Le Figaro
- The Finances of Virtue
- The New Czechoslovak Cabinet
- The Radical Congress Opens Today
Le Figaro's front page led with Lucien Romier's signed column on Raymond Poincaré's draft budget for 1927. Romier admired the finance minister's command of the subject. He called the programme a policy of “high-tension virtue” that strained taxpayers, the public services and the nation's productive capacity alike. He warned that the public's hope for a financial “miracle” and the memory of 11 May made such virtue hard to sustain. He also named the floating debt and monetary policy as the plan's weak points. On foreign affairs, the paper reported that Czechoslovakia replaced its caretaker cabinet of officials with a parliamentary government under Švehla in less than twenty-four hours. It stressed that two ministers from German parties had joined the government and that Beneš stayed on. A dispatch from Bordeaux previewed the Radical-Socialist congress, where Herriot was expected to answer criticism of his leadership.
Translation
The Finances of Virtue
M. Poincaré, Minister of Finance, in drawing up the draft budget for 1927, treats the deficit somewhat in the same way that, as Minister of Foreign Affairs, he treated the late Lord Curzon: without consideration, and after first giving a forceful demonstration of its wrongs. Poor Marquess Curzon died of illness and of never having been made a duke. But since then British diplomacy has taken some handsome revenges. With all due respect to British diplomacy, let us hope that the deficit will not do as it did.
The explanatory statement for the draft budget, very evidently written in M. Poincaré's own hand, is a fine piece of work. Without impertinence, one may well admire the intellectual mastery of the man who, after a career such as his, and with every right to consider that he has nothing more to learn, masters at the first attempt, in its details and in its full scope, a subject so constantly renewed and so elusive. It will be readily understood that we are not going to try to “demolish” the plan of the President of the Council. We shall simply try to shed light on two or three of its general aspects.
M. Poincaré's financial policy is the policy of high-tension virtue. Tension of the sacrifices imposed on taxpayers, tension of the debt-redemption charges that our generation will have to bear, tension of the effort at economy in the public services, tension of our productive capacities, and tension, finally, of credit and confidence. That is a great deal of virtue. Virtue is only one aspect of wisdom and therefore always receives its reward, on condition that it can be sustained. The history of morals and the history of 11 May warn us that the lifespan of practical virtue is often shorter than the prestige of theoretical virtue.
In matters of financial restoration, our people still remain very attached to the hope of a “miracle.” They remain attached to it because a “miracle” spares them long ordeals or sustained efforts, and because a vague instinct warns them that, under our regime, one must not count too much on continuity. M. Poincaré himself must not hide from himself that his first success comes partly from the miraculous talents people attribute to him. On the day when circumstances strip his harsh wisdom of its appearance of wonder-working and leave it quite naked, what will happen? Thus, once again, the financial problem joins the political problem.
Without looking so far ahead, what still seems weak in M. Poincaré's plan is, on the one hand, the solutions envisaged for a possible crisis of the floating debt and, on the other, its strictly monetary conceptions. One sentence of the explanatory statement seems to us to hold the key to everything. It is this: “Failing the voluntary renewal of the commitments contracted by the Treasury, failing the free agreement of its creditors for the maturity –
The New Czechoslovak Cabinet
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
On the eve of the reopening of the Czechoslovak Parliament, the Tcherny cabinet, as we announced yesterday, has resigned. And the same dispatch that told us of the opening of a ministerial crisis informed us that it had been resolved by the formation of a Svelha cabinet — in less than twenty-four hours. Happy country!
M. Tcherny, who is leaving power, had headed a cabinet of civil servants since last March, in the midst of a serious crisis in Czechoslovak domestic politics. M. Svelha, by contrast, takes the head of a parliamentary cabinet, which nonetheless includes a certain number of experts from outside Parliament. But the new and essential fact in the composition of the new ministry is that it includes two figures belonging to groups of German nationality: Professor Mayr-Harting, a Christian Social, who takes charge of Justice, and the Agrarian Spina, who takes the Public Works portfolio.
The new cabinet also includes four Czechoslovak Agrarians: the Premier, M. Svelha; M. Hódza, at Public Instruction; M. Udrzal, at National Defence; and M. Srdinko, at Agriculture. It has two Populists: Mgr Sramek, at Social Welfare, and M. Mosek, at Posts. Finally, M. Najuran, representing the small craftsmen, takes the Railways portfolio. The other ministers, who do not belong to Parliament, were already members of the previous cabinet. They are: M. Englis at Finance, M. Cerny at the Interior, M. Peroutka at Commerce, M. Kallay for Slovak Affairs, and finally M. Benès.
The Prime Minister deserves praise for including among his colleagues that eminent diplomat, M. Benès. By this choice the Czechoslovak government shows that it is determined to preserve in its foreign policy the conti-
The Radical Congress Opens Today
BORDEAUX, 13 October. — The Radical-Socialist Congress opens tomorrow. In the morning, under the chairmanship of M. Archimbaud, there will be a purely formal session. At the same time, a meeting of the presidents and secretaries of the local Federations will be held to examine various amendments to the party's statutes.
