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 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow 85.: FRENCH NEWS [15] EXAMINER, 13 FEB., 1831, P. 106 - The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume XXII - Newspaper Writings December 1822 - July 1831 Part I

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Subject Area: Political Theory
Collection: The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill

85.: FRENCH NEWS [15] EXAMINER, 13 FEB., 1831, P. 106 - John Stuart Mill, The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume XXII - Newspaper Writings December 1822 - July 1831 Part I [1822]

Edition used:

The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Volume XXII - Newspaper Writings December 1822 - July 1831 Part I, ed. Ann P. Robson and John M. Robson, Introduction by Ann P. Robson and John M. Robson (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1986).

Part of: Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, in 33 vols.

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Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


85.

FRENCH NEWS [15]

EXAMINER, 13 FEB., 1831, P. 106

The article is headed “London, February 13.” For the entry in Mill’s bibliography, see No. 55. The item is listed as “Article on France” in the Somerville College set, with the paragraphs here included surrounded by square brackets; the article begins with a paragraph, here excluded, on Belgian affairs.

the government of louis philippe appear to be trying a course of experiment how much the patience of the French people will bear. We mentioned in our last paper the dismissal of M. Merville, the prefect of Meurthe, for signing an address, in which wishes were expressed for more popular institutions.1 This was followed by the resignation of the sub-prefect, the mayor, his deputy, and many officers of the national guard.2 Another prefect has since been dismissed for his democratic inclinations, M. Pons de l’Hérault, prefect of the Jura.3 Such was this magistrate’s popularity, that a few days previously, on a mere rumour that he had been, or was about to be recalled, the people of the neighbouring country thronged into the town, the streets were crowded with people; deputations waited upon the prefect from all quarters to ascertain the fact; and a petition to the King, not to remove M. Pons, was actually sent to Paris, and must have crossed his dismissal on the road.4

The King has taken off the mask: and in his answer to an address from Gaillac, a town of some consequence in the south of France, has dropped at length his hypocritical adulation of the people and the revolution, and, for the first time, adopted the cant of the stationary or stagnation party.5 He has thus (whether from cowardice and weakness, or from original evil intention, we know not, nor need we care,) made his determination to stand, or, as we devoutly trust will be the case, to fall, with the new oligarchy. Posterity at least will know, if contemporaries do not, on whose head the responsibility should rest of all the evils which may result from another struggle, followed by another convulsion.

[1 ]For earlier discussion, see Nos. 79 and 81.

[2 ]The sub-prefect has been identified only as the chevalier de Landrian; the mayor was Nicolas André Esprit Tardieu (1790-1843); and his deputy, Louis Victor Chenut.

[3 ]André Pons de l’Hérault (1772-1853), a supporter of the Revolution and then of Napoleon, during a career of mixed fortunes had always favoured reform. He had been appointed Prefect of the Jura after the July Revolution.

[4 ]The town into which the people thronged was Lons-le-Saunier; the petition (undated, but ca. 1 Feb.) is in the Archives Départementales du Jura, cote M 12.

[5 ]Moniteur, 1831, p. 205.