1. The French Republic no longer pays the expenses or salaries of any sect.

G. Decree upon Religion. February 21, 1795 (3 Ventôse, Year III). Duvergier, Lois, VIII, 25-26.

1. In conformity with article 7 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and with article 122 of the Constitution, the exercise of any worship cannot be disturbed.

2. The Republic does not pay salaries for any of them. 3. It does not furnish any edifice, either for the exercise of worship or the lodging of the ministers.

4. The ceremonies of every sect are forbidden outside of the premises chosen for their exercise.

5. The law does not recognize any minister of religion: nobody can appear in public with garments, ornaments or costumes set apart for religious ceremonies.

6. Every gathering of citizens for the exercise of any worship is subject to the surveillance of the constituted authorities. That surveillance confines itself to measures of police and public security.

7. No symbol peculiar to a sect can be put in or upon the outside of a public place, in any manner whatsoever. No inscription can designate the place which is set aside for it. No proclamation or public summons can be made in order to call the citizens there.

8. The communes and communal sections in collective name shall not acquire nor loan buildings for the exercises of

sects.

9. No perpetual or life time endowment can be formed or any tax established in order to provide for the expenses of them.

H. Decree for Restoring Church Buildings. May 30, 1795 (11 Prairial, Year III). Duvergier, Lois, VIII, 127.

I. The citizens of the communes and communal sections of the Republic shall have the free use provisionally of the non-alienated edifices originally set apart for the exercises of one or more worships and of which they were in possession

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on the first day of the Year II of the Republic. They can make use of them under the surveillance of the constituted authorities, both for the assemblies ordered by the law and for the exercise of their worship.

5. Nobody shall perform the duties of the ministry of any sect in the said edifices, unless he has made acknowledgment, before the municipality of the place in which he shall wish to exercise it, of submission to the laws of the Republic. Ministers of worship who shall have contravened the present article, and citizens who shall have summoned or admitted them, shall each be punished with a thousand livres fine by way of correctional police.

I. Organic Act upon Religion. September 29, 1795 (7 Vendémiaire, Year IV). Duvergier, Lois, VIII, 293-297.

The National Convention, after having heard the report of its committee of legislation;

Considering that by the terms of the Constitution, nobody can be prevented from exercising, in conformity with the laws, the worship which he has chosen; that nobody can be forced to contribute to the expenses of any sect, and that the Republic does not pay salaries for any of them;

Considering that, these fundamental bases of the free exercise of worship being thus laid down, it is important, on the one hand, to reduce into laws the necessary consequences which are derived therefrom, and, for that purpose, to unite them into a single body and to modify or complete those which have been rendered; and, on the other hand, to add to them the penal provisions which may assure the execution of them;

Considering that the laws to which it is necessary to conform in the exercise of worship do not legislate upon what belongs to the domain of thought only, or upon the relations of man with the objects of his worship, and that they have and can have for their purpose only a surveillance restricted to measures of police and public security;

That thus they ought to guarantee the free exercise of worship by the punishment of those who disturb the ceremonies or outrage the ministers in their functions;

To demand of the ministers of every sect a purely civic guarantee against the abuse which they may make of their ministry in order to excite disobedience to the laws of the State;

To anticipate, prevent, or punish everything which may tend to render a sect exclusive or dominant and persecuting, such as acts of the communes in the collective name, endowments, forced contributions, acts of violence relative to the expenses of sects, the exposure of special symbols in certain places, the exercise of ceremonies and the use of costumes outside of the premises designated for the said exercises, and the undertakings of the ministers relative to the civil condition of the citizens;

To repress offences which may be committed by occasion or abuse of the exercise of worship;

And, finally, to regulate the competency and procedure [of the courts] in these classes of cases;

Decrees as follows:

TITLE I.

SURVEILLANCE OF THE EXERCISE OF WORSHIP.

Preliminary and General Provision.

1. Every gathering of citizens for the exercise of any worship whatsoever is subject to the surveillance of the constituted authorities.

This surveillance is confined to measures of police and public security.

TITLE II. GUARANTEE OF THE FREE EXERCISE OF EVERY

WORSHIP.

2. Those who shall insult the objects of any worship whatsoever in the places designated for its exercise, or its ministers on duty, or shall interrupt by a public disturbance the religious ceremonies of any other worship whatsoever, shall be condemned to a fine, which shall not exceed five hundred livres, nor be less than fifty livres per person, and an imprisonment which shall not exceed two years nor be less than one month; without prejudice to the penalties provided by the Penal Code, if the nature of the act can give occasion thereto.

TITLE III. OF THE CIVIC GUARANTEE REQUIRED OF THE MINISTERS OF EVERY SECT.

5. Nobody can discharge the duties of the ministry of any sect, in any place whatever, unless he has previously made before the municipal administration or the municipal deputy of the place in which he shall wish to exercise it, a declaration, the model of which is in the following article. The declarations already made shall not dispense with that ordered by the present article. .

6. The formula of the declaration required above is this: "The before us. . . has appeared N. (the

who has

name and prenomens only), resident of . made the declaration whose tenor is as follows: "I recognize that the totality of the French citizens is the sovereign, and I promise submission and obedience to the law's of the Republic.'

"We have given to him an acknowledgment of this declaration and he has signed with us."

The declaration which shall contain anything more or less shall be null and void:

TITLE IV. OF THE GUARANTEE AGAINST ANY SECT WHICH MAY ATTEMPT TO BECOME EXCLUSIVE OR DOMINANT.

Section I. Concerning the expenses of the sects.

9. Communes or communal sections shall neither acquire nor loan in the collective name premises for the exercise of worship.

IO. No perpetual nor life-time endowment can be formed nor any tax established in order to provide for the expenses of any sect or the lodgment of its ministers.

Section II. Of the places in which it is forbidden to place the special symbols of a sect.

13. No special symbol of a sect can be raised, affixed or attached in any place whatsoever in such a manner as to be exposed to the eyes of the citizens, except within the premises designated for the exercises of that same sect, or within the interior of private houses, within the studios or magazines

of artists and merchants, or the public edifices set apart to receive works of art.

Section III. Of the places in which the ceremonies of the sects are forbidden.

16. The ceremonies of all sects are forbidden outside of the precincts of the edifice chosen for their exercise.

This prohibition does not apply to the ceremonies which take place within the precincts of private houses, provided, that, besides the persons who have that domicile, there shall not be on the occasion of the said ceremonies a gathering in excess of ten persons.

17. The premises chosen for the exercise of a worship shall be indicated and declared to the municipal deputy, in the communes above five thousand souls, and in others to the municipal administrations of the canton or district.

19. Nobody

can appear in public with the garments, ornaments or costumes set apart for religious ceremories or for a minister of a sect.

TITLE V. OF CERTAIN OFFENCES WHICH CAN BE COMMITTED ON
THE OCCASION OR BY THE ABUSE OF THE EXERCISE
OF WORSHIP.

22. Every minister of a sect who, outside of the premises of the edifice set apart for the ceremonies or exercises of a worship, shall read or cause to be read in an assembly of persons, or who shall post or cause to be posted, shall distribute or cause to be distributed, a writing emanating from or announced as emanating from a minister of worship who shall not be resident within the French Republic, or even from a minister of worship residing in France who declares himself the delegate of another who does not reside here, shall be condemned to six months in prison, independently of the tenor of the said writing, and in case of repetition, to two years.

23. Any minister of worship who shall commit any one of the following offences shall be condemned to prison forever, whether it be by his discourses, exhortations, sermons, invo