The société d'instruction républicaine and the propagation of civic republicanism in provincial and rural France, 1870-1877

Journal of Modern History

Volumn 71, Issue 2, 1999, Pages 271-307

  Hazareesingh, Sudhir ^a  

^a BALLIOL COLLEGE   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0007422022     PISSN: 00222801     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1086/235248     Document Type: Review

References (232)

1. I use the term "republican party" in the loose sense in which it was deployed in nineteenth-century France (le parti républicain).
2. See Jean-Marie Mayeur, Les débuts de la Troisième République, 1871-1898 (Paris, 1973), pp. 36-48.
3. Some historians have seen the late 1840s as marking the critical breakthrough in terms of peasant political consciousness: notably, Maurice Agulhon, La république au village (Paris, 1970);
4. Ted Margadant, French Peasants in Revolt (Princeton, N.J., 1979);
5. Peter McPhee, The Politics of Rural Life (Oxford, 1992).
6. On the failure of royalism, see Steven Kale, Legitimism and the Reconstruction of French Society, 1852-1883 (Baton Rouge, La., 1992).
7. See Pierre Cuiral, Adolphe Thiers (Paris, 1986);
8. J. P. Bury and R. Tombs, Thiers (London, 1986);
9. Joseph Reinach, La vie politique de Léon Gambetta (Paris, 1918);
10. Jacques Chastenet, Gambetta (Paris, 1968).
11. Christophe Charle, Histoire sociale de la France au XIXeme siècle (Paris, 1991), pp. 180-227.
12. On the philosophical underpinnings of the education debates, see Yves Déloye, Ecole et citoyenneté (Paris, 1994).
13. Gabriel Hanotaux, Histoire de la fondation de la Troisième République (Paris, 1926), 1:33-34.
14. For a sense of the debates among republican parliamentarians, see Léon Gambetta, "Lettres à un conseiller général," in his Discours politiques, 1871-1873 (Paris, 1875), pp. 10-39; and
15. E. L. G. de Marcère, Histoire de la République de 1876 à 1879 (Paris, 1908), 1:92-100.
16. The classic example of this dualism is Eugen Weber, Peasants into Frenchmen (London, 1977).
17. On the development of republican "print culture" during this period, see Philip Nord, The Republican Moment (Cambridge, Mass., 1995), pp. 205-12.
18. In 1850, 40 percent of French conscripts were illiterate; by 1870 this figure had fallen to 25 percent. See Martin Lyons, Le triomphe du livre (Paris, 1987), p. 169.
19. This is the conclusion of the most comprehensive existing study of the French political press in the 1870s: "C'est l'éfficacité de [leur] propagande qui a finalement permis aux républicains d'assurer la défaite politique des conservateurs." See Pierre Albert, Histoire de la presse politique nationale au début de la Troisième République (1871-1879) (Paris, 1980), 2:1053-54.
20. See, e.g., Pierre Nora, ed., Les lieux de mémoire, vol. 1 (Paris, 1984);
21. Pierre Rosanvallon, Le sacre du citoyen (Paris, 1992);
22. Maurice Agulhon, Marianne au combat (Paris, 1979).
23. On these manifestations of republican sociability, see Nord; on a republican popular library, see Pascale Marie, "La Bibliothèque des Amis de l'Instruction du IIIe arrondissement," in Nora, ed., 1:323-51.
24. A term used in an official communiqué issued at the time of the SIR's reconstitution in November 1871. See Le siècle (December 5, 1871 ).
25. Jules Barni, L'instruction républicaine (Paris, 1872), p. 19.
26. La République: Moniteur du suffrage universel (1872?), emphasis added. This was the predecessor to the SIR's journal Le patriote; it seems to have been the only issue to bear this title.
