The Modern Regime Volume I Part 31

VII. Munic.i.p.al and general councillors under the Empire.

Quality of munic.i.p.al and general councilors under the Consulate and the Empire.--Object of their meetings.--Limits of their power.--Their real role.--Role of the prefect and of the government.

Observe the selections which he imposes on himself beforehand; these selections are those to which he has tied down the electoral bodies.

Being the subst.i.tute of these bodies, he takes, as they do, general councilors from those in the department who pay the most taxes, and munic.i.p.al councilors from those most taxed in the canton. One the other hand, by virtue of the munic.i.p.al law, it is from the munic.i.p.al councilors that he chooses the mayor. Thus the local auxiliaries and agents he employs are all notables of the place, the leading landowners and largest manufacturers and merchants. He systematically enrolls the distributors of labor on his side, all who, through their wealth and residence, through their enterprises and expenditure on the spot, exercise local influence and authority. In order not to omit any of these, and be able to introduce into the general council this or that rich veteran of the old regime, or this or that parvenu of the new regime who is not rich, he has reserved to himself the right of adding twenty eligible members to the list, "ten of which must be taken from among citizens belonging to the Legion of Honor, or having rendered important services, and ten taken from among the thirty in the department who pay the most taxes." In this way none of the notables escape him; he recruits them as he pleases and according to his needs, now among men of the revolution who he does not want to see discredited or isolated,[4124] now among men of the old monarchy whom he wants to rally to himself by favor or by force. Such is the Baron de Vitrolles,[4125] who, without asking for the place, becomes mayor of Versailles and councilor-general in Ba.s.ses-Alps, and then, a little later, at his peril, inspector of the imperial sheepfolds. Such is the Count de Villele, who, on returning to his estate of Morville, after an absence of fourteen years, suddenly, "before having determined where he would live, either in town or in the country," finds himself mayor of Morville. To make room for him, his predecessor is removed and the latter, "who, since the commencement of the Revolution, has performed the functions of mayor," is let down to the post of a.s.sistant. Shortly after this the government appoints M. de Villele president of the cantonal a.s.sembly. Naturally the a.s.sembly, advised underhandedly, presents him as a candidate for the general council of Haute-Garonne, and the government places him in that office.--"All the notable land-owners of the department formed part of this council, and the Restoration still found us there seven years afterwards. General orders evidently existed, enjoining the prefects to give preference in their choice to the most important land-owners in the country." Likewise, Napoleon everywhere selects the mayors from the rich and well-to-do cla.s.s"; in the large towns he appoints only "people with carriages."[4126] Many of them in the country and several in the towns are legitimists[4127], at least at heart, and Napoleon knows it; but, as he says; "these folks do not want the earthquake"; they are too much interested, and too personally, in the maintenance of order.[4128]

Moreover, to represent his government, he needs decorative people; and it is only these who can be so gratis, be themselves, look well, at their own expense, and on the spot. Besides, they are the most informed, the best able to supervise accounts, to examine article by article the budgets of the department and commune, to comprehend the necessity of a road and the utility of a ca.n.a.l, to offer pertinent observations, to proclaim wise decisions, to obey orders as discreet and useful collaborators. All this they will not refuse to do if they are sensible people. In every form of government, it is better to be with the governors than with the governed, and in this case, when the broom is wielded from above and applied so vigorously and with such meticulousness to everybody and everything, it is well to be as near the handle as possible.

And what is still better, they will volunteer, especially at the beginning, if they are good people. For, at least during the first years, one great object of the new government is the re-establishment of order in the local as well as in the general administration. It is well-disposed and desires to mend matters; it undertakes the suppression of robbery, theft, embezzlement, waste, premeditated or unintentional arrogation of authority, extravagance, negligence and failure.

"Since 1790,"[4129] says the First Consul to the minister of the interior, "the 36,000 communes represent, in France, 36,000 orphans.

