Once more, Bailly was still at the head of his colleagues on the 23d of June, when, by an inexcusable inconsistency, and which perhaps was not without some influence on the events of that day, the Deputies of the Third Estate were detained a long time at the servants’ door of the Hall of Meeting, and in the rain; while the deputies of the other two orders, to whom a more convenient and more suitable entrance had been assigned, were already in their places.

The account that Bailly gave of the celebrated royal meeting on the 23d of June, does not exactly agree with that of most historians.

The king finished his speech with the following imprudent words:  “I order you, Gentlemen, to separate immediately.”

The whole of the nobility and a portion of the clergy retired; while the Deputies of the Communes remained quietly in their places.  The Grand Master of the Ceremonies having remarked it, approaching Bailly said to him, “You heard the king’s order, Sir?” The illustrious President answered, “I cannot adjourn the Assembly until it has deliberated on it.”  “Is that indeed your answer, and am I to communicate it to the king?” “Yes, Sir,” replied Bailly, and immediately addressing the Deputies who surrounded him, he said, “It appears to me that the assembled nation cannot receive an order.”

It was after this debate, at once both firm and moderate, that Mirabeau addressed from his place the well-known apostrophe to M. de Breze.  The President disapproved both of the basis and the form of it; he felt that there was no sufficient motive; for, said he, the Grand Master of the Ceremonies made use of no menace; he had not in any way insinuated that there was an intention to resort to force; he had not, above all, spoken of bayonets.  At all events, there is an essential difference between the words of Mirabeau as related in almost all the Histories of the Revolution, and those reported by Bailly.  According to our illustrious colleague the impetuous tribune exclaimed, “Go tell those who sent you, that the force of bayonets can do nothing against the will of the nation.”  This is, to my mind, much more energetic than the common version.  The expression, “We will only retire by the force of bayonets!” had always appeared to me, notwithstanding the admiration conceded to it, to imply only a resistance which would cease on the arrival of a corporal and half-a-dozen soldiers.

Bailly quitted the chair of President of the National Assembly on the 2d of July.  His scientific celebrity, his virtue, his conciliating spirit, had not been superfluous in habituating certain men to see a member of the Communes preside over an assembly in which there was a prince of the blood, a prince of the church, the greatest lords of the kingdom, and all the high dignitaries of the clergy.  The first person named to succeed to Bailly was the Duke d’Orleans.  After his refusal, the Assembly chose the Archbishop of Vienne (Pompignan).