Part 47 (1/2)
If there had ever existed any doubt as to the crimes of high treason charged against Louis XVI, the doubt vanished before the crus.h.i.+ng proofs furnished against him during his examination. Deseze, Tronchet and Malesherbes, charged with the defense made their main plea on the royal inviolability guaranteed by the Const.i.tution of 1791.
According to the defense of Louis XVI, and, indeed, according to the text of the Const.i.tution itself, the King, even though he violated the Const.i.tution, even though he betrayed the state, even though he led an invasion upon France, and at the head of foreign troops put the country to fire and sword, even then he incurred no penalty other than that of deposition. Such was the brief of the King's lawyers.
This theory, in which the absurd jostled the monstrous, was not judged worthy of a refutation by the Convention. Capet's accusers placed the question on a higher plane, by affirming and demonstrating the nullity of the Const.i.tutional pact of 1791. Such was the opinion held by Robespierre, St. Just, Condorcet, Carnot, Danton, several Girondins, and, in fact, the great majority of the house.
In the name of justice, of right, and of reason, Louis XVI richly merited the verdict of guilty.
The sovereignty of the people being permanent, indivisible and inalienable, the Const.i.tution of 1791 was radically null and void, in that it provided for the hereditary alienation of a portion of the people's rights, in favor of the ex-royal family. The Conventionists of 1793 were no more in love with the Const.i.tution of 1791 than the Const.i.tuents of 1791 were with the monarchical, feudal and religious inst.i.tutions which had weighed like an incubus on France fourteen centuries long.
A nation has the power, but never the right, to alienate its sovereignty, either in whole or in part, by delegating it to a hereditary family. Such an alienation, imposed amid the violence of conquest, borne out of habits of thought, or consented to in a moment of public aberration, binds neither the present generation nor those to come. Accordingly, the Const.i.tution of 1791 being virtually null in fact, Louis Capet could not invoke the protection of that Const.i.tution, which guaranteed the inviolability of the royal person, and limited his punishment to deposition in a few specified cases. Louis XVI was, then, legally brought to trial. By reconquering its full sovereignty on the 10th of August, the nation invested the Convention with the powers necessary for judging the one-time King. His crimes were notorious and flagrant; their penalty was written in the books of the law, equally for all citizens; he must, then, undergo the penalty for his misdeeds.
I, John Lebrenn, add here some further pa.s.sages from my diary, relating to the trial, judgment and execution of Louis Capet.
JANUARY 15, 1793.--Having heard the defense submitted by Deseze, one of the attorneys for Louis XVI, the Convention put to a vote this first question:
”Is Louis Capet guilty of conspiracy against liberty and the nation, and of a.s.sault on the general safety of the State?”
The a.s.sembly contained seven hundred and forty-nine members.
Six hundred and eighty-three replied:
”Yes, the accused is guilty.”
The roll-call being completed, the president of the a.s.sembly announced the decision:
”In the name of the French people, the National Convention declares Louis Capet guilty of conspiracy against liberty and the nation, and of a.s.sault on the general safety of the State.”
The second question was:
”Shall the decision of the National Convention be submitted to ratification by the people?”
The members who voted for ratification by the people were two hundred and eighty-one; those against ratification, four hundred and twenty-three.
The president announced the result of the vote:
”The National Convention declares the judgment rendered on Louis Capet shall not be sent for ratification to the people.”
JANUARY 17, 1793.--To-day and yesterday the sessions of the Convention were permanent, due to the gravity of the situation. The debate turned upon the third question:
”What shall be the penalty imposed on Louis XVI?”
I was present at the sessions wherein the elected Representatives of the people decided the fate of the Frankish monarchy, imposed on Gaul for fourteen centuries. It was not alone the man, the King, that the Convention decapitated--it was the most ancient monarchy in Europe. It was not only the head of Capet that the Republic wished defiantly to cast at the feet of allied Europe; it was the crown of the last of the Kings.
It was eight in the evening. In response to their names as the roll was called the members of the Convention mounted the tribunal one by one, and in the midst of a solemn silence cast their vote.