In August the result of the plebiscite was announced: among three and a half millions of votes only a few thousand were in the negative. One of them was Lafayette's. His gratitude to Bonaparte for release from his Austrian prison had so far expressed itself in abstaining from open opposition to his liberator's will, although in reality he was the strongest exponent of what little enlightened liberalism was left in France. Determined not to approve even negatively of what was passing, but to withdraw from public life, he wrote to the First Consul remonstrating against the latter's course. "Surely," he said, "you, who are the first in that order of men who lay tribute on all the ages in order to find a compeer and a place, would wish that such a revolution, such conquest and bloodshed, such sufferings and marvelous deeds, should have for you some other end than arbitrary power." The protest was of course unheeded.
Thus, then, to use Bonaparte's language, "liberty and equality were put beyond the caprice of chance and the uncertainty of the future." A few finishing touches were given to the work after the announcement of the vote. The lists of notables were abolished, and small cantonal assemblies designated the candidates for lower offices. Electoral colleges of manageable size sent up from the districts the names of candidates for the tribunate; similar colleges sent up from the departments the names of candidates for the legislature and the senate; while all the electors of these primary assemblies were appointed for life. The functions of the tribunate were limited, and it deliberated thenceforward behind closed doors. The council of state was stripped of its supremacy by the creation of a small privy council which did most of its work. The powers of the senate were so enlarged as to make it nearly sovereign. It could suspend or interpret the constitution, reverse the decisions of the courts, and dissolve the tribunate and legislature, always provided the proposition came from the government. And the government retained only three prerogatives--the pardoning power, the right to designate a successor in the office of chief magistrate, and the right to nominate forty senators. In reality, the clever manipulation of these provisions made the First Consul supreme for life, and his office hereditary, without recourse to a further plebiscite.