I
NECKER'S FINANCIAL PLAN[1]
(1789)
Born In 1749, died In 1791; before the French Revolution, had served in Corsica, obtaining the rank of Captain; had written essays and pamphlets, traveled extensively, and been noted for dissolute habits; elected to the Convention of the States-General in 1789; attracted wide notice as an orator; became President of the Jacobin Club, and in 1791 President of the National Assembly.
The minister of finance has presented a most alarming picture of the state of our affairs. He has assured us that delay must aggravate the peril; and that a day, an hour, an instant, may render it fatal. We have no plan that can be substituted for that which he proposes. On this plan, therefore, we must fall back. But, have we time, gentlemen ask, to examine it, to probe it thoroughly, and verify its calculations? No, no! a thousand times no! Haphazard conjec-
- ↑ Delivered in the National Assembly on September 26, 1789. Abridged. On July 14th, of this year, the Bastille had fallen. The occasion of this speech was Necker's plan of an income tax of twenty-five per cent, to relieve the desperate state of the treasury. Mirabeau, heretofore, had been opposed to Necker, but now came forth to assist him, making two speeches in favor of his measure. The Bill being still threatened with defeat, he then made a third speech, from which is taken the passage given here. The Bill now passed. Necker's famous daughter, Madame De Stäel, who sat near Mirabeau while he spoke, afterward described the effect of the
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