Napoleon III had again disappointed the hopes…
1864 CE to 1875 CE
These inconsistencies have led opposition leaders to form the Union libérale, a coalition of the Legitimist, Liberal and Republican parties.
The Opposition had gained forty seats in the elections of May–June 1863, and Adolphe Thiers has urgently given voice to the opposition parties' demands for "necessary liberties".
It would have been difficult for the emperor to mistake the importance of this manifestation of French opinion, and in view of his international failures, impossible to repress it.
The sacrifice of minister Persigny of the interior, who was responsible for the elections, the substitution for the ministers without portfolio of a sort of presidency of the council filled by Eugène Rouher, the "Vice-Emperor", and the nomination of Jean Victor Duruy, an anti-clerical, as minister of public instruction, in reply to those attacks of the Church which culminate in the Syllabus of 1864, all indicate a distinct rapprochement between the emperor and the Left.
But though the opposition represented by Thiers is rather constitutional than dynastic, there is another and irreconcilable opposition, that of the amnestied or voluntarily exiled republicans, of whom Victor Hugo is the eloquent mouthpiece.
Thus, those who had formerly constituted the governing classes are again showing signs of their ambition to govern.
There appears to be some risk that this movement among the bourgeoisie might spread to the people.
As Antaeus recruited his strength by touching the earth, so Napoleon believes that he will consolidate his menaced power by again turning to the laboring masses, by whom this power had been established.
Assured of support, the emperor, through Rouher, a supporter of the absolutist régime, refuses all fresh claims on the part of the Liberals.
He is aided by international events such as the reopening of cotton supplies when the American Civil War ends in 1865, by the apparent closing of the Roman question by the convention of September 15, which guarantees to the Papal States the protection of Italy, and finally by the treaty of October 30, 1864, which temporarily puts an end to the crisis of the Schleswig-Holstein question.
Locations
Groups
Subjects
Regions
