Virginia Argus

PARIS, June 11.

PREFECTURE OF POLICE.

IMPERIAL DECREE,

CONTAINING ACTS OF INDULGENCE AND BENEFICENCE.

Palace of St. Cloud,

13 Prairial, year 12.

Napoleon, by the grace of God and the constitutions of the republic, emperor of the French, wishing to distinguish his accession to the empire by acts of indulgence and beneficence.

Upon the report of the ministers, having heard the council of state, Decrees:

TITLE 1st.

The setting at liberty of the individuals by the correctional police, who are only in confinement for the payment of their fines and expenses.

Article First. The individuals now in confinement by virtue of the judgments of the correctional police, and who have remained so until the expiration of the period stated in their sentence, and who are still confined or liable to be so, after the period, in default of payment of the fine or expenses, shall be dispensed from paying the said expenses or fines, and set at liberty at the expiration of the time fixed for the penalty.

TITLE II.

State debtors constrained, or liable to be arrested who may be discharged from the arrest.

II. The ministers of the public treasure or of the public finance, shall make a report to the Emperor of each of the individuals confined for debt, on the demand of the agents of the public treasure, or the public tax gatherers, in order for his majesty to determine who are those who may obtain, by favor of circumstances, their enlargement or discharge from arrests, and the conditions on which they may obtain one or the other.

TITLE III.

Payment by the treasurer of the civil list, of the nurse expenses due by the inhabitants of Paris, and of the jurisdiction thereof, who shall be held incapable of paying them themselves.

III. The sums due to the nurse office of the city and jurisdiction of Paris, from the 18th Brumaire, year 8, by the poorest fathers and mothers, shall be paid on their discharge by the treasurer of the civil list.

IV. The minister of the interior shall appoint in consequence an extraordinary commission, which in concert with each of the officers of benevolence in Paris, and of the municipalities in its jurisdiction, shall draw up a list of the fathers and mothers who are to enjoy the benefits of the preceding articles.

V. The treasurer of the civil list shall keep the sum of one hundred and fifty thousand francs at the disposal of the commission.

VI. All the sums paid to the nurse officers, by virtue of the present imperial decree, shall be employed without delay in payment of the nurses.

TITLE IV.

Granting a marriage portion to a poor and honest girl, in each arrondissement communal, and municipality of the cities of Paris, Lyons, Bordeaux, and Marseilles.

VII. For each of the municipalities of Paris, Lyons, Bordeaux, and Marseilles, and for each arrondissement communal of the empire, a sum of six hundred francs is granted, for the purpose of serving as a marriage portion to a poor girl of good character.

VIII. The selection shall be made at Paris, Lyons, Marseilles, Bordeaux, and in the arrondissements of the chef-lieu of the prefectures, by the prefects; in the other arrondissements, by the under-prefect.

IX. The marriages shall be celebrated on the day fixed for the coronation of the Emperor.

(Extract of title V.)

Title V. grants an amnesty to all officers and soldiers, in the land and sea service, condemned to hard labor, for desertion, and relieves them from the penalties incurred by them or their fathers and mothers.

To enjoy the benefit of this amnesty, every deserter must present himself in the course of one month after the publication of the imperial decree, before an under-prefect or inspector of reviews, and declare that he repents of his crime, that he wishes to serve again, and immediately to rejoin his corps.

In default of making this declaration or rejoining his corps by the abovementioned time, such deserter shall be brought before a council of war, and condemned to drag a cannon shot, as being guilty of desertion a second time.

The counsellor of state, prefect of police, to the commissaries of police, the inspector general, the peace officers and the inspectors of the police of Paris.

Paris, 21st Prairial, year 12.

As long as the trial of the conspirators continued, I enjoined you, gentlemen, to leave free all the avenues of the palace of justice, and I recommended to you that the opinion of all the citizens upon the trial might be permitted to manifest themselves freely and every where; but now that the court of justice has pronounced its judgment, every thing must return to the usual order, and you must no where permit any assemblage of people, particularly at the palace of justice, nor that there shall be hawked, sold or distributed any writing or pamphlet relative to the condemned; you shall arrest every person acting in opposition to this order.

I salute you.

(Signed) DUBOIS.