Annual Register of World Events

and with the payers established in the departments. To maintain with the said receivers and payers with the boards and administrations, the correspondence necessary for assuring the exact and regular paying in of money.

318. They can pay nothing under penalty of forfeiture, but by virtue,-1. Of a decree of the le. gislative body, and to the amount of the sum decreed by it for each object.-2. Of a decision of the di rectory.-3. Of the signature of the minister who directs the expence.

319. They cannot, under penalty of forfeiture, approve of pay ment, if the mandate signed by the minister, who directs the expence, do not set forth the date, the de. cision of the executive directory, and the decrees of the legislative body, which authorize the payment.

320. The receivers of direct con. tributions in each department, the different national boards, and the payers in the departments, give in to the national treasury their respective accounts; the treasury audits and passes them.

321. There are five commis. saries of national accounts, elected by the legislative body at the same periods, and according to the same forms and conditions as the com. missaries of the treasury.

322. The general account of receipt and expenditure of the re. public, with the particular ac counts and documents, is presented by the commissaries of the treasury to the commissaries of accounts, who audit and pass them.

323. The commissaries of aс. counts give notice to the legislative body of abuses, malversations, and all cases of responsibility, which they discover in the course their

operations; they propose measures suitable to the interests of the re. public.

324. The result of the accounts passed by the commissaries of aca counts, is printed and made public.

325. The commissaries of the national treasury and accounts cannot be suspended or removed but by the legislative body. But during the adjournment of the le. gislative body, the executive direc. tory may suspend and replace provisionally the commissaries of the national treasury, to the number of two at most, but are bound to refer them to both councils of the legis. lative body, as soon as they have resumed their sittings.

Title XII.-External Relations:

326. War cannot be decided upon but by a decree of the legis. lative body, upon the formal and necessary proposition of the exe. cutive directory.

327. The two legislative councils concur according to the ordi nary forms in the decree, by which war is decided upon.

328. In case of hostilities, imminent, or actually commenced, of menaces, or preparations for war against the French republic, the executive directory is bound to employ, for the defence of the state, the means at its disposal, charged, however, with communicating them without delay to the legislative body. It may even, in that case, point out the augmentation of force, and the new legislative re. gulations, which circumstances may require.

329. The directory alone can maintain political relations abroad, conduct negotiations, distribute the land and naval forces as it judges

judges necessary, and regulate their Title XIII.-Revision of the Condirections in case of war.

330. It is authorized to make preliminary stipulations, such as armistices, treaties of neutrality; it may likewise agree upon secret conventions.

331.. The executive directory agrees to, signs, or causes to be signed, with foreign powers, all treaties of peace, alliance, truce, neutrality, commerce, and other conventions, which it may judge to be necessary for the interest of the state. These treaties and con. ventions are negotiated in the name of the French republic, by diplomatic agents, nominated by the executive directory, and charged with its instructions.

332. In the case of a treaty con. taining secret articles, the regulations of those articles cannot be subversive of the open articles, or contain any alienation of the terri. tory of the republic.

333. Treaties are not binding till after having been examined and ratified by the legislative body; nevertheless, the secret conditions provisionally receive their execution from the moment they shall have been agreed upon by the executive directory.

334. Neither of the legislative councils deliberate upon war or peace, but in general commit.

tee.

335. Foreigners, whether esta. blished in France or not, succeed to their foreign or French relations; they may contract for, acquire and receive property situated in France, and dispose of it in the same manner as French citizens, by all the means authorized by the laws.

stitution.

336. If experience shew the inconveniences of some articles of the constitution, the council of elders proposes th revision of them.

337. The proposition of the council of elders is, in that case, submitted to the ratification of the council of five hundred.

338. When, in a period of nine years, the proposition of the council of elders, ratified by the council of five hundred, has been made at three intervals, of at least two years each, an assembly of revision is convened.

330. This assembly is formed of two members by department, all chosen in the same manner as members of the legislative body, and possessing the same qualifications as those required for the council of elders.

340. The council of elders points out, for the meeting of the assem. bly of revision, a place distant zo myriameters at least from that where the legislative body sits.

341. The assembly of revision has a right to change the place of its residence, observing the distance prescribed by the preceding ar.. ticle.

342. The assembly of revision exercises no function of legislation or government; it confines itself to the revision of the constitutional articles pointed out to it by the le gislative body.

343. All the articles of the con-: stitution, without exception, con-. tinue to be in vigour as long as the changes proposed by the as. sembly of revision are not accepted b ythe people. H3

344. The

344. The members of the assembly of division deliberate in

common.

345. The citizens who are mem, bers of the legislative body, at the time of convoking an assembly of revision, cannot be elected mem. bers of that assembly.

346. The assembly of revision addresses immediately to the primary assemblies the plan of reform it has agreed upon. It is dissolved the moment the plan is addressed to them.

