Chapter 84 Public Opinion Boomerang

Joseph continued with some excitement:

"I have read many of your articles. I always felt strange that as a freedom fighter, you never attacked the dirtiest, most corrupt and darkest places in Paris. It was not until I saw your article that I realized that I had wronged you."

Marat blinked in confusion:

"What do you mean by the most corrupt and darkest place?"

Joseph clenched his fist and said:

"Of course it is the High Court! It is full of money and power transactions, and unjust cases are created all the time. Judges regard the suffering of victims as a means of getting rich. It is the source of all the suffering of the people of Paris!"

He did not slander the High Court at all. There are a lot of records in later generations that the High Court at this time was the most corrupt place in France, no doubt about it!

Because judges gradually became hereditary, and the power of judges became more and more important, the winning or losing of lawsuits completely became a competition of bribing judges.

So many grassroots people would rather ask gangs for help to solve problems than go to court.

It was not until the emperor came to power and severely rectified the judiciary that the court began to be a little cleaner.

Marat frowned. He was well-informed and naturally knew about the dirty deeds in the High Court.

Compared with the High Court, the bureaucrats in other departments were as pure as underage girls.

Joseph continued:

"Your article was well written. It denounced the High Court's shameless obstruction of the tax bill and exposed the dirty deals between them and the nobles!"

Marat couldn't help feeling ashamed when he heard this. His article only mentioned that the bill was beneficial to the national finances. The court had no sufficient reason to reject it. There must be something hidden in the three consecutive rejections of registration.

But it was far from the level of "denunciation" mentioned by Mr. "Xavier".

Joseph seemed to be giving a speech to himself:

"Because the High Court holds the power of publication review, no newspaper has dared to expose their ugliness, but I decided to declare war on them!

"Even if my newspaper is closed down, even if I am imprisoned, I will never regret it! At least the respected Mr. Marat has fought side by side with me! "

Listening to his impassioned declaration, Marat suddenly felt like a coward.

Because he knew subconsciously that writing about the High Court would be difficult to pass the publication review, he unconsciously avoided this aspect. How much ugliness and injustice were buried under lies because of this cowardice.

Young Mr. Xavier is a real fighter!

Joseph looked at Marat's expression and thought that success or failure depended on this one move. He took a deep breath and said:

"Mr. Marat, I know all this is very dangerous. Even if you choose to retreat, I can definitely understand. But I will continue to fight for the French people to the end!"

Mara felt a surge of blood rushing to his head. He stood up suddenly, clenched his fists, and said seriously:

"I will fight with you to expose the crimes of the High Court! Return judicial justice and dignity to the people! "

……

In the western suburbs of Paris, the police intelligence service is stationed.

Accompanied by Fouché and other senior police intelligence service officials, Joseph walked quickly past the rooms with signs such as "Intelligence Team", "Action Team" and "Resource Team" and walked into the supervisor's office at the end of the corridor.

The police intelligence service is developing very fast. Fouché had just made a brief report to him. Now the entire police intelligence service has more than 400 "police officers". Informants are spread all over Paris.

Important departments such as the City Hall, the Court, and the Embassy have established a complete intelligence network to collect and summarize intelligence on time every day.

At present, if we talk about the ability to obtain intelligence, the secret police with seven or eight times more people dare not say that they can beat the police intelligence service.

Joseph sat down at his desk, first praised Fouché and others for their excellent work, and then began to assign tasks:

"The police intelligence service must investigate the corruption and crimes of the chief justice of the High Court and important officials within one month! ”

Actually, he could just send someone to tell Fouché about these things, but since it was related to his own political future, he decided to come to the police department in person to show his importance.

"And the Duke of Seville, the Count of Sérurier..." He looked at the note in his hand and read out more than a dozen names in a row, all of which were the nobles who supported the removal of Briand mentioned by Soumyaer at the cabinet meeting.

"These people must also be investigated in detail, whether it is raping women or evading taxes, or even beating servants, everything that can be found must be investigated!"

"Yes, Your Highness!"

Joseph said a string of blocks and house numbers, and said to Fouché:

"This is Marat's address."

Fouche asked in confusion:

"Is it that Jean-Paul Marat? A stubborn anti-royalist."

Joseph nodded:

"At present, he is considered to be 'one of our own'. You can let your men take the initiative to be his informant and give him the dirty tricks of the High Court that you have found. "

He had just successfully guided Mara, the "piranha", to swim to the High Court. The prey must be wounded so that the "piranha" will bite more fiercely.

...

Paris High Court.

In the justice lounge on the second floor, Chief Justice Vezinier threw a ball of newspaper fiercely in the face of the official in front of him and said angrily:

"What on earth are you doing? You actually let this kind of thing pass the news censorship!"

