of over 10000 each which cast for Senators
only 1S6 votes. On the other hand, there
are 27,390 communes whose population
ranges from under 100 up to 1000 The
sum of population in these communes is about
12,000,000. In the small communes spread
all over the rural districts are the peasants,
subject to priest and mayor, who is gen.
orally an old Bonapartist, and here II, 900, 900
of population have 27,390 votes; and in the
larger unes-manufacturing towns
ports, cities-where republican ideas -four
ish, one-quarter of this number of persons
instead of having one-quarter the number of
votes, which would be 6.S47, have only 1856
Here is the trap in which the republicans
have been caught.