27. Claude Nicolet, L'idée républicaine en France (Paris, 1982), p. 155.
28. Jules Barni, Les principes et les moeurs de la République (Paris, 1873), p. 21.
29. A. Henryot, Ce que disent les Bonapartistes (Paris, 1872), p. 20.
30. Jules Barni, L'instruction républicaine, p. 21.
31. Raymond Franc, La question militaire et la République (Paris, 1872), pp. 7-8.
32. A theme developed extensively in Albert Joly, L'enseignement clérical et la société civile (Paris, 1877).
33. Barni, Les principes et les moeurs de la République, p. 12.
34. Most notably Jacquillou (Aristide Couteaux), who gave a detailed account of his social history in "Histoire d'un paysan poitevin racontée par lui-même," Le patriote (October 8, 1876), pp. 109-11.
35. See Nord (n. 11 above); and Sudhir Hazareesingh, From Subject to Citizen: The Second Empire and the Emergence of Modern French Democracy (Princeton, N.J., 1998).
36. On this theme, see Olivier Ihl, La fête républicaine (Paris, 1996).
37. Barni translated Kant's main philosophical writings into French during the 1850s and 1860s. His Geneva lectures were published as Les martyrs de la libre-pensée (Geneva, 1862).
38. On this period, see Auguste Dide, Jules Barni: Sa vie et ses oeuvres, 2d ed. (Paris, 1892), pp. 203-4.
39. See Bulletin officiel de la République Française (Bordeaux) (January 4, 1871), which noted that "la société dont il s'agit n'a aucun caractère officiel, mais elle poursuit un but qui intéresse si vivement l'avenir de la République Française que nous croyons devoir publier ses statuts."
40. For further details, see the 1872 circular letter of the Central Committee of the SIR and the statutes of the organization in Barni, L'instruction républicaine (n. 17 above), pp. 27-35.
41. Jules Cazot was secretary-general at the Ministry of the Interior in the Government of National Defense (1870-71), also serving as representative of the Ministry at the delegation of Tours. Between 1871 and 1876 he represented the department of the Gard in the National Assembly, after which he was elected to the Senate. In 1879 he served as minister of justice, and took an active role in justifying republican policy against religious congregations.
42. For a report on the 1876 meeting, held at the Cirque d'Hiver, see Le patriote (August 13, 1876), p. 44.
43. A circular from the Central Committee underlined the point in late 1871: "Le Comité Central n'a point la prétention de donner en quelque sorte l'investiture aux comités locaux qui se formeront. Il n'exige de ceux-ci d'autre condition que leur adhésion aux statuts; pour le reste, il leur laisse une entière indépendance" (quoted in Le siècle [December 5, 1871]).
44. The director of the Bibliothèque Démocratique collection was Victor Poupin; leading republican patrons included Arago, Barthélémy Saint-Hilaire, Michelet, Quinet, Simon, Gambetta, and Ferry.
45. Archives de la Préfecture de Police, Paris, BA-1497 (hereafter APP), report dated March 2, 1874.
46. APP, report dated August 21, 1877.
47. APP, report dated August 1, 1881.
48. In a ground floor room at the Rue Sainte-Catherine d'Enfer office (which was on the second floor), according to a well-informed police report; APP report dated July 3, 1877.
49. Patrick Harismendy, Sadi Carnot: l'ingénieur de la République (Paris, 1995), p. 176.
50. Paul Bouchard to Sadi Carnot, letter dated October 6, 1874; in l'ingénieur de la République ibid., 164-65. Carnot was eventually elected to the Conseil Général in 1877.
51. Harismendy.
52. Dide (n. 30 above), p. 217.
53. APP, report dated September 18, 1874.
54. He later wrote its history; see Narcisse Leven, Cinquante ans d'histoire: L'Alliance Israélite Universelle, 1860-1910, 2 vols. (Paris, 1911-20).
55. Press freedom was only fully codified by the opportunist government in 1881. For details, see Albert Cinquante ans d'histoire: L'Alliance Israélite Universelle, 1860-1910, (n. 13 above), 1:305-90.
