Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

M. Lainé Villevêque complained of the injustice done to writers, by depriving them, in any case, of the benefit of a jury, and pointed out the inconveniences which would naturally arise from remitting some offences of the press to the arrêts of the correctional police, and others to the award of a jury. He also thought that the article on the defamation of the Chambers was peculiarly dangerous, from their having it in their power to determine, in the first instance, what they considered of this description. Of the same kind was that relative to fóreign Princes, against which he declaimed with peculiar energy; maintaining, that the vices, acts, and crimes of sovereigns belonged properly to history, and ought to be left open to the most free and unfettered discussion. Several other members, and particularly Mr B. Constant, followed nearly the same course of observation, and a number of amendments were proposed, which were however negatived, and the project carried, as it originally stood, by a majority of 85, there being 145 for it, and 58 against it. In the Chamber of Peers, whither it was carried on the 24th of April, it encountered but little op. position, and finally passed by a majority of 130 to 50.

The second project was not so keenly contested, as in fact most of the topics which it involved had been discussed when the first was under the consideration of the Chambers. It was accordingly carried through by the most decided majo

rities.

In the discussion of the last project, that relative to the public jour nals, some strong and pointed remarks were made on that part which demanded security for the payment of fines that might afterwards be levied for the commission of the of

fences denounced in the law. MM. Daunou and B. Constant declared, that it was a mockery to tell Frenchmen that they had the power of printing and publishing their sentiments, and yet to refuse them the exercise of that power except on condition of sinking a capital of from 70,000 to 140,000 francs; a condition in the highest degree injurious and tyrannical. A journal, they said, established for several years, or even for several months, offered of itself a more substantial guarantee than any they could obtain; while, in point of right, it was as unreasonable to demand securities as hostages. These objections were answered, though, it must be confessed, in very vague and general terms, by the defenders of the principle of the law, M. Guizot, the King's Commissary, and MM. Lainé, Roger-Collard, and the Keeper of the Seals. In fine, however, after five days' discussion, the Ministry consented to the reduction of the amount of the security to be demanded, though only in the case of provincial journals, and to the modification of some other articles; and on the sitting of the 5th of May, the law passed the Chamber of Deputies by a majority of 108. On the 8th, it was carried to the Peers, where it excited little or no discussion, and on the 28th was passed, 14 only vot ing against it. Upon a survey of the whole, we cannot say that we coincide in opinion with the Keeper of the Seals, that the authors of this law "had at length established in France the liberty of the press.”

We come now to the Budget for the year, which the Minister, for the convenience of discussing it more in detail, divided into two separate projects; the first called the Law of Expenditure, which was submitted to the Chamber of Deputies on the 16th of March, and the second, call

ed the Law of Receipts, which was introduced four days after. But, for the convenience of having the whole of the estimates under our eye at once, we shall combine them together, as on former occasions:

EXPENCES.

Interest of the Public
Debt, and the Sink- Francs.
ing Fund................. 232,000,000
Civil List................ 34,000,000
Ministry of foreign af.
fairs..........

8,000,000 of Justice...... 17,460,000 of the Interior, 102,700,000 of War.......... 192,750,000 - of the Marine 45,200,000 of Finance..... 257,100,000 Total charge,......889,210,000 About L.37,050,420 Sterling.

WAYS AND MEANS.

Direct Taxes............... 363,558,000
Administration of the
national demesnes,

From this exposé, as compared with the budget of last year, a decided improvement is manifest in the French Finances. The ways and means of last year amounted only to L. 31,999,100 Sterling, while the charge was estimated at no less than L. 41,383,500, leaving a deficit to be provided for of L. 9,384,400; whereas this year they were calculated to equal the expenditure, the former exhibiting an increase of L. 5,051,420, and the latter a decrease of L. 4,333,080 Sterling. In addition to this, the Minister stated, that the surplusage on Bank stock, annuities, &c. would give an excess of ways and means over the charge, amounting to 23,372,000 francs, or about L.973,833.

