Under Louis Philippe, every riot failed, at which the National Guard
stood on the side of the troops. When, in the February days of 1848,
it showed itself passive against the uprising and doubtful toward Louis
Philippe himself, he gave himself up for lost. Thus the conviction cast
root that a revolution could not win without, nor the Army against
the National Guard. This was the superstitious faith of the Army in
bourgeois omnipotence. The June days of 1548, when the whole National
Guard, jointly with the regular troops, threw down the insurrection,
had confirmed the superstition. After the inauguration of Bonaparte's
administration, the position of the National Guard sank somewhat through
the unconstitutional joining of their command with the command of the
First Military Division in the person of Changarnier.
As the command of the National Guard appeared here merely an attribute
of the military commander-in-chief, so did the Guard itself appear only
as an appendage of the regular troops. Finally, on June 13, the National
Guard was broken up, not through its partial dissolution only, that from
that date forward was periodically repeated at all points of France,
leaving only wrecks of its former self behind.
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