56. Georges Weill, Le journal (Paris, 1934), p. 258.
57. Archives Nationales, Paris (hereafter AN), F18-399, letters dated February 9 and March 7, 1872 to the prefect of police and the minister of interior.
58. The reason, a letter from the police prefect seems to suggest, was that the paper's owner and administrator Le Chevalier had been twice fined under the Second Empire for "offenses envers l'Empereur" and was furthermore thought to be a républicain avancé because of his book La Commune (Paris, 1871). AN F18-399, letter to the minister of interior, April 6, 1872.
59. AN F18-472B, proclamation dated July 14, 1872.
60. APP, reports dated January 4, February 25, April 20, and July 20, 1872.
61. APP, report dated August 3, 1876. This was part of a wider trend; in 1873 nearly twenty republican newspapers were either closed down or denied sales permission by overzealous prefects. See Hanotaux (n. 8 above), 3:61.
62. For a study of his career and political thought, see Alan Grubb, The Politics of Pessimism: Albert de Broglie and Conservative Politics in the Early Third Republic (Newark, N.J., 1996).
63. The trial was extensively covered in the conservative La Côte d'Or, in its issues of January 20, 21, and 22, 1874. Long extracts of letters seized at Tenting's house were published, notably one by a bachelier activist of the SIR who took great pride in having sold a copy of Renan's Vie de Jésus to a local police officer. The story was also covered in Le Figaro (January 30, 1874).
64. APP, report dated September 18, 1874.
65. Fresnette Pisani-Ferry, Le coup d'état manqué du 16 mai 1877 (Paris, 1965), p. 232.
66. APP, notice dated August 28, 1877. Marais and Henri Martin wrote a letter protesting against the iniquity of this decision; it appeared in Le temps (Septembers, 1877).
67. APP, Prefectoral communiqué dated February 11, 1878.
68. For example, Auguste Marais, Elève Pinard, à votre place! Lettre à l'ancien ministre de l'Intérieur (Paris, 1876).
69. APP, report dated July 4, 1877.
70. APP, report dated September 18, 1874.
71. Albert (n. 13 above), 2:1075.
72. Le patriote (July 9, 1876), p. 2.
73. According to the flysheet announcing the relaunching of Le patriote (Bibliothèque Nationale LC2-3798), the members of the Conseil d'Administration in June 1876 were parliamentarians Barni, Henri Martin, Cazot, Joigneaux, Méline, Journault, Joly, Sadi Carnot, and De Pontlevoy; former prefects Coulon and Ribert; schoolteachers Maze and Huet; lawyers Menard-Dorian and Leven; publicists D. Ordinaire, Bonnemère, and Hugues; and the editor Germer-Baillière.
74. The files in AN F7-12681, 12682, 12683, and 12684 contain interesting material on the dissemination of conservative propaganda in the 1877 elections. For example, a letter dated September 18, 1877 from the Ministry of Interior to the Prefect of Seine-Inférieure apologized for only being able to send 5,000 brochures of Clément Duvernois's pamphlet La politique du Maréchal; the ministry's stocks were exhausted.
75. APP, report dated July 4, 1877.
76. Almost the entire collection is held at the Bibliothèque Nationale, LB57-1300.
77. "Des royalistes bâtards." See Dionys Ordinaire, Les prétendants et la République (Paris, 1872), p. 5.
78. See, e.g., Eugène Bonnemère, Les paysans avant 89 (Paris, 1872);
79. J. B. Jouancoux, Jacques Bonhomme: Histoire des paysans français, vol. 2 (Paris, 1873).
80. Léon Journault, La liberté organisée (Paris, 1872), p. 5.
81. La liberté organisée Jouancoux, 1:8-11.
82. Ordinaire, Les prétendants et la République, p. 13.
83. Ordinaire, Les prétendants et la République, p. Ibid., pp. 30-32.
84. P. Joigneaux, Cléricaux et Bonapartistes (Paris, 1875), pp. 18-24.
85. Eugène Bonnemère, Le maître d'école (Paris, 1874), pp. 21-25.
86. See "Le fantôme clérical," Le patriote (December 10, 1876), pp. 179-80.
87. Où le cléricalisme mène les nations, par un alsacien (Paris, 1876), pp. 10-11.
88. La pression cléricale dans les élections (Paris, 1876).
89. Le cléricalisme condamné par la Chambre des Députés: Discours de MM. Leblond et Gambetta (Paris, 1877).
90. Speech by Léon Gambetta, June 16, 1877, in Le Ministère du 17 Mai devant la Chambre des Députés, 2 vols. (Paris, 1877), 1:46.
