"1. The powers to be accorded to the Legislative Body, including the right of laying down the regulations relating to its proceedings and the right of electing its bureaux.

"2. The simplification of the mode of presenting and considering amendments.

"3. To make it obligatory upon the Government to submit to the Legislative Body all modifications of the tariffs in international treaties.

"4. The voting of the Budget by chapter in order to render the control of the Legislative Body more complete.

"5. The suppression of the incompatibility hitherto existing between the position of Deputy and the assumption of certain public functions, particularly those of Ministers.

"6. The extension of the right of interpellation. The Government will also deliberate upon questions relating to the position of the Senate and the more efficient 'solidarity' which will be established between the Chamber and the Government, the faculty of exercising simultaneously the functions of Minister and Deputy, the presence of all the Ministers in the Chambers, the discussion of affairs of State in the Council, the establishment of a real understanding with the majority elected by the country, and the creation of all those guarantees which we seek in our common solicitude. I have already shown several times how much I am disposed to relinquish in the public interest certain of my prerogatives. The modifications which I have decided to propose constitute the natural development of those which have successively been made in the institutions of the Empire. They must, at the same time, leave intact the prerogatives which the people have most explicitly confided to me, and which are the essential condition of power and of the preservation of order and society."

The intended measure was not approved of by several of the Ministers, and the consequence was that MM. Rouher, Duruy, Lavalette, and Baroche resigned office, and their places were supplied by MM. Bourbeau, Leroux, and Prince de la Tour d'Auvergne. M. Rouher was afterwards appointed President of the Senate.

The Senatus Consultum, as finally submitted to the Senate at the end of August, was as follows:

"Art. I. The Emperor and the Legislative Body possess the initiative of proposing laws.

"Art. 2. The Ministers are dependent on the Emperor alone. They deliberate in Council under his presidency; are responsible; can be impeached only by the Senate.

"Art. 3. The Ministers can be members of the Senate or of the Legislative Body. They can take their seats in either Assembly, and have a right to speak when they consider such a course advisable.

"Art. 4. The sittings of the Senate are public. On the demand of five members the House can resolve itself into a Secret Committee. It fixes its own internal regulations.

"Art. 5. The Senate can, on indicating the modifications of which any Bill before it appears to be susceptible, send the measure back to the Legislative Body for a new deliberation. It can, in every case, by a resolution with reasons assigned, oppose the promulgation of a Bill. [The words 'by a resolution with reasons assigned,' were suppressed, and the following added :- The Bill of which the Senate opposes the promulgation cannot be again presented in the Legislative Body in the course of the same session.']

"Art. 6. The Legislative Body fixes its own internal regulations. At the opening of every session it nominates its President, VicePresidents, and Secretaries. It also appoints its Questors.

"Art. 7. Every member of the Senate or of the Legislative Body possesses the right of addressing an interpellation to the Government. Orders of the day with reasons assigned can be adopted. The reference to the bureaux of such orders of the day is a matter of right when demanded by the Government. The bureaux name a committee, on the summary report of which the Legislative Body pronounces.

"Art. 8. No amendment can be discussed if it has not been sent to the committee charged with the task of examining the Bill and communicated to the Government. When the Government does not accept the amendment, the Council of State gives its opinion; the Legislative Body then pronounces definitively.

"Art. 9. The Budget of Expenditure shall be presented to the Legislative Body by Chapters and Articles. The estimates of each Ministry are voted by Chapters, in conformity with the nomenclature annexed to the present Senatus Consultum.

"Art. 10. The modifications introduced in future into the Customs or postal tariffs by international treaties cannot be obligatory unless in virtue of a law.

"Art. 11. The relations, as fixed by the regulations, between the Senate and the Legislative Body, and with the Emperor's Government, are fixed by Imperial decree. The constitutional relations between the several powers are fixed by a Senatus Consultum.