347. The duration of the assembly of revision can in no case exceed three months.

348. The members of the assembly of revision cannot be exa. mined, accused, or tried at any time for what they have said or written in the exercise of their functions. During the continu. ance of those functions they cannot be put upon trial, except by a deci. sion of the members of the assembly of revision.

349. The assembly of revision attends no public ceremony; its members receive the same indem nity as the members of the legisla. tive body.

350. The assembly of revision has the right of exercising, or causing to be exercised, the police of the commune in which it resides.

Title XIV. General Dispositions. 351. There exists among the citizens no superiority but that of public functionaries, a and relative

to the exercise of their functions.

352. The law acknowledges neither religious vows, nor any other engagement, contrary to the natural rights of man.

353. No man can be hindered from speaking, writing, printing, and publishing his thoughts. Writ ings cannot be subject to any censure before their publication. No man can be responsible for what he has written or published, but in cases provided for by the law,

354. No man can be hindered from exercising the form of worship he has chosen, while he conforms to the laws. No man can be forced to contribute to the expences of any form of worship. The republic pays for none.

355. There is neither privilege nor right of companies, nor cor. poration, nor limitation to the freedom of the press, of commerce, and to the exercise of industry and arts of every kind. Every prohibitory law of this sort, when circumstances render it necessary, is essentially provisional, and has no effect beyond a year at most, unless it be formally renewed.

356. The law watches particu, larly the professions which interest public morals, the safety and the health of citizens; but admission to the exercise of these professions cannot be made to depend upon any pecuniary security.

357. The law ought to provide for the recompense of inventors, or for the maintenance of the exclusive property of their discoveries or productions.

358. The constitution guarantees the inviolability of all property, of a just indemnity for that of which public necessity legally proved may require the sacrifice.

359. The house of every citizen is an inviolable asylum; during the night no one has a right to enter it, except in case of fire, inunda

tion, or a call from within the house. During the day, the orders of the constituted authorities may be executed in it. No domiciliary visit can be made but in virtue of alaw, and for the person or object expressly stated in the act which orders the visit.

360. No corporation or association contrary to public order can be formed.

361. No assembly of citizens can call itself a popular society.

362. No particular society em. ploying itself upon political questions, can correspond with any other, or affiliate with it, or hold public sittings, composed of members and auditors, distinguished from one another, or impose conditions of admission and eligibility, or arrogate rights of exclusion, or make its members wear any exter. nal mark of their association.

363. The citizens cannot exercise their political rights, but in the primary or communal semblies.

364. All the citizens are free to address petitions to the public authorities, but the petitions must be individual: no association can present collective petitions, except the constituted authorities, and that only upon subjects appertaining to their functions. The petitioners must never forget the respect due to the constituted authorities.

365. Every armed assemblage is an offence against the constitution; it ought to be instantly dispersed by force.

366. Every assemblage, not armed, ought also to be dispersed, at first by means of verbal command, and, if necessary, by the display of armed force.

367. Several constituted autho.

rities cannot meet to deliberate together; no act issuing from such a meeting can be executed.

368. No man can wear distinctive marks which call to mind functions formerly exercised, or services performed.

359. The members of the legis. lative body, and all the public functionaries, wear, in the exer. cise of their functions, the dress or sign of the authority with which they are invested; the law deter. mines the form of it.

307. No citizen can renounce, in whole or in part, the indemnity or salary allowed him by the law on account of public functions,

371. There is uniformity of weights and measures in the re. public.

372. The French æra commences on the 22d of September 1792, the day of the foundation of the re. public.

373. The French nation declares, that in no case will it suffer the return of the French, who having abandoned their country since the 15th of July, 1789, are not com, prehended in the exceptions made to the laws against emigrants: and the nation interdicts the legislative body from creating new exceptions upon this point. The property of emigrants is irrevocably confiscated to the benefit of the republic.

374. The French nation proclaims also as a guarantee of the public faith, that after an adjudi. cation legally completed of na. tional property, whatever may have been its origin, the legitimate holder cannot be dispossessed of it, but a person reclaiming it may, if there be reason, be indemnified by the national treasury.

375. None of the powers instiH4 tuted

tuted by the constitution, has the

November 19

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right to change it, in whole or in

part, saving the reforms that may 1795. February 6

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be made in it, by means of revision,

conformably to the dispositions of

title thirteen.

376. The citizens shall call to mind incessantly, that it is upon the wisdom of choice in the primary electoral assemblies, the du. ration, preservation and prosperity of the republic principally depend.

377. The French people com. mit the deposit of the present con. stitution to the fidelity of the legis. lative body, of the executive directory, of the administrators and judges; to the vigilance of fathers of families; to wives and to mo. thers; to the affection of the young citizens, and to the courage of all

the French.

Inspected by the representatives of the people, inspectors of the mi.