stry, which was but a pretence.
The permanent Committee had received Mr. Giraud with laughter when he
introduced himself in the name of the new Ministers. So weak a Ministry
for so strong a measure as the restoration of universal suffrage! The
question, however, then was to do nothing in, everything against the
parliament.

On the very day of its re-opening, the National Assembly received the
message from Bonaparte demanding the restoration of universal suffrage
and the repeal of the law of May 31, 1850. On the same day, his
Ministers introduced a decree to that effect. The Assembly promptly
rejected the motion of urgency made by the Ministers, but repealed the
law itself, on November 13, by a vote of 355 against 348. Thus it once
more tore to pieces its own mandate, once more certified to the fact
that it had transformed itself from a freely chosen representative body
of the nation into the usurpatory parliament of a class; it once more
admitted that it had itself severed the muscles that connected the
parliamentary head with the body of the nation.

While the Executive power appealed from the National Assembly to the
people by its motion for the restoration of universal suffrage, the
Legislative power appealed from the people to the Army by its "Questors'
Bill." This bill was to establish its right to immediate requisitions
for troops, to build up a parliamentary army. By thus appointing the
Army umpire between itself and the people, between itself and Bonaparte;
by thus recognizing the Army as the decisive power in the State, the
National Assembly was constrained to admit that it had long given up
all claim to supremacy. By debating the right to make requisitions for
troops, instead of forthwith collecting them, it betrayed its own doubts
touching its own power. By thus subsequently rejecting the "Questors'
Bill," it publicly confessed it impotence. The bill fell through with a
minority of 108 votes; the Mountain had, accordingly, thrown the casting
vote It now found itself in the predicament of Buridan's donkey, not,
indeed, between two sacks of hay, forced to decide which of the two was
the more attractive, but between two showers of blows, forced to decide
which of the two was the harder; fear of Changarnier, on one side, fear
of Bonaparte, on the other. It must be admitted the position was not a
heroic one.

On November 18, an amendment was moved to the Act, passed by the party
of Order, on municipal elections