In the afternoon, at 2.30 p.m., the inaugural session. After the customary address, the floor will be given to M. Herriot, speaking as leader of the party. In the course of his remarks, which will be political in nature, he will probably be led to defend himself against the accusations or grievances that have been directed at him. The session would end with this speech. But controversy could break out a few moments later before the general policy committee.
In the Socialist Party
M. Paul-Boncour explains his role at the League of Nations
M. Renaudel leaves the “Quotidien”
Context
Why Romier invoked 11 May
Romier's warning that practical virtue is shorter-lived than its reputation points back to Poincaré's own experience. Poincaré became premier in January 1922 and also held the foreign ministry until 1 June 1924. In that period his government could not agree on policy with the British at the Interallied conferences, so it decided to act alone. That quarrel is probably the background to the column's opening joke about how Poincaré had treated Lord Curzon. Poincaré then met the 1924 currency crisis with a 20 percent increase in indirect taxes to pay for the Ruhr occupation. The measure saved the situation, but the taxes were unpopular. Radical and Socialist attacks then helped the Cartel of the Left win a substantial victory in the general elections of 11 May 1924. When Romier wrote “the history of 11 May”, he was reminding readers that voters had already punished one round of Poincaré's austerity. He feared that the heavier sacrifices in the 1927 budget could end the same way.
Poincaré's franc rescue and the floating-debt question
When Poincaré took office again in 1926, he formed a government of the National Bloc parties plus the Radical-Socialists, and the monetary crisis ended. Confidence returned, and the franc immediately rose from 50 to 40 to the dollar. Romier hinted at this when he wrote that Poincaré's first success owed something to his reputation for miracles. Poincaré's measures included creating, by constitutional amendment, an inviolate fund to meet bond payments and raising interest rates. These measures dealt with the same danger as the sentence Romier quoted from the budget statement, which considered what would happen if the Treasury's creditors did not renew their holdings. Romier also judged the plan's monetary conceptions still weak, and that question stayed open for years. The National Union won the April 1928 elections, and only after that did Poincaré officially devalue the franc to one-fifth of its prewar value. In October 1926, the franc's final legal value had not yet been settled.
Why German ministers in Švehla's cabinet mattered
The paper prints the new premier's name as “Svelha”. He was Antonín Švehla, and Le Figaro was right to call the German ministers the “new and essential fact” of his government. Franz Spina chaired the Bund der Landwirte, a farmers' party of the German-speaking countryside. It was the first German party to cooperate actively with the Czechoslovak government, and it entered Švehla's coalition cabinet. Spina thus became the first ethnic German government minister in Czechoslovakia. Robert Mayr-Harting of the German Christian Social People's Party was one of the few German-speaking politicians to serve in a Czechoslovak government. He was Minister of Justice from 12 October 1926 to 7 December 1929. Their entry marked the first time that parties of the German minority took a share in governing the state rather than standing in opposition to it. Spina kept his faith in Czech-German cooperation until he died in 1938, a fortnight before the Munich Agreement.
Herriot's position on the eve of the Bordeaux congress
By October 1926 Herriot had to defend his record on two fronts. He had led the majority that the Cartel of the Left won in 1924. That majority broke up in 1926, and the SFIO went into opposition. His second ministry lasted only from 19 to 23 July 1926. Poincaré then formed a government of the National Bloc parties plus the Radical-Socialists, and Herriot served in it as Minister of Education and Fine Arts from 1926 to 1928. So when the dispatch says Herriot would speak “as leader of the party”, he was a Radical chief sitting in a cabinet with his former opponents. His first term as president of the Radical Party is recorded as 1919–1926, which shows that his leadership was changing in this very year. The short note that Renaudel was leaving the “Quotidien” also concerns the Cartel's world, because the Cartel had launched that daily. The article only predicted that Herriot would answer accusations and grievances. It did not say what they were.