From the division of the budget into two parts, it was necessarily That on the expenditure, which gave referred to two separate Committees. in its report on the 10th of May, to have entered very minuteappears ly into the different heads of charge, 17,600,000 upon all of which it proposed con113,013,000 siderable reductions; amounting in Indirect Taxes............ 174,834,500 all to 12,856,343 francs, of which Post-office........................................... 22,460,000

&C.............

Woods............

Customs...............................................

Lottery..............

163,566,000

12,500,000

5,298,500

Salt-works...... ... ... ... ..
Annuities due by the
Treasury...............
Retained on Titles...... 11,200,000
5,180,000
Total of Ways & Means 889,210,000
About L.37,050,420 Sterling, (be-
ing equal to the expenditure).

4,003,777 were under the head of
the public debt alone. The reduc-
tions voted by the Chamber, how-
ever, were eight millions in the War,
General's departments.
and 900,000 francs in the Receiver-

On the 7th of June, M. Beugnot presented the report of the Committee of Ways and Means. One of

• The following is the substance of this report in a tabular form :—

According to the Budget. According to Reduction.

the Committee.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

the inconveniences attending the division of the budget being to oblige the Chambers to enter into points which they had already decided on, we shall not attempt to enter into the detail of the different heads of Ways and Means which this Committee, like the preceding one, appears to have examined with great minuteness, and, like its predecessor too, to have come to a different conclusion from the Minister. It may suffice to mention, that they estimated the total proceeds of the ways and means at 892,000,000 francs; (being somewhat more than 24 millions above the estimates in the budget,) and the expence of collection, management, &c. at 136,000,000; leaving a net product of 750,600,000 francs applicable to the service of the current year. Into these calculations, M. Villèle appears to have entered very minutely, though we cannot say with what accuracy; for he arrives at results different both from those of the Minister and the Committee. For example, the proceeds of registration were estimated by the Minister at 181,166,800, by the Committee at 184,166,000, and by M. Villèle at 193,565,000 francs: the indirect taxes were estimated by the Ministers at 174,834,500, by the Committee at 187,324,500, and by M. Villèle at 200,000,000 francs; while the respective amounts finally fixed by the Chamber were 183,694,000, and 190,000,000 francs. In conclusion, the total amount of the ways and means definitively fixed was 891,435,000; an approximation exceedingly close to the calculation of the Minister; and so satisfied were the members of the fair and just principles upon which this approximation had been form ed, that when the vote was taken, 170 voted for, and only 5 against the project. On the 16th of July, the

budget passed through the Chamber of Peers; and on the following day, a royal ordonnance announced the termination of the session. In the interim between the passing of the budget in the Lower Chamber, and the close of the Session, the deputies were chiefly occupied in discussing petitions, and other matters purely of local importance, into which we cannot here enter.

A few general observations, however, naturally suggest themselves, when we survey the important objects to which the attention of the Legislative Body was this session directed, and the peculiar situation in which the new Ministry found themselves. And the first is, that they were obviously unprepared for the difficult and critical situation to which they were called. In the Chamber of Deputies they were hampered and restricted by never being able to calculate on a majority in support of their measures; and we have already seen that, in the case of the three laws relative to the press, they were compelled to resort to the strong, and, we believe, unprecedented measure of throwing sixty new Peers into the Upper Chamber, in order to avoid the same defeat with their predecessors. In the defence of the law of elections, and in the early part of the session, they depended for support almost entirely on the left, or opposition side of the Chamber: latterly, however, they were more generally supported by the right side; while, at the close, they stood ill with both parties, with the one for the principles they had defended, with the other for the questions they had avoided. A very few considerations will be necessary to explain this variation of fortune. Scarcely had they rescued the law of elections from a formidable attack, when in