The official carefully picked up the newspaper and unfolded it. It was a copy of the Paris Business Daily. The front-page headline was "The Harm of Hereditary Judges of the High Court".

He frowned and looked at the "News and Pictures" at the back. The front page was "Discussion on the scope of the power of the High Court."

He hurriedly defended:

"Count Vezinier, there is nothing wrong with these articles. I read them carefully yesterday. Although there are some suggestive or misleading contents..."

The judge with a hooked nose next to Vezinier frowned and said:

"you sure?"

The official in charge of press censorship muttered:

"Maybe I can ask them to change the title."

Vezinier said with a sullen face:

"Your review standards can be stricter!"

The official immediately lowered his head and responded:

"Yes, sir, I will definitely not let similar articles appear again."

Vezinier turned to the judge beside him:

"Let Rene take people to this newspaper office and find any reason to shut him down."

"You are right, I will give him orders right now."

Two hours later, more than 30 publishing police officers armed with sticks and shields surrounded the front and back doors of the Paris Merchant newspaper office.

Although the publishing police are called "police", they are not under the management of the police department. They are like bailiffs and are dispatched by the court.

René, the leader of the publishing police, led a few people, strode into the newspaper office, pulled over a worker, and asked sternly:

"Who's in charge here?"

The worker pointed gingerly to Denico's office. Rene pushed him away, rushed straight into the office, pointed at Denico and shouted:

"Are you the person in charge here? Let everyone gather in the open space over there immediately. I want to conduct a comprehensive inspection!"

However, before Denico could answer, René heard a whistle coming from outside the newspaper office.

Rene turned around and saw more than a dozen policemen in blue uniforms running in in formation with whistles blowing.

He stepped forward in confusion and raised his hat in salute to the leading policeman:

"Excuse me, are you trying to arrest a criminal?"

The policeman glanced at him and said coldly:

"What are you doing?"

René took out the court documents:

"There may be contraband in this newspaper office, and I was ordered to come and search it!"

The leading policeman turned a blind eye and said:

"Have your people leave the newspaper office immediately."

René blinked and held up the court documents again:

"I am executing the order, please..."

The leading policeman waved his hand, and the policemen behind him immediately formed two lines. The front row pointed at the publishing police with explosion-proof crotches. The rear row opened the bolt of the musket.

René looked at the black muzzle of the gun, shrank his neck in fear, and still shouted inwardly:

"What do you want to do?!"

The leading policeman smiled:

"My mission is to prevent any outsiders from affecting the operation of the newspaper. Please get out immediately!"

Rene still wanted to struggle, but saw another group of police officers arriving and surrounding the publishing police at the door.

The publishing police under him usually do things like search for banned books and seal newspapers. They don't dare to be tough with the security police. They all stick together very obediently.

Rene nodded hurriedly:

"Okay, okay, let's just leave."

Immediately, he led dozens of his men and retreated from the newspaper office in despair.

Joseph expected that the High Court would use despicable means to deal with the newspaper, so he had already said hello to Besançon.

The latter built a security booth directly opposite the newspaper office, and doubled the number of patrol police in nearby neighborhoods, asking them to ensure the normal operation of the newspaper office.

After Rene went back to report the situation and was scolded by his immediate boss, he had no choice but to bring more publishing police to the newspaper office. However, he found that there were already police outside the newspaper office with guns drawn, and they could not even get close to the door.

The next day, several articles in "Paris Business" and "News and Pictures" failed to pass the censorship, so they had to temporarily fill the empty pages with some innocuous articles.

In the afternoon of that day, a large number of pamphlets published articles that failed to pass censorship, accompanied by commentaries on "The High Court tramples on the freedom of the press."

The title on the front page of another brochure is "Shock!" Publish police violent break-in! The purpose is..."

The main contents of the two booklets were wonderful and refreshing articles, and the price was very cheap. Tens of thousands of copies were quickly sold and spread throughout the streets of Paris.

Two days later, after the contents of the pamphlet had fermented, journalists and people from the publishing industry appeared in front of the High Court to protest, demanding that the freedom of the press should not be interfered with. The article of "Paris Business" did not have prohibited content and should pass the censorship.

Other reporters began to give speeches on the streets, criticizing the High Court for using violence and threatening a newspaper that had no problems.

The people of Paris have long been extremely dissatisfied with the corrupt High Court. Many people gathered around the speaker, enthusiastically agreed and discussed, and cheered loudly from time to time.

Although according to regulations, Paris prohibits unapproved speeches, the Paris police were ordered to turn a blind eye to any speech involving the High Court and not interfere.

Begging for the first order!

The author is very grateful. I will try my best to add more updates today. I only ask for the first order.