.. girls abandoned or plundered during ten years by their munic.i.p.al guardians, appointed by the Convention and the Directory. In changing the mayors, a.s.sistants, and councilors of the commune, scarcely more has been done than to change the mode of stealing; they have stolen the communal highway, the by-roads, the trees, and have robbed the Church;[4130] they have stolen the furniture belonging to the commune and are still stealing under the spineless munic.i.p.al system of year VIII."

All these abuses are investigated and punished;[4131] he thieves are obliged to restore and will steal no more. The county budget, like of the State, must now be prepared every year,[4132] with the same method, precision, and clearness, receipts on one side and expenses on the other, each section divided into chapters and each chapter into articles, the state of the liabilities, each debt, the state of the a.s.sets and a tabular enumeration of distinct resources, available capital and unpaid claims, fixed income and variable income, certain revenue and possible revenue. In no case must "the calculation of presumable expenditure exceed the amount of presumable income." In no case must "the commune demand or obtain an extra tax for its ordinary expenses." Exact accounts and rigid economy, such are everywhere indispensable, as well as preliminary reforms, when a badly kept house has to be transformed into one which is kept in good order. The First Consul has at heart these two reforms and he adheres to them. Above all there must be no more indebtedness; now, more than one-half of the communes are in debt. "Under penalty of dismissal, the prefect is to visit the communes at least twice a year, and the sub-prefect four times a year.[4133] A reward must be given to mayors who free their commune of debt in two years, and the government will appoint a special commissioner to take charge of the administration of a commune which, after a delay of five years, shall not be liberated. The fifty mayors who, each year, shall have most contributed to unenc.u.mber their commune and a.s.sure that is has resources available, shall be summoned to Paris at the expense of the State, and presented in solemn session to the three consults. A column, raised at the expense of the government and placed at the princ.i.p.al entrance of the town or village, will transmit to posterity the mayor's name, and, besides, this inscription: 'To the guardian of the commune, a grateful country.'"

Instead of these semi-poetic honors adapted to the imaginations of the year VIII, take the positive honors adapted to the imaginations of the year XII, and the following years, brevets and grades, decorations of the Legion d'Honneur, the t.i.tles of chevalier, baron, and count,[4134]

presents and endowments,--the rewards offered to the representatives of local society, the same as to the other functionaries, but on the same condition that they will likewise be functionaries, that is to say, tools in the hands of the government. In this respect, every precaution is taken, especially against those who, forming a collective body, may be tempted to consider themselves a deliberative a.s.sembly, such as munic.i.p.al and general councils, less easily handled than single individuals and, at times, capable of not being quite so docile. None of these can hold sessions of more than fifteen days in the year; each must accept its budget of receipts and expenses, almost complete and ready made, from the prefecture. In the way of receipts, its powers consist wholly in voting certain additional and optional centimes, more or less numerous, at will, "within the limits established by law";[4135] again, even within these limits, its decision can be carried out only after an examination and approval at the prefecture. There is the same regulation in regard to expenses; the council, indeed, munic.i.p.al or general, is simply consultative; the government delegates the mayor, sub-prefect, or prefect, who prescribes what must be done. As the preliminary steps are taken by him, and he has constant direction of the local council for two weeks, and finally the right of confirmation, he controls it, and then for eleven months and a half, having sole charge of the daily and consecutive execution of its acts, he reigns in the local community.

Undoubtedly, having received and expended money for the community, he is accountable and will present his yearly accounts at the following session; the law says[4136] that in the commune, "the munic.i.p.al council shall listen to and may discuss the account of munic.i.p.al receipts and expenses." But read the text through to the end, and note the part which the law, in this case, a.s.signs to the munic.i.p.al council. It plays the part of the chorus in the antique tragedy: it attends, listens, approves, or disapproves, in the background and subordinate, approved or rebuked, the princ.i.p.al actors remain in charge and do as they please; they grant or dispute over its head, independently, just as it suits them. In effect, it is not to the munic.i.p.al council that the mayor renders his accounts, but "to the sub-prefect, who finally pa.s.ses them,"