Original
Les finances de la vertu
Les finances de la vertu M. Poincaré, ministre des finances, élaborant le projet de budget pour 1927, traite le déficit un peu de la même manière que, ministre des affaires étrangères, il traitait feu lord Curzon, sans ménagement et avec, au préalable, une forte démonstration de ses torts. Le pauvre marquis Curzon est mort de maladie et de n'avoir été duc. Mais, depuis, la diplomatie britannique a pris de belles revanches. Toute révérence gardée pour la diplomatie britannique, espérons que le déficit ne fera pas comme elle. L'exposé des motifs, rédigé très évidemment de la main même de M. Poincaré, pour le projet de budget est un beau morceau. Sans impertinence, on peut bien admirer la maîtrise intellectuelle de l'homme qui, après une carrière comme la sienne et ayant le droit de considérer qu'il n'a plus rien à apprendre, domine du premier coup, dans ses détails et dans son ampleur, une matière aussi renouvelée et fugace. On pense bien que nous n'allons pas tenter de «démolir» le projet du président du Conseil. Nous tâcherons simplement d'en éclairer deux ou trois aspects généraux. La politique financière de M. Poincaré est celle de la vertu à haute tension. Tension des sacrifices imposés aux contribuables, tension des charges d'amortissement que devra supporter notre génération, tension de l'effort d'économie dans les services publics, tension des facultés de production, tension, enfin, du crédit et de la confiance. C'est beaucoup de vertu. La vertu n'est qu'un aspect de la sagesse et, par conséquent, reçoit toujours sa récompense, à la condition qu'elle se puisse maintenir. L'histoire des mœurs et l'histoire du 11 mai nous avertissent que la durée de la vertu pratique est souvent moindre que le prestige de la vertu théorique. Notre peuple, en matière de restauration financière, reste encore très attaché à l'espérance du «miracle». Il y reste attaché parce que le «miracle» dispense d'épreuves longues ou d'efforts poursuivis et parce qu'un vague instinct l'avertit que, dans notre régime, il ne faut pas trop compter sur la continuité. M. Poincaré luimême ne doit pas se dissimuler que sa première réussite vient, en partie, de ce qu'on lui prête des talents miraculeux. Le jour où les circonstances dépouilleront son âpre sagesse d'une apparence de thaumaturgie et la laisseront toute nue, qu'adviendra-t-il? Ainsi, une fois de plus, le problème financier rejoint le problème politique. Sans regarder si loin, ce qui paraît encore faible dans le plan de M. Poincaré, ce sont, d'une part, les solutions prévues pour une crise éventuelle de la dette flottante et, d'autre part, les conceptions proprement monétaires. Une phrase de l'exposé des motifs nous paraît contenir la clef de tout. C'est celle-ci: «A défaut du renouvellement volontaire des engagements contractés par le Trésor, à défaut de l'accord libre de ses créanciers pour l'échelon -
LE NOUVEAU CABINET TCHECOSLOVAQUE
LES AFFAIRES EXTERIEURES LE NOUVEAU CABINET TCHECOSLOVAQUE A la veille de la rentrée du Parlement tchécoslovaque, le cabinet Tcherny, comme nous l'avons annoncé hier, a démissionné. Et la même dépêche qui nous apprenait l'ouverture d'une crise ministérielle nous faisait connaître que celle-ci était résolue par la constitution d'un cabinet Svelha, - en moins de vingt-quatre heures. Pays heureux! M. Tcherny, qui abandonne le pouvoir, dirigeait depuis mars dernier, au milieu d'une crise grave de la politique intérieure tchécoslovaque, un cabinet de fonctionnaires. M. Svelha, au contraire, prend la tête d'un cabinet parlementaire, qui, d'ailleurs, n'en comprend pas moins un certain nombre de techniciens étrangers au Parlement. Mais le fait nouveau et essentiel dans la composition du nouveau ministère, c'est qu'il renferme deux personnalités appartenant à des groupes de nationalité allemande: le professeur Mayr-Harting, chrétien-social, qui prend la direction de la justice, et l'agrarien Spina, qui prend le portefeuille des travaux publics. Le nouveau cabinet comprend encore quatre agrariens tchéco-slovaques: le président Svelha, M. Hódza, à l'instruction publique; M. Udrzal à la défense nationale, et M. Srdinko, à l'agriculture. Il compte deux populistes: Mgr Sramek, à la prévoyance sociale, et M. Mosek aux postes. Enfin, M. Najuran, représentant des petits artisans, prend le portefeuille des chemins de fer. Les autres ministres, qui n'appartiennent pas au Parlement, faisaient déjà partie du précédent Cabinet. Ce sont: M. Englis aux finances, M. Cerny à l'intérieur, M. Peroutka au commerce, M. Kallay aux affaires de Slovaquie, enfin M. Benès. Il faut louer le président du Conseil d'avoir compris dans la liste de ses collaborateurs l'éminent diplomate qu'est M. Benès. Par ce choix, le gouvernement tchécoslovaque prouve qu'il tient à conserver à sa politique extérieure la conti -
LE CONGRES RADICAL S'OUVRE AUJOURD'HUI
LE CONGRES RADICAL S'OUVRE AUJOURD'HUI BORDEAUX, 13 octobre. - Le Congrès radical-socialiste s'ouvre demain. Le matin, sous la présidence de M. Archimbaud, aura lieu une séance de pure forme. En même temps, se tiendra une réunion des présidents et secrétaires de Fédérations locales pour examiner diverses modifications au statut du parti. L'après-midi, à 14 heures 30, séance inaugurale. Après l'allocution d'usage la parole sera donnée à M. Herriot, parlant en tant que chef du parti. Il sera vraisemblablement amené, au cours de ses considérations, d'ordre politique, à se défendre contre les accusations ou les griefs dont il a été l'objet. La séance prendrait fin sur ce discours. Mais la controverse pourrait s'engager quelques instants après devant la commission de politique générale. Dans le parti socialiste M. Paul-Boncour explique son rôle à la S. D. N. M. Renaudel quitte le «Quotidien»