tribunals, the adminiftrative bodies

and other establishments, fhall alfo

be made public.

TITLE VII.

crees.

I. The National Conftituent Affembly declares, that the nation has an imprefcriptible right to change its conftitution; and neverthelefs, confidering that it is most fuitable to the national interest to make use, only by means appointed by the conftitution itself, of the right of reforming thofe articles which experience fhall demonftrate the invenience of, decrees, that the affembly of revifion fhall proceed in the following manner:

II. When three following legiflatures fhall have declared an uniform wifh for the change of any conftitu

with other Nations.

The French nation renounces the undertaking of any war with a view to make conquefts, and will never employ its forces against the liberty of any people.

The conftitution no longer admits the Droit d'Aubaine.

Foreigners, whether fettled in France or not, inherit the property of their parents, whether foreigners or Frenchmen.

They can contract, acquire, and receive, property fituated in France, and difpofe of it as well as any French citizen, in every mode author. Ifed by the laws.

Foreigners in France are fubject to the fame criminal laws and regulations of police as French citizens, with a referve for conventions agreed on with foreign powers. Their perfons, effects, industry, and religion, are equally protected by the law.

fhall take place.

III. The enfuing legislature (that commencing in 1791) cannot propofe the reform of any conftitutional article.

IV. Of the three legislatures who fhall fucceffively propofe any changes, the first two shall not occupy themfelves relative to that object, but in the last two months of their last feffion, and the third at the end of its firft annual fellion, or at the beginning of the second.

Their deliberations on that matter fhall be fubjected to the fame forms as the legislative acts; but the decrees by which they fhall have expreffed their defires, fhall not be fubjected to the fanction of the king.

V. The fourth legislature, augmented by two hundred and fortynine members chofen in each department, by doubling the ordinary number which it furnishes for its population, fhall constitute the affembly of revifion.

(G 3)

There

These two hundred and fortynine members fhall be elected after the nomination of reprefentatives to the legislative body fhall have been terminated, and there fhall be formed a feparate proces-verbal of it.

The affembly of revision fhall not be compofed of more than one chamber.

VI. The members of the third legiflature, who fhall have demanded a change, cannot be elected in the affembly of revision.

VII. The members of the affenbly of revifion, after having pronounced all at once the oath, "to

live free or die," fhall individually fwear, to confine themselves to decide on the objets which shall have been submitted to them by the unanimous with of three preceding legiflatures; and to maintain, in other refpects, with all their power, the conftitution of the kingdem, decreed by the National Conftituent Aembly in the years 1789, 1790, and 1791; and to be in all faithful to the nation, to the law, and to the king.

VIII. The affembly of revifion fhall be bound to occupy itself afterwards, and without delay, in the objects which fhall have been fubmitted to its examination; and as foon as this task is finished, the two hundred and forty-nine new members, named over and above, fhall retire, without taking a part in any cafe in the legislative acts.

The French colonies and poffeffions in Afia, Africa, and America, although they make a part of the French empire, are not included in the prefent constitution.

conformably to the regulations of Title VII. above.

The National Constituent Affembly commits the depofit of it to the fidelity of the legislative body, of the king, and of the judges, to the vigilance of fathers of families, to wives and to mothers, to the attachment of young citizens, to the courage of all Frenchmen.

The decrees paffed by the national the act of constitution, shall be exaffembly, which are not included in ecuted as laws; and thofe anterior laws which it has not altered, fhall alfo be obferved fo long as they shall not be revoked or modified by the legiflative power.

(Signed) VERNIER, Prefident. POUGEARD, COUPPE, MAILLY, CHATEAURENARD, CHAILLON, AUBRY, (Bishop of the Department of the Meufe) DARCHE, Se. cretaries.

Sept. 3, 1791. The national af, fembly having heard the conftitional act above read, after approving of it, declare, that the conftitution is fi nifhed, and that it can make no change in it. There fhall be named immediately, a deputation of fixty members, to offer, the fame day, the conftitutional act to the king.

(Signed as before)

Letter from the King to the National Affembly, announcing his Refolution to accept the Conftitution, Sept. 13. Gentlemen,

I Have attentively examined the conftitutional act, which you have

pre

prefented for my acceptance. I accept it, and I will caufe it to be executed. At another time this declaration might have been fufficient; at prefent, I owe to the interefts of the nation, I owe to myself, to make known my motives.

I have always, fince the commencement of my reign, defired the reform of abufes, and in all acts of government wifhed to be regulated by the public opinion. Different caufes, among the number of which may be placed the fituation of the finances at my acceffion to the throne, and the immenfe expences of an honourable war, long fupported without increase of impofts, had established a confiderable difproportion betwen the revenues and the expences of the state.

Impreffed with the extent of the evil, I not only fought the means of remedying it; I felt the neceffity of preventing its return. I had formed the project of fecuring the happiness of the people upon a fixed bafis, and of fubjecting to invariable rules, even that authority of which I was the depofitary. I called on the nation to execute it.

In the courfe of the events of the revolution, my intentions never varied. When, after having reformed the ancient inftitutions, you be gan to fubftitute in their ftead the firft effays of your work, I did not delay the expreffion of my fentiments till the whole conflitution fhould be known to me; I favour ed the establishment of its parts, even before I could judge of the whole and if the diforders which have attended almost all the periods of the revolution, have too frequently afflicted my heart, I hoped that the law would refume force in the hands of new authority; and that, in approaching the term of your labours, every day would reftore to it that refpect, without which the peo

ple can neither enjoy liberty nor happiness. I long perfevered in this hope, and my refolution only changed at the moment when it abandoned me. Let every one recollect the moment at which I quitted Paris; the conftitution was almoft completed; and, nevertheless, the authority of the laws feemed to diminifh every day; opinion, far from concentring in any point, was divided into a number of parts. The most violent counfels alone feemed to be received with any degree of favour; the licentioufnefs of the prefs was at its height; no power was refpected.

