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the fatherland being the sole divinity which it is permissible to adore, could that divinity so dear to all Frenchmen exist even in its temple, for deserters from its worship? could it live? Let the friends of arbitrary power speak! let them make themselves known! The people, the true sovereign, is there to judge them. Their place is not here; let the land of liberty be purged of them; let them go to Coblentz to join the Émigrés. Near them, their hearts will expand; there they will distill their venom; they will plot without regret; there they will conspire against their fatherland, which will never tremble.

It was thus that Cicero spoke in the senate of Rome, when he was pressing the traitor Cataline to go to join the camp of the traitors to the fatherland. Then cause to be carried into effect the constitution and the will of the people who sustain you, and who will perish in order to defend you. Unite, act; it is time. Yes, it is time, legislators, that the French people show themselves worthy of the character which they have assumed. They have overthrown prejudices; they intend to remain free and to deliver themselves from the tyrants leagued against them. You know the tyrants; do not yield before them, since a simple declaration often overwhelms the will of despots.

The executive power is not in accord with you. We do not wish for any other proof of it than the dismissal of the patriotic ministers. Is it thus then that the welfare of a free people shall depend upon the caprice of a king? but ought this king to have any other will than that of the law? The people willed him thus; and their head is indeed worth that of the crowned despots. That head is the genealogical tree of the na tion; and before that robust oak, the feeble reed must bend. We complain, gentlemen, of the inaction of our armies. We ask that you ascertain the cause of it. If it springs from the executive power, let it be abolished! The blood of the patriots ought not to flow to satisfy the arrogance and ambition of the perfidious chateau of the Tuileries.

Who then can stop us in our march? Shall we behold our armies perish by parts? The cause being a common one, the action ought to be general; and if the first defenders of liberty had thus temporised, would you have been sitting today in this august areopagus?

Reflect well herein: nothing can stop you; liberty cannot be suspended. If the executive power does not act, there can be

no other alternative; it is that which must cease to be: a single man must not influence the determination of 25 millions of men. If, out of respect, we maintain him in his post, it is on condition that he will fill it constitutionally: if he deviates therefrom he is no longer anything to the French people.

We complain, finally, of the delays of the High National Court: you have entrusted to it the sword of the law; why does it wait to lay a heavy hand upon the head of the guilty? Has the civil list here again some influence? Are there privileged criminals whom it may with impunity shelter from the vengeance of the law? Shall the people be forced to go back to the date of the 14th of July, to take up that sword again themselves, to avenge at a single stroke the outraged law, and to punish the guilty and pusillanimous depositories of that same law? No, gentlemen, no; you see our fears and our alarms, and you will dissipate them.

We have set forth in your midst a great anguish; we have opened our long since embittered hearts; we hope that the last cry which we address to you will make itself felt among you. The people are there; they await in silence a response worthy of their sovereignty. Legislators, we ask for the permanence of our arms until the constitution be put into execution.

This petition is not that of the inhabitants of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine alone, but of all the sections of the capital and of the environs of Paris. The petitioners of this address ask to have the honor of filing before you.

22. Addresses to the Legislative Assembly.

These addresses are typical of the many sent to the Legislative Assembly from all parts of France between June 20 and August 10, 1792. From them much may be learned about the character of the movement which finally resulted in the suspension of the King. Both the reasons assigned for action against him and the measures demanded should receive attention.

REFERENCE. Aulard, Revolution Francaise, 192-205, has a careful study of the entire series of addresses.

A. Address of the Commune of Marseilles. June 27, 1792. Archives Parlementaires, XLVI, 383-384.

Legislators, the nation entrusts to you the maintenance and

defence of its liberty, its independence, and the sovereignty of its rights. The law relative to royalty, which your predecessors established without any regard for the objections and complaints of the nation, is contrary to the rights of man. It is time that that tyrannical law should be finally abolished, that the nation should make use of all its rights, and that it should govern itself.

Legislators, the principles of the Constitution of every free nation, which your predecessors have decreed, which the French have adopted, and which they have sworn to defend, give us the right to these. These are: "Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions can be based only upon public utility."

"The aim of every political association is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression."

"All citizens are equal in the eyes of the law; all are equally admissible to all the dignities, public places and employments, according to their capacities, and without any other distinction than that of their virtues and their talents."

