Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1897-05-25
Ex-Ambassador Eustis on the
French People.
Regards Them as Wonderful Nation.
Behind Us in Government.
Thinks Proposed Arbitration treaty With Eng.
land a Sentimental Farce.

| Eustis, drove to the Elyses palace, to-
day. and presented his letters of recall
TO President Faure. After the cere-
mony, Mr.. Eustis granted an interview
to a reporter of The Associated Press
and gave the latter, in an interesting
way his impressions of France, ex-
pressed his admiration for the French
people and gave his opinion Of the re-
| jected arbitration treaty. Mr.. Eusti5
said
i My four years residence in France
has afforded me a very favorable OPP
portunity of studying French institu-
| lions and ii has been a most interesting
study, as it has enabled me to contrast
the working of republican government
in France and constitutional govern
ment in the United States. There are
strong points of dissimilarity. They are
| called sister republics. but as to fun
| damental principles, they are not very
| closely related.
| In our constitutional, personals
rights, personal liberty and the free
| dom of the citizen from the arbitrary
| interference OF the government ar,
| specifically protected Here, these con-
stitutional guarantees are unknown,
nor are all the other rights. which ire
secured to the citizen accused of crime
| under our system, unknown to the
French constitution, such as the right
to bail, the writ of habeas corpus, and
| many others.
THE French constitution is based
upon the idea of political liberty. Gus
upon The idea of personal liberty. In
| advocacy of personal liberty. France
has never produced a single great man,
the fact being that no matter how
ardent a Republican a Frenchman may
be and how great may have been his
devotion to the political rights of the
people, he does not seem to be able to
form the slightest conception of what
are known in England and the United
States as the fundamental rights of
personal liberty. $780,
''They made a revolution to destroy
one Bastile, but they have many. to-
day, uponthe Republican soil of France.
owing to their system of arbitrary ar
rests. detentions and .perquisltions
which exist only under the most auto
cratic form of government.
THE fact is that every Judge din
struction is invested with a power to
Cypress innocent citizens. so that he
| may become petty tyrant, depriving
them of their liberty for an indefinite
period, denying to them access to any
member of their family and the aid
and advice Of counsel. To an Ameri-
can such a system would render his life
intolerable. 1t could be wiped out Of
existence in one day, but no one seems
to consider it sufficiently important to
protect the personal liberty of the citi-
zens.
1T is very extraordinary that when
the French adopted their present con-
stitution ours had been in successful
operation for over So years and yet they
did not borrow single idea or copy a
single provision of our constitution,
which an English statesman has pro-
nounced to be the greatest work of
human reason. This only illustrates
what is observable with regard to other
matters-how intensely French every
thing is in France.
The French certainly do deserve
great deal of credit for having main
tanned their republic in the face of such
adverse circumstances. but they pre-
sent the strange anomaly of self-gov-
erning people, being fond of the con-
slant and unremitting interference of
tit SoNSIIiilcHt III tHelT pefSoflll dilduS
and their personal relations and being
supremacy Indifferent to the rights of
personal liberty.
THE ignorance of public men in
France with regard to the working of
our constitutional government has
often amazed me.
"As regards the French people, my
residence in Paris has increased my
admiration for them. / consider them
a most marvellous people as regards
their intelligence. their thrift. their
habits of sobriety, their wonderful re-
sources and their devotion to political
liberty. and if. as we do. they would
allow their free Institutions to develop
instead of dwarfing the individuals.
their national power would be much
greater than it is now"
LAS you We're for years a member of
the Senate foreign relations committee,
what is your opinion of the rejected
treaty of arbitration between Great
Britain and the United States?"'
Il have always considered it a sem
timental farce. 1t is based upon :,
false idea in the first place that the in
telligent processes of diplomacy are in
adequate to adjust differences between
the two governments and secondly that
the American process of special arbitra-
ton will not be resorted to when diplo-
macy fails. Both of these assumpt ions
are falsifed. even by our very late ex-
perience. and it is a humiliating con-
fession by both governments to admit
that these potent instrumentalities are
not to be within their reach in the
future as they have been in the past.
IF, on the ether hand, it means that
the feeling of hostility between the two
is 50 pronounced that it is
necessary to establish a disciplinary
tribunal to keep them in order and to
prevent them from rushing at each
others threats (Which is a preposter-
Gus suppositicn any permanent tribu-
nal Of arbitration would be brushed
aside and utterly fail of it's intended.
Lurpose."
What are your plans Dow?'