Napoleon III and the French Second Empire Roger Price (novels to read .txt) 📖

counter-society which patronised its own cafés, shops and doctors. Occasionally, it would demonstrate its strength in local elections. This was even the case in some of the areas in which insurrections had occurred and in which repression had been especially intense, particularly since most of the militants who had been arrested benefited from a succession of

amnesties. However, it was still sensible to be cautious. A harsh reminder of this and of the repressive capacity of the regime was provided by the general security law ( loi de sûreté générale) hurriedly introduced on 27 February 1858 following the attempt on 14 January 1858 by the Italian nationalist Orsini to assassinate the Emperor. Under its terms, 2, 883 republican suspects selected from the lists kept in every department were detained without trial, and some 350–400 deported to

Algeria (Wright 1969: 416). However, the republican revival was interrupted only briefly by these measures which were followed indeed by a general amnesty on 16

August 1859. This act of clemency revealed that the government itself appreciated that exceptional measures of repression had become unacceptable to the general public, at least in the absence of a credible threat of revolution.

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As an electoral force, the republican party had almost disappeared. In the 1852

elections committed republicans generally either voted for non-official

conservative candidates or abstained. In Paris, the moderate republicans General Cavaignac and Hippolyte Carnot were elected and, in Lyons, Jacques Hénon. All three refused to take the oath of allegiance to the Emperor and were unseated.

However, for other activists repeated elections at local, departmental and national levels proved to be too much of a temptation. Although in most areas the

combination of administrative repression and the organisational problems faced by opposition groups ensured that successes were limited, electoral activity

contributed to the gradual process of revival. In spite of the fact that in most departments organised electoral committees were not re-introduced before 1863 or even 1868, the signs of republican resurgence were evident much sooner. In the 1857 general elections, 100 candidates presented themselves (in 261

constituencies as a result of multiple candidacies), five were successful in Paris (Carnot, Goudchaux, Cavaignac, Ollivier and Darimon) and one in Lyons (Hénon).

The refusal of Carnot to take the oath of allegiance and the death of Cavaignac, were followed by renewed victories in the ensuing by-elections, with the election of Jules Favre and Ernest Picard. Substantial support for the republican cause was also evident in other large cities, in spite of the restrictions placed upon opposition electioneering. For the urban classes populaires, the republic clearly remained the ideal form of government. However, these successes also revealed the continued strength of divisions within the republican movement. There was clearly a gulf between the more intransigent who claimed that abstention was the only principled policy and those, frequently representatives of the younger generation, like Ollivier and Darimon who were less rigid in their attitudes. Equally evident was the division which had caused so much strife in 1848 between the moderates, including all the elected deputies who were essentially democratic liberals committed to political change, and the radical and socialist advocates of social reform.

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4

Liberalisation

From 1860 the context for political activity was again to be gradually transformed.

Although, contrary to the periodisation commonly employed by historians, it is difficult to agree that a genuinely ‘liberal’ empire existed before May 1869 when most of the restrictions on the right to hold public meetings as well as on the press were finally lifted, significant steps had already been taken towards the creation of a parliamentary regime. A decree on 24 November 1860 conceded to the Corps législatif the right to discuss the address from the throne outlining government policy at the beginning of each parliamentary session. The Emperor further

announced his attention to nominate ministers without portfolio (initially Magne, Billault and Baroche) and, in 1863, a minister of state (Billault then Rouher) to explain and defend government policy before parliament. Moreover,

parliamentary debates were now to be reproduced in full in the official Moniteur and might be reprinted in other newspapers. Publicity would provide the essential stimulus to debate. In December 1861, the Emperor responded to anxiety in

conservative financial circles about the growth of the national debt and the unconventional arrangements made by Haussmann, as Prefect of the department of the Seine, for financing the massive public works programme which was

transforming the capital. He conceded greater parliamentary control over the budget. This would provide the essential means for the extension of parliamentary influence in every sphere of policy. Throughout the decade too, although

repressive legislation remained intact, much greater tolerance was displayed towards the press and public meetings, partly because of the adverse public 39

reaction to the loi de sûreté générale. The introduction of more permissive legislation in 1868 would be seen by conservatives as the final opening of the flood gates.

Reasons for liberalisation

Why did this process of liberalisation occur? It seems likely that once social order had been secured, the Emperor had always intended to proceed with measures of reconciliation directed at liberals and republicans. He was encouraged in this, to varying degrees, by his half-brother Morny and by his cousins Walewski – the illegitimate son of Napoléon I – and the Prince Napoléon-Jérôme and he chose to ignore the misgivings of his more authoritarian ministers – Baroche, Fould and Rouher. He was anxious, given his own deteriorating health and the youth of his heir, the Prince-Imperial (born in 1856), to create a regime less dependent upon his own survival. It seems likely that he also realised that authoritarian government was becoming an obstacle to the maintenance of the business confidence so vital to the achievement of the economic and social modernisation he believed were

essential both to internal stabilisation and the retention of France’s great power status. Initially, at least, liberalisation probably represented confidence in the strength and stability of the regime and in its ability to control the process of change. However, the diverse series of ambitious decisions taken