XXV. aspect forbade refusal, while their woeful appearance de- CHAP. monstrated distress, and their numbers precluded effectual succour. 1831. 36. budget of its effects. The minds of all parties were in this feverish and excited state, each deploring the public suffering, and throw- Alarming ing upon the other the responsibility of having occasioned 1831, and it, when the ministerial budget was brought forward, and revealed at once the frightful gulf into which the finances of the kingdom were on the point of falling.* The finance minister laid before the Chamber a statement of the probable expense of the year, which, taking into view the floating debt which it was necessary to provide for, amounted to the enormous sum of 1,434,655,000 francs (£58,500,000), being an increase of nearly 500,000,000 francs (£20,000,000) on the last budget of the Restoration! * FINANCIAL STATEMENT OF THE MINISTER OF FINANCE FOR THE YEAR 1831. Ample as these estimates were, they were less than the total expenditure of the year, which reached the enormous amount of 1,511,000,000 francs, or £60,400,000. RECEIPTS AND EXPENDITURE OF THE LAST YEARS OF CHARLES X., AND FIRST XXV. 1831. CHAP. Of this huge sum, it is true, 160,400,000 francs (£6,500,000) was stated to be debt anterior to 1830, and for which the Government of Louis Philippe was not responsible; but still the regular budget of 1831 amounted to 1,177,000,000 francs (£45,200,000), and it confessed extra advances of no less than 90,755,000 francs (£3,750,000) since 1830, for which no provision had been made. And after taking into view every imaginable resource, and stating every sum that possibly could be brought to bear against the old Government, there remained a deficit of 211,655,000 francs (£8,450,000) to be provided for by loan, or carried forward as floating debt, to cripple the income of future years. The receipts of the year, from ordinary sources, were taken at 947,940,000 francs (£39,800,000); Exposé du 46,000,000 francs (£1,800,000) was added to the landtax; and no less than 310,000,000 francs (£12,250,000) was proposed to be raised by loans in a year of peace, and the first of the reign of the Citizen-King and of the regenerated monarchy.1 1 Ann. Hist. xiv. 193, Ministre de Finance; and App., 105, Tableau de Finances. 37. indignation The No words can describe the storm of indignation which Universal arose in Paris, and over all France, upon the promulgation it excited. of this alarming budget. In truth, it was unavoidable, and arose necessarily from the vast increase of the expenditure for the army and ordnance, which was the natural consequence of the position which France, antagonistic to continental Europe, had now assumed. estimate for the army, which in 1829 had been 214,576,000 francs (£8,500,000), had risen in 1831 to 386,624,000 francs (£11,750,000.)* This was the necessary consequence of arming for defence or attack against Europe. But this result, how natural or obvious soever a consequence of the Revolution of July, which put it in a state of antagonism with the Continental powers, was by no means what the authors of that revolution intended when The troops, which were 255,323 in the first year, had risen to 368,921 in the second, and in 1832 amounted to 389,273.-Stat. de la France, vol. x. p. 194. XXV. 1831. they brought it about. They had no intention of adding CHAP. 50 per cent to the military force or public expenditure of the kingdom. They expected to be permitted to send their propagandists through all the adjoining states, and effect the overthrow of all their governments, without any increase of their own expenses, or being called on to 1 Louis arm or spend money in their own defence. Whatever Blanc, ii. visions may flit before the minds of the bourgeois who Stat. de la effect a revolution, assuredly increase of expenditure and (Finances). taxation is not one of them.1 279, 281; France, 194 38. situation of and credit. What rendered this great increase in the expenditure and taxation of the kingdom still more exasperating, was Deplorable its advent at a time when the industrial resources of the commerce kingdom, so far from increasing, were rapidly diminishing, and the general misery of the country was in consequence at its height. Statistical facts of unquestionable authenticity, which the Government of Louis Philippe itself has adduced, prove this beyond a doubt. The commercial paper, under discount at the Bank of France, which in 1829 had been 129,000,000 francs (£5,400,000), had sunk in 1832 to 29,000,000 francs (£1,140,000.)