Shinobu Masamoto

Nous avons traduit ici tout le texte d'une ordonnance du Roi "concernant la subordination et la discipline des marechaussees" du 16 mars 1720. Document essentiel a l'etude sur la reforme de la marechaussee de 1720, elle est l'une des quatre lois royales qui ont amene la reorganisation de la marechaussee en mars et en avril 1720. Le pouvoir royal a essaye, par cette ordonnance, de completer l'edit du mois de mars 1720 prescrivant la refonte entiere de l'ancienne marechaussee et par la d'ameliorer le degre de subordination de la marechaussee, d'enrayer le relachement de sa discipline, d'augmenter son activite, alors, faible.

The maréchaussée, a rural police force, served both as a royal army, keeping order particulary in the countryside and on highways, and as a royal court (prévôt's court) judging without appeal cas prévôtaux. In March 1720, the royal government tried to reform the maréchaussée after abolishing almost its entire old organisation and reorganizing a new one. This paper examines how the new maréchaussée was established in Haute -Normandie by analyzing historical sources of the Prefectural Archives of Seine-Maritime (at Rouen) and the Historical Service of the Army (at Vincennes) from three points of view: recruitment of members, budgetary steps, and activities.<BR>The laws in March and April 1720 laid out its framework, thus the new maréchaussée was organized legally. However, all of the members were not recruited at the same time just after the reform. It was in March 1721 that all brigades made up the numbers. As for the budgetary steps of the maréchaussée, an ancient budgetary measure continued until 1720 and the new one was fixed in 1722 through a transitional one for 1721. Finally, it seems that 1720 was a transitional period for activities of prévôt's court and the brigades, and that the new maréchaussée began to function in earnest between the end of 1720 and the beginning of 1721. That is to say, the new maréchaussée, (though it was formed legally in the spring of 1720, was established practically in 1721 in) Haute-Normandie. We should pay attention to such an interval between laws and their application when we study an organisation.

The marechaussee was a rural police force which was led by a prevot des marechaux. It served both as a royal army keeping order particulary in the countryside and on highways, and as a royal court judging without appeal such cas prevotaux as a vagabondage, mendicacy, and highway robbery. The marechaussee was not functioning sufficiently prior to the reform of 1720, due mainly to a lack of uniformity both in its organisation and chain of command. In 1720, Claude Le Blanc, secretary of state for war, tried to reorganize the marechaussee after abolishing almost its entire old organisation. In a period when governmental institutions and systems were venal, a method to create a new organisation after a destruction of an old one, which was never done by the royal government before, made the reform possible. The reform was, first of all, a total restructuring of the marechaussee wiht the aim to give uniformity to its organisation. At the same time, it contained important aspects, such as making the generalite (intendance : intendant's district) correspond to a marechaussee's district, unifying the chain of command under the secretary of state for war, intendants and prevots, positioning brigades all over the realm, and introducing the commission sytem more widely. The reform of the marechaussee established a national police network though its force was insufficient, which was deployed closely in the monarchy, put under the direct control of the state and had unified organisation, districts, and chain of command. The reform gave a police force to intendants and created a group of lower officials dependant directly on the state by introducing the commission system. This has a close connection with two basic systems of monarchic government : a centralization policy through intendants and a bureaucracy based on venality. The reform of the marechaussee was carried out after half a century after the judicial reform in the early years of Louis XIV, during a regency when the royal government was groping for a new governmental system. There we can find points which indicate to total reform of governmental organisation under the absolute monarchy, not just a simple reform of the police force.