91. These themes are developed in two pamphlets by Jacquillou, Première lettre aux paysans, and Deuxième lettre aux paysans (Paris, 1877).
92. Henri Martin, Les Napoléon et les frontières de la France (Paris, 1874), p. 6.
93. Most notably, Georges Lassez, La vérité sur le 2 Décembre (Paris, 1872), which drew extensively from Eugène Ténot's works on Parisian and provincial resistance to the 1851 coup d'état.
94. See also Victor Schoelcher, Les décembriseurs (Paris, 1874), which listed the atrocities against civilians in 1851; and
95. Eugène Pelletan, La police sous le Second Empire (Paris, 1875), which cataloged the evil practices of the secret police.
96. La police sous le Second Empire Henryot (n. 21 above), p. 10.
97. E. George, Ce que coûte un Empire (Paris, 1874), pp. 7-8.
98. Léon Journault, Ce qu'il faut entendre par les dix-huit années de prospérité de l'Empire (Paris, 1875), pp. 7-9.
99. Victor Guichard, Les finances du Second Empire (Paris, 1874), pp. 8-10.
100. Eugène Bonnemère, Les paysans après 1789 (Paris, 1872), p. 25.
101. A point made repeatedly. See, e.g., George,Les paysans après 1789 pp. 17-18;
102. Journault, Ce qu'il faut entendre, p. 4.
103. Jules Barni, L'appel au peuple (Paris, 1874), p. 10.
104. Jules Barni, L'appel au peuple Ibid., pp. 11-16. The shambles of the Mexican expedition were exposed in Taxile Delord's brochure,
105. La guerre du Mexique (Paris, 1874).
106. See, e.g., P. Joigneaux, Le filleul du Pape (Paris, 1874), pp. 7-8;
107. Adolphe Michel, Qui a voulu la guerre de 1870? (Paris, 1874), p. 10.
108. Jouancoux Qui a voulu la guerre de 1870? (n. 70 above), 2:65, n. 1.
109. La vérité sur Sedan, par un officier supérieur (Paris, 1875), p. 2.
110. Ce qu'on fait les Bonaparte, par un Alsacien (Paris, 1874), pp. 8-11.
111. See John Rothney, Bonapartism after Sedan (Ithaca, N.Y., 1969).
112. Report to Prefect of Somme, dated March 6, 1873. Archives Départementales de la Somme, 99 M 702.
113. Extensive details of Bonapartist organization and propaganda were given by former prefect of police Léon Renault in a testimony to a parliamentary commission in 1875; his entire deposition was published in a two-part SIR pamphlet, La conspiration bonapartiste, 2 vols. (Paris, 1875).
114. Jules Barni, La renaissance du bonapartisme: Le mal et le remède (Paris, 1875), pp. 6-8.
115. According to Rothney, Bonapartist support in the provinces peaked before the movement's propaganda effort "had really begun." La renaissance du bonapartisme: Le mal et le remède Rothney, p. 80. Whatever the truth of the matter, there is no denying that the republicans were extremely worried about the resurgence of Bonapartism.