and gives him his discharge. Whatever the council may say, the approval is valid; for greater security, the prefect, if any councilor proves refractory, "may suspend from his functions" a stubborn fellow like him, and restore in the council the unanimity which has been partially disturbed.--In the department, the council-general must likewise "listen" to the accounts for the year; the law, owing to a significant omission, does not say that is may discuss them. Nevertheless, a circular of the year IX requests it to "make every observation on the use of the additional centimes" which the importance of the subject demands, to verify whether each sum debited to expenses has been used for the purpose a.s.signed to it, and even "to reject expenses, stating the reasons for this decision, which have not been sufficiently justified." And better still, the minister, who is a liberal, addresses a systematic series of questions to the general councils, on all important matters,[4137] "agriculture, commerce, and manufactures, asylums and public charities, public roads and other works, public instruction, administration properly so called, state of the number of population, public spirit and opinions," collecting and printing their observations and desires. After the year IX, however, this publication stops; it renders the general councils too important; it might rally the entire population of the department to them and even of all France that could read; it might hamper the prefect and diminish his ascendancy.

From now on, it is the prefect alone who replies to these questions, and of which the government gives an a.n.a.lysis or tables of statistics;[4138]

then, the publication of these ceases; decidedly, printing always has its drawbacks--ma.n.u.script reports are much better; local affairs are no longer transacted outside the bureaus, and are managed with closed doors; any report that might spread outside the prefect's cabinet or that of the minister, is carefully toned down or purposely stifled, and, under the prefect's thumb, the general council becomes an automaton.

In private, dealing directly with the Emperor's representative, it appears as if one is dealing directly with the Emperor. Consider these few words--in the presence of the Emperor; they carry an immeasurable weight in the scales of contemporaries. For them, he has every attribute of Divinity, not only omnipotence and omnipresence, but again omniscience, and, if he speaks to them, what they feel far surpa.s.ses what they imagine. When he visits a town and confers with the authorities of the place on the interests of the commune or department, his interlocutors are bewildered; they find him as well informed as themselves, and more clear-sighted; it is he who explains their affairs to them. On arriving the evening before, he calls for the summaries of facts and figures, every positive and technical detail of information, reduced and cla.s.sified according to the method taught by himself and prescribed to his administrators.[4139] During the night he has read all this over and mastered it; in the morning, at dawn, he has taken his ride on horseback; with extraordinary promptness and accuracy, his topographical glance has discerned "the best direction for the projected ca.n.a.l, the best site for the construction of a factory, a harbor, or a dike."[4140] To the difficulties which confuse the best brains in the country, to much debated, seemingly insoluble, questions, he at once presents the sole practical solution; there it is, ready at hand, and the members of the local council had not seen it; he makes them touch it with their fingers. They stand confounded and agape before the universal competence of this wonder genius. "He's more than a man" exclaimed the administrators of Dusseldorf to Beugnot.[4141] "Yes," replied Beugnot, "he's the devil!" In effect, he adds to mental ascendancy the ascendancy of force; we always see beyond the great man in him the terror-striking dominator; admiration begins or ends in fear; the soul is completely subjugated; enthusiasm and servility, under his eye, melt together into one sentiment of impa.s.sioned obedience and unreserved submission.[4142]

Voluntarily and involuntarily, through conviction, trembling, and fascinated, men abdicate their freedom of will to his advantage. The magical impression remains in their minds after he has departed. Even absent, even with those who have never seen him, he maintains his prestige and communicates it to all who command in his name. Before the prefect, the baron, the count, the councilor of state, the senator in embroidered uniform, gilded and garnished with decorations, every munic.i.p.al or general council loses his free will and becomes incapable of saying no, only too glad if not obliged to say yes "inopportunely,"

