Lectures on the French Revolution

VIII. THE CONSTITUTIONAL DEBATES

LectFrRevol_051-100.indd 95 4/27/12 9:59 AM VIII THE CONSTITUTIONAL DEBATES When the Assembly passed the Rights of Man, they acted in harmony for the last time. Agreement on first principles did not involve agreement in policy, and in applying them to the Constitution , a week later, the division ofparties appeared. From the tennis court to the great constitutional debate, the Moderates, who may be called the Liberals, were predominant. Mounier was their tactician, Clermont Tonnerre and Lally Tollendal were their orators, Malouet was their discreet adviser. They hoped, by the division of powers and the multiplication of checks, to make their country as free as England or America. They desired to control the Representatives in three ways: by a Second Chamber , the royal veto, and the right of dissolution. Their success depended on the support of Ministers and of reconciled Conservatives . Whilst the Constitution for them was a means of regulating and restraining the national will, it was an instrument for accomplishing the popular will for their rivals rising to power on the crest of the wave. The Democrats refused to resist the people, legitimately governing itself, either by the English or the American division of power. There was little concentration yet of the working class in towns, for the industrial age had hardly dawned, and it was hard to understand that the Third Estate contained divergent interests and the material of a coming conflict. The managers of the democratic party were Duport, Lameth, and Barnave, aided sometimes by Sieyes, sometimes by Talleyrand, and by their sworn enemy Mirabeau. 95 LectFrRevol_051-100.indd 96 4/27/12 9:59 AM THE FRENCH REVOLUTION The nobles, weak in statesmanship, possessed two powerful debaters : Cazales, who reminded men of Fox, but who, when not on his legs, had little in him; and Maury, afterwards Cardinal and Archbishop ofParis, a man whose character was below his talents. Numbering nearly a third of the Assembly, and holding the balance, it was in their power to make a Constitution like that of 1814. How these three parties acted in that eventful September, and what in consequence befell, we have now to consider. The five weeks from August 27 to October 1 were occupied with the constitutional debates. They were kept within narrow limits by the Rights of Man, which declared that the nation transmits all powers and exercises none. On both sides there were men who were impatient of this restriction, and by whom it was interpreted in contrary ways. Some wished for security that the national will should always prevail, through its agents; the others, that they should be able to obstruct it. They struggled for an enlarged construction , and strove to break the barrier, in the republican or the royalist direction. The discussion opened by a skirmish with the clergy. They observed the significant omission of a State church in the Declaration of Rights, and feared that they would be despoiled and the Church disestablished. The enthusiasm of the first hour had cooled. One after another, ecclesiastics attempted to obtain the recognition of Catholicism. Each time the attempt was repulsed. The clergy drifted fast into the temper which was confessed by Maury when he said, "The proposed measure would enable the Constitution to live: we vote against it." The scheme ofthe Committee was produced on August 31, and was explained by Lally in a speech which is among the finest compositions of the time. He insisted on the division of the legislative, and the unity of the executive, as the essentials of a free government . On the following day Mirabeau spoke on the same side. He said that the danger was not from the Crown, but from the representatives ; for they may exclude strangers and debate in secret, as the English law allows, and these may declare themselves permanent , and escape all control. Through the king, the public possesses the means ofholding them in check. He is their natural ally against usurping deputies, and the possible formation ofa new aristocracy. The legislature enjoys a temporary mandate only. The perpetual LectFrRevol_051-100.indd 97 4/27/12 9:59 AM THE CONSTITUTIONAL DEBATES representative of the people is the king. It is wrong to deny him powers necessary for the public interest. It is the partial appearance ofa view that was expanded by Napoleon. Mounier defended his plan on September 4. On several points there was no large...