These were noble sentiments nobly expressed; and, though execrated in monarchical Europe, were revered in republican America. These were the principles against which despotic Europe, coalesced by the genius of William Pitt, rose in arms.[209] The battle was long and bloody. Millions perished. The terrible drama was closed, for a season, by the triumph of despots at Waterloo.[210]
The Assembly now turned its attention to the organization of the legislative body of the nation. The all-absorbing question was whether the National Congress or Parliament should meet in one chamber or in two; if in two, whether the upper house should be an aristocratic, hereditary body, like the House of Lords in the British Parliament, or an elective republican Senate, as in the American Congress. The debate was long and impassioned. The people would not consent to an hereditary House of Lords, which would remain an almost impregnable fortress of aristocratic usurpation. They were, however, inclined to assent to an upper house to be composed exclusively of the clergy and the nobles, but to be elected by the people. To this arrangement the haughty lords peremptorily refused their assent. They were equally opposed to an election to the upper house even by the nobles and the clergy, for the high lords and great dignitaries of the Church looked down upon the lower nobility and upon the working clergy with almost as much contempt as they regarded the people. Finding the nobles hostile to any reasonable measure, the masses of the people became more and more irritated. The vast gathering at the Palais Royal soon became unanimous in clamoring for but one chamber. The lords were their enemies, and in a house of lords they could see only a refuge for old and execrable feudality and an insurmountable barrier to reform.[211]
When the vote was taken there were five hundred for a single chamber and but one hundred for two chambers.[212] It was unquestionably a calamity to France that two chambers could not have been organized. But the infatuation of the nobles now for the second time prevented this most salutary check upon hasty legislation.
The next question to be decided was the royal veto. All were united that the laws should be presented to the king for his sanction or refusal. The only question was whether the veto should be absolute or limited. That of the King of England is absolute. That of the President of the United States is limited. All France was agitated by this question. Here the aristocracy made their last desperate stand and fought fiercely. Many of the popular party, alarmed in view of the rapid progress of events, advocated the absolute veto. Its inconsistency, however, with all enlightened principles of liberty was too apparent to be concealed. That the caprice of a single man, and he perhaps weak or dissolute, should permanently thwart the decrees of twenty-seven millions of people appeared so absurd that the whole nation rose against it.
The fate of liberty seemed to depend upon this question, as the absolute veto would enable the court, through the king, to annul every popular measure. The crowds in Paris became turbulent and menacing. Threatening letters were sent to members of the National Assembly. The Parisian mob even declared its determination to march to Versailles, and drive from the Assembly those in favor of the veto. The following letter, addressed to the Bishop of Langres, then president of the Assembly, may be presented as a specimen of many with which the hall was flooded:
"The patriotic assembly of the Palais Royal have the honor to make it known to you, sir, that if the aristocratic faction, formed by some of the nobility and the clergy, together with one hundred and twenty ignorant and corrupt deputies, continue to disturb the general harmony, and still insist upon the absolute veto, fifteen hundred men are ready to enlighten their country seats and houses, and particularly your own."[213]
"I shall never forget," writes Dumont, "my going to Paris one of those days with Mirabeau, and the crowd of people we found waiting for his carriage about Le Say the bookseller's shop. They flung themselves before him, entreating him, with tears in their eyes, not to suffer the absolute veto."
"They were in a phrensy. 'Monsieur le Comte,' said they, 'you are the people's father. You must save us. You must defend us against those villains who are bringing back despotism. If the king gets this veto, what is the use of the National Assembly? We are all slaves! All is undone.'[214] There was as much ability in the tumultuous gathering at the Palais Royal as in the National Assembly, and more of impassioned, fiery eloquence. This disorderly body assumed the name of the Patriotic Assembly, and was hourly increasing in influence and in the boldness of its demands. Camille Desmoulins was one of its most popular speakers. He was polished, keen, witty, having the passions of his ever-varying, ever-excitable audience perfectly at his command. He could play with their emotions at his pleasure, and though not an earnest man, for jokers seldom are, he was eager and reckless."[215]
St. Huruge was, however, the great orator of the populace, the Mirabeau of the Palais Royal. A marquis by birth, he had suffered long imprisonment in the Bastille by lettre de cachet. Oppression had driven him mad, and he was thoroughly earnest. Every day he uttered the most fierce and envenomed invectives against that aristocratic power by whose heel he had been crushed. He was a man of towering stature, impassioned gesticulation, and with a voice like the roar of a bull.