“The permanent participation of the citizens in Communal affairs by the free manifestations of their opinions, and the free defence of their interests:  guarantees to this effect to be given by the Commune, the only power charged with the surveillance and the protection of the full and just exercise of the rights of meeting and publicity;

    “The organisation of the city defences and of the National Guard,
    which elects its own officers, and alone ensures the maintenance of
    order in the city.”

With regard to the affirmation of these rights we may repeat that which we have said above, that some of them really belong to the Commune, but that the greater part of them do not.

    “Paris desires nothing more in the way of local guarantees, on
    condition, let it be understood, of finding in the great central
    administration ...”

    “...  In the great central administration appointed by the federated
    Commune the realisation and the practice of the same principles.”

That is to say, in other words, that Paris will consent willingly to be of the same opinion as others, if all the world is of the same opinion as itself.

“But, thanks to its independence, and profiting by its liberty of action, Paris reserves to itself the right of effecting, as it pleases, the administrative and economic reforms demanded by the population; to create proper institutions for the development and propagation of instruction, production, commerce, and credit; to universalize power and property,...”

Whew!  Universalize property!  Pray what does that mean, may I ask?  Communalism here presents a singular likeness to Communism!

    “...  According to the necessities of the moment, the desire of those
    interested, and the lessons famished by experience: 

“Our enemies deceive themselves or the country when they accuse Paris of wishing to impose its will or its supremacy on the rest of the nation, and to pretend to a dictatorship which would be a positive offence against the independence and the sovereignty of the other Communes: 

“They deceive themselves, or they deceive the country, when they accuse Paris of desiring the destruction of French unity, constituted by the Revolution amid the acclamations of our fathers hurrying to the Festival of the Federation from all points of ancient France: 

    “Political unity as imposed upon us up to the present time by the
    empire, the monarchy, and parliamentarism, is nothing more than
    despotic centralization, whether intelligent, arbitrary, or onerous.

“Political unity, such as Paris demands, is the voluntary association of all local initiatives, the spontaneous and free cooperation of individual energies with one single common object—­the well-being and the security of all.

    “The Communal revolution, inaugurated by the popular action of the
    18th of March, ushers in a new era of experimental, positive, and
    scientific politics.”