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Page 5
In the early winter of 1851, a crisis came on which broke in a
marvelous manner in the event called the Coup d'Etat. The President
made up his mind to conquer the Assembly by force. He planned what is
known in modern history by pre-eminence the stroke. He, and those whom
he trusted, made their arrangements secretly, silently, that the
"stroke" should fall on the night of the second of December. On that
evening the President held a gay reception in the palace of the
Elysee, and after his guests had retired, the scheme was perfected for
immediate execution.
During the night seventy-eight of the leading members of the
Opposition were seized at their own houses and taken to prison. The
representatives of the people were hurried through the streets, and
suddenly immured where their voices could be no longer heard. At the
same time a strong force of soldiers was stationed near the Tuileries.
The offices of the liberal newspapers were seized and closed, and the
Government printing presses were employed all night in printing the
proclamation with which the walls of the city were covered before
morning. With the coming of daylight, Paris awoke and read:
1. The National Assembly is dissolved;
2. Universal suffrage is re-established;
3. The Elective Colleges are summoned to meet on December 21;
4. Paris is in a state of siege.
By the side of this proclamation was posted the President's address to
the people. He proposed the election of a president for ten years. He
referred the army to the neglect which it had received at the hands of
former governments, and promised that the soldiery of France should
rewin its ancient renown.
As soon as those members of the Assembly who had not been arrested
could realize the thing which was done, they ran together and
attempted to stay the tide of revolution by passing a vote deposing
the President from office. But the effort was futile. A republican
insurrection, under the leadership of Victor Hugo and a few other
distinguished Liberals, broke out in the city. But there was in the
nature of the case no concert of action, no resources behind the
insurrection, and no military leadership. General Canrobert,
Commandant of the Guards, soon put down the revolt in blood. Order was
speedily restored throughout Paris, and the victory of the President
was complete. It only remained to submit his usurpation to the
judgment of the people, and the decision in that case could, under
existing conditions, hardly be a matter of doubt.
In accordance with the President's proclamation, a popular election
was held throughout France, on the twentieth and twenty-first of
December, at which the Coup d'Etat was signally vindicated. Louis
Napoleon was triumphantly elected President, for a period of ten
years. Out of eight millions of votes, fewer than one million were
cast against him. He immediately entered upon office, backed by this
tremendous majority, and became Dictator of France. In January of
1852, sharp on the heels of the revolution which he had effected, he
promulgated a new constitution. The instrument was based upon that of
1789, and possessed but few clauses to which any right-minded lover
of free institutions could object. On the twenty-eighth of March,
Napoleon resigned the dictatorship, which he had held since the Coup
d'Etat, and resumed the office of President of the Republic.
It was not long, however, until the _After That_ began to appear.
Already in the summer and autumn of 1852 it became evident that the
_Empire_ was to be re-established. In the season of the vintage the
President made a tour of the country, and was received with cries of
_Vive L'Empereur_! In his addresses, particularly in that which he
delivered at Bordeaux, the sentiment of Empire was cautiously offered
to the people. The consummation was soon reached. On the seventh of
November, 1852, a vote was passed by the French Senate for the
re-establishment of the imperial order, and for the submission of the
proposed measure to a popular vote.
The event showed conclusively that the French nation, as then
constituted, was Bonapartist to the core. Louis Napoleon was almost
unanimously elected to the imperial dignity. Of the eight millions of
suffrages of France, only a few scattering thousands were recorded in
the negative. Thus, in a blaze of glory that might well have satisfied
the ambition of the First Bonaparte, did he, who, only twelve years
before at Boulogne, had tried most ridiculously to excite a paltry
rebellion by the display of a pet-eagle to his followers, mount the
Imperial throne of France with the title of Napoleon III.
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