Il Piccolo
- Force and Consent
- Slow Progress of the Franco-German Negotiations
- Maurras Sentenced to One Year in Prison
This reading of Il Piccolo for 30 October 1926 takes three pieces from the page. The lead editorial, 'Forza e consenso', survives here only from mid-sentence: it praised pictures that set the 'impartiality of the photographic lens' beside intimate scenes of the leader's superhuman daily toil for the tides of citizens who trusted him and swore by him. A dispatch reported that a nearly two-hour meeting between Ambassador von Hoesch and Briand had produced nothing new, while the Paris papers complained that the Quai d'Orsay was giving out no exact information. A third report said that Charles Maurras, retried after an appeal to the Court of Cassation, had been sentenced to one year in prison and a 1,000-franc fine because his letter to former minister Schrameck amounted to a death threat.
Translation
Force and Consent
the impartiality of the photographic lens, but here at the same time are intimate scenes of that daily, immense toil to which the Man subjects himself with superhuman endurance, in order to answer the expectation and the love of these tides of citizens who entrust themselves to Him and swear by Him.
Slow Progress of the Franco-German Negotiations
The conversation of almost two hours that Ambassador von Hoesch had yesterday with Briand brought nothing new. The Parisian newspapers complain that the Quai d'Orsay does not give exact information, and here nothing more is known, evidently for the simple reason that nothing definitive has yet been reached.
Maurras Sentenced to One Year in Prison
Maurras was sentenced to two years' imprisonment in a first trial, against which he had lodged an appeal with the Court of Cassation. Today, after a new examination of his case, he was sentenced to one year in prison and a fine of one thousand francs. The court found, in substance, that the letter sent by Charles Maurras to former minister Schrameck contained the elements of the offence of threatening death. But
Context
Why the Franco-German talks stalled after Thoiry
Germany was admitted to the League of Nations on 10 September 1926. During the ceremonies marking that admission, on 17 September, the French and German foreign ministers, Aristide Briand and Gustav Stresemann, met in the French village of Thoiry. There Stresemann pledged material support to stabilize the franc, and Briand agreed to return the Saar Basin early and to bring an early end to the military control and occupation of the Rhineland. The same chronology records that objections from both the German and the French governments soon narrowed the scope of what had been agreed at Thoiry. Il Piccolo's report of 30 October comes from the weeks when those follow-up talks were still under way: it described a meeting of almost two hours between Ambassador von Hoesch and Briand that brought nothing new, and gave as its own explanation for the silence of the Quai d'Orsay simply that nothing definitive had yet been reached. The paper's short dispatch says nothing about the governmental objections that, according to the historical record, were shrinking the Thoiry bargain.
Schrameck and Maurras's threatening letter
Abraham Schrameck served as French Minister of the Interior for seven months in 1925 and sat as senator for Bouches-du-Rhône from 1925. As interior minister in Paul Painlevé's Cartel des Gauches government he had ordered the disarming of the far-right leagues, and, amid clashes between monarchists and communists, he banned the May Day and Joan of Arc parades. In an open letter published on 9 June 1925, Maurras attacked him in openly antisemitic terms and, offering what he called the promised answers, wrote: 'we will kill you like a dog.' This is the letter whose content the court, as Il Piccolo reported, found to contain the elements of a death threat. Because Schrameck had left the interior ministry within 1925, the paper in October 1926 rightly called him a 'former minister'.
The political violence behind the letter
Maurras wrote his letter in a climate of real bloodshed. In 1923 Germaine Berton assassinated Marius Plateau, a fellow member of Action Française. According to one historical account, seven people close to Maurras were killed by anarchist militants in 1923 and 1924, and it was for these killings that Maurras, in his open letter of 9 June 1925, reproached the interior minister Schrameck while giving free rein to his antisemitism. The royalist leader thus presented his threat as a reply to the killing of his own followers, and directed it at the minister responsible for public order. The excerpt from Il Piccolo reports only the court's legal finding about the letter and does not mention this background.
How the verdict was reported, and what followed for Maurras
Il Piccolo reported that Maurras had first been sentenced to two years, had appealed to the Court of Cassation, and on retrial received one year in prison and a 1,000-franc fine. Another record of the case states that for this death threat he received a fine and a one-year jail term that was suspended. The paper's excerpt breaks off at the word 'But', so the page as read does not show whether it went on to mention any such qualification. The verdict came shortly before a heavier blow to Maurras's movement: in an allocution of 20 December 1926, Pope Pius XI placed many of Maurras's works on the Index. Threats against political opponents also remained part of his conduct; in 1936, after threatening the socialist Léon Blum with death, Maurras was sentenced to eight months in La Santé prison.
Original
Forza e consenso
imparzialità dell'obiettivo fotografico, ma ecco al tempo stesso scene intime di quella diuturna immane fatica cui l'Uomo si sottopone con una resistenza sovrumana per corrispondere all'aspettazione e all'amore di queste maree di cittadini che a Lui si affidano e in Lui giurano.
Lento svolgimento dei negoziati franco-tedeschi
Il colloquio di quasi due ore che ieri basciatore von Hoesch ha avuto con Briand, non ha recato nulla di nuovo. I giornali parigini lamentano che il Quai d'Orsay non dia informazioni esatte, e qui non si sa nulla di più, evidentemente per la semplice ragione che non si è ancora raggiunto nulla di definitivo.
Maurras condannato ad un anno di prigione
Maurras è stato condannato a due anni di carcere in un primo processo. contro il quale aveva sporto ricorso in Cassazione. Oggi è stato condannato, dopo un nuovo esame della sua causa, ad un anno di prigione ed a mille franchi di ammenda. Il tribunale ha rilevato in sostanza che nella lettera inviata da Carlo Maurras all'ex ministro Schramek, erano contenuti gli elementi del reato di minaccia di morte. Ma
Source: Source: Internet Archive