Evening Post. TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1933. FRENCH POLITICAL CRISIS

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 25, 31 January 1933, Page 6

Evening Post. TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1933. FRENCH POLITICAL CRISIS

A state of -alarm "bordering on panic ' is reported .on the authority of the Berlin, correspondent "of the Daily Mail" to have overtaken the German >natio;n as the result of the resignation :of General yon Schleichef^and the lates^news from Paris is almost : , equally; unpleasant. Though .this new| contains no suggestion of; panic,,' the unrest of France appears indeed to be more ominous than that of Germany, for in its present degree it is a new development, whereas the upheaval of» Germany under her terrible complications of debt, taxes, industrial stagnation, and political strife is chronic. More than a year ago the economical condition of Germany was reported by the Young Plan Advisory Committee to be a peril to the whole world, and especially during the eight months which have elapsed since the fall of the Bruehing Cabinet the peril has been intensified by political instability, military ambition', and resentment of the inferiority imposed upon her by the Peace Treaty. But until the great depression' came France*, next only to the United States, was the envy of the post-war world, and even eighteen months ago her diplomacy and her gold- were threatening to dominate Europe. But the pushing of Britain off the gold standard which was to have completed that domination, did not .work out-as expected, and in spite of her gold the economic troubles of. France have been steadily increasing ever since.

'It was partly to the growth of these economic troubles and to the lesson which they taught of the interdependence of. nations, and partly to the victory of M. Herriot at the French General Election in May last that the world owes, the happy change:which has- since come over;the.spirit of French diplomacy. What is generally regarded as the most hopeful achievement in international policy during the past year would have been impossible without it. The detachment or semi-detach-ment%f Britain from the quarrels arid .v the jealousies of continental Europe, and her dual position ■as both a creditor and a debtor nation, made it a relatively easy matter for her to take, a broad view of war debts and reparations. For France, whose, foreign policy had for centuries been chiefly determined- by her hatred and her fear of Germany, it was a far more difficult task to consider calmly the cancellation of the damages which the Germans had contracted to pay for their devastation of her territory, and under M. Tardieu it would- probably, have teen impossible... But M; Herriot proved equal to the task, and one qf the most formidable obstacles, to settled peace and to.economic ' recovery was removed by the virtual cancellation of German reparations at the Lausanne Conference. The trouble which H. Herriot had a right to .expect from! the. Opposition diehards did not develop, seriously, and though. spine embarrassing problems 7 of domestic finance confronted him on his return, his, success at Lausanne proved to be a help and not a handicap in dealing'with them. ' But the relief that was offered-to Germany at Lausanne by her European creditors had to.be made contingent upon, their obtaining relief from their own American creditor, and it was on that issue, or an essentially inseparable issue, that the Herriot Government'fell in December^ In two of the preliminary .debates the Chamber of Deputies gave the Government huge majorities, but when M. Herriot moved his motion for .payment of the,instalment of war debt due in - Washington on; the 15th December it had not a; chance. His. argument, as, our vcabled . report showed, was masterly, but it could not affect the voting. By 402 votes! to 187 the Chamber rejected M. Herriot's;motion, .thus complicating"the settlement of the war debt and reparation problems in a maniler that still, defies calculation. On. the. meaning of. the vote ; the "Manchester Guardian's" Paris correspondent wrote on the 14th December as follows:— - "What is the true significance of this vote against the debt payment tp the United States? How was it possible for two-thirds of the Chamber to ignore M. Herriot's almost unanswerable arguments? There can be no doubt that the Chamber only expressed French popular sentiment on the question o£ war debts. Its vote symbolised the general feeling that it would be "monstrous" to pay the United States (tho adjective is K. Benaudel's) now that reparations have ceased. It was not, only that; it also symbolised the grievance of the average Frenchman against Mr. Hoover and his "three-

quarter promises." If the United States had accepted Britain's reservations and had. thus acknowledged the link between reparations and war debts, the Chamber would have agreed to pay.

In the, Lausanne Agreement, in his tactful handling of Germany's embarrassing claim to equal rights, and in. the intimate relations that he established with Britain, M: Herriot had rendered distinguished ! service during his six and a half months of office, and the "Spectator" has described him as the best Prime Minister that France had had for manyyears. But on account partly of his absorption in foreign policy, and partly of their intrinsic difficulties, he paid less effective- attention to domestic affairs. The thorny problem of finance nearly brought about his downfall immediately after the Lausanne .Conference in July. The position was described as follows:—

As originally tabled, the Government's proposals for balancing the Budget provided for savings amounting to about £.45,000,000 at the present rate of exchange, and included cuts in Army, Navy, and Air Force expenditure and a 5 per cent, reduction iii the salaries of civil servants and the allowances to Senators and Deputies In the course of its passage through Parliament, however, the economy measure was so whittled down that it is estimated to represent relief for the Treasury in 1933 of only sonic 2,340,000,000 francs and for 1932 of only 340,000,000 francs, whereas M. Palmade, the Budget Minister, had stated that the-ffeficit in the 1931 Budget was 4,470,000,000 francs, ana that of the present year would probably be about 4,000,000,000 francs.

It was the opposition of the Socialists that emasculated the economy programme of the Herriot Government and has now destroyed its much , feebler successor. By 390 votes to 193, as we were informed yesterday, the Chamber, of Deputies rejected some of the vital economies of the Boncour Government's Budget:

Defeat.came at six o'clock, when the Socialists, gingered by the civil servants' clamour against cuts, solidly opposed the 5 per cent, cut and increase in; income tax despite an impassioned appeal by the Prime Minister, M. Paul Boncour. ■

An hour later M. Boncour resigned, bequeathing to M. Daladier, the Radical-Socialist leader, a difficult and-even perilous task.

The finances of France are compromised, says "Le Temps," and the danger is growing hourly. The country is restless and troubled. Political anarchy must cease.

This grave diagnosis is fully confirmed by the particulars supplied yesterday.