RECENT POLITICS

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 109, 10 May 1932, Page 7

RECENT POLITICS

HERRIOTS FORMER ESSAY

Prance entered the year 1924 in perilous fashion. The reparations on which she had reckoned had not been, paid, and it was doubtful if they ever would be. The ruins of her industrial structure would have to be rebuilt by her own efforts, and this work had already called for considerable capital expenditure which, joined to the enormous war debts and aggravated by paper currency, had reached fabulous figures. Grave financial difficulties soon became a political danger, and heavy taxation had the inevitable result—it provoked opposition and encouraged the people to listen to demagogues. The easy expedient was to issue paper currency, and this was taken. In the end it provoked the crash.

The foreign policy followed by the Poincaro Government was vulnerable at two points: the stability of the franc and the high cost of living. In order to combat an, international attack on the franc, economies and taxes which had been too much neglected during the war period were now necessary, and this was a difficult policy for an election programme. On ground so favourable the opposition, which had been reinforced by many Eadieals and had formed the Cartel of the Left, confronted the Government with opposition both inside i and outside of Parliament. As had happened in other European countries, the Government, with its authority,throatened, reinforced its power by the substitution of law by decree for law by ordinary parliamentary procedure. Strong financial measures were taken, and within ten days the franc rose from 120 to the £ to 80. In April there came the Dawes Plan, which gave relief, and the battle of the franc seemed won.

But after the financial came the electoral battle. Poincare lost it on 11th May, 1924. The Government's fall followed a movement to the Left at the very time when the German elections of 4th May strengthened the parties of both the extreme Eight and the extreme Left. The Government had pursued a policy weak and vacillating at all points in home affairs, and the country listened Teadily to those who promised a ready solution of all its difficulties. The Cartel of the Left began with a Parliamentary coup d'etat forcing President Millerand to resign in July. They had never forgiven him for his National Bloc of 1919, and for his assumption of increased powers. However, instead of Paiuleve, the candidate of the Cartel, Doumergue was elected to the Presidency, while the Left candidate for the Presidency of the Senate was also rejected—a double warning on the part of the Senate to the party which possessed a majority in the Chamber of Deputies. EFFECTS OP INFLATION. Tho Herriot Ministry again brought to the front the old Radical policy— anti-clericalism, the withdrawal of the Embassy to the Vatican, tho end of tho income-tax, the right of trade-unionism for all State employees, the capital levy and_ reduction of military service. The Socialists, because of their~"policy of support, shared tho benefits of office without shouldering its responsibilities. From tho first the new Government confronted grave financial difficulties. The position was not alone of its creating, and from 1924 to 1926 there were seven Ministers of Finance. The depletion of bank balances, the refusal of bonds, the flight of capital, and the fall of the franc followed in rapid succession. In foreign policy the Ministry's record was no better. It gave up the guarantee of the Euhr in August, 1924, at the Conference of Landonj it obtained the