"Art. 12. Are abrogated-all enactments contrary to the present Senatus Consultum, and especially those of Arts. 6 (par. 2), 8, 13, 24 (par. 2), 26, 40, 43, 44 of the Constitution, and 1 of the Senatus Cousultum of the 31st of December, 1861."

At a sitting of the Senate on the 26th of August, a long report on the Senatus Consultum was read by M. Devienne, the reporter of the Committee. It is an important document, and we give it in extenso.

"Messieurs les Sénateurs,-You had reason to expect that the report of your committee would be presented to you by your President, or by the Procureur-Général Delangle. For different causes they have declined the honour of this mission. You will regret the character of authority and superiority of views they would have brought to a labour of no difficulty for them. The first reflection which the presentation of the Senatus Consultum suggests to many minds, whether in France or elsewhere, is that the appeal to your

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constituent action is very frequently renewed. These modifications, so often repeated, of the fundamental law give to our institutions an appearance of uncertainty, and to our nation, whose reputation for fickleness is not recent, a semblance of instability which is not without prejudice to our own country, and even to those that surround us. Moreover, experience demonstrates that nations which occupy themselves more in respecting their laws than in changing them are the greatest and most prosperous. But the situation of France, as must be admitted, is at this hour altogether exceptional; the movement in our constitutional laws is the inevitable and logical result of the events that preceded the establishment of the Empire. The political régime of 1852 was, therefore, a necessity, but a temporary one. In the year 1860 there were men who protested against the prudential laws of 1852, feeling convinced that the moment was come for a change in the political legislation. But such was not the general anxiety; and the postponement of all modification in the Constitution was not only possible, but was advocated by many sound thinkers. The memory of a recent past, the prosperity of the present every thing authorized the maintenance of the existing situation, when the Emperor opened, by a purely personal initiative, the path in which he has since constantly marched, accelerating his steps as if he feared that the duration of one reign would not be sufficient to sweep away, for the advantage of liberty, the rubbish accumulated by our revolutions. We cannot say what will be the issue of this undertaking. But, whether the result be fortunate or not, history, if she preserves any truth, will declare that Napoleon III. inaugurated alone the liberal movement, not only without constraint, but in the midst of considerable resistance, and under the burden of the discouraging ingratitude which at the outset awaits, among ourselves, the most generous acts of the power existing. The new Senatus Consultum has appeared to your committee the wise, opportune, and even necessary continuation of the progress of internal policy undertaken by the Emperor; and we, therefore, propose to you, in principle, to adopt it. Article 1, declaring that the Emperor and the Legislative Body possess the initiative in proposing laws, has not undergone any alteration. Two observations were made on the wording-one, that no necessity existed for repeating what was already known, namely, that the Emperor had the right to propose Bills; and next, that too much power was thus given to the Lower Chamber. As to the first, the committee saw no reason why the privilege of the two to propose measures should not be clearly stated, since they both possessed it; and for the second, it certainly gave to the Legislative Body a considerable increase of power, but the course now proposed was necessary to complete the attributions of the Chamber, and was in fact called for by the fact of its having already the right of amendment and of interpellation. Article 2, asserting that the Ministers are dependent on the Emperor alone, deliberate in Council under his presidency, are responsible, and can be impeached only by the Senate, has not been modified in any way.

