The Loan and the Republic.
The extraordinary success of the French loan has a marked political, as well as financial, significance. It shows that France is regaining her former position in the family of nations, and that capitalists, the most sensitive of animals, have recovered their confidence in her health and longevity. A loan is for a nation what a policy of life-insurance is for an individual. The one, as well as the other, is calculated on the expectation of life of the party insured. If a loan had been solicited eighteen months ago, just after the fierce crisis of the war was over, and while France was yet in the agony of Communism, the sequela or dregs of that febrile access, the proposition would have been received with ridicule, and the result, if any there had been, loaded with onerous and humiliating terms. The loan is, in fact, the recognition of the French Republic by the powers behind thrones mightier than the thrones themselves. When the capitalists of Germany itself—of Berlin, of Frankfort, of Cologne—eagerly asked leave to lend many millions to their conquered enemy, it was the surest of proofs that, though conquered, they were sure that she was not destroyed. When England, Belgium, Holland, and Switzerland, competed with France herself for the privilege of investing their funds in the good faith of the Republic, it were of no consequence if the principalities and powers that predominate over those countries had refused to acknowledge its existence. Even the cities which had been ravished from the domain of France by the conqueror—such as Strasbourg, Mulhouse, and Metz—ask to be allowed to contribute toward the redemption of the soil of what they still esteem their mother country. All this goes to show that the credit of France, which is the breath of the nostrils of a nation, is still sound, though she has exchanged the pinchbeck trappings of imperialism for the simpler robes of a republic. Much of this renewal of confidence in the credit of France is due to the great statesman whom Providence has raised up in the extremity of France, as was Lincoln at the turning-point of our own destinies. He has pursued the wise and sagacious policy of strict honesty in his administration of affairs. The polity intrusted to his charge was not the one he would have preferred, could he have had the absolute direction of the form of government to be adopted by his country. He is by nature and conviction a believer in a constitutional monarchy, and holds that a hereditary executive gives a steadiness to the workings of a government which the agitations attendant on an elective one would be very apt to disturb, especially in a people so mercurial as the French, while the responsibility of ministers to the legislature would secure the ultimate prevalence of the deliberate will of the nation. And it was, doubtless, the knowledge of these, his opinions, that induced the majority of the Assembly, which was strongly monarchical, to elect him President of the Republic. They hoped that he would make the Republic a bridge to the Monarchy, and would bring back the Bourbons, as Monk did the Stuarts. Fortunately, the advocates of the elder and the younger branches could not agree on the monarch; for, if they had, they could have proclaimed him by a majority vote, which would have been the certain signal of a renewed civil war. They feared to take the responsibility and the risk of such a measure, and trusted that events, guided by a former minister of Louis Phillippe, would bring about the desired Restoration. But M. Thiers had received the Republic in his charge, and he felt himself bound in honor to surrender it intact into the hands of the nation, when the nation was ready to pass upon its future form of government. The monarchical party has been losing prestige and influence in the nation, from the first. Their obvious wish to juggle the Monarchy into existence by some political legerdemain, has shaken whatever confidence a considerable proportion of the French people was inclined to place in them. These partisans of theirs desired a monarchy, in the faith that it would establish peace and a permanent form of government, quite as much as from any belief in divine right. But when the delegates of the Right and the Right Center expostulated with M. Thiers, on the 20th of June, for not resorting to the tricks of imperialism, and using the power of the government to influence elections by official nominations and otherwise, the truly conservative part of the nation saw that they were actuated by personal ambitions and dynastic prejudices, rather than by intelligent patriotism. The majority of the Assembly have it in their power to depose M. Thiers at any moment—a power which they dare not use. On the contrary, by the power of resignation which he holds, he virtually controls its legislation, and has compelled consent to his own financial policy, to which the majority at both ends of the Chamber were strongly opposed. He has kept the peace, suppressed disturbances, executed justice, and given to the nation the repose which is its greatest need. It is this fact which gives him his hold on his own countrymen, and gives to his country the confidence on the part of other nations of which the success of the loan is a most signal proof. His own and foreign nations are content to leave the direction of affairs in his hands until the time is fully arrived for a truly Constituent Assembly, answering to our Constitutional Conventions. When this body meets, we may be very sure that no form of monarchy will proceed forth from it. Bourbonism will have as little chance as Bonapartism itself in it. We may hope that the Monarchists, seeing the hopelessness of their cause, will unite with the moderate Republicans in the establishment of a genuine republic, which will protect persons and property, keep the peace at home and abroad, and give their country the season of rest necessary to repair its forces. If the French can but learn that a republic means the government of the majority, however small, and the submission of the minority, however large, and that tranquillity, and not agitation, is its object, France may recover her rank among the nations of Europe, and her example be more dangerous to crowned heads than her arms ever were.