Popular welfare was further encouraged, providing it did not come into conflict with governmental policies. A form of rudimentary sickness insurance was tried out in the region surrounding Liège, and in due course many independent “benefit societies” sprang up. The workhouses were greatly modernized throughout France, and carried little of the social stigma conferred by their English equivalents. Enlightened though these measures were, there was a less constructive side to Napoleon’s reforms. Trade unions were ruthlessly suppressed as “Jacobin” institutions, for example; the trade guilds were closely supervised, and every worker was required by law to carry a labor permit on his person at all times on pain of imprisonment. Such restrictive measures reveal that below the facade of the “welfare state” lurked the Emperor’s basic distrust of the people.
Education was considerably improved, but once again the hand of the totalitarian state was not far to seek. On the constructive side, it was decreed in 1802 that every Commune should have a primary school and that each Department should contain at least one secondary academy. The large cities were to open lycées (linking the secondary schools with the universities). Less commendable was the degree of state control over the content of education. Mathematics and science received every encouragement, but most of the liberal arts were either completely banned or severely curtailed; in particular the Government forbade the teaching of modern history, substituting intensive study of the period of Charlemagne, which the Emperor wished to emulate. Similarly, the teaching profession was closely supervised by the State; all teachers were compelled to belong to the “University of France”—a corporate examining and organizing institution. Napoleon entrusted much of the educational activity to the Church, but the powers abrogated from the Organic Articles gave him complete control.
The effectiveness of law and order was vastly improved under his supervision; in 1802 a new national police force was raised with detachments in every commune, and the next year special tribunals were sent out on circuit through the Departments. Until the refractory recruit situation got out of hand, the police were generally on top of the criminal situation and the crime index showed a slight decline. Behind the police lay a new system of local government—really borrowed from the more enlightened days of l’Ancien Régime. Once again, tight centralization was the theme. By the law of February 1800, every Department was placed under the orders of a prefect directly responsible to Paris, and below him, sub-prefects supervised every arrondissement and a mayor was appointed in each commune. At each level, the Government representative was assisted by a council of local notables. In this way France was run by 83 petit-consuls, and the system bore a remarkable resemblance to the old Intendancy of the eighteenth-century; Napoleon was never loathe to borrow from the past to embellish the present.
The redrafting of the legal codes represents the very best of Napoleon’s constructive work. In 1800, the First Consul set up two commissions to review the law, and a little later combined them into a single body under Cambacérès. The proposals of this commission were considered by the Judicial Committee of the Council of State before being presented to the First Consul for final approval. Once again, the early revolutionary reformers had greatly eased their successors’ work by sweeping away most of the ancient legal anomalies, and the First Consul received much expert assistance from a number of able lawyers. Nevertheless, he took a profound interest in the revision of the codes, attending in person, for instance, no less than 57 of the 109 meetings held to discuss the Civil Code. “During the four years of the Consulate, he summoned several councils each day,” records Chaptal; “At these, every aspect of administration, finance and law were considered in turn; and, as he was endowed with remarkable perception, the First Consul frequently uttered profound comments and judicious reflections which astounded the experts…. These councils often lasted until five in the morning for he never let a matter drop before his mind was made up.”7
The basis of the revised legal system was toleration and equity, the sanctity of private property and the central significance of the father in family life. Urged on by Napoleon, the laws of France were progressively codified and clarified; the Civil Code was promulgated between 1802 and 1804, and was followed by the Commercial (1807), Criminal (1808) and Penal Codes (1810). All in all this represented an amazing legal achievement, the effects of which are still felt in France, Belgium, Holland, Italy and parts of Germany. As one prefect wryly put it: “God created Bonaparte and then he rested.”8
The French people were not long in appreciating the magnitude of the national reconstruction being undertaken by their General Bonaparte. His presence at the helm of state became increasingly regarded as synonymous with national and personal security, and the wish to secure his position at the head of affairs rapidly crystallized. As early at 1800, men were fearing what the effect of an assassin’s bullet, dagger or bomb would be on France’s continued progress and prosperity, and the cynical realists in high positions also came to appreciate that the First Consul’s untimely death or overthrow would probably entail their own ruin. This current of opinion went a great way toward preparing the ground for the next step toward the throne—the Life Consulate. The first mention of what was afoot was cleverly timed to coincide with the signature of the Peace of Amiens on March 25, 1802; on May 6, the general pacification was jubilantly proclaimed, and two days later the formal proposal to make Bonaparte Consul for life was made. He demanded a plebiscite to decide the issue, at the same time to bypass the Tribunate’s hostility, and an overwhelming mark of popular approval was the outcome. Nevertheless, it was significant that much of the opposition to the proposal came from sections of the army. In August, the Senate declared the Life Consulate “in the name of the People,” and rather pointedly chose the same day for the unveiling of a large statue to peace in the capital. His new position permitted Bonaparte to nominate a successor, and his constitutional powers were increased at the expense of the Council of State and the troublesome Tribunate.