116. Barni, L'appel au peuple, pp. 24-29.
117. Hippolyte Carnot, Ce que serait un nouvel empire (Paris, 1874), p. 7.
118. L. Garnier-Pagès, Le Bonapartisme et l'ordre (Paris, 1875), p. 4.
119. La conspiration bonapartiste, 2:61-62.
120. See Bernard Ménager, Les Napoléon du peuple (Paris, 1988).
121. Eugène Liébert, La vérité sur le 4 Septembre (Paris, 1876), pp. 4-7.
122. Eugène Liébert, La vérité sur le 4 Septembre (Ibid., pp. 8-15.
123. Eugène Liébert, La vérité sur le 4 Septembre (Ibid., pp. 16-25.
124. See, e.g., Adolphe Michel, L'Empire et l'opposition (Paris, 1875).
125. Colonel Charles Martin, L'Empereur a-t-il été trahi? (Paris, 1875).
126. Adolphe Michel, L'homme de Sedan (Paris, 1875), pp. 3-4.
127. Henri Martin, Hoche et Bonaparte (Paris, 1875), p. 6.
128. Jules Ferry, La lutte électorale en 1863 (Paris, 1863), p. 84.
129. Rosanvallon La lutte électorale en 1863 (n. 14 above), p. 353.
130. Rosanvallon La lutte électorale en 1863 Ibid., p. 354.
131. See, e.g., W. Gagneur's brochure in the Bibliothèque Démocratique series, La politique au village (Paris, 1874).
132. See, e.g., Lazare Pancrace's open letter to Hippolyte Taine, one of the scourges of the French peasantry, in Le patriote (February 4, 1877), p. 243.
133. Albert Le patriote (n. 13 above), 2:1075-76.
134. See in particular, Pierre Joigneaux, Nouvelles lettres aux paysans (Paris, 1871).
135. For a general study of his work, see A.-J. Devarennes, Pierre Joigneaux: Sa vie et ses oeuvres (Paris, 1903).
136. Alphonse Guyot, Aux habitants des campagnes (Paris, 1874), p. 5.
137. Dionys Ordinaire, La République c'est l'ordre (Paris, 1875), p. 16.
138. Lassez La République c'est l'ordre (n. 84 above), p. 2.
139. W. Gagneur, L'Empire et la candidature officielle (Paris, 1875), p. 34.
140. Edouard Millaud, Le suffrage universel (Paris, 1873), p. 6.
141. Barni, L'instruction républicaine (n. 17 above), p. 13.
142. Ordinaire, La République c'est l'ordre, p. 20.
143. Bonnemère, Les paysans après 1789 (n. 89 above), p. 5.
144. Journault, La liberté organisée (n. 71 above), p. 17.
145. Bonnemère, Les paysans après 1789, p. 30.
146. Journault, La liberté organisée, p. 18.
147. Journault, La liberté organisée, p. Ibid., pp. 34-35.
148. Millaud, Le suffrage universel, p. 31;
149. also Ordinaire, La République c'est l'ordre, p. 6.
150. Journault, La liberté organisée, pp. 12-13.
151. Jules Grévy, Le gouvernement nécéssaire (Paris, 1875), p. 34.
152. Hippolyte Maze, La fin des révolutions par la République (Paris, 1872), p. 17.
153. Hippolyte Maze, La fin des révolutions par la République Ibid., p. 24.
154. Barni, Les principes et les moeurs de la République (n. 20 above), p. 19.
155. Franc Les principes et les moeurs de la République (n. 23 above), p. 24.
156. Gustave Hubbard, Le budget des trois monarchies et le budget de la République (Paris, 1873), p. 26.
157. Bonnemère, Le maître d'école (n. 76 above), p. 33;
158. Joigneaux, Cléricaux et Bonapartistes (n. 75 above), p. 25.
159. "La République seule nous assure la paix"; see Guyot (n. 121 above), p. 11.
160. Franc, pp. La République seule nous assure la paix"; see 7-8.
161. Hubbard, pp. La République seule nous assure la paix"; see 19-20.
162. H. Martin, Hoche et Bonaparte (n. 113 above);
163. see also Hippolyte Carnot, Lazare Hoche: Général républicain (Paris, 1874).
