Invention of the Political Center as an Ideal: Staël and the Constitutional Monarchy (1789–1795)

Takeda, Chinatsu

doi:10.1007/978-981-10-8087-6_2

Chinatsu Takeda²

192 Accesses

Abstract

This chapter asserts that Staël’s liberal political thought represents, above all, a pragmatic application of an important political concept in Enlightenment philosophy, namely, moderation. I briefly present how Enlightenment philosophers such as Montesquieu and Hume dealt with this unique concept before it turned into a pragmatic debate on the second chamber on the eve of the French Revolution. After 1789, the concept remained important among left-wing moderates. While Staël oscillated between revolution and moderation under constitutional monarchy, she was among a few left-wing moderates who insisted upon the importance of institutionalizing elements of moderation such as the strengthened executive and constitution of the intermediate ranks in order to secure liberty in terms of security.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution

eBook: USD 16.99; Price excludes VAT (USA)

Softcover Book: USD 89.99; Price excludes VAT (USA)

Hardcover Book: USD 119.99; Price excludes VAT (USA)

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

1.
I draw from my earlier draft, Chinatsu Takeda, Mme de Staël’s Contribution to Liberalism in France, PhD dissertation, the University of London, 2000. On Staël’s political activities under constitutional monarchy, Fontana, Germaine, 11–36; Gzynne, Madame de Staël et la Révolution française; Susan Tenenbaum, The Social and Political Thought.
2.
Chinatsu Takeda, “Apology of liberty in Lettres sur les ouvrages et le caractère de J.-J. Rousseau: Mme de Staël’s Contribution to the Discourse on Natural Sociability,” European Review of History, vol. 14, No. 2, 165–193, June 2007, 180. Lettres will be discussed in detail in Chap. 3 of this book.
3.
Craiutu , A Virtue, 13–66 and “The Virtues of Political Moderation,” Political Theory, 29-3 (2001): 449–468; Ran Halévi, “La modération à l’épreuve de l’absolutisme. De l’Ancien Régime à la Révolution française,” Le Débat, 109 (2000): 73–98.
4.
Craiutu, A Virtue, 22.
5.
Ibid., 29–30.
6.
“The balance of power is a secret in politics, fully known only to the present age.” Hume , ‘Of civil liberty,” Political Essays, 55.
7.
Ibid. , “Of national characters,” 85.
8.
Ibid., 56.
9.
Takeda, “On a liberal,” 91–108.
10.
Charles-Louis de secondat. Baron de Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws (hereafter ST), ed. Anne M. Cohler, Basia C. Miller, and Harold S. Stone, (Cambridge: Cambridge U.P., 2005), 48.
11.
Ibid., bk 11–14, 155–156.
12.
“One cannot abuse power: power must check power by the arrangement of things. A constitution can be such that no one will be constrained to do the things the law does not oblige him to do or be kept from doing the things the law permits him to do.” Montesquieu, ST, bk 11–14, 155–156; Craiutu, A Virtue, 54.
13.
Annelien de Dijn, French Political Thought from Montesquieu to Tocqueville, (Cambridge: Cambridge U.P., 2011), 5; Johnson Kent Wright, “A Rhetoric of Aristocratic Reactions? Nobility in De l’esprit des lois,” The French Nobility in the Eighteenth Century: Reassessments and New Approaches, ed. Jay M. Smith, (University Park, PA: Penn State U.P., 2006), 242.
14.
Montesquieu, ST, bk 11 section 8, 167.
15.
John Greville Agard Pocock, The Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law: A Study of English Historical Thought in the Seventeenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge U.P., 1987), 17.
16.
Montesquieu, ST, bk 18–14, 292 and bk 30–33, 620–621.
17.
Ibid., bk 5–9, 55.
18.
Ibid., bk 10–16, 160.
19.
Montesquieu, “Notes sur l’Angleterre,” Oeuvres complètes, (Paris: Seuil, 1964), 332.
20.
Montesquieu, ST, bk 11–16, 160.
21.
François Furet and Ran Halévi ed., La monarchie républicaine: la constitution de 1791, (Paris: Fayard, 1996); François Furet and Mona Ozouf, ed., Terminer la Révolution: Mounier et Barnave dans la Révolution française, (Grenoble: Presses universitaires de Grenoble, 1990).
22.
Charles-Alexandre de, Calonne , Lettre adressée au roi par M. de Calonne le 9 février 1789, (London: T. Spilsbury, 1789), 137.
23.
Ibid., 168.
24.
Craiutu , A Virtue, 69–103; Jean Egret, La Révolution des Notables: Mounier et les Monarchiens, (Paris: Arnaud-Collin, 1950); Robert Howell Griffiths, Le centre perdu: Malouet et les “monarchiens” dans la révolution française, (Grenobe: Presses universitaires de Grenoble, 1988); Ran Halévi, “Monarchiens,” Dictionnaire critique de la Révolution française, 394–403.
