Enacting the Suppression of Offices Connected with the Ports, Quays, Stalls and Markets of Paris

Louis, etc. The resolution we have made to direct our attention to everything which may procure the welfare of our subjects, has caused us to examine the different edicts by which the kings, our predecessors, successively created, suppressed and restored different offices, of which the greater part remain in existence, in connection with the port, quays, stalls and markets of our good city of Paris, and the concessions of various sorts which were alienated to these offices.

We have discovered, by the conditions of the period in which they were created, that they owe their origin to the extraordinary needs of the state in times of calamity, and we are assured that in times more fortunate it has always been proposed to suppress them as burdensome to the people and useless to the police regulations, which had served as the pretext for their creation.

It was in accordance with these motives that the suppression of all offices of that kind which were created since 1688 was decreed by the edicts of May, 1715, and September, 1719, and all these offices remained abolished and suppressed without making any change in public order and police, after the said years 1715 and 1719, until the years 1727 and 1730, when the late king, our honored lord and grandfather, decided to restore them, and did so by the edicts of January and June of the said years.

By article II of the edict of 1730, it was specifically ordained that the former incumbents of the offices which had been suppressed might acquire the offices newly created upon the payment of sums fixed by the roles decreed by the Council: namely, one-seventh in money and six-sevenths in liquidation of the former offices, in arrears of the same liquidations, and in supplemental contracts with the city; and with regard to those who had not been incumbents formerly, they were permitted to acquire the offices in like manner upon payment of one-sixth in money and five-sixths in contracts.

The taxes alienated to these offices having been compared, in 1759, with other taxes of the same kind re-established by the edict of December, 1743, and farmed out, it was discovered that there was a great disproportion between the products of these taxes and the finances of the offices. The late king, by his edict of September, 1759, ordained that the offices should be suppressed; that the taxes should be collected to his profit and that the product should be destined to the repayment of so much of the finances of the holders of the offices as was comprised in the sums loaned by them.

That edict announced to the people freedom from many branches of burdensome restrictions, and to the state the recovery of part of its revenue.

New requirements prevented its execution: the edict of March, 1760, permitted the holders of the offices suppressed to continue for a time the exercise of their functions and to enjoy their privileges; it ratified their suppression, however, by postponing the collection which would effect their reimbursement, the time of which was fixed at January 1, 1771, and to be completed in 1782. Circumstances continuing to be contrary to these provisions, it became necessary to provide by the declaration of December 5, 1768, that the beginning of repayment should be deferred until January 1, 1777, and be finished in 1788.

The edict of 1760 and the declaration of 1768, although permitting a temporary enjoyment of their privileges by the incumbents, did not revoke the suppression decreed by the edict of September, 1759. That disposition remains in full force and ought to be put into execution at the moment when the holders of the offices may receive the indemnity which they have a right to claim by virtue of their warrants (titres).

That indemnity, fixed for them by article II of the edict of June, 1730, consists for part of them of one-seventh of their finances in money and six-sevenths in mortgage-contracts on the product of the same taxes; for the other part of them, it consists of one-sixth in money and five-sixths in contracts. Therefore, since the holders of the offices are assured of that indemnity the suppression ordained by the edict of 1760 ought to be in force.

The creditors of the guilds of officials should receive their payment in preference to the officials themselves, because the offices are encumbered and their profits mortgaged.

It is in accordance with our justice to preserve their rights and to assure the capital and interest of the credits which are due to them according to the profits of the taxes alienated to the said offices, until the execution of the arrangements ordained by the declaration of September 5, 1768.

Such an operation is equally advantageous to the officials, to their creditors, and to the people.

Most of the guilds complain that the products they enjoy at present are diminished to the point of being insufficient to acquit them of the charges with which they are burdened. Thus the incumbents of offices lose their value, and their creditors see the security of their credits diminishing and becoming inadequate.

On the part of our subjects, to whom we desire to give, on every occasion, tokens of our affection, their interest requires that the taxes heretofore alienated to these guilds be henceforth reunited in our hand and administered under our order, in order that, during the time that the state of our finances will not permit us to cease collecting them altogether, we may have, at least, the best opportunity to make them less annoying by effecting in them such modifications and reductions as would be impossible if the existence of offices, continued in actual exercise, furnished pretexts to the incumbents to disarrange by demanding indemnities, the plans we purpose to adopt for the greatest advantage of our people.

For these causes, etc., we have, by our present edict, enacted and ordained as follows:

Article I. Article I of the edict of the month of September, 1759, will be executed; accordingly, all offices created by the edicts of January, 1727, and June, 1730, connected with the ports, quays, stalls and markets of our good city of Paris, will continue suppressed, beginning from the day of publication of the present edict. We prohibit those who may be found holders of them, their clerks and officers, from continuing to exercise their functions in the future.

Article II. We except, however, the offices of supervisors, gaugers and measurers, jurés-vendeurs and comptrollers of wines and liquors, commission brokers of wines, and others such as have been combined in the domain and patrimony of our good city of Paris, by the declaration of August 16, 1733, and by the edicts of June, 1741, and August, 1744, of which offices the taxes will continue to be collected to the profit of the said city.

Article III. The taxes heretofore attributed to the guilds of officials, the suppression of which we specifically ordain, as well as the taxes combined in our fermes, will continue to be collected to our profit by the highest bidder for our taxes fermes) beginning from the day of publication of the present edict and continuing until otherwise ordered by us, with the exception at all times of the taxes united in the domain and patrimony of our city of Paris, mentioned in the preceding article, which it will continue to enjoy as in the past.

Article IV. The proprietors of offices suppressed by the present edict will be reimbursed regularly from funds set apart for the purpose by us, pursuant to the liquidation provided by the edict of March, 1760, and in the same manner as the finances of the said offices were paid into our casual revenue. Wherefore, those of the said proprietors who acquired the offices by paying one-sixth of the sums in money, will be repaid the said sixth in money, and those who acquired the offices by paying one-seventh only in money, will receive similarly only the said seventh. And with regard to the balance of the finance of the said offices furnished in collaterals, mortgages at 4 per cent, will be delivered to each of the said proprietors, the arrears of which, special effects under the product of the taxes heretofore attributed to them, will commence to run from the day they cease to exercise the functions of the said offices and to collect the taxes, and shall continue until they are wholly repaid.

Article V. Arrears of profits, due by the guilds of officials suppressed by the present edict, will be paid on the same basis as the said profits would be liquidated by the edict of March, 1760, and as the proprietors of the said privileged profits and mortgages on the product of taxes restored to our hand in consequence of the said suppression, will be paid.

Article VI. The balance of the product of these taxes, as well as the funds we shall designate from our finances, shall be used to reimburse the capital sums; namely, by preference, to reimburse the profits now due by the said guild of officials, and subsequently the capital sums of the mortgages we shall give them to complete the finance of offices. We will that the interest on the sums repaid be employed progressively to augment the sinking funds until the profits of the offices are wholly reimbursed, and that the product of the said taxes or the said interests be not diverted to any other use.

Article VII. We reserve the right to suppress, to simplify or to modify the said taxes reunited in our hand which may seem to us too burdensome to our people, either by reason of their nature or because of the formalities required for their collection. And if it happens that the product be diminished, the balance will be provided for by us by assigning some other branch of our revenues to the payment of arrears and the reimbursement of the capital due to the said officials and their creditors.

Article VIII. We annul all edicts, ordinances, declarations, decrees and regulations in all that may be contrary to the provisions of the present edict.

So given by commandment, etc.

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Published in February, 1776, and registered at a Lit-de-Justice on the 12th day of March of the same year.

¹ Mixed grains.