It was not a long step from the Life Consulate to the assumption of the imperial purple. The Consular Court was monarchical in organization and tone, forming part of Bonaparte’s deliberate conditioning of influential French opinion. He was determined to fuse all conditions of men together—soldiers, returned aristocrats, the nouveaux riches—and bind them all to his person. He had little taste for the frivolities of court life, but, as the financier Mollieu described it, “he was always prepared to sacrifice his simpler tastes for the sake of a greater interest.”9
Napoleon took great pains to ensure that his Court measured up to the necessary standards; old etiquette books were severely studied, and a new volume—“as large as that of the Civil Code”—was produced under the supervision of an extremely aged gentleman, uprooted from peaceful retirement in the provinces because he had once been a royal page at Versailles. Brilliant uniforms were designed for the chamberlains, equerries and a host of other Court dignitaries. However, the resultant splendor was at first very superficial, as the Countess Potocka recorded somewhat spitefully in her memoirs. “This Court—so magnificent from afar—could not stand close inspection. A type of confusion and lack of harmony was clearly distinguishable—undermining the impressions of grandeur and impressiveness that one might expect to find there. Nothing rang exactly true, and you felt that you were attending a rehearsal where actors were trying on their costumes and repeating their lines.”10
In their way, the conspiracies of 1803 and 1804 were godsends in leading the people toward accepting Napoleon as Emperor, for in the furore that followed the revelation of the plots there came a revival of popular anxiety for the future of France. To guarantee the continuation of Napoleonic government, it appeared necessary to ensure that the succession should go to a member of the Bonaparte family de jure in order to discourage further plotters against the regime. Naturally this feeling coincided with Napoleon’s own ambitions, and maximum pressure was exerted on the Senate and weakened Tribunate to ensure the f
ree passage of the necessary legislation. On May 18, 1804, this was duly accomplished, and the Empire formally came into existence on that date, but on November 6 a confirmatory plebiscite was held at the Emperor’s request with the encouraging, if rather suspicious, result already mentioned. Thus it was that on December 2, 1804, Napoleon was crowned Emperor of the French, though to the end of his days he remained plain General Bonaparte to his foreign enemies. “Joseph, if only our father could see us now!”11 he murmured as he ascended the steps of the throne. As Robespierre had prophesied would happen when he opposed the original declaration of war in 1792, a more absolute monarch than any known in France’s history hitherto had emerged from the years of struggle, but not everything that the Revolution stood for had perished. The best principles of equality of opportunity and fraternité were incorporated in the new order, and the revolutionary land settlement remained sacrosanct, but only at the price of the destruction of political liberty. Nevertheless, Napoleon Bonaparte had brought his adopted country a period of peace, albeit very shortlived, during which he established firm government and national security by starting the re-ordering of every aspect of civil life. For these gifts he received the genuine gratitude of the mass of the population. Order, efficiency and prosperity seemed worth the price of tyranny—at least in the early years. A purely military dictatorship could hardly have survived as long.