I could no longer perceive the expreffion of the general will in the laws which I every where faw without force, and without effect. Then, I am bound to declare, if you had prefented to me the conftitution, I fhould have been of opinion that the intereft of the people (the constant and uniform rule of my conduct) did not permit me to accept it. Í had only one fentiment; I formed only one project; I wished to get at a distance from all parties, and learn what was the real wifh of the nation.

The motives by which I was then influenced no longer fubfift; fince that time, the inconveniences and the evils of which I complained have ftruck you in the fame light as me; you have teftified an inclination to re-establish order; you have direct your attention to the want of difcipline in the army; you have perceived the neceflity of reftraining the abufes of the prefs. The revifion of your labour has placed among the number of laws of regulation, feveral articles which had been prefented to me as conftitutional You have eftablished legal forms, for the revifion of those which you. have placed in the conftitution. In fine, the fentiment of the people appear to me no longer doubtful: (G. 4)

have

have seen them at once difplayed, both by their adherence to your work, and by their attachment to the fupport of monarchical govern

ment.

I accept then the constitution; I engage to maintain it at home, to' defend it against attacks from a broad, and to cause it to be executed by all the means which it puts in my power.

I declare that, informed of the adherence of the great body of the people to the conftitution, I renounce the right of concurring, which I had claimed in this work, and being refponfible only to the nation, no other, while I renounce it, can have a right to complain.

I fhould, however, deviate from truth, if I affirmed that I perceived in the means of execution and administration, all the energy neceffary to give motion and preferve the unity in all the parts of so vaft an empire; but fince opinions are divided upon thefe fubjects, I confent that the eeifion fhould be left to the test of experience alone. While I thall have faithfully employed all the means which are entrusted to me, no reproach can be laid on me; and the nation, whofe intereft alone ought to be the fupreme rule, will explain itself by those means which the conftitution has reserved to it.

But, gentlemen, for the fecurity of liberty, for the ftability of the conftitution, for the individual hap

inefs of all Frenchmen, there are interefts in which an imperious duty prefcribes to us to combine all our efforts: thefe interefts are, refpet for the laws, the re eftablishment of order, and the re-union of all citizens. Now that the conftitution is definitively fettled, Frenchmen living under the fame laws ought to know no enemies but thofe who infringe

them.-Discord and Anarchy; thele are our common enemies.

I will oppofe them with all my power: it is neceffary that you and your fucceffors fecond me with energy; that the law, without attempting to establish its dominion over the mind, may equally protect all those who fubmit their conduct to it; that thofe, whom the fears of perfecution and of trouble have driven from their country, be af fured of finding at their return fafety and tranquillity. And, in order to extinguish the animofities, to foften the 'evils which a great re volution always brings in its train; that law may, from this day, begin to receive a full execution, let us confent to an oblivion of the past. Let thofe accufations and profecutions which originate folely from the events of the revolution, be for ever extinguished in a general reconciliation. I fpeak not of those who have been folely influenced by their attachment to me--can you regard them as criminals? As to those who by exceffes, in which I can perceive perfonal injuries have brought upon them the profecution of the laws, I fhall prove in my conduct to them, that I am the king of all the French.

1 COME to confecrate, in this place, folemnly, the the acceptance

which I have given to the conftitutional act in confequence of which I fwear to be faithful to the nation and the law; and to employ all the power that is delegated to me, to maintain the conftitution decreed by the conftituting national affembly. May this great and memorable epoch be that of the re-establish ment of peace and union, and become the furety of the happiness of the people, and the profperity of the empire.

The PRESIDENT'S ANSWER.

ABUSES of long ftanding, which had triumphed over the good inten tions of the best of kings, and had inceffantly braved the authority of

the throne, oppreffed France. Depofitary of the wifhes, rights, and power of the people, the national affembly has established, by the destruction of all abuses, the folid bafis of public profperity. Sire, what this affembly has decreed, the national concurrence has ratified. The most complete execution of its decrees, in all parts of the empire, attefts the general fentiment. deranges the weak plans of thofe whom difcontent has too long kept blind to their own interefts. It promises to your majefty, that your wishes for the welfare of the French will no longer be vain.

It

The national affembly has nothing more to defire, on this ever. memorable day, in which you com plete, in its bofom, by the most folemn engagement, the acceptation of conftitutional royalty. It is the attachment of the French, it is their confidence, which confers upon you that pure and refpectable title to the moft defirable crown in the univerfe; and what fecures it to you, fire, is the unperishable authority of a conftitution freely decreed. It is

the invincible force of a people who feel themselves worthy of liberty. It is the neceffity which fo great a nation will ever have for an hereditary monarchy.

When your majefty, waiting from experience the lights which are about to be fpread by the practical refult of the conftitution, promises to maintain it at home, and to defend it from external attack, the nation, trufting to the juftice of its rights, and to the confcioufnefs of its force and courage, as well as to the loyalty of your co-operation, can entertain no apprehenfion of alarms from without, and is about to contribute, by its tranquil confidence, to the speedy fuccefs of its internal govern

ment.