164. Ordinaire, La République c'est l'ordre (n. 122 above), pp. 27-28.
165. Léon Gambetta, Discours de M. Gambetta prononçé à Abbeville le 10 Juin 1877 (Paris, 1877), p. 18.
166. The same point was made earlier in Jouancoux Discours de M. Gambetta prononçé à Abbeville le 10 Juin 1877 (n. 70 above), 2:70.
167. See, e.g., Rogers Brubaker, Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany (Cambridge, Mass., 1992), p. 35.
168. This theme is further elaborated in Sudhir Hazareesingh, "Defining the Republican Good Life: Second Empire Municipalism and the Emergence of the Third Republic," French History 11, no. 3 (1997): 310-37.
169. Barni, L'instruction républicaine (n. 17 above), p. 14; emphasis in original.
170. Barni, L'instruction républicaine Ibid., p. 18.
171. Ordinaire, La République c'est l'ordre, p. 10.
172. Pierre Lefranc, L'Empire et les municipalités (Paris, 1874), p. 5.
173. Pierre Lefranc, L'Empire et les municipalités 1874), p. 5. Ibid.
174. Ordinaire, La République c'est l'ordre, p. 10.
175. Millaud La République c'est l'ordre, p. (n. 125 above), p. 9.
176. Barni, Les principes et les moeurs de la République (n. 20 above), p. 28.
177. Millaud, Les principes et les moeurs de la République p. 13.
178. Lefranc, L'Empire et les municipalités, p. 5.
179. Alexandre Laserve, La République et les affaires (Paris, 1875), p. 10. In 1877 the SIR newspaper noted: "
180. Les conseils généraux s'occupent avec calme des intérêts locaux. La République et le pays n'ont rien de plus à désirer." Le patriote (April 15, 1887), p. 321.
181. This position was vigorously defended by Gambetta as from the early 1870s. See, e.g., his speech at the Saint-Quentin commemorative banquet, in La République Française (November 18, 1871).
182. See, e.g., "A un conseiller municipal," Le patriote (October 8, 1876), pp. 105-6.
183. Hubbard (n. 140 above).
184. Ordinaire, La République c'est l'ordre (n. 122 above), p. 15.
185. La vérité sur Sedan (n. 95 above), p. 3.
186. Bonnemère, Les paysans après 1789 (n. 89 above), p. 28.
187. Journault, La liberté organisée (n. 71 above), p. 25.
188. Ordinaire, Les prétendants et la République (n. 69 above), p. 31.
189. Henri Martin, Aux conseillers municipaux des communes de France (Paris, 1875), p. 11.
190. Gagneur, L'Empire et la candidature officielle (n. 124 above), p. 15.
191. See also "Dialogue entre un sénateur et un conseiller municipal," Le patriote (August 20, 1876), pp. 50-51.
192. Guyot Le patriote (n. 121 above), p. 5.
193. See also "La République et les municipalités," Le patriote (July 16, 1876), p. 15; and
194. "Un maire de l'Ordre Moral," Le patriote (February 25, 1877), p. 268.
195. Lefranc Le patriote (n. 153 above), p. 6.
196. Charles-Louis Chassin, Projet de cahier du délégué de commune aux élections sénatoriales (Paris, 1875), p. 9.
197. Speech by Jules Ferry, June 18, 1877, in Le Ministère du 17 Mai devant la Chambre des Députés (n. 81 above), 2:22.
198. Le Ministère du 17 Mai devant la Chambre des Députés Chassin, p. 10.
199. The 1877 almanac, Almanac de la Société d'Instruction Républicaine, 1877 for example, included pieces on village life and politics by Erckmann-Chatrian, D. Ordinaire, and two pieces by Joigneaux; the second was entitled: "Comme quoi la vie des champs n'a point son égale."
200. This analogy would have been scornfully rejected by Thiers, an unrepentant Jacobin centralist who despised municipal power. Pierre Joigneaux, "Qu'est-ce que la République?" La République: Moniteur du suffrage universel (n. 18 above).
