New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1877-11-19
NfCV4HON .STBVITS.

Gambetta was a true prophet. Within five
weeks from the election of the new Chamber
Of Deputies the De Broglie and De FOurtOu
Ministry has been compelled to resign, and the
Marshll-president faces the alternative which
was predicted for him. He does not resign, OF
course we presume that no one in France,
friend or foe, suspected that he would give up
his place and power while there remained any
possibility of retaining them in his own hands.
1t seems likely, indeed, that he would have
attempted to keep his Ministers, if they had
not been clearer sighted than himself. But
every day, since the election, has deepened
and brOadencd the moral effect of the
Republican triumph, and there is wisdom
enough among the leaders of the sepa-
rate monarchcal factions to perceive
the grave danger which must ensue
to each and all of them from further resistance.
The thirty members Of the Senate, who have
now formally announced to MacNlahOn that
they will not agree to a new dissolution of the
Chamber of Deputies, manifest only the COM
monest prudence; but the circumstance that NJ.
Bocher, the leader of the Constitutional u
which is the Orleanist-bOdy, speaks for his
entire party, betTays "a distinct division Of the
ant-Republican combination. Further, the
army has gradually learned the true nature of
the crisis, and is no longer the compliant in
strument which it might have been on the 10th
of May last. The alternative of submission or
resignation could scarcely have been presented
to MacMahOn in a more peremptOry manner.
The new Ministry, however, even if the
names be correctly reported and the members
should accept the offered responsibility, cannot
he considered as indicating q frank and full
submission to the will of the majority. 1t has
rather the air of being IA temporzing trick
and will probably inspire more disgust and
suspicion than confidence. In fact the list of
names sounds almost like burlesque: not
one is known outside of France, nor we sus-
pect, is generally known there. Whoever
heard of NJ Lefebvre-Behenne, to be
Minister of Foreign Affairs Or of Cen
eral Grimaudet de Rochebouet9 Or of
Welche, Fare, Ozcnne, or Graftl Moreover
the declaration that this Ministry will only
hold office professionally, shows that it is only
an awkward ad interim organization of the
Government MacAlahOn's advisers seem TO
have selected men, for or against whom moth
ing could be specially said, in order that each,
in turn, or all together, may be replaced as
Executive strife with the legal and moral ma
iority of the French people. Therefore, al
though the act is an acknowledgment of the
defeat of the Government, it by no means
indicates that the struggle is over.
The most significant feature of the present
state of affairs is the attitude of the three mon
archical parties. The BOnapartists, who gained
most in the recent election, are disappointed,
bitter, defiant, ready for extreme measures
the Legitimists keep disrreetly quiet and the
Ultramontane element, which stands behind
both, withdraws its hands from view and hides
them in its capaciOus sleeves. The Orleansts
thus hold the solution of the crisis, so far as
the Senate is concerned, and the restraint
which they have put upon the Government
separates them sharply and deeply from their
late allies. They may not gain much for their
cause by the policy, but they have at least
avoided position of antagOnism, and have kept
their peace with the French people. If, in the
future, the hope Of reestablshing their dynasty
must be relnquished, they may all the more
easily coalesce with the successful Republic,
having secured claim to its favor. 1t is al
most impossible to Overestmate the value, to
France, of her political experience during the
past six months. Now that the grievous trial
has been so molly endured, and the danger
seems TO be at an end we can scarcely regret
that the crisis was unnecessarily forced upon
the nation. Nothing else could have so mani
tested the natural, steadfast Republican senti-
ment of the people, and the rapidity of their
development under free institutions.
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