The worthy Minister of Public Instruction revised his tactics. Repulsed in one method of action, he knew how to gain his end by other and more decisive ways. On March 27, 1880, in concert with his friends of the Cabinet, he induced the President to affix his signature to the famous decrees of expulsion. In virtue of these decrees, which were launched under the pretence of "existing laws," thousands of religious were expelled from their convents—with what violence, and in the midst of what protestations and tragic incidents, it would take too long to tell.
When the decrees were made known to the Pope Leo XIII., on March 31, the Holy Father replied to M. Desprez, then ambassador of France to the Holy See:
The Church, which seeks the salvation of souls, has no more ardent desire than to preserve peace with those who govern public affairs, and to strengthen that peace among peoples. At the same time, the Church never changes. We are plunged in grief to learn that it is intended to adopt certain measures in regard to the religious Congregations. In the eyes of the Holy See the Congregations are all of equal value. Our heart is torn with the profoundest sorrow to learn that they have become the butt of a hostile power, and it is our duty to raise our voice to protest in their favor.
Still later, in writing to Cardinal Guibert, the Holy Father said:
As soon as the expulsion of the Company of Jesus was ordered, we have directed our Nuncio in Paris to bear our remonstrances to the members of the government of the Republic, and to represent to them the injustice of this treatment accorded to men of virtue, of devotion, and of recognized and approved learning. But, as the remonstrances formulated by our Nuncio have been fruitless, we were on the point of raising our Apostolic voice, as it was our right and our duty to do, when it was represented to us that there was a chance of arresting the execution of the decrees.
This last resource, which M. de Freycinet proposed to the Holy Father, was to obtain from the Congregations not yet stricken the written declaration that they were not hostile to the political institutions of France. Following the guidance of Cardinals Guibert and Bonnechose, and counselled by the Holy Father, the Congregations appended their signatures to the declaration. The action of M. Freycinet only aroused the anger of the Masons, whose adherents in the Cabinet met the declaration and destroyed it as soon as presented. Freycinet was not long in meeting summary punishment from the sectaries. On the day following the presentation of the declaration he was forced to resign his portfolio.
EXPULSION OF RELIGIOUS.
In October, 1880, the expulsions began. The residences and colleges of the Jesuits and other Congregations were entered and their occupants driven out. Very often the military were called upon to enforce the decrees. It was to no purpose that the Catholics of the nation lifted up their voices in angry protest, or that bishops—like Mgr. Gay and Mgr. de Cabrieres—clothed in their pontifical vestments, uttered sentence of excommunication against the despoilers. The rout went on with ever-increasing ardor. It is to the credit of the French bar of the time that it refused to concur in the shameful acts. M. Chesnelong, in 1891, writes: "After the decrees of March 29, 1880, more than three hundred magistrates abandoned their career rather than sacrifice the least particle of their honor; these heroes of duty displayed a magnificent spirit of sacrifice to the very end."
Against the Congregations not attainted by the decrees, recourse was had to tactics slower but more perfidious. They were rounded up in a pitiless circle of taxes and assessments to such an extent as to rob the Congregations of one-fifth of their net revenues.
Once more the Holy Father sent forth his vigorous protestations. In an open letter to Cardinal Guibert of Paris, dated October 22, 1880, after reviewing the situation he writes: "But today, in the midst of these new disasters, our emotion is great, our anguish is extreme; and we cannot help but grieve and protest against the injury done to the Catholic Church." The great Pope ended by declaring that "in the presence of this license, the duties of his office commanded him to safeguard with invincible constancy the institutions of the Church, and to defend her rights with a courage that would not end at any peril." Following this letter of the Sovereign Pontiff the Apostolic Nuncio, Mgr. Czacki, proceeded in a few weeks, November 25, to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and placed before him a ministerial declaration of November 9, which glorified in having dispersed two hundred and sixty-one non-authorized establishments, together with a note protesting against these avowed and cowardly persecutions.