In his system, he is to declare who the notables of the nation shall be and stamp them with the seal of the State; it is not for the nation to present them to the head of the State stamped with the national seal." Consequently, at the end of a year, he becomes, through the establishment of electoral colleges, the veritable grand-elector of all the notables; he has transformed, with his usual address, a liberal institution into a reigning instrumentality.[4117] Provisionally, he holds on to the list of communal notables, "because it is the work of the people, the result of a grand movement which must not prove useless, and because, moreover, it contains a large number of names....

offering a wide margin from which to make good selections.[4118] He brings together these notables in each canton, and invites them to designate their trusty men, the candidates from which he will choose municipal councilors.

But, as there are very few cultivated men in the rural districts, "nearly always it is the old seignior who would get himself designated";[4119] it is essential that the hand of the government should not be forced, that its faculty of choosing should not be restricted.

Thus, the presentation of municipal councilors of that category must cease, there must no longer be any preliminary candidates.

Now, according the senatus-consulte, this category is a large one, for it comprises all communes of less than 5000 souls, and therefore over 35,000 municipal councils out of 36,000, whose members are appointed arbitrarily, without the citizens whom they represent taking any part in their nomination .-- Four or five hundred average or large communes still remain, in which for each municipal post, the cantonal assembly designates two candidates between whom the government chooses.