In rural districts the Commune corresponds to the English parish; it is the oldest and best-defined of all local areas.

In urban districts it corresponds with the municipality or township.

The Revolutionists of 1790 and 1848 had sought to apply the principle of manhood suffrage to communal government; but their plans were swept away by the ensuing reactions, and the dawn of the Third Republic found the Communes, both rural and urban, under the control of the _prefets_ and their subordinates.

We must note here that the office of _prefet_, instituted by Bonaparte in 1800, was designed to link the local government of the Departments closely to the central power: this magistrate, appointed by the Executive at Paris, having almost unlimited control over local affairs throughout the several Departments.

Indeed, it was against the excessive centralisation of the prefectorial system that the Parisian Communists made their heedless and unmeasured protest.