In fact, there have been
many instances in which they have been cashiered by their corps.
Here is a second negative on the choice of the king- a negative as
effectual at least as the other of the Assembly. The soldiers know
already that it has been a question, not ill received in the
National Assembly, whether they ought not to have the direct choice of
their officers, or some proportion of them? When such matters are in
deliberation it is no extravagant supposition that they will incline
to the opinion most favorable to their pretensions. They will not bear
to be deemed the army of an imprisoned king whilst another army in the
same country, with whom, too, they are to feast and confederate, is to
be considered as the free army of a free constitution. They will
cast their eyes on the other and more permanent army; I mean the
municipal. That corps, they well know, does actually elect its own
officers. They may not be able to discern the grounds of distinction
on which they are not to elect a Marquis de la Fayette (or what is his
new name?) of their own. If this election of a commander-in-chief be a
part of the rights of men, why not of theirs? They see elective
justices of peace, elective judges, elective curates, elective
bishops, elective municipalities, and elective commanders of the
Parisian army- why should they alone be excluded? Are the brave troops
of France the only men in that nation who are not the fit judges of
military merit and of the qualifications necessary for a
commander-in-chief? Are they paid by the state and do they, therefore,
lose the rights of men? They are a part of that nation themselves
and contribute to that pay.
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