to enter upon odious and disagreeable undertakings, to simulate at one's own expense, and that of others, excessive zeal and voluntary self-sacrifice, to vote for and hurrah at patriotic subscriptions of which it must contribute the greatest portion and for supplementary conscriptions[4143] which seize their sons that are except or bought out of service.[4144] It allows itself to be managed; it is simply one of the many wheels of our immense machine, one which receives its impulsion elsewhere, and from above, through the interposition of the prefect.--But, except in rare cases, when the interference of the government applies it to violent and oppressive schemes, it is serviceable; fixed in position, and confining itself to turning regularly and noiselessly in its little circle, it may, in general, still render the double service demanded of it in the year IX, by a patriotic minister. According to the definition which Chaptal then gave the general councils, fixing their powers and competence, they exist for two purposes and only two:[4145] they must first "insure to the governed impartiality in the a.s.sessment of taxes along with the verification of the use of the latest levies in the payment of local expenses," and next, they must, with discretion and modesty, "obtain for the government the information which alone enables it to provide for the necessities of each department and improve the entire working of the public administration."

VIII. Excellence of Local Government after Napoleon.

The inst.i.tution remains intact under the Restoration.

--Motives of the governors.--Excellence of the machine.

--Abdication of the administrator.

Such is the spirit of the inst.i.tution and such is its form. After 1814 and 1815, after the fall of the Empire and the Restoration, the inst.i.tution subsists and remains as it was before in form and in spirit: it is always the government which appoints and directs all the representatives of local society, in the department, in the commune, and in the intermediate circ.u.mscriptions, the prefect, sub-prefects, mayors and a.s.sistants, the councilors of the department, of the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt and of the commune. Whatever the ruling power may be it is repugnant to any change; never does it voluntarily restrict itself in its faculty of bestowing or withholding offices, authority, consideration, influence, or salaries, every desirable and every desired good thing; as far as it can, it retains these in its own hands to distribute them as it pleases, and in its own interest to bestow them on its partisans and to deprive its adversaries of them, to attract clients and create minions. The four thousand offices of prefect, sub-prefect, and councilors of the prefecture, department, and arrondiss.e.m.e.nt, the four hundred thousand offices of mayor, a.s.sistants, and munic.i.p.al councilors, and added to these, the innumerable salaried employments of auxiliary or secondary agents, from the secretary-general of the prefecture down to the secretary of the mayor, from the scribes and clerks of the prefecture and sub-prefecture down to the staff of the munic.i.p.al police and of the octroi in the towns, from the city or department architect down to the lowest road-surveyor, from the watchmen and superintendents of a ca.n.a.l or harbor down to the field-guards and stone-breakers or the highway, directly or indirectly, the const.i.tutional government disposes of them in the same fas.h.i.+on as the imperial government, with the same interference in the most trifling details and in the most trifling affair. Commune or department, such local society remains under the second Regime what it was under the first one, an extension of the central society, an appendix of the State, an adjunct of the great establishment of which the seat is at Paris. In these adjuncts, controlled from above, nothing is changed, neither the extent and limits of the circ.u.mscription, nor the source and hierarchy of powers, nor the theoretic framework, nor the practical mechanism, not even the names.[4146] After the prefects of Empire come the prefects of the Restoration, the same in t.i.tle and uniform, installed in the same mansion, to do the same work, with equal zeal, that is to say, with dangerous zeal, to such an extent that, on taking leave of their final audience, on setting out for their department, M. de Talleyrand, who knows men and inst.i.tutions profoundly, gives them, as his last injunction, the following admirable order: "And, especially, no zeal!

"--According to the recommendation of Fouche, "the Bourbons slept in the bed of Napoleon," which was the bed of Louis XIV., but larger and more comfortable, widened by the Revolution and the Empire, adapted to the figure of its latest occupant, and enlarged by him so as to spread over the whole of France. When, after twenty-five years of exile, one returns home, it is pleasant to find such a bed in the house ready made, taking down and remaking the old one would give double trouble; moreover, in the old one, one was less at his ease; let us profit by all that rebels and the usurper have done that was good. In this particular, not alone the king, but again the most antiquated of the Bourbons are revolutionaries and Bonapartists; despotic traditionally, and monopolists through their situation, they accept with no regrets the systematic demolition effected by the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, and the systematic centralization inst.i.tuted by the First Consul. The Duc d'Angouleme, when, in 1815, he was paraded about the country, among the bridges, ca.n.a.ls, and splendid roads of Languedoc, on being reminded that these fine works were formerly executed by the "etats" of the province, dryly replied "We prefer the departments to the provinces."[4147]

