For a long time now have they been rather feeble against the
intendant, unable to protect their parish. Twenty gentlemen cannot not
assemble and deliberate without the king's special permission.[13] If
those of Franche-Comté happen to dine together and hear a mass once a
year, it is through tolerance, and even then this harmless group may
assemble only in the presence of the intendant. Separated from his
equals, the seignior, again, is further away from his inferiors. The
administration of the village is of no concern to him; he is not even
tasked with its supervision. The apportionment of taxes, the militia
contingent, the repairs of the church, the summoning and presiding
over a parish assembly, the making of roads, the establishment of
charity workshops, all this is the intendant's business or that of the
communal officers whom the intendant appoints or directs.[14] Except
through his justiciary rights, so much curtailed, the seignior is an
idler in public matters.[15] If, by chance, he should desire to act in
an official capacity, to make some reclamation for the community, the
bureaus of administration would soon make him shut up. Since Louis
XIV, the higher officials have things their own way; all legislation
and the entire administrative system operate against the local
seignior to deprive him of his functional efficiency and to confine
him to his naked title. Through this separation of functions and title
his pride increases, as he becomes less useful. His vanity deprived of
its broad pasture-ground, falls back on a small one; henceforth he
seeks distinctions and not influence. He thinks only of precedence and
not of government.[16] In short, the local government, in the hands of
peasants commanded by bureaucrats, has become a common, offensive lot
of red tape. "His pride would be wounded if he were asked to attend to
it. Raising taxes, levying the militia, regulating the corvées, are
servile acts, the works of a secretary." He accordingly abstains,
remains isolated on his manor and leaves to others a task from which