201. This title was thought up by Georges Coulon, a former Gambettist prefect who was closely involved with the SIR in Paris. Dide La République: Moniteur du suffrage universel (n. 30 above), p. 217.
202. Ses, e.g., Le patriote (March 11, 1877), p. 283. The Bulletin de la Société d'Instruction Républicaine of April 1877 called for the formation of republican committees in view of the forthcoming cantonal elections.
203. Among the new works (all published in Paris by Librairie Centrale, 1885) were Adolphe Michel, Petite histoire de la famille d'Orléans, and Les finances de la République;
204. Joseph Reinach, Les lois de la République; and
205. J. Guillemaud, La république c'est l'ordre, la monarchie c'est l'émeute. 181 AN F18-399, prefect of police to minister of interior, August 20, 1877.
206. Le Temps (July 3, 1877).
207. The final Parisian issue (July 1, 1877, p. 413) announced that Le patriote would henceforth be edited by Jules Steeg in Libourne. According to the Biblithèque Nationale's Bibliographie de la Presse Française, vol. 33 (Gironde) (1975), a weekly edition of Le patriote came out in Libourne between July 1877 and January 1888. There was also a daily paper by the same name, which lasted until July 1879, at which point it merged with several other local republican titles, notably L'Union Républicaine, which remained one of the main dailies in Libourne until the Liberation.
208. The Bibliothèque Nationale (Q-10164) has a copy of the 1887 catalog of the "Bibliothèque Populaire de la Société d'Instruction Républicaine de l'arrondissement de Vesoul." With just over 5,000 titles, this branch of the society still seemed fairly active and prosperous. However, the annual report complained that the number of rural readers had not increased, and it particularly lamented that novels were in much greater demand than "serious" works in history, philosophy, and politics.
209. La République Française (November 14, 1871).
210. The work of the organization is also reported in Le patriote (July 14, 1872), p. 6.
211. John Patrick Bury, Gambetta and the National Defence: A Republican Dictatorship (London, 1936), pp. 243-44.
212. AN F18-472B, letter of prefect of Loiret to minister of interior.
213. Reported in Progrès de la Somme (July 8-9, 1879).
214. Progrès de la Somme (July 10, 1879).
215. APP, BA 946 (Barni), report dated January 3, 1872.
216. "La propagande radicale," L'univers (January 8, 1874).
217. APP, minister of interior to prefect of police, letter dated August 22, 1877.
218. Le patriote (July 9, 1876), p. 2.
219. APP, report dated July 3, 1877.
220. APP, report dated August 3, 1876.
221. APP, undated report (probably late 1878/early 1879).
222. Daniel Halévy, La fin des notables (Paris, 1930), p. 291.
223. Eugène Sémérie, La république et le peuple souverain (Paris, 1871).
224. On this theme, see P. M. Jones, Politics and Rural Society: The Southern Massif Central, c. 1750-1880 (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 305-27;
225. and James Lehning, Peasant and French: Cultural Contact in Rural France during the Nineteenth Century (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 179-203.
226. Pierre Barrai, Les agrariens français de Méline à Pisani (Paris, 1968), p. 40.
227. Jacquillou, "Ce que c'est que la République," Le patriote (August 27, 1876), p. 58; emphasis added.
228. Louis Rouchon, "La décentralisation municipale et la loi du 5 avril 1884" (Ph.D. diss., University of Paris, 1900), pp. 35-39.
229. On the development of this legislation before 1914, see Edmond Soulage, "Le décentralisation au profit des communes depuis la loi du 5 avril 1884" (Ph.D. diss., University of Montpellier, 1910).
230. Maurice Agulhon, "La Mairie," in Nora, ed. (n. 14 above), 1:167-93. For an illustration of the role played by municipalities in the new republican order,
231. see Bruno Dumons and Gilles Pollet, "Fonctionnaires municipaux et employés de la ville de Lyon (1870-1914):
232. Légitimité d'un modèle administratif décentralisé," in Revue historique 287 (1992): 105-25.