WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1936. DEMOCRACY'S CAESAR

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 97, 21 October 1936, Page 10

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1936. DEMOCRACY'S CAESAR

Political crisis in France menaces ihe Government even sooner than was expected. Although triumphant, at the General Election only four or five months ago, M. Blum issues an open challenge to his wing supporters that the price of desertion is another appeal to Caesar—the only Caesar democracy knows—and that there can be no wavering in the Popular Front without the people of France being again consulted. Although he addresses this warning specifically to his moderate.wing, the Radicals, the Premier is similarly candid to the Communists of his Left flank. He will resist a proletarian pull from, the Communists equally with a middle-class pull from the Radicals; and if the Popular Front is to be pulled asunder by tugs from Right or from Left or from both, the people of France shall know about it. From his middle position as Socialist leader, M. Blum might—if he were a professional politician-r-counter the pulls of discontented Radicals or Communists by negotiating for support from Opposition groups. It is the way of professional politics—particularly the group politics of France— that plots to break up a "Front," and pjols to bring in Opposition support for a threatened Government, often go on side by side. But no whisper of such has been cabled. Instead, M. Blum has bracketed Premiership with principle, and has met, revolt at the outset with the plain intimation that it means sending all Deputies back to their masters, the French electors, presumably including the newly-enfranchised won»en. The people of France and the people of Europe are alike unfortunate in .that, because of drift in other years, the year 1936 sees France at a crisis both internal and external. The Socialist Premier—who happens to be the first "Jew who has ,ever held the French Premiership—has to steer such a difficult alliance as that of Moscow-inspired' Communists, heterogeneous Socialists, and middleclass- Radicals through the intricate task of enacting a French New Deal coupled with devaluation of the franc. Surely to secure social justice with a team like that requires a political genius. But the internal part of the task is only half of it. There is a chronic European unrest in which not only the Popular Front may be sundered, but France herself. Already the outstanding fact of the new Europe is the retreat of France from her former hegemony. Her military-political domination of the Continent is already gone. Any student of history will recognise the fundamental character of this finding, by one of the informed and unrhetorical contributors to the "Round Table": What is fundamentally happening, of course, is that Europe is passing from a system of stability by a French preponderance to a system of stability by balance, which is inevitable once Germany obtains the position of power, and equality inherent in her size and national vitality, though the composition of the new regional balance is notyet defined, and there are probably certain adjustments to be made in the status quo before Europe is likely to settle down. . For instance, Belgium now seeks "certain adjustments." In the recent past Poland has been considered an uncertain ally of France. Austria remains an enigma. Ominous change has occurred in Rumania. The Little Entente is uneasy. The words "of course" in the above quotation are interesting. They seem to be a sort of apology by the writer for mentioning what everybody ought to be able to see for himself. But the fact is that people continually overlook the fundamentals, , among which this passing of Europe from French domination to "a new balance" is outstanding. Such a radical transformation has frequently beert accompanied with international explosions. In the same matter-of-fact way the "Round Table" contributor expands his finding: > Europe has been stabilised since the Armistice not by the League of Nations, but mainly through the complete military preponderance of France and Poland and France's Little Entente allies in Eastern Europe, and through the unilateral disarmament of Germany imposed by the Treaty of Versailles. When Hitler tore up that Treaty, France, to counter him, sought to extend her alliances. First she courted Italy—and the price was her •failure (through. Premier Laval) to. iOTj)jtoifeSlfflfiamaelaHoar^3gainsteAd

Duce concerning Abyssinia. Then she made her Pact with Russia, which was Herr Hitler's excuse for entering the Rhineland. And, in turn, Germany's fortification of the Rhineland is part of the reason of Belgium's proposal not to renew the Locarno Agreement; perhaps another part of Belgium's reason is German military designs against France's ally Russia. Thus one thing has led to another in disconcerting fashion. The international chess moves have been rapid; and M. Blum must play that difficult, prestige-losing game simultaneously with the even more intricate chess of French party politics. Well may he have the prayers of the French. Well may he prefer a clean appeal to the electors-to the customary party intrigues of French officeholders. : Much more could be written of the internal politics of Fiance, and the insincerities underlying the party professions and tactics, both inside and outside the governing Popular Front (Radicals, Socialists, Communists). What brought these ill-assorted cooperators together in the first instance in 1934? Probably it was fear of the Fascism identified with the name of Colonel de la Rocque and the Croix de Feu. At that time the Colonel was expected to become a Hitler, but he quite failed in that role; and opinion is still divided as to whether his failure to Hitlerise was due to personal incapacity or to a shrewd desirenot to contribute, by Croix de Feu violence, to the cement in the Popular Front. Whatever the reason, the Popular Front, finding anti-Fascism an insufficient bond, came together in 1935 on the programme which the Blum Government is now applying—public works and relief for workers, a 40-hour week, reform of the Bank of France, etc. That the hours and wages concessions would go' too far for employers and not far enough for employees was but to be expected. It is true that M.. Blum's new economic dispensations may be facilitated by the co-operation of the Bank of France in his devaluation policy; but' here again he is under an external as well as an internal strain, for he cannot throw . devaluation sops to French internal interests at the price of damaging the "tripartite front"—the currency entente of France, Britain,, and the United States. In these uncharted seas of labour concessions and devaluation, the thrifty French easily lose confidence in any Government. Perhaps this is to be expected in a country where, it is recorded, 11 per cent, of industrialists are employers (in Britain 3 per cent.), every fifth person holds Government securities, and of eight million agriculturists five million own their own land. To an English questioner who was befogged by group politics, a French Deputy explained: "I am one of those Republicans of the Left, who sit ,in the Centre, and who ■vole with the Right." Votes of this kind have seldom carried a Popular Front programme, and Popular Fronts do not endure when made of such' material. For this defect M. Blum proposes the acid test of a General Election. Hitherto it has been quite "of course" that a Radical Deputy should talk Left and vote Right. But now the Socialist Premier has told such Radical Deputies whither they are heading. Is he.strong enough to make good his word? And will Europe wait while French internal. parties submit themselves again to the gamble of a French General Election, with its primaries and its run-off? .