The Life of La Fayette, the Knight of Liberty in Two Worlds and Two Centuries

by Lydia Hoyt Farmer

In 1819 La Fayette was again chosen a member of the Chamber of Deputies. His many stirring and eloquent speeches in favor of liberty, and his fearless denunciations of despotic tyranny, aroused the fear and hatred of Louis XVIII. In 1823 the king ordered his solicitor-general to accuse La Fayette of treason. The charge was made publicly in the Chamber of Deputies, and for a moment was received with profound silence. Then La Fayette slowly rose from his seat, and with calm and commanding dignity took his stand upon the tribune. With folded arms he surveyed the assembly with unquailing eye; and then he spoke: “In spite of my habitual indifference to party accusations and animosities, I still think myself bound to say a single word upon this occasion. During the whole course of a life entirely devoted to liberty, I have constantly been an object of attack to the enemies of that cause; under whatever form, despotic, aristocratic, or anarchic, they have endeavored to combat it. I do not complain, then, because I observe some affectation in the use of the word ‘proved,’ which the solicitor-general has employed against me; but I join my honored friends in demanding a public inquiry, within the walls of this chamber, and in the face of the nation. Then, I and my adversaries, to whatever rank they belong, may declare, without reserve, all that we have mutually had to reproach each other with for the last thirty years.”

His accusers recoiled from such a daring, and to them condemnatory, challenge, and La Fayette was acquitted; but the government, by intrigues and bribery, defeated his re-election.

The following speech of La Fayette, delivered in the Chamber of Deputies in 1821, and published in the New York American, of July, that same year, will give some idea of the fearless eloquence of the marquis, which dauntless frankness so incensed the corrupt court and enraged the Bourbon king.

The New York American thus comments upon the speech:—

“We have allotted a considerable portion of our paper to-day to a speech of General La Fayette, delivered last month in the French Chamber of Deputies; and, in doing so, we shall gratify, as we hope, that deep feeling of interest with which every act of that ‘soldier of America,’ as he proudly calls himself, is looked upon by his fellow-citizens of the United States. It will be seen that, true to his early principles, this veteran friend of freedom still maintains the doctrines to which this country owes its existence and glory, and which, shackled and fettered indeed, but still prevailing, he has the high honor of having transplanted, sheltered, and under all changes adhered to in France. It has, indeed, been truly and beautifully said of La Fayette that he was among those who took an active part in the French Revolution, perhaps the only one ‘who had nothing to ask of oblivion.’ Pure and disinterested in his views and in his conduct, the public good has ever been his object and his sole aim; and the blessings of this great nation, in whose favor he early drew his noble sword, and the respect of every lover of liberty in every clime, bear testimony to the consistency of a life which, midst every variety of changes and perils, has never been sullied by meanness nor dishonored by crime.”

General La Fayette’s Speech.

During the discussions on the budget on the 4th of June, which, in making appropriations for the expenditures of the country, laid open to remark all the various interests of France, M. La Fayette, having been called on to speak, presented himself at the tribune, and, after the lively expressions of interest which his presence there excited in the Chamber had subsided, spoke as follows:—

“The general discussion of the budget gives us the right of making some summary remarks upon each of its provisions. The public debt, however contracted, is sacred. I regret, in common with others, its recent increase; but without recriminations here, as the errors of the first restoration, which produced the 20th March, or as to the fatal landing which came to mingle itself with the progress of a more salutary and less turbulent resistance, or as to the conditions of the last treaty of peace, stipulated exclusively between the powers at war with France and the august ally of those powers, I will confine myself to drawing from the past an important lesson for the future, which is, that it would have cost, as I said at the time, much less to expel the coalition of foreigners than to treat with it; and that, if ever such a state of things should recur, and that, following the example of Napoleon and the provisional government, the rulers of France should hesitate to call out the people en masse, it would be alike the duty and the safety of that people themselves to leap to their arms, and combining with one accord the million arms of her warlike generation and devoted youth, to bury beneath them, as she might do, the violators of her independence.

“The civil list has been voted for the whole duration of this reign; but when, in consequence of encroachments and dilapidations forty million francs of personal revenue for the monarch and his family begin to be considered as insufficient, it is allowable to look at—I will not say that country of ten millions of inhabitants, where the salary of the chief magistrate is not equal to that of a French minister, but at the monarchical, aristocratic, and expensive government of England; where, nevertheless, the provision for the princes is smaller than in France; and where more than half the civil list is employed in paying the diplomatic corps, ministers, and judges; where the sum for which the king is not bound to account does not exceed a million and a half of francs.... Whatever may have been the losses and the pressure caused by a just defence against the aggressions of European cabinets, and which the ambition of a conqueror provoked, it must be owned, by more than one act of perfidy on the part of those courts, has since immeasurably increased; the enormous amount of the pension list arises from other causes. These are to be found in the rapid succession of the different governments in France, each anxious to create vacancies in favor of its friends; and, above all, in the recent irruption of a crowd of pretenders, all claiming rewards for having, either in will or in deed, in foreign pay or in domestic insurrections, on the highways or in obscure idleness, and even beneath the imperial liveries, manifested or dissembled their opposition to those governments which, each flattered in its turn, are now all called illegitimate. It is thus, that by deviations and apostasies from a revolution of liberty and equality, we have finished by seeing Europe during some years inundated with two complete assortments of dynasties,—nobility and privileged classes....

“I come now, gentlemen, to the second part of our expenses, the contingent part of the budget; but before remarking upon its items separately, I would ask how we can conscientiously support, by voting the ways and means, a government so scandalously expensive, and of which the system is hostile to the rights and to the wishes of almost all those who contribute to its support; and who, doubtless, only pay these contributions with a view to be honestly served, and by those who will study the national interest. It is to be hoped that this year the special application of every sum to the object for which it was voted will be closely scrutinized, as is the case in other countries....