The objection has been made that dependence of Ministers on the Emperor and their responsibility before the Chambers were incompatible, and that no good reason could be assigned for introducing the two enactments into the same article. By former Constitutions the person of the Sovereign was declared to be above all responsibility, but that legal fiction had been set aside by the Emperor, who considered himself responsible to the nation, and therefore Article 13 of the Constitution declared, 'The Ministers only depend on the head of the State, they are responsible only for what concerns each individually in the affairs of the Government, and there is no conjoint responsibility among them.' The Emperor, consequently, was alone to be accountable for what was done, and the Ministers could only be called on to answer each for his own special acts. It is that state of things which the Senatus Consultum desires to put an end to, so that the members of the Cabinet shall be responsible for their acts, not alone individually, but collectively. That is the only innovation introduced by the Article-namely, to enlarge their sphere of responsibility, and to make it collective. The position of the Sovereign remains what it was, and the committee thought that the wording of the article ought to continue unchanged, as it clearly defined the real state of things. Article 3 states that the Ministers can be members of the Senate or of the Legislative Body; they can take their seats in either assembly, and have a right to be heard when they consider such a course advisable. In admitting Ministers to the Legislative Chamber, this disposition establishes between the Government and the Assembly more immediate relations. It allows of rapid explanations given in the bureaux of a nature to expedite business, and prevents the rise of difficulties acknowledged at a later period to be of no value. On the other hand, it completes the political responsibility of Ministers before the Chamber, in placing them constantly in presence of the Opposition there to be found. These last cannot legitimately attack the Ministerial policy, except on condition of being ready to substitute some other in its place, and to take in their turn the direction of affairs. Such is one of the aspects of a Parliamentary government. Some persons find a danger in this sort of competition, and in the share that may be taken by personal ambition and the intrigue of political passions. But these things subsist even when legal dispositions appear to interdict them, only they have an irregular issue. Free Governments should be allowed to follow their natural course. In refusing a place to the Constitutional Opposition we give a wider scope to subversive passions. We become, without intending it, their accomplices, and with them we compromise the sovereign interest of human societiescivilization. Your committee is unanimous in proposing to you the adoption of Article 3. In the wording they ask you to substitute for the phrase 'When they consider' this other one, All the times they consider.' This unimportant modification has been suggested by the recollection of disputes that arose about the precise sense of the old wording. Article 4, relating to the sittings of the Senate

and their publicity, had not met with any objections. The publicity of the sittings would only add to the favourable impression already produced by the publication of the debates in the Official Journal, and the authority of the decisions arrived at would disseminate in the country additional elements of confidence and stability. Article 5 declares that the Senate can, on indicating the modifications of which any Bill before it appears to be susceptible, send the measure back to the Legislative Body for a new deliberation; it can, in every case, by a resolution with reasons assigned, oppose the promulgation of a Bill. The article so worded in reality contains only one innovation, expressed by these words, in every case,' forming part of the second paragraph. At present the Senate can only oppose the promulgation of a law under the circumstances determined by Article 1 of the Senatus Consultum of the 14th March, 1867. That right is now generalized. In presence of all the legitimate extensions given to the powers of the Legislative Body this is the only one conferred on the Upper Chamber. In the existing legislation it had the faculty of postponing the Bill to a following session; but if the measure was then again presented it was bound to order the promulgation, unless the law contained some provision contrary to general principles, and the application of which was left to its judgment. In the new situation it will have, in every case, the right not only to ask for modifications of a Bill, but, further, to reject it. This faculty has been treated as a very considerable one, and as giving this Chamber too great an authority The alarms which represent the Senate as stopping the passage of Bills, and placing itself at every instant in opposition to the wishes of the nation, are vain. Assemblies have no such power. At present, more than ever, they have no authority unless they are supported by public opinion. The Senate has more necessity than any other body for that sustenance: its mission is to appeal to reflection. The exercise of the absolute right of rejection conferred upon it ought to be, and will be, very rare. Should that course be adopted, the reason will be that, far from proceeding against the movement of the general sentiment, the Senate will then feel by its side a strong pressure of public opinion. As to the conflicts to be dreaded, the provision does not, therefore, possess the importance attributed to it, but it has a great one from another point of view. Ordinary reason does not admit a deliberation and discussion without result. A body like the Senate, which debates and resolves without having the ultimate right of pronouncing an effective 'No,' loses at the same time the respect and even the attention of the public. Supposing it never made use of that ultima ratio, it ought to be possessed of the faculty. In this country of logic that condition is indispensable to the moral authority and the dignity of any assembly whatever. But, it is said, the Senate thus becomes a legislative body partially. The Upper Chamber remains what it ought to be-a power of control, of temporization, and of moderation. It does not possess the