Note (Back) — Chapter XV

In the hope that eventually they might gain sufficient strength to place their candidate on the throne without the co-operation of the Legitimists, the Orleanists joined with the Bonapartists and the republicans, November 20, 1873, in voting to fix the term of President MacMahon definitely at seven years.[457] By the Orleanists it was assumed that if within that period an opportunity should be presented for the establishment of the Count of Paris upon the throne, the President would clear the way by retiring. The opportunity, however, never came, and the septennial period for the French presidency, established thus by monarchists in their own interest, was destined to pass into the permanent mechanism of a republican state.