“ I lived very long on borrowing and charity,
Of Barras, vile flatterer, I married the whore;
I strangled Pichegru, assassinated Enghien,
And for such noble efforts obtained me a crown.”
For a full list of the Marshalate and their titles of nobility, see Appendix. The first list of marshals of the Empire was published on May 19, 1804.
30
THE CAMP OF BOULOGNE
The blessings of total peace were only enjoyed for fourteen short months, but it was almost three years before a full-scale continental war again broke out. The causation of the renewal of the struggle is a complex subject with many roots going back to 1789 and beyond, but the most immediate reason was the mutual dissatisfaction felt by all the signatories of the peace agreements of 1801 and 1802. In fact, these amounted to little more than temporary truces, for the real issues of the struggle had not been resolved. This was particularly true of the dissensions existing between Great Britain and France; the British Government had good reason to be dissatisfied with the terms of the Peace of Amiens and the international situation it appeared to establish. In the first place, it was soon quite clear that Bonaparte was determined to exclude British influence from the Continent by every overt and clandestine means at his disposal. British attempts to negotiate a renewed commercial treaty between the two countries were icily rejected by France, and this attitude, together with the fact that France remained in de facto control of Antwerp and the Scheldt, convinced many British Members of Parliament that a resumption of the struggle would not be long delayed. Nor was there the least sign that Bonaparte’s territorial appetities in Europe were satisfied; Piedmont, Elba, Parma, Switzerland and Holland were in turn annexed or retained on a sequence of trumped-up pretexts between April 1801 and September 1802. It was clear from a very early stage that Bonaparte intended to employ “cold-war” tactics to complete his unfulfilled territorial ambitions and the threat to British continental markets steadily increased.
Friction between the two powers was particularly acute over the colonial question. By the peace terms, Britain had agreed to return all her overseas conquests since 1793, save only Ceylon and Trinidad, to their respective former owners. In return, France had agreed to abandon Egypt, evacuate Naples and guarantee the independence of Portugal and the Ionian isles, and for this comparatively light price had been restored to the position of a colonial power. Furthermore, the treaty provisions by which Britain undertook to return Minorca to Spain and Malta to the Knights of St. John appeared to hold out the prospect of naval predominance in the Mediterranean returning to France. These facts were, in themselves, threatening enough, but the First Consul appeared to spare no pains in the months following the signature of the treaty to pile fresh fuel onto the smoldering embers. The dispatch of his brother-in-law, General Leclerc, with an expeditionary force to recapture fever-ridden San Domingo from the rebel leader, Toussaint l’Ouverture, was only a beginning. Bonaparte also compelled a weak Spanish Government to return Louisiana to France, and for a time it appeared possible that he was contemplating the creation of a new empire on the Mississippi. In the event, however, neither of these ventures brought lasting success; the capture of Toussaint only briefly forestalled the destruction of Leclerc’s army by yellow fever, while in 1803 the French Government sold Louisiana to the United States for 80 million francs, sorely needed for the prosecution of the war against Great Britain. However, the most serious challenge to British colonial supremacy appeared to be embodied in the mysterious and well-publicized mission of Colonel Sébastiani to the eastern Mediterranean powers in late 1802. This event appeared to presage a renewal of French interest in Syria and Egypt, and the worst British fears seemed on the point of being realized in January 1803 when the French Government prepared an expedition to India.
