wer of the parliament over the people, and its constitutional
power over the President? None. All that was left to it was the appeal
to peaceful principles, that itself had always explained as "general
rules" merely, to be prescribed to third parties, and only in order
to enable itself to move all the more freely. With the removal of
Changarnier, with the transfer of the military power to Bonaparte,
closes the first part of the period that we are considering, the period
of the struggle between the party of Order and the Executive power.
The war between the two powers is now openly declared; it is conducted
openly; but only after the party of Order has lost both arms and
soldier. With-out a Ministry, without any army, without a people,
without the support of public opinion; since its election law of May
31, no longer the representative of the sovereign nation sans eyes, sans
ears, sans teeth, sans everything, the National Assembly had gradually
converted itself into a French Parliament of olden days, that must
leave all action to the Government, and content itself with growling
remonstrances "post festum." [#4 After the act is done; after the fact.]

The party of Order receives the new Ministry with a storm of
indignation. General Bedeau calls to mind the mildness of the Permanent
Committee during the vacation, and the excessive prudence with which it
had renounced the privilege of disclosing its minutes. Now, the Minister
of the Interior himself insists upon the disclosure of these minutes,
that have now, of course, become dull as stagnant waters, reveal no
new facts, and fall without making the slightest effect upon the blase
public. Upon Remusat's proposition, the National Assembly retreats into
its Committees, and appoints a "Committee on Extraordinary Measures."
Paris steps all the less out of the ruts of its daily routine, seeing
that business is prosperous at the time, the manufactories busy, the
prices of cereals low, provisions abundant, the savings banks receiving
daily new deposits. The "extraordinary measures," that the parliament
so noisily announced fizzle out on January 18 in a vote of lack of
confidence against the Ministry, without General Changarnier's name
being even mentioned. The party of Order was forced to frame its motion
in that way so as to secure the votes of the republicans, because, of
all the acts of the Ministry, Changarnier's dismissal only was the very
one they approved, while the party of