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Leader (1850-1860), 13th April 1850, Edition 1 of 1, Page 53

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      amends to Sir Harry Smith , for the rebuke implied in the despatch above quoted , the Governor ' s explanation being satisfactory to her Majesty's Government : "I have to signify to you her Majesty's approval of the course you felt it necessary to adopt . " In consideration of what the convicts have undergone , conditional pardons will be granted to them on their arrival in Van Diemen ' s Land ; " the case of Mitchel , which is quite distinct from that of all the others , " being reserved for separate consideration .

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      FRANCE , HER FINANCES , COERCIONS , AND PORTENTS . The new budget of the French Minister of Finance has been laid on the table of the Assembly , but it does not seem to have excited much discmssion among the French papers . In his statements M . FouiiD showed that the object of the budget of 1851 was , to make the income equal to the expenditure , to relieve the agricultural classes of a part of the taxation which presses exclusively on them , and to render the fiscal burdens more equable in their pressure . In order to relieve agriculture , he proposed to reduce the impot foncier to the extent of

      27 , 000 , 000 francs , rather more than £ 1 , 000 , 000 . The local burdens also , which have been greatly augmented of late , and which amounted to 130 , 000 , 000 francs in ten departments , are to be reduced ; also the registry duties ; the latter to the extent of 6 , 000 , 000 francs . Among those taxes in which some modifica- ' tion is to take place , are the taxes on doors and windows . The duties on sugar and coffee are to be reduced . To make up for the loss of revenue arising from these changes , new taxes are to be imposed on powder and shot , on cards and certain chemical products , by which an increase of about

      48 , 000 , 000 francs is anticipated . M . Fould also proposes to sell 50 , 000 hectares of forest land belonging to the state , by which questionable expedient he expects to receive 56 , 000 , 000 francs , and from these and the usual sources of income he calculates that the total revenue of 1851 will be 1 , 292 , 000 , 000 francs , which would give a surplus of 8 , 000 , 000 above the estimated expenditure . But that , as he remarked , depends upon the maintenance of order- In the event of any serious disturbance to shake public confidence , the income would inevitably fall off , while the expenditure would necessarily increase .

      The most unsatisfactory part of the budget is the very small reduction which he proposes to make in the army estimates . In 1848 the cost of the army was 420 , 000 , 000 francs , upwards of £ 12 , 000 , 000 . Since that year it has been reduced to 314 , , 000 francs , and will now experience a further reduction of 12 , 000 , 000 francs , leaving still , however , an expenditure of nearly £ 9 , 000 , 000 a year for the maintenance of an army in a time of peace .

      The first reading of the bill for the transportation and close imprisonment of political offenders was carried on the 5 th , in the French Assembly , after a fierce debate , by 431 to 217 votes . In a long and most eloquent speech M . Victou Hugo opposed the measure . He commenced by recalling the days of February , among which the most admirable was that one when mouths yet black with biting off the ends of cartridges joined in one cry of clemency . The decree of the abolition of death-punishment for political offences contained within it the germ of a whole code , leading logically to the entire abolition of the

      extreme penalty . Yet now the Government asked them to retrace their way , and under the modest title of " law of transportation" proposed to them a law which public opinion had already construed in a single line—The re-establishment of death-punishment for political questions . The authors of the law denied this ; they said there was a gap in the penal code which it was necessary to fill up ; they had to substitute some punishment for that of death . How would they do this ? They had sought out a climate known us " the tomb of Europeans ; they combined climate , exile , and imprisonment ; instead of one executioner

      they would have three . They were restoiing deathpunishment ; let them quit their wordy precautions , their hypocritical phraseology , and be at least sincere . . Doubtless they desired not merely a severe law , but one which could be executed ; but there were limits of punishment beyond which the legislator could not pass . These sacred limits were traced by the linger of God in the human conscience ; the moment the law endeavoured to transgress them it would meet the opposition of society . The tribunals would hesitate , the juries would acquit , the law would be a dead letter under the very t ; ycs of the

      Judges . Though they built their iniquities in granite , a breath would throw them down—the breath of universal opinion . Over-severity renders a law powerless . JJut , supposing they should have the misfortune of carrying their law into execution , two questions would remain—the occasion and the necessity for it . L ) id he forget the loth of May , the 23 rd and the 13 th of June ? Was it not necessary to intimidate such attempts , and , us the revolution of February hud deprived them of the guillotine , to find for it the best substitute th ( 3 y could r For himself ho disavowed and condemned those rebellions . The right of the suilrago had abolished the right of insurrection .