* The sums advanced by the Bank of France to the public exchequer, which in 1828 had been 73,000,000 francs (£2,700,000), had risen in 1830 to 291,500,000 francs (£11,600,000). The five per cents, which in 1829 had been all 109.85 cents, sunk in 1831 to 74.75 cents. The exports in the former year had been 504,247,000 francs (£20,200,000), in the latter they had sunk to 455,000,000 francs (£18,200,000); the imports, which in the first year had France, x. been 483,000,000 francs (£19,200,000), had sunk in the 192. last to 374,000,000 francs (£15,750,000). So great a 2 Stat. de la 47, 49, 189, —Statistique de la France, vol. x. p. 187—(Finances). XXV. CHAP. diminution of receipts and increase of burdens in so short a time, indicated in the clearest manner the cala1831. mitous action of the Revolution on the industry and resources of the nation.* 39. dignation of the demo crats. The effect of this state of things is thus described by General in the Republican historian who has so ably described the course of the Revolution. "An assembly of notables elected by another assembly of notables, and directed by ministerial agents-such was the new system of government, such the economy of the new laws! The ministerial power rested on thirty-four thousand little bourgeois oligarchies. All the democrats were in commotion. 'What!' exclaimed they is this the course into which 1 Louis Blanc, ii. 280. 40. Extravagant ideas generally afloat in society at this time. we are to be turned by the Revolution? Is France to pass under the yoke of notabilities of municipalities and notabilities of offices? What do those municipal capacities signify, which are revealed only by the weight of burdens and increased taxation? Better to destroy at once the shadow of a representation than to corrupt it. The electoral right has become only the strongest instrument of tyranny. If the rich predominate in the municipal councils, we shall only have organised a protection for the interests which have least need of protection." 1 This woeful social state, immediately succeeding, as it did, the ardent hopes and boundless expectations of felicity which the Revolution of July had ushered in, led, as is usual in such cases, to every imaginable excess in opinion and belief. When men, in the political world, are suffering the punishment of their sins, or smarting under the consequences of their transgressions, they never recede or pause in their course till the extremity of suffering XXV. 1831. has been endured, and society is brought back by absolute CHAP. force to more rational sentiments. The drunkard who, the morning after his debauch, is suffering for his sins, seldom thinks of retracing his steps and becoming habitually sober; he seeks relief for the moment in fresh intoxication, in still more stimulating spirits. With the blasting of all their hopes of the regeneration of society by revolution, the Republicans took refuge in still more violent principles, and the doctrines of the St Simonians became the creed of the great majority of the working classes in the capital. Their position was, that the remuneration of labour should be regulated by a power issuing from itself, and capable of judging of its just demands; that production should be concentrated, and its fruits distributed to each in proportion to his merit; that the transmission of property by inheritance, as of employment, should be annihilated; that marriage, the "legalisation of adultery," should be abolished, and give place to the "sovereignty of passion-the emancipation of pleasure ;" and that the government of society should be substituted for that of families in the education of the young. Such were the doctrines which were daily poured forth and ably elaborated in numerous publications, particularly the Globe newspaper, by a band of powerful, eloquent, and sensual young men. It may be conceived how agreeable these doctrines were to the numerous class, including the natural children, in Paris, forming a third of the entire population, which, destitute of property, and having no hopes of succession, was yet steeped in sensual desires, and thirsting for the enjoyments consequent on affluence; enjoyments 1 Louis which had hitherto, as it seemed to them, unjustly been 268, 269. monopolised by a single and limited class in society.1 In truth, however, the state to which society had been brought in France by the effect of the first great Revolution, had now become such that its regeneration, or the removal by moral influence of the existing evils, had become impossible. It is thus painted by the ablest of VOL. IV. 2 M 1 Blanc, ii. |