The First French Republic; A Study of the Origin and the Contents of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, of the Constitution, and of the Adoption of
Horace Mann Conaway
Paperback
(RareBooksClub.com, July 4, 2012)
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1902 edition. Excerpt: ...perhaps have attributed sufficient meaning to these hazy avowals if we say that Louis XVI., partly from his paternal spirit, and partly from a desire for relief from financial crises, meditated, in his more liberal moods, granting the nation some sort of a charter, in the formulation of which he wished the assistance of the States-General. This resuscitated institution convened at Versailles, May 5, 1789. The first months were occupied in the disputes over the verification of the powers of the deputies. On May 28, a representative of the nobility, Count de Crillon, said that "he was of the firm opinion that it was less for maintaining than for establishing the Constitution that they were called together." On June 15, Abbe Sieyes announced that those whose powers had been verified represented ninety-six per cent, of the nation, and suggested as a fitting name, "Assemblee des representants." Mirabeau, at the same session, offered a series of resolutions that provoked much discussion, one of which affirmed that their first duty was "to agree upon and to fix legally the principles for the regeneration of the kingdom, to assure the rights of the people, to adopt the basis of a wise and useful constitution, and, to secure these rights from all attempts, they shall be put under the safeguard of the legislative power of the king and of the National Assembly." Rabaudde Saint Etienne, in another series of resolutions, expressed the same conviction.' Two days later, the name "National Assembly" was adopted and an oath taken "to fulfill with zeal and fidelity the duties which devolve upon us."5 Debarred from the place usually occupkd by the Assembly by the carpenters who were at work upon it, the members of the...