      Universal suffrage put an end to revolutions . Society ought to be protected ; but to do that there was no occasion for a new penalty . The law of transportation in the penal code was sufficient both for intimidation and punishment . Let them look at the power which the existing law conferred . A man condemned by a special tribunal for the most uncertain of all crimes—a political crime , by the most uncertain of all justice—political justice , — ( Murmurs from the Right ) . When he so qualified political justice , he was but the echo of history : This man , so condemned , this criminal according to some , this hero according to others—{ Explosion of murmurs from the Right } . The President . —When judgment is pronounced the criminal is a criminal for all the world ; he can only be a hero to his accomplices .

      M . Victor Hugo would remark to the President that ; Marshal Ney , judged in 1815 , had been pronounced a criminal , yet , in his eyes , Ney was a hero , though he was not his accomplice . { Prolonged applause . } To resume : the criminal , or the hero , is seized in the midst of his renown , his influence , and his popularity , torn from his family and country , rooted out from all his interests and affections , and flung into darkness and silence , at a distance from his native soil . There he is kept , alone , a prey to his regrets if he thinks himself necessary to his country , to his remorse if he feels that he had been fatal to it . There he is detained , free , but guarded , escape impossible , unable to injure , or to influence , in isolation , impotence and oblivion , uncrowned , disarmed , broken , and annihilated . ** And this does not suffice for you " : —

      " This man , vanquished , proscribed , condemned by fortune , you desire to shut up . You would do that nameless thing which no legislation has yet done ; joining to the tortures of exile the tortures of a prison , multiplying rigour by cruelty . It is not enough for you to have put this man under a tropical sky ; you would wall him up alive in a fortress , which even at this distance has so gloomy an aspect that you , who have built , are not sure how you shall baptize it , not knowing whether it is a dungeon or a tomb . You desire that

      slowly , day by day , and hour by hour , this soul , this intelligence , this activity , this yet living ambition , four thousand leagues from the country , under that stifling sun , under the horrible weight of that prison-sepulchre , should writhe , and waste , and consume itself , and despair , asking pardon , appealing to France , imploring air , life , and liberty , till it expire in agony . It is monstrous . I protest against it in the name of humanity ! Ah , you are pitiless and neartless . What you call an expiation I call a martyrdom ; what you call iustice I denounce as an assassination . of reli

      " Rise , then , Catholics , priests , bishops , men - gion , who sit in this Assembly . It is your duty . What are you doing on your benches ? To the tribune , and with the authority of your holy creeds , with the authority of your traditions , tell these inventors of cruel measures , these applauders of barbarous laws , that what they do is bad , detestable , and impious . Remind them that Christ came into the world bringing a law of kindness , and not of cruelty ; tell them that the day when the Man-God suffered the punishment of death he abolished it , because he showed that the foolishness of human justice could strike not only an innocent but a divine head . Tell the authors and defenders of this

      law—tell these politicians that it is not by torturing the wretched in a cell four thousand leagues from their country that they can quiet the public streets . * * * " I said there would be three executioners . I forgot a fourth—the director of the Penitentiary . Have you taken into account the sort of man he must almost necessarily be who , in the face of the civilized world , will accept the moral charge of so odious an establishment , who will consent to be the gravedigger of this prison , the gaoler of this tomb ? St . Helenas produce Hudson-Lowes . Figure to yourselves the refinements of torture which a man of that temperament could invent for men who have not the glory of Napoleon . In our prisons in France , when an abuse arises , when an • • ' * * A ¦ i ¦ . _ M ~ A-M— — I — _ _^ - >— _» ~_ . _~ ¦ - BK ~ - ^ ~> L « ini is the of the reach

      ^ . quity attempted , cry prisoner can the Government and the people through the double echo of the press and the tribune . But in your citadel , in the Marquesas , the sufferer will be reduced to sigh mournfully—Ah , if the people but knew it ! There , at that dreadful distance , in the silence of that walled-up solitude , where human voice comes not nor departs , to whom shall the wretched prisoner complain ? Who shall hoar him ? Between his complaint and you will be the noise of sill the waves of ocean ; the shadow and the silence of death will overhang this frightful political hulk } nothing will transpire , nothing wili reach you , nothing save , from time to time , the mournful news traversing the sea to France and Europe—Such a one is dead . * * * I have examined Avhat are called reasons of state . I

      recall all the evil counsels they have already given . Marat invoked them as well as Louis XI . For me , I will have neither the policy of the guillotine , nor the policy of power , neither that of Marat , nor that of Ilaynau , nor that of your law of transportation . ^ I am of those who will never hesitate between that virgin whom men call Conscience , and that prostitute they call Statepolicy . I bcc plainly that I am ' only a poet . ' " Should it be possible for this law to pass , it would