Such, legislators, are the eternal foundations of all political principles. Anything which is contrary to these principles ought to be rejected from a free Constitution. How then could our Constituents, your predecessors, establish upon these foundations that monstrous pretension of a special family to which should be delegated hereditarily the royalty, from male to male, by order of primogeniture? How can there be that reigning family in a time in which everything must be regenerated? What has that reigning family done to be preferred to every other? Is it necessary to make a law for the inviolability of one person? Does that inviolability guarantee it against the steel of assassins? Is not the privilege subversive of every principle? Who would recognize there the principles of that sovereign reason which had consecrated the imprescriptible rights of man, in decreeing that there should no longer exist any hereditary distinction? Is this supreme distinction founded upon public utility? Who is the wise Constit. uent who can assure and guarantee that the son of the great est and most just of kings will be like his father? that he will not be a traitor, a scoundrel? Would it be necessary, then,

in conformity with that pernicious law, that although he should be depraved, he might with impunity bring wretchedness upon men whom that same law submitted to the fury of his crimes? No, legislators, it is only the hired abettors of tyranny who have been capable of abandoning themselves to that delirium! and it is in the sanctuary destined for the triumph of liberty, reason, and justice, that that usurped pretension has obtained the force of law! What infamy! The nation cannot subscribe to it. It once made vain objections; it desires today that they may be effective. It has the incon testable right to approve or to reject the laws which its representatives impose upon it, since it is the only sovereign.

What has this ruling family done to be elevated to this post? Was it the ruin of our finances, was it the sceptre of iron with which it ruled us who had prepared that homage, while robbing us of our gold and exhausting our substance? or, indeed, was it the hereditary descendants of that family, prolific of rebellious Emigrés, who, charged with debts, accusations and crimes, our Constituents would have wished to force us to recognize as masters? Do not be offended by that word, legislators, it signifies nothing for us. But such is the pretension of kings, such is the intention of cowards and slaves.

May not the gold of that enormous civil list, which cannot be diminished before the date of each change of reigu, perpetuate the means of corruption? and may not these means ruin the nation before it has the right to abolish them? And that independent guard which our Constituents have granted to their king and which the nation pays by keeping up the civil list, can there be a private force by the terms of the Rights of Man? And if it is a public force, can it serve the King alone? And that law, by which the choice and dismissal of the ministers belong to the King alone, is it not, despite their pretended responsibility, an inexhaustible source of abuses, crimes and disorders, a source of eternal divisions and contradictions? And, finally, that suspensive veto, put in opposition to our best laws by the authority of a single person and contrary to the general will, does it not radically destroy our Constitution? Can the legislative power exist in the presence of that destructive law of the absolute executive power? And can the

judicial power, to which the legislative power gives existence and life, continue to be effective, if the executive power par alyzes our laws?

Avow, legislators, that our Constituents have settled nothing at all; and if you wish to be something, if you wish to be useful to the nation, abrogate a law which renders null the

national will.

We all know the history of our disasters, it would be useless to recall it. The indignation which it provokes has reached its climax. Let us make haste to destroy the cause and to re-establish ourselves in our rights. Let the execu tive power be appointed and renewed by the people, as are, with some slight differences, the other two powers, and soon all will be re-established.

Done at Marseilles, at the communal building, June 27, the fourth year of liberty.

B. Address of the Fédérés at Paris, July 23, 1792. Archives Parlementaires, XLVII, 69-70.

Representatives elected by the people to defend and preserve their rights, listen to-day once more to the cry of their grief.

Some weeks have passed since you declared that the fatherland was in danger and you do not indicate to us any means of saving it. Can you still ignore the cause of our evils, or ignore the remedies for them? Well, legislators, we citizens of the 83 departments, we, whom love of liberty alone has brought here, we, who are strong in the deliberate and strongly pronounced opinion of all the French, point out to you that remedy. We say to you that the source of our evils is in the abuse which the head of the executive power has made of his author ity; we say to you that it is also in the staffs of the army, in a large portion of the department and district directories and in the tribunals. Let us say to you once more, with the frankness of a free people and one which holds itself ready to defend its rights, that it exists in part in your midst.

Legislators, the peril is imminent, it can no longer be dissimulated, it is necessary that the reign of the truth commence; we are courageous enough to come to tell it to you, be courageous enough to hear it.

Deliberate, during the sitting and without leaving the

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