With the exception of a few antiquarian and half-rustic royalists, n.o.body objects; there is no thought of reconstructing the machine on another plan; in sum, n.o.body is dissatisfied with the way it works. It works well, most effectively; under the Restoration as under the Empire, it renders to those who are interested the service demanded of it; it goes on providing better and better for the two grand objects of local society, care for the public highways and protection against natural calamities. In 1814, its net results are already admirable and do it credit--reparation of the ruins acc.u.mulated by the Revolution,[4148]

the continuation and completion of former projects, new and striking enterprises, dikes against the sea and the rivers, basins, moles, and jetties in the harbors, quays, and bridges, locks and ca.n.a.ls, public edifices, 27,200 kilometers of national roads and 18,600 kilometers of departmental roads,[4149] without counting the district roads just laid out; all this done regularly, exactly, and economically, Charles Nicolas, "Les Budgets de la France depuis le commencement du XIXe siecle." In 1816, the four direct contributions returned, in princ.i.p.al, 249 millions, and, in additional centimes, 89 millions only. For a long time the additional centimes applied to the local service and voted by the department or by the commune are not many and do not exceed 5 %. of the princ.i.p.al. by competent functionaries, employed and superintended, who at first through fear are compelled to be prudent, and then through habit and honor have become honest accountants; there is no waste, no underhand stealing, no arbitrary charges; no sum is turned aside between receipts and expenses to disappear and be lost on the road, or flow out of its channel in another direction. The sensitive taxpayer, large or small, no longer smarts under the painful goad which formerly p.r.i.c.ked him and made him jump. Local taxation, annexed to the general tax, is found to be reformed, lightened, and duly proportioned. Like the princ.i.p.al, the "additional centimes" are an equitable charge, graduated according to the sum of net revenue; like the princ.i.p.al, they are a.s.sessed according to the a.s.sumed sum of this net revenue by the councils of the arondiss.e.m.e.nts among the communes, and by the communal a.s.sessors among the inhabitants. They are collected by the same collector, with the same formalities, and every taxpayer who thinks himself taxed too heavily finds a court of appeal in the council of the prefecture, before which he can make his claim and obtain the release or reduction of his quota.--Thus no crying iniquity exists, nor keen suffering; on the other hand, there are the infinite conveniences and daily enjoyment of possessions, the privation of which, to the modern man, is equal to the lack of fresh, pure air, physical security and protection against contagion, facilities for circulation and transport, pavements, light, the salubrity of healthy streets purged of their filth, and the presence and vigilance of the munic.i.p.al and rural police.

All these benefits, the objects of local society, are due to the machine which works with little cost, without breaking down or stopping for any long time, as lately under the Republic, and without any extortion and clas.h.i.+ng, as in the times of the ancient Regime. It works by itself, almost without the help of the parties interested, and which, in their eyes, is not its least merit; with it, there is no bother, no responsibility, no elections to attend to, no discussions to maintain, no resolutions to pa.s.s. There is only one bill to be settled, not even a specified bill, but a surplus of centimes added to each franc, and included with the princ.i.p.al in the annual quota. Just like an owner who, by his correct, exact, and somewhat slow although punctual and capable supervisors, are relieved of the care of his property. He may dismiss the head steward of his domain in a fit of ill-humor, but, if he changes his stewards, he does not change the system; he is too accustomed to it, and his indolence demands it; he is not tempted to take care and trouble on himself, nor is he qualified to become his own intendant.