25.
M.J. Madival and E. Laurent ed., Archives parlementaires de 1787 à 1860. Recueil complet des débats législatifs des chambres françaises, 1867–1871, (Paris: Paul Dupont, 1867–1871), vol. VIII, 515; Lally-Tollendal, “Discours de Lally-Tollendal sur l’organisation du pouvoir législatif et la sanction royale,” La monarchie républicaine, la constitution de 1791, ed. François Furet and Ran Halévi, (Paris: Fayard, 1996), 345–364.
26.
Archives parlementaires, vol. VIII, 521.
27.
Furet and Ozouf ed., Terminer la Révolution.
28.
Henri Grange, Les idées de Necker, (Paris: Librairie C. Klincksieck, 1974).
29.
Staël, Considerations, I–XVII, 130.
30.
Jacques Necker, De la Révolution française, vol. 1, (Paris: J. Drissonniers, 1797), 190; Grange, Les idées de Necker, 403; Jean Egret, La prérévolution française (1787–1788), (Paris: Presse universitaire de France, 1962), 403; Jean Egret, La révolution des notables, (Paris: Arnaud-Collin, 1950), 276.
31.
Grange, Les Idées, 423.
32.
Craiutu , A Virtue, 113–131.
33.
A large bulk of Staël’s letters between 1789 and 1792 disappeared and almost “no published or unpublished texts from this period have survived.” Fontana, Germaine, 11.
34.
About the social climate of Mme de Staël’s salon and her devotion to the cause of her father, Gouverneur Morris, Journal (1788–1792), (Paris: Mercure de France, 2002).
35.
Philippe Godet, Mme de Charrière et ses amis d’après des documents inédits (1740–1805), (Geneva: A. Julien, 1906), 440.
36.
Macheteld de Poortere, The Philosophical and Literary Ideas of Mme de Staël and Mme de Genlis, trans. John Leavar and Peter Lang, (New York: Peter Lang, 2007), 118.
37.
Staël, “L’Eloge de M. de Guibert,” Œuvres complètes de madame de Staël, vol. III, (Geneva: Slatkine Reprints), 1967, 414, 422; Staël, Correspondance générale, ed. Béatrice W. Jasinski, (Paris: Chez Jean-Jacques Pauvert, 1962) c, 1-II, 370. (Hereafter C.G.).
38.
Ibid., 2-II, 412.
39.
Ibid., 2-II, 412.
40.
Morris , Journal, 204.
41.
Fontana, Germaine, 11.
42.
Staël, A quels signes peut-on connaître quelle est l’opinion de la majorité de la nation?, OCb, vol. III-I, 559–565. Quotation, 563.
43.
Ibid., 563–564.
44.
Fontana, Germaine, 32.
45.
Staël, A quels signes, 565.
46.
Ibid., 562.
47.
Ibid., 562–565.
48.
Staël, Des circonstances actuelles qui peuvent terminer la Révolution et des principes qui doivent fonder la République en France, OCb, 351.
49.
Dijn asserts that what she calls “aristocratic liberalism,” inspired by Montesquieu’s idea “that the preservation of liberty in a monarchy depended first and foremost upon the nobility–a hereditary, landowning class with specific privileges that distinguished it from the rest of the nation (V, 9),” originated in the circle of ultraroyalists of Restoration France as they defended the political revival of traditional aristocracy in Restoration France. This chapter maintains that if we define aristocracy broadly as an intermediary large-sized landowning class without being tied down by the hereditary nature of traditional aristocracy endowed with privileges, the pro-revolutionary version of aristocratic liberalism started twenty years earlier than she claims. Dijn, French Political, 40–61, “Aristocratic Liberalism in post-revolutionary France,” Historical Journal, 48–3 (2005), 661–681. Steven Vincent identifies Montesquieu’s influence over the “non-authoritarian Left.” Steven Vincent, Pierre-Joseph Proudon and the Rise of French Republican Socialism (New York: Oxford U.P., 1984), 34–41, and “The Republican Moment(s) in Modern France,” European Journal of Political Theory, 6.2 (2007): 239–248, Benjamin Constant, 218–219.
50.
Leonard Burnand, Necker et l’opinion publique, (Paris: Honoré Champion, 2004).
51.
Jacques Necker, Dernières vues de politique et de finance offertes à la nation française, (Paris: S.I., 1802), 174.
52.
Ibid., 251–252.
53.
Ibid., 111.
54.
Note 9 by Florence Lotterie, Staël, A quels signes, in OCb III-I, 564.
55.
See Chap. 3 of this book.
56.
Fontana, Germaine, 9.
57.
Jacques Necker, Sur l’administration de M.Necker par lui-même, (Paris: hôtel de Thou, 1791), 54–55.
58.
Jacques Necker, Nouveaux éclaircissements sur le compte rendu au roi. Libr.Bermuset, (Paris: Libr. Bermuset, 1788), 445–446.
59.
