Le Figaro
- THE ARMY WE NEED
- The Socialist Party and the Senate Elections
- MADAME LEFEBVRE IS SENTENCED TO DEATH
The front page of 31 October 1926 covered defence doctrine, party tactics and the courts. A column on "the army we need" argued that on modern European battlefields matériel is the first condition of soldiers' effectiveness, and that its quality, nature and composition must shape how a battle army is organized. In a signed editorial, Lucien Romier mocked the socialists as a husband who scorns his wife but loves her dowry. He noted that none of the proposals going to the SFIO National Council ruled out an alliance with the Radicals in the coming Senate elections, and that Renaudel's group openly favoured a first-round pact. A court report on Mme Lefebvre's death sentence observed that no woman had been executed for many years and that, because she was over sixty, a sentence of hard labour would become reclusion for her.
Translation
THE ARMY WE NEED
Let us note it once more: on the modern battlefields of Europe, where the so-called civilized nations meet, matériel is the first condition of the fighting men's effectiveness, however excellent they may be. Its quality, its nature and its composition are the foundations on which the organization of a battle army must rest if it is to lead to victory.
The Socialist Party and the Senate Elections
To tell the truth, the socialists are like the husband who does not love his wife and complains about her to all comers, but who loves his wife's dowry and the comfort he finds attached to it. Hence, whenever it matters, ingenious reasons arise for a modus vivendi. And so, in the various proposals on electoral tactics that will be submitted to the National Council, we see nothing that absolutely forbids an alliance of the socialists with the Radicals. The proposal of M. Renaudel and his friends frankly recommends the alliance in the first round of voting.
MADAME LEFEBVRE IS SENTENCED TO DEATH
But it is many long years since a woman was executed, and, as Mme Lefebvre is over sixty, the penalty of hard labour would mean reclusion for her.
Context
Why a party hostile to the Senate still wanted its seats
Romier's image of a husband who disdains his wife but prizes her dowry describes a long-standing socialist ambivalence. A history of the socialists and Senate elections published by the Fondation Jean-Jaurès records that socialists regarded the second chamber as an obstacle to progressive ideas, yet the party went on contesting senatorial seats. The same history shows what was at stake in the renewal Romier was discussing: the socialists held only two Senate seats in 1921 but fourteen in 1927, which allowed them to form a group of their own. Romier wrote before that result. His editorial reads the party's interest in the upper house as opportunism, while the later seat count shows that the socialist presence in the Senate did grow substantially by 1927.
Alliance with the Radicals or socialist-only lists
Romier reports that none of the tactical proposals before the SFIO National Council absolutely forbade an alliance with the Radicals, and that Pierre Renaudel and his friends openly recommended an alliance in the first round. The Fondation Jean-Jaurès history describes the SFIO's interwar senatorial strategy as the wish to present lists made up entirely of socialists in the first round. It also records that some members objected, arguing that an alliance with the Radical-Socialists would win more seats. The editorial therefore captures one moment in a recurring argument inside the party. Renaudel's proposal corresponds to the members who wanted alliance, while the strategy the history describes as typical for the period was autonomous socialist lists at the first ballot. Romier, writing for a conservative paper, presents the openness to alliance as proof of socialist inconsistency.
How rare the execution of a woman had become
The court report's remark that no woman had been executed for many long years matches the wider record. According to an overview of capital punishment in France, when Marshal Pétain refused to pardon five women under the Vichy regime, no woman had been guillotined in France for more than five decades. The power to commute death sentences belonged exclusively to the President of the Republic, and in 1926 that office was held by Gaston Doumergue, who had defeated Paul Painlevé for the presidency in 1924. Mme Lefebvre's life therefore depended on a presidential decision. Clemency had already limited executions in earlier years: President Armand Fallières pardoned every person condemned to death during the first three years of his term. Abolition itself had failed when Aristide Briand's bill was rejected on 8 December 1908 by 330 votes to 201. The statement that hard labour would become reclusion for a woman over sixty is the paper's own explanation of the penal rules.