And what is worse, in the present case the master has forgotten that he is the owner of his domain, he hardly remembers that he is a personality. Whether large or small, department or commune, local society has no longer the consciousness of being a natural body, composed of involuntarily united members with common interests; this sentiment, already weakened and drooping at the end of the ancient regime, lost under the multiplied attacks of the Revolution and under the prolonged compression of the Empire. During twenty-five years it has suffered too much; it has been too arbitrarily manufactured or mutilated, too frequently recast, and made and unmade.--In the commune, everything has been upset over and over again, the territorial circ.u.mscription, the internal and external system, all collective property. To the 44,000 munic.i.p.alities improvised by the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, there succeeded under the Directory 6000 or 7000 cantonal munic.i.p.alities, a sort of local syndicate, represented in each commune by a subaltern agent, and then, under the Consulate, 36,000 distinct and permanent communes. Sovereign at the start, through the improvidence and abdication of the Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, the communes become, in the hands of the Convention, so many timorous subjects surrendered to the brutality of perambulating pashas and resident agas, imposed upon them by Jacobin tyranny; then under the Empire, a docile herd governed in a correct way from above, but possessing no authority of their own, and therefore indifferent to their own affairs and utterly wanting in public spirit. Other more serious blows affect of the them still more deeply and acutely. Through a decree of the Legislative a.s.sembly, in every commune where a third of the inhabitants demand a part.i.tion of the communal property, the commune is stripped, and its time-honored patrimony is set off in equal lots, in portions according to families or per head, and converted into small private holdings. (Page 319/584)Through a decree of the Convention, the whole of the communal fortune, its debts and a.s.sets, are swallowed up by the public fortune and engulfed along with that in the sale of real property, in the discredit of the a.s.signats, and in the final bankruptcy. After this prolonged process, communal property, even when disgorged and restored by the exchequer, is not what it was before; once out of the monster's stomach, the remains of it, dismembered, spoilt, half-digested, are no longer held sacred and inviolable; a settlement of accounts intervenes; "there are a good many communes," says Napoleon[4150] "whose debts have been paid and whose property was not sold; there are many others whose property has been sold and whose debts are not paid.... The result is that many pieces of property in certain communes are not considered reputable." Consequently, he first deprives these of one-tenth of their income from land, and then one-quarter of the produce of their extra cuttings of timber,[4151] and finally, their capital, the whole of their real property,[4152] estimated at 370 millions; in exchange, he gives them 138 millions in the rentes; the loss to them as well as the gain to him, is thus 232 millions, while the sale of communal properties at auction, begun in 1813, continues under the Restoration in 1814, 1815, and even in 1816. A human community treated in this way for one quarter of a century, ceases to be a personality, and becomes a mere material object; as far as this is concerned, its members have come to believe, that it is and must be so and cannot be otherwise.

Above the commune, nearly dead, is the department, completely dead; here local patriotism is stamped out at the beginning by the destruction of the provinces. Among so many political crimes and other outrages committed by the Revolution against France, this is one of the worst.

The Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly has dismantled long-established a.s.sociations, the acc.u.mulated work of ten centuries, historic and powerful names, each of which aroused enthusiasm in thousands of b.r.e.a.s.t.s and cemented together thousands of wills, centers of spontaneous co-operation, firesides warm with generous feeling, zeal, and devotion, a practical school of high political education, an admirable theater for available talent, n.o.ble careers open to legitimate ambition, in short, the small patrimony whose instinctive cult forms the first step out of egoism and a march onward toward thoughtful devotion to the large patrimony.

Cut apart by geometrical shears, and designated by an entirely new geographical term, small sections of the province became so many fact.i.tious agglomerations of juxtaposed inhabitants, human a.s.semblages without any soul; and, for twenty years, the legislator fails to communicate to them that semblance of spirit, the judicial quality of which it disposes; it is only after 1811 that the departments arrive at civil proprietors.h.i.+p and personality: this dignity, besides, the State confers only to disburden itself and to burden them, to impose expenses on them which hardly concern them but which do concern it, to compel them in its place to support the costly maintenance of its prisons, police quarters, courts of justice, and prefectorial mansions; even at this late date, they are not yet, in the eyes of jurisconsults or before the Council of State, incontestable proprietors and complete personalities;[4153] they are not to be fully qualified in this sense until the law of 1838.

