Democracy in Eclipse

Manawatu Times, Volume 64, Issue 161, 11 July 1939, Page 4

Democracy in Eclipse

Serious students of democracy in franco are carefully weighing—and not without somo misgivings—the effects of government by decree rather than by legislative action which is the momentary French heritage of crisis, writes the Paris correspondent of the Christian Science Monitor. Since last March, decrees possessing the force of law have been issued by the Cabinet upon the authorisation of the Chamber of Deputies, granted under the spur of Germany's seizure of Czechoslovakia. The theoretical possibility remains that the Chamber, in session, could challenge the Cabinet on some decision and vote it out of office. But such a development, in the present strained international situation, is unlikely; and with an eye on Germany, where * 1 de- i crec law” was one of the forerunners of present dictatorship, French politi-

cal circles are not stranger to the question: “Has rule by decree, which is so convenient to any group in power, come to stay in France?” One frequently hears the fear expressed that the habitual use of the “decree-law” it stimulating apathy and indifference to parliamentary institutions.