by the Catholics and merely resulted in the
creation of Catholic faculties in several great cities. A third matter
was the intense anxiety over the prospect of a rupture with Germany.
Bismarck was renewing his policy of pin-pricks. The French army had been
strengthened by a battalion to every regiment, and so Bismarck
complained of the strictures of French and Belgian bishops on his
anti-papal policy. Whether he only meant to humiliate France still more,
or whether he actually desired a new rupture so as to crush the country
finally, is not clear. At any rate, with the aid of England and
especially of Russia, France showed that she was not helpless, and
Bismarck protested that he was absolutely friendly.

By the close of 1875, the measures constituting the new Government had
been voted and, on December 31, the Assembly, which had governed France
since the Franco-Prussian War, was dissolved to make way for the new
legislature. During the succeeding elections M. Buffet's Cabinet,
antagonized by the Republicans and rent by internal dissensions, went to
pieces, M. Buffet personally suffered disastrously at the polls. The
slate was clear for a totally new organization. The Assembly had done
many a good service, but its dilatoriness in establishing a permanent
government, its ingratitude to M. Thiers, its clericalism, and its
stubbornness in trying to foist a king on the people made it pass away
unregretted by a country which had far outstripped it in republicanism.

The "Constitution of 1875," under which, with some modifications, France
is still governed, is not a single document constructed _a priori_, like
the Constitution of the United States. It was partly the result of the
evolution of the National Assembly itself, partly the result of
compromises and dickerings between hostile groups. Particularly, it
expressed the jealousy of a monarchical assembly for a President of a
republic, and the desire, therefore, to keep power in the hands of its
own legislative successor. The Assembly took it for granted that the
Chamber of Deputies would have the same opinions as itself. As a matter
of fact, the political complexion of the legislature has been
consistently toward radicalism, and the result has hindered a strong
executive and promoted legislative demagogy.

The Constitution of 1875 may be considered as consisting of the
Constitutional Law of February 25, relating to the organization of the
public powers (President, Senate