      be a mournful spnetaele , —violence in the senate contrasting with wisdom in the streets , statesmen showing themselves blind and passionate where the people had shown themselves intelligent and just . In proclaiming mercy in February the people shut the door of revolutions , with your decrees of vengeance you reopen it . You say the law is intended for the future . For whom do you make it ? The sword of political punishment belongs not to justice but to chance . * * I am

      defending you . You may shut your eyes to the future ; but will you shut them to the past ? Had the two last revolutions been overcome by royalty , and your law of transportation been then existing , Charles X . would have applied it to M . Thiers , and Louis Philippe to M ; Odilon Barrot . " M . Barrot indignantly denied that he had ever conspired against any government . M Hugo resumed : " I did not speak of justice , but of political and party judgments . * * * Jl . oolc and reflect ! Who regained the throne of France in 1814 ? The exile of Hartwell . Who reigned after 1830 ? The proscribed of Reichenau , to-day the banished of Claremont . Who governs at this moment ? The prisoner of Ham . Now pass your laws of proscription ! * * * When men put injustice in a law , God puts justice there , and strikes with the law the men who make it .

      M . Hugo concluded with an energetic protest against whatever could tend to inflame the dissensions of France : — " Let us seek together , and cordially , the solution of the problem of civilization placed before us . Our fathers had only to serve France , we have to save it . We have not time for hate . " M . Rouher , Minister of Justice , defended the utility of the bill . The crimes it was intended to punish were those which had been formerly subjected to the penalty of death , the crimes of men who excited to civil war , and advocated devastation and pillage : —

      " Perpetual imprisonment was not commensurate with such offences . He had heard an individual say from the tribune of that Assembly— I have conspired for twenty years j I have succeeded , and I shall not conspire again . Such language was odious . When a criminal has stained the streets with blood ; when he made an appeal to civil war" On the Left : " Boulogne ! " ( Loud interruption . } TheMiNisTEROF Justice : " Whenhe made an appeal to civil war" Another voice on the Left : " Strasbourg 1 " { Violent murmurs on the Right . }

      The Minister of Justice : " He would perhaps feel some shame in appealing to those reminiscences after the elections of the 10 th of December . Had the justice of the country , he would ask , remained powerless ? had there been no condemnation ? " M . Charras : " For Strasbourg ? No ! " The Minister of Justice : ' * Did not the prisoner , on the threshold of his prison , deplore the attack which he had made against the laws of his country ? He had redeemed his past conduct , and an end should be put to that system of degrading the Government , which attacked it even when it proceeded from the majority of the nation . " ( Loud approbation . )

      The President , addressing the Mountain : " The Government of the Republic itself finds no favour wjth you , because it is a Government . " ( Laughter and applatise . ) M . Emmanuel Arago , in reply to the Minister of Justice , read a speech uttered by M . Odilon Barrot in 1835 , which denounced the imprisonment of transported criminals as something even worse than the carcere duro of Austria . Referring to the chances of pardon , M . Arago said— " Calculate the time necessary to transmit this pardon , and , when you grant it , it will go forth to find a corpse . " The debate closed after a heated discussion , continually interrupted , the President himself not refraining from offensive remarks .

      The outbreak ' which occurred at Limoges , in consequence of the punishment of an adjutant who had voted for the Democratic candidates at the recent election , is spoken of by the Siecle as a serious affair , and an indication of the general feeling of the army . The Limoges papers also allude to it as serious , with the exception of the Government paper , the Courrier de Limoges , which asserts it to have been onl y a trifling incident . "A sub-officer , when leaving to join a regiment in Africa , was accompanied as far as the bridge by some of his comrades . A handlul of wellknown democrats collected round them , and raised some cries in honour of Socialism . One of the officers desired the soldiers to return to their respective quarters , which they immediately did . That is the whole affair . "

      The non-commissioned officers in garrison at Valenciennes deny the statement of the Republicain du Nord , that they are imbued with Socialist opinions . The municipal guard at Lyons is to be reorganized in order to render it more efficient for the preservation of public order . A letter from Belle He of March 30 th states , that lodgings are prepared there for 400 of the most violent of the political criminals detained in prison in France . M . Proudhon's journal , the Voix du Peuplc , has again been seized , ibr , an article on the Budget , " calculated to excite hatred and contempt against the Government . "

      The Napoleon intimates that in case the approaching election for Paris be of the same kind as on tho 10 th of March , a revision of tho electoral law will become necessary . The paragraph is worth giving . ' An Electoral law which would continue to produce such results is already judged . Society must demand its reform . Tho constitution has only proposed tho princiiKil of election , the law fixes its conditions . It is from u new law that society will havo to demand

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      Aprii . 13 , 1850 . ] Qttye ULe&ittt . 53

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), April 13, 1850, page 53, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1840/page/5/