“Public opinion and public credit, which is nothing more than public opinion applied to financial questions, became daily more essential to government.” Staël, Considerations, I-II, 41.
60.
Staël, A quels signes, 563.
61.
Ibid., 562.
62.
Ibid., 562.
63.
Lotterie, “introduction,” Staël, A quels signes, 558.
64.
Staël, A quels signes, 565.
65.
Staël published this pamphlet anonymously to justify Necker’s third administration. Staël, Simple Extrait du livre de M.Necker sur son administration, OCb, III-1, 573–598.
66.
Staël, C. G., 1-II, 493.
67.
Jacques Necker, Du pouvoir exécutif dans les grands états, vol. 1, (Paris: S.I., 1792), 18. Pierre Rosanvallon, Le bon gouvernement, (Paris: Seuil, 2015), 15–16.
68.
Georges Michon, Le rôle de la presse dans les derniers mois de 1791 et au début de 1792, (Paris: T.E.P.A.C., 1941), 6.
69.
Staël’s ideas and actions on the war question remain controversial among historians. Fontana, Germaine, 59. Jaume , “introduction,” Réflexions sur la paix, OCb III-I, 74. John Isbell, “Madame de Staël, ministre de l aguerre? Les discours de Narbonne devant l’assemblée législative,” Annales historiques de la Révolution française, 1997, vol. 307-1, 93–104. Darnton, “Mme de Staël,” 40.
70.
Michon, Le rôle, 30.
71.
Ibid., 34–35.
72.
Staël, C. G., I-II, 523–524.
73.
Robespierre, “Troisième discours sur la guerre,” Œuvres de Maximilien Robespierre, vol. 8. Discours (Octobre 1791–Septembre 1792), (Paris: Fb and C limited, 2016), 132–152.
74.
Fontana, Germaine, 37–38.
75.
Emile Dard, Un confident de l’empereur: le comte de Narbonne, 1755–1813, (Paris: Plon, 1943), 523–524.
76.
Fontana, Germaine, 53–57.
77.
Isbell, Madame de, 97.
78.
Narbonne spoke that “to show ourselves willing to do it the surest way to avoid it.” Isbell, Madame de, 101. Janinski, C. G., I-ii, 524 and II-ii, 316–320.
79.
Necker considers the 1791 constitution as follows: “This incomprehensible constitution … has placed, on one side, a single permanent assembly … and, on the other side, an executive power, without prerogatives.” Quotation from Craiutu, A Virtue, 133.
80.
Ibid., 133.
81.
Alain Laquièze, “Le modèle anglais et la responsabilité ministérielle selon le groupe de Coppet,” ed. Lucien Jaume , Coppet, creuset de l’esprit libéral, (Paris and Marseille: Economica and Presses universitaires d’Aix-Marseille, 2000), 157–176; Craiutu, A Virtue, 133–134.
82.
Staël, C. G., 2-I, 330–331.
83.
Ibid., 328.
84.
Ibid., 332.
85.
Ibid., 332–333.
86.
Laquièze, “Le modèle anglais,” 164.
87.
Ibid., 157–158.
88.
Ibid., 159.
89.
Ibid., 168.
90.
Staël, “December 12, 1791,” C. G., 1-II, 523–524.
91.
Ibid., 323–324.
92.
Narbonne wrote, “perhaps the only shadow of hope to dispel mistrust and save the regime.” Quotation from Isbell, “Madame de,” 101.
93.
Darnton, “Mme de Staël,” 40.
94.
Blennerhassett, Mme de Staël et son temps, vol. II, 92–122.
95.
Gouvernor Morris , “March 6, 1792,” Journal (1789–1792), 338.
96.
Feuillet de Conches, Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette et Mme Elisabeth, (Paris: Plon, 1864–1869), vol. I, 124–127.
97.
Jean Charles Dominique de Lacretelle, Histoire de la Révolution française, (Paris: Treutelle et Würtz, 1823), vol. III, 31–32.
98.
In the third chapter of Réflexions sur la paix, Staël warned that she would not address the origin of the war. Lucien Jaume, “introduction,” Réflexions sur la paix, OCb III-I, 74.
99.
Staël, Réflexions sur le procès de la reine par une femme, OCb, Les Circonstances actuelles et autres essais politiques sous la Révolution, vol. I-II, 40.
100.
Ibid., 40–41.
101.
Ibid., 42–43.
102.
Ibid., 43.
103.
Ibid., 59.
104.
Simone Balayé, “Un ouvrage inconnu de Madame de Staël, sur M.Necker,” Cahiers staëliens, vol. XII, June 1791, 27.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Faculty of Comparative Culture, Otsuma Women’s University, Tokyo, Japan
Chinatsu Takeda

Authors

Chinatsu Takeda
View author publications
You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Takeda, C. (2018). Invention of the Political Center as an Ideal: Staël and the Constitutional Monarchy (1789–1795). In: Mme de Staël and Political Liberalism in France. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8087-6_2

Download citation

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8087-6_2
Published: 01 August 2018
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-10-8086-9
Online ISBN: 978-981-10-8087-6
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyPhilosophy and Religion (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics