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If the violation of treaties is not a right of the victor, after the plebiscite, in which, notwithstanding all the violences, three-quarters of the population voted for Germany, then there is no reason for discussion. The words used by Lloyd George on May 18, 1921, in the House of Commons, are a courteous abbreviation of the truth.
He certainly had one paltry object of his own; he wished to gratify his subjects by military glory. He began to suspect the hollowness of the testimony of the plebiscite; the French people did not like him, and never would like him. A war would please the populace and the army; it would also make him look much more like a real Napoleon.
"We shall organize a popular vote, by yes or no, confiding the destinies of our beloved country to the wisdom and valiance of my heroic brother, the invincible general. A plebiscite. Do you understand?" And Senor Fuentes, puffing out his leathery cheeks, had inclined his head slightly to the left, letting a thin, bluish jet of smoke escape through his pursed lips. He had understood.
"The Emperor has resorted to a plebiscite viz., a vote by ballot and universal suffrage as to certain popular changes which circumstances compel him to substitute for his former personal rule.
Some said twenty-five hundred, some made it five hundred, and almost every person killed was, not a Red combatant, but an innocent victim. Thus Louis Napoleon made himself master of Paris. The army was all for him, the masses were apathetic, the rural population was on his side. A few weeks later a plébiscite made him emperor.
The Minister, the Deputes and the Duchesse de Tarascon talked politics, and ridiculed the trumpery emeute of the 14th; exulted in the success of the plebiscite; and admitting, with indignation, the growing strength of Prussia, and with scarcely less indignation, but more contempt, censuring the selfish egotism of England in disregarding the due equilibrium of the European balance of power, hinted at the necessity of annexing Belgium as a set-off against the results of Sadowa.
When the vote on the Plebiscite was taken, his majority consisted of "Ouis" which were given because it was supposed that he was about to treat. Since then we have gone on from day to day vaguely hoping that either the Neutral Powers or the armies of the provinces would get us out of the mess in which we are, or, even if these failed us, that by a sortie the town would be revictualled.
Austria was deprived of everything but Venice; Tuscany and Romagna declared for incorporation by plebiscite; Garibaldi conquered Sicily and the south; and by the end of 1860 the King of Sardinia was king of practically the whole of Italy.
At my suggestion, you have been a ringleader in strikes which have terribly shaken the Imperial system, more than its Ministers deem; now I want a man like you to assist in a bold demonstration against the Imperial resort to a rural priest-ridden suffrage, on the part of the enlightened working class of Paris." "Good!" said Monnier. "In a day or two the result of the plebiscite will be known.
"Then came words which touched me deeply me, who, knowing nothing of politics, still feel the link that unites Art to Freedom: 'But from the first your Majesty has looked forward to the time when this concentration of power would no longer correspond to the aspirations of a tranquil and reassured country, and, foreseeing the progress of modern society, you proclaimed that 'Liberty must be the crowning of the edifice. Passing then over the previous gradual advances in popular government, the President came to the 'present self-abnegation, unprecedented in history, and to the vindication of that plebiscite which I have heard so assailed viz., Fidelity to the great principle upon which the throne was founded, required that so important a modification of a power bestowed by the people should not be made without the participation of the people themselves.
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