Although France undoubtedly required a considerable period of actual peace to complete the reconstruction of her society and economy, actions of this kind can only be regarded as deliberate provocations aimed against Great Britain. British opinion became increasingly convinced that Bonaparte’s sole motive in granting a peace in 1802 had been to win time to rebuild his shattered fleet and prepare a new invasion. Under this atmosphere of mounting tension, there is little wonder that British troops were withdrawn from Egypt with the greatest reluctance or that the British Government refused to implement the promised evacuation of Malta, employing a series of legal technicalities to justify their continued occupation of the Mediterranean island. Increasing numbers of men-of-war were taken out of “laying up in ordinary” and prepared for sea, and the press gangs were soon busy once more in the ports of England. The British press opened a virulently slanderous campaign against the First Consul, and the barbed shafts of the English commentators and the caricaturists were bitterly resented in the, Tuileries. In retaliation, the French Government could charge Britain with failing to carry out the peace terms over. Malta, and attempts were made to implicate British conspirators in the current assassination plots; indeed, Chouan agents were undoubtedly operating from Jersey. Bonaparte’s pride was wounded by what he considered to be English perfidy, and despite the genuine attempts of Talleyrand to find grounds for conciliation, the prospects of a lasting peaceable solution rapidly receded.
By March 1803 a new war was clearly very close, and the only issue remaining in doubt was which side would take the initiative and earn the title of “aggressor.” In the end, Prime Minister Addington took the bull by the horns on May 10 by issuing a virtual ultimatum to France, aware that the French Government was anxious to postpone the reopening of hostilities for several more months on account of its complex program of internal reforms and the unprepared state of its forces. The Gallic press lost no time in fulminating against “perfidious Albion,” the “violator of treaties,” and very shortly the French Government was ordering 160,000 men toward the Channel ports to form a new Army of England under the command of Soult and Ney. For its part, the British Government placed an immediate embargo on all French shipping in British ports, whereupon Bonaparte retaliated by arresting British nationals resident in or passing through France and her satellites. On May 16, France declared war, the first shots being fired when a Royal Navy frigate brushed with a French convoy in the Channel. So commenced the epic struggle between Great Britain and France which was only to be finally concluded on the field of Waterloo, more than twelve weary years away.
Until the winter of 1804, the war remained restricted to the two great powers that shared the waters of the Channel. There were, indeed, certain repercussions on the Continent—for instance, France lost l
ittle time in occupying Hanover and seizing Naples, while Spain was forced into a Gallic alliance and English goods were for a time excluded from Portugal—but the form of the war remained essentially maritime. Napoleon was aware that the only way to overcome Great Britain’s implacable hostility was to undertake the invasion of the country and dictate a peace from Windsor Castle, but the essential preliminary to any such undertaking was the winning of naval control of the Channel by the French fleet:
The Continent exhibiting as yet no symptoms of an immediate attack upon France, I profited by the occasion to menace England with invasion. Although difficult, this operation has always been regarded as possible; the descent once made, the capture of London was almost certain. The capital once occupied, a powerful political party would be created against the oligarchy…. London is but a few miles from Calais; the English army, scattered along the coast, could not unite in time to cover the capital. Of course this expedition could not be attempted by a mere corps d’armée, but its success was almost certain with 150,000 men presenting themselves before London within five days of their landing. Flotillas were the only means by which these 150,000 men could be landed in a few hours, and possession be gained of all the shallows. It was under protection of a squadron collected in the Antilles, and coming from thence under full sail to Boulogne, that this passage was to be effected…. Fifty vessels sailing from Toulon, Brest, Rochefort, l’Orient, and Cadiz would unite at Martinique. Their departure would make England tremble for the two Indies, and while the British fleets were in search of them off the Cape of Good Hope and the Antilles, our vessels would unite before Boulogne and secure the landing on the English coast. Only ten hours would be needed for landing 150,000 disciplined and victorious soldiers upon a coast destitute of fortifications and undefended by a regular army. It has been thought that English patriotism would have caused a levée-en-masse for the defense of their country, and that the retreat of my army would have been impossible. This patriotism would have been an obstacle under any circumstances, but preceded by a declaration of democratic principles we should have found partisans enough in England to effect a disunion sufficient to paralyze the rest of the nation.12
The Campaigns of Napoleon Page 42
