July Ordinances

Ordinance Against the Press
CHARLES, &c.

To all to whom these presents shall come, health.

On the report of our Council of Ministers, we have ordained and ordain as follows:―

Art. 1. The liberty of the periodical press is suspended.

2. The regulations of the articles 1st, 2nd, and 9th of the 1st section of the law of the 21st of October, 1814, are again put in force, in consequence of which no journal, or periodical, or semi-periodical writing, established, or about to be established, without distinction of the matters therein treated, shall appear either in Paris or in the departments, except by virtue of an authority first obtained from us respectively by the authors and the printer. This authority shall be renewed every three months. It may also be revoked.

3. The authority shall be provisionally granted and provisionally withdrawn by the prefects from journals and periodicals, or semi-periodical works, published or about to be published in the departments.

4. Journals and writings published in contravention of article 2 shall be immediately seized. The presses and types used in the printing of them shall be placed in a public depot under seals, or rendered unfit for use.

5. No writing below twenty printed pages shall appear, except with the authority of our Minister, Secretary of State for the Interior of Paris, and of the prefects in the departments. Every writing of more than twenty printed pages, which shall not constitute one single work, must also equally be published under authority only. Writings published without authority shall be immediately seized; the presses and types used in printing them shall be placed in a public depot, and under seals, or rendered unfit for use.

6. Memoirs relating to legal process, and memoirs of scientific and literary societies, must be previously authorized, if they treat in whole or in part of political matters, in which case the measures prescribed by article 5 shall be applicable.

7. Every regulation contrary to the present shall be without effect.

8. The execution of the present ordinance shall take place in conformity to article 4 of the ordinance of November 27, 1816, and of that which is prescribed in the ordinance of the 18th of January, 1817.

9. Our Secretaries of State are charged with the execution of this ordinance.

Given at Chateau St. Cloud, the 25th of July, of the year of Grace 1830, and the 6th of our reign.

(Signed) CHARLES.

(Countersigned) Prince de POLIGNAC, President. CHANTELAUZE, Keeper of the Seals. Baron D'HAUSSEZ, Minister of Marine. MONTBEL, Minister of Finance. Count GUERNON RANVILLE, Minister of Ecclesiastical Affairs. Baron CAPELLE, Secretary of State for Public Works.

Ordinance Annulling the Elections of the Deputies
CHARLES, &c.

To all to whom these presents shall come, &c.

Having considered Art. 50 of the Constitutional Charter; being informed of the manœuvres which have been practiced in various parts of our kingdom, to deceive and mislead the electors during the late operations of the electoral colleges; having heard our council; we have ordained and ordain as follows:―

Art. 1. The Chamber of Deputies of Departments is dissolved.

2. Our Minister, Secretary of State of the Interior, is charged with the execution of the present ordinance.

Given at St. Cloud, the 25th day of July, the year of Grace 1830, and the sixth of our reign.

CHARLES.

(Countersigned) Count de PEYRONNET, Peer of France, Secretary of State for the Interior.

Ordinance Abridging the Right of Election
CHARLES, &c.

To all those who shall see these presents, health.

Having resolved to prevent the return of the manœuvres which have exercised a pernicious influence on the late operations of the electoral colleges, wishing in consequence to reform according to the principles of the Constitutional Charter the rules of Election, of which experience has shown the inconvenience, we have recognized the necessity of using the right which belongs to us, to provide by acts emanating from ourselves for the safety of the state, and for the suppression of every enterprise injurious to the dignity of our crown. For these reasons, having hard our council, we have ordained and ordain―

Art. 1. Conformably to the articles 15, 36, and 30, of the Constitutional Charter, the Chamber of Deputies shall consist only of Deputies of Departments.

2. The electoral rate and the rate of eligibility shall consist exclusively of the sums for which the elector and the candidate shall be inscribed individually, as holders of real or personal property, in the roll of the land tax or of personal taxes.

3. Each department shall have the number of deputies allotted to it by the 36th article of the Constitutional Charter.

4. The deputies shall be elected, and the chamber renewed, in the form and for the time fixed by the 37th article of the Constitutional Charter.