Local society, accordingly, proves abortive over the whole 27,000 square leagues of territory; it is simply a legal figment, an artificial grouping together of neighbors who do not find themselves bound and incorporated together by neighborhood; in order that their society might become viable and stimulating would require both commune and department to have in mind and at heart the following idea, which they no longer entertained:

"We are all aboard the same s.h.i.+p, it is ours and we are its crew. We are here to manage it ourselves, with our own hands, each according to his rank and position, each taking his part, little or big, in doing his own work."

[Footnote 4101: My understanding, today in 1999, that all people other animals by nature are 'built' as egoists, that is to look out for themselves, to preserve their life, protect their property and family.

As far as the social (or gregarious) instincts are concerned then there are several which manifest themselves in the correct and timely order during our entire existence. Some will regulate falling in love, others procreation, others relations.h.i.+p between man and woman, others between parents and children, at yet others the group and its choice and submission to a leader. One of the results is that everyone wants to be important and accepted, another that a mob has drives or instincts which may galvanize it into compa.s.sion, anger, fear and action. To this must be added that all people can remember, not only what they have tried, but also what they have seen or heard about. They also tend to imagine that others react in the same way as they themselves do. This allows them to look ahead and imagine various possible scenarios. They are also aware of how they would want to be dealt with by others. (SR.)]

[Footnote 4102: That is what has happened during communism where men worked as little as possible since the principle of equality made most effort rest without reward.]

[Footnote 4103: The so-called "Centimes additionels" was an increase in certain taxes to be paid to the communes and departments.]

[Footnote 4104: Rocquain, "L'etat de la France au 18 Brumaire" (report by Fourcroy, pp. 138, 166)": A sack of wheat worth 18 francs at Nantes costs an equal sum for its cartage to Brest. I have seen carters plodding along, seven or eight in a line, each with six or eight strong horses dragging their vehicles and alternately helping each other, their horses hauling their carts out of ruts into which they had got stuck...

In many places, I was grieved to see carts and wagons leaving the high-road and traversing, in s.p.a.ces from 100 to 200 yards wide, the plowed ground, when each made his own road.... The carters sometimes make only three or four leagues from morning to night."--Hence, a dearth of provisions at Brest. "We are a.s.sured that the people have long been on half-rations, or even quarter rations."--And yet, "There is now in the river, at Nantes, from four to five hundred boats loaded with grain; they have been there for months, and their number increases daily. Their cargoes are deteriorating and becoming damaged."]

[Footnote 4105: Ibid., preface and summary, p.41 (on the dikes and works of protection against inundations at Dol in Brittany, at Frejus, in Camargue, in Lower Rhine, in Nord, in Pas-de-Calais, at Ostende and Blankenberg, at Rochefort, at La Roch.e.l.le, etc.). At Blankenberg, a gale sufficed to carry away the dike and let in the sea. "The dread of some disaster which would ruin a large portion of the departments of the Lys and of the Escaut kept the inhabitants constantly in a state of frightful anxiety."]

[Footnote 4106: Hence the additional centimes to the tax on doors and windows, the number of which indicates approximately the value of the rent. Hence also the additional centimes to the personal tax, which is proportionate to the rent, this being considered as the most exact indication of domestic expenditure.]

[Footnote 4107: Hence the communal "additional centimes" to the tax on business licenses.]

[Footnote 4108: Hence the "additional centimes" to the land tax.]

[Footnote 4109: Today, in 1999, we may in Denmark observe how the contemporary oligarchy of non-violent Jacobins, have transformed the local authorities into tools of the central government which through an all permeating administration, has replaced the authority of the father and the solidarity of the family with a communal care and supervision.(SR.).]

