Abolition and Reinstatement
Lettres de cachet were abolished after the French Revolution by the Constituent Assembly, but Napoleon reestablished their penal equivalent by a political measure in the decree of 8 March 1801 on the state prisons. This is all the more striking, given that Napoleon had pushed for measures ensuring the rule of law in the codes of laws adopted under his rule. This action was one of the acts brought up against him by the senatus-consulte of 3 April 1814, which pronounced his fall "considering that he has violated the constitutional laws by the decrees on the state prisons."
Read more about this topic: Lettre De Cachet
Famous quotes containing the word abolition:
“... this nation is rotten at the heart, and ... nothing but the most tremendous blows with the sledge-hammer of abolition truth, could ever have broken the false rest which we had taken up for ourselves on the very brink of ruin.”
—Angelina Grimké (1805–1879)