5. The electoral colleges shall be divided into colleges of arrondissement and colleges of departments, except the case of electoral colleges of departments, to which only one deputy is alloted.

6. The electoral colleges of arrondissement shall consist of all the electors whose political domicile is established in the arrondissement. The electoral colleges of departments shall consist of a fourth part, the highest taxed, of the electors of departments.

7. The present limits of the electoral colleges of arrondissements are retained.

8. Every electoral college of arrondissement shall elect a number of candidates equal to the number of departmental deputies.

9. The college of arrondissement shall be divided into as many sections as candidates. Each division shall be in proportion to the number of sections, and to the total number of electors, having regard as much as possible to the convenience of place and neighborhood.

10. The sections of the electoral college of arrondissements may assemble in different places.

11. Every section of the electoral college of arrondissements shall choose a candidate, and proceed separately.

12. The presidents of the sections of the electoral college of arrondissement shall be nominated by the prefects from among the electors of the arrondissement.

13. The college of department shall choose the deputies; half the deputies of departments shall be chosen from the general list of candidates proposed by the colleges of arrondissements; nevertheless, if the number of deputies of the department is uneven, the division shall be made without impeachment of the right reserved by the college of department.

14. In cases where, by the effect of omissions, of void or double nominations, the list of candidates proposed by the colleges of arrondissements shall be incomplete, if the list is reduced below half the number required, the college of department shall choose another deputy not in the list; if the list is reduced below a fourth, the college of department may elect beyond the whole of the deputies of department.

15. The prefects, sub-prefects, and the general officers commanding military divisions and departments, are not to be elected in the departments where they exercise their functions.

16. The list of electors shall be settled by the prefect in the Council of Prefecture. It shall be posted up five days before the assembling of the colleges.

17. Claims regarding the power of voting which have not been authorized by the prefects shall be decided by the Chamber of Deputies; at the same time it shall decide upon the validity of the operations of the colleges.

18. In the electoral colleges of department, the two oldest electors and the two electors who pay the most taxes shall execute the duty of scrutators.

The same disposition shall be observed in the sections of the college of arrondissement, composed, at most, of only fifty electors. In the other college sections the functions of scrutators shall be executed by the oldest and the richest of the electors. The secretary shall be nominated in the college of the section of colleges by the president and the scrutators.

19. No person shall be admitted into the college, or section of college, if he is not inscribed in the list of electors who compose part of it. This list will be delivered to the president, and will remain posted up in the place of the sitting of the college, during the period of its proceedings.

20. All discussion and deliberation whatever are forbidden in the bosom of the electoral colleges.

21. The police of the college belongs to the President. No armed force without his order can be placed near the hall of sittings. The military commandant shall be bound to obey his requisitions.

22. The nominations shall be made in the colleges and sections of college by the absolute majority of the votes given. Nevertheless, if the nominations are not finished after two rounds of scrutiny, the bureau shall determine the list of persons who shall have obtained the greatest number of suffrages at the second round. It shall contain a number of names double that of the nominations which remain to be made. At the third round, no suffrages can be given except to the persons inscribed on that list, and the nominations shall be made by a relative majority.

23. The electors shall vote by bulletins; every bulletin shall contain as many names as there are nominations to be made.

24. The electors shall write their vote on the bureau, or cause it to be written by one of the scrutators.

25. The name, the qualification, and the domicile of each elector who shall deposit his bulletin, shall be inscribed by the secretary on a list destined to establish the number of the voters.

26. Every scrutiny shall remain open for six hours; and shall be declared during the sitting.

27. There shall be drawn up a proces verbal for each sitting. This proces verbal shall be signed by all the members of the bureau.

28. Conformably to article 46 of the Constitutional Charter, no amendment can be made upon any law in the Chamber, unless it has been proposed and consented to by us; and unless it has been discussed in the bureaus.

29. All regulations contrary to the present ordinance shall remain without effect.

30. Our Ministers, Secretaries of State, are charged with the execution of the present ordinance.

Given at St. Cloud, this 25th day of July, in the year of grace 1830, and 6th of our reign.

CHARLES.

(Countersigned by all the Ministers.)