[Footnote 4110: Syndicates of this kind are inst.i.tuted by the law of June 25, 1865, "between proprietors interested in the execution and maintenance of public works: 1st, Protection against the sea, inundations, torrents, and navigable or non-navigable rivers; 2d, Works in deepening, repairing, and regulating ca.n.a.ls and non-navigable water-courses, and ditches for draining and irrigation; 3d, Works for the drainage of marshes; 4th, Locks and other provisions necessary in working salt marshes; 5th, Drainage of wet and unhealthy ground."--"Proprietors interested in the execution of the above-mentioned works may unite in an authorized syndical company, either on the demand of one or of several among them, or on the initiative of the prefect."--(Instead of authorized, we must read forced, and we then find that the a.s.sociation may be imposed on all interested parties, on the demand of one alone, or even without any one's demand.)--Like the Annecy building, these syndicates enable one to reach the fundamental element of local society. Cf. the law of September 26, 1807 (on the drainage of marshes), and the law of April 21, 1810 (on mines and the two owners of the mine, one of the surface and the other of the subsoil, both likewise partners, and no less forcibly so through physical solidarity.)]

[Footnote 4111: See "The Revolution," vol. I., pa.s.sim. (Ed. Laff. I. pp.

315-445).]

[Footnote 4112: Two kinds of police must be distinguished one from the other. The first is general and belongs to the State: its business is to repress and prevent, outside and inside, all aggression against private and public property. The second is munic.i.p.al, and belongs to the local society: its business is to see to the proper use of the public roads, and other matters, which, like water, air, and light, are enjoyed in common; it undertakes, also, to forestall the risks and dangers of imprudence, negligence, and filth, which any aggregation of men never fails to engender. The provinces of these two police forces join and penetrate each other at many points; hence, each of the two is the auxiliary, and, if need be, the subst.i.tute of the other.]

[Footnote 4113: Rocquain, "l'etat de la France au 18 Brumaire," pa.s.sim.]

[Footnote 4114: Raynouard, "Histoire du droit munic.i.p.al,"II., 356, and Dareste, "Histoire de l'administration en France," I., 209, 222.

(Creation of the posts of munic.i.p.al mayor and a.s.sessors by the king, in 1692, for a money consideration.) "These offices were obtained by individuals, along with hereditary t.i.tle, now attached to communities, that is to say, bought in by these," which put in their possession the right of election.--The king frequently took back these offices which he had sold, and sold them over again. In 1771, especially, he takes them back, and, it seems, to keep them forever; but he always reserves the right of alienating them for money. For example (Augustin Thierry, "Doc.u.mens sur l'histoire du tiers etat," III., 319), an act of the royal council, dated October 1, 1772, accepts 70,000 francs from the town of Amiens for the repurchase of the installment of its magistracies, and defining these magistracies, as well as the mode of election according to which the future inc.u.mbents shall be appointed. Provence frequently bought back its munic.i.p.al liberties in the same fas.h.i.+on, and, for a hundred years, expended for this purpose 12,500,000 livres. In 1772, the king once more established the venality of the munic.i.p.al offices: but, on the Parliament of Aix remonstrating, in 1774, he returned their old rights and franchises to the communities.--Cf. Guyot, "Repertoire de jurisprudence" (1784), articles, Echevins, Capitouls, Conseillers.]

[Footnote 4115: Thibaudeau, p.72 (words of the First Consul at a meeting of the Council of State, Pluviose 14, year X).]

[Footnote 4116: Roederer, III., 439 (Note of Pluviose 28, year VIII), ib., 443 "The pretended organic senatus-consulte of Aug. 4, 1802, put an end to notability by inst.i.tuting electoral colleges... The First Consul was really recognized as the grand-elector of the notability,"]

[Footnote 4117: Any dictator or dictator's draftsman will, upon reading this understand how easy it is to make a sham const.i.tution and sham electoral systems for a de facto dictators.h.i.+p.(SR.)]

[Footnote 4118: Thibaudeau, 72, 289 (words of the First Consul at a meeting of the Council of State, Thermidor 16, year X).]