withhold their obedience, the executive power
passes in full right to the National Assembly. The judges of the High
Court of Justice will meet immediately, under pain of forfeiture; they
will convoke the juries in the place which they will select to proceed
to the judgment of the President and his accomplices; they will nominate
the magistrates charged to fulfil the duties of public ministers.

"And seeing that the National Assembly is prevented by violence from
exercising its powers, it decrees as follows, viz.: Louis Napoleon
Bonaparte is deprived of all authority as President of the Republic. The
citizens are enjoined to withhold their obedience. The executive power
has passed in full right to the National Assembly. The judges of the
High Court of Justice are enjoined to meet immediately, under pain of
forfeiture, to proceed to the judgment of the President and his
accomplices; consequently, all the officers and functionaries of power
and of public authority are bound to obey all requisitions made in the
name of the National Assembly, under pain of forfeiture and of high
treason.

"Done and decreed unanimously in public sitting, this second day of
December, 1851."

After this first decree was voted, another was unanimously passed,
naming General Oudinot commander of the public forces, and M. Tamisier
was joined with him as chief of the staff. The choice of these two
officers, each having distinct shades of political opinion, showed that
the Assembly was animated by one common spirit.

These decrees had hardly been signed by all the members present, and
deposited in a place of safety, when a band of soldiers, headed by their
officers, sword in hand, appeared at the door, without, however, daring
to enter the apartment. The Assembly awaited them in perfect silence.
The President alone raised his voice, read the decrees which had just
been passed to the soldiers, and ordered them to retire. The poor
fellows, ashamed of the part they were compelled to play, hesitated. The
officers, pale and undecided, declared that they should go for further
orders. They retired, contenting themselves with blockading the passages
leading to the apartment. The Assembly, not being able to go out,
ordered the windows to be opened, and caused the decrees to be read to
the people and the troops in the street below, especially that decree
which, in pursuance of the sixty-eighth article of the constitution,
declared the deposition and impe