three departments, where deputies still remained to be elected, (the Rhone, the Sarthe, and Finisterre) the operation of that law was to add to the number of their opponents. Scarcely had they exerted themselves to encourage petitions favourable to the system on which they proposed to act, when numbers poured in, whose object and aim was to strike at the very root of their power. Scarcely had the law relative to the press been passed, and which, with all its imperfections on its head, was more favourable to free discussion and the dissemination of liberal opinions than any that had hitherto been given to France, (the best proof of which is, that after the publication on the 9th of June of the law which freed the journals from the censorship, several new ones sprung up, notwithstanding the obligation imposed on them to find security in guarantee of fines that might be imposed,) when their conduct was criticised and censured with a bitterness which approached to ingratitude; for surely if they had failed to do everything, they might have been allowed credit for what, in their precarious circumstances, they were able to accomplish. The want of regular support in the Chambers necessarily rendered them timid and irresolute; they were compelled to compromise between what they wished and what they were able to effect; and they were placed in the cruel circumstances of being liable to blame, from which they found it as difficult to escape as to defend themselves. Hence it is not to be wondered, that they soon

found themselves in a situation considerably more difficult and perilous then even the Ministers whose places they occupied. But if we restrict our judgment to the session of the events of which we have been able to trace only an imperfect outline, we shall be compelled by justice to admit, that, in spite of all the embarrassments by which they were surrounded, the mortifications to which they were exposed, and the violent passions with which they had to contend, they succeeded in considerably ameliorating the representative system of France. This was the first session of the Legislative Body in which the projects of the different laws were presented in a form properly digested and arranged, in which the will of the King was not compromised for ministerial interests, and in which the principle of ministerial responsibility and the details of the budget had been effectually recognised and examined.

With the exception of some fresh outrages committed in the early part of the year against the Protestants at Nismes, by the blood-thirsty ruffians who had often imbrued their hands in their blood with impunity, and a riot, on some trifling occasion, at Montpelier, the general state of France continued tranquil. At the close of the year the new elections and the opening of the Chambers took place as usual; but in order to give a connected view of the events of each session by itself, we shall, as before, delay entering upon its proceedings till the next volume.

CHAP. XI.

THE REST OF EUROPE.

SPAIN. Death of Charles IV. and his Queen.-Proceedings of General Elio at Valentia.-State of the Finances, and of the Army and Navy.-Edict against foreigners in the service of the South American Insurgents.-Diffi culties in ratifying the treaty for the cession of the Floridas.-Discovery of a conspiracy in the expedition at Cadiz.-The introduction of the Plague. -Its ravages.-Change of Ministry.-Report of the Council of Castile.Manoeuvre of the Court.-Revolution of the 1st of January 1820.-Germany.-Deliberations of the Diet.- General State of Affairs.—Assassination of Kotzebue.-Congress of Carlsbad.-Resolutions of the Diet.-Austria. —Prussia.-Bavaria.-Baden-Wurtemberg.-Hesse Darmstadt. The Netherlands.-Denmark.-Sweden.-Russia.-Turkey.

THIS year, the events of which indicated the approach of a great crisis in the history of the Spanish Monarchy, was ushered in by accounts of the death of the Ex-King Charles IV. and of his Queen, Louisa Maria Theresa of Parma; which took place at Rome, (where they lived latterly on a pension of three millions of reals paid by their son Ferdinand,) in the month of January. The extinction of this wretched dotard, and his profligate Queen, who retained to, the last, apparently with the concurrence of her husband, Godoy, Prince of Peace, and the minion of her licentious pleasures, appears to have excited no sensation, and certainly to have produced no alteration in the relative state of parties in Spain.

Early in the year, an event occurred, trifling in itself, but important from the arbitrary proceedings to which it led, and the results with which it has since been attended. In the middle of the night of the 2d of January, information was

brought to General Elio, CaptainGeneral of the province of Valentia, that a plot had been formed against his life, and that the conspirators were then assembled in a coffee-house deliberating on the means of carrying their designs into effect. Thither he instantly repaired, accompanied by his informer and a few soldiers. On entering the retreat of the conspirators, he perceived a retired officer, Colonel Vidal, who had been pointed out as the author of the plot, and whom, having refused to surrender his sword, the General, after severely wounding him, disarmed with his own hand. After some resistance, his companions, twelve in number, were also secured, and the whole conducted to prison, tried by a court-martial, and executed on the 22d, before the courier sent to the King by the Governor with the report of the trial had returned to Valentia, with his Majesty's approval of the sentence. Vidal who, by his merits and his courage, had raised himself from the ranks, was hung like a common felon,

« ПредишнаНапред »