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who may interrupt it. The right to speak is accorded to him who, on being called to order, submits and demands to justify himself; he alone obtains the right to speak. When a speaker has been twice called to order in the same speech, the president, after having allowed him to speak to justify himself, if he demands it, consults the assembly to know if the right of speaking shall not be interdicted to the speaker for the rest of the sitting on the same question. The decision is taken by assis et lévé without debate.

ART. 65. All personalities and all signs of approbation or disapprobation are interdicted.

ART. 66. If a member of the legislative body disturbs order, he is called to order by name by the president; if he persists, the president orders the call to order to be inscribed in the minutes. In case of resistance, the assembly, on the proposition of the president, pronounces without debate exclusion from the house for a period which cannot exceed five days. The placarding of this decision in the department in which the member whom it concerns was elected may be ordered.

ART. 67. If the assembly becomes tumultuous, and if the president cannot calm it, he puts on his hat. If the disorder continues, he announces that he will suspend the sitting. If calm be not then re-established, he suspends the sitting during an hour, during which the deputies assemble in their respective bureaus. On the expiration of the hour the sitting is resumed; but, if the tumult recommences, the president breaks up the sitting and postpones it to the next day.

ART. 68. The demands for the order of the day, for priority, and for an appeal to the standing orders, have the preference over the principal question, and suspend the discussion of it. Orders of the day are never motivés. The previous question-that is to say, that there is no ground

for deliberation-is put to the vote before the principal question. It cannot be demanded on propositions made by the president of the republic.

ART. 69. The demands for secret sittings, authorized by article 14 of the constitution, are signed by the members who make them, and placed in the hands of the president, who reads them, causes them to be executed, and mentioned in the minutes.

ART. 70. When the authorization, required by article 11 of the law of the 2d February, 1852, shall be demanded, the president shall only indicate the object of the demand, and immediately refer it to the bureaux, which shall nominate a committee to examine whether there be grounds for authorizing a prosecution.

CHAPTER IV.
Minutes.

ART. 71. The drawing up of the minutes of the sittings is placed under the high direction of the president of the legislative body, and confided to special clerks nominated. by him, and liable to dismissal by him. The minutes contain the names of the members who have spoken and the résumé of their opinions.

ART. 72. The minutes are signed by the president, read by one of the secretaries at the following sitting, and copied on two registers, signed also by the president.

ART. 73. The president of the legislative body regulates, by special order, the mode of communicating the minutes to the newspapers, in conformity with article 42 of the constitution.

ART. 74. Any member may, after having obtained the authorization of the assembly, cause to be printed and distributed at his own cost, the speech he may have delivered. An unauthorized printing and distribution shall be punished

by a fine of from 500f. to 5,000f. against the printers, and of from 5f. to 500f. against the distributors.

We read in the Constitutionnel: "It is, as already stated, at the Tuileries, in the Salle des Maréchaux, that the sitting of the senate and legislative body on the 29th will be held. The prince-president, surrounded by his aides-de-camp, his orderly officers, his ministers, and the council of state, will be placed on a raised platform; opposite the president of the republic will be, on one side the senate, and on the other the legislative body. The prince-president will deliver a speech. A form of an oath will then be read, and each member of the senate and of the legislative body, on his name being called over, will pronounce from his place the words Je le jure! The clergy, the magistracy, and the diplomatic body will be represented at this solemnity. A small number of places will be reserved in an upper gallery for persons receiving invitations."

APPENDIX XIV.

REPORT OF THE FRENCH SENATORIAL COMMITTEE ON THE PETITIONS TO CHANGE THE REPUBLIC INTO AN EMPIRE, IN NOVEMBER, 1852, AND THE SENATUS CONSULTUM ADOPTED IN CONFORMITY WITH IT.

MESSIEURS LES SENATEURS: France, attentive and excited, now demands from you a great political act-to put an end to her anxieties and to secure her future.

But this act, however serious it may be, does not meet with any of those capital difficulties which hold in suspense the wisdom of legislators. You know the wishes expressed by the councils general, the councils of arrondissement, and the addresses of the communes of France: wishes for stability in the government of Louis Napoleon, and for return to a political form which has struck the world by the majesty of its power and by the wisdom of its laws. You have heard that immense petition of a whole people rushing on the steps of its liberator, and those enthusiastic cries, which

1 This report was read by Mr. Troplong, chairman of the committee. It is universally ascribed to him, and Mr. Troplong is now president of the senate. Whether this remarkable paper be considered as a political creed or confiteor, or as a piece of attempted logic to connect certain occurrences and account for surprising turns, or as a high state paper of singular shallowness-in whatever light it may be viewed, it will be allowed on all hands that it fully deserves preservation.

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we may almost call a plebiscite by anticipation, proceeding from the hearts of thousands of agriculturists and workmen, manufacturers and tradesmen. Such manifestations simplify the task of statesmen. There are circumstances in which fatal necessities prevent the firmest legislator from acting in accordance with public opinion and with his own reason; there are others where he requires a long consideration in order to solve questions on which the country has not sufficiently decided. You, gentlemen, are not exposed either to this constraint or to this embarrassment. The national will presses and supplicates you, and your exalted experience tells you that in yielding to her entreaties you will contribute to replace France in the paths which are suitable to her interests, to her grandeur, and to the imperious necessities of her situation. All this is in fact explained by the events which take place before you.

After great political agitations, it always happens that nations throw themselves with joy into the arms of the strong man whom Providence sends to them. It was the fatigue of civil wars which made a monarch of the conqueror of Actium; it was the horror of revolutionary excesses, as much as the glory of Marengo, which raised the imperial throne. In the midst of the recent dangers of the country, this strong man showed himself on the 10th of December, 1848, and on the 2d of December, 1851, and France confided to him her standard, which was ready to perish. If she has declared her will to confide it to him forever in this memorable journey, which was only one suite of triumphs, it is because, by his courage and by his prudence, the man has shown himself equal to the task; it is because, when a nation feels herself tormented by the agitations of a stormy government, a necessary reaction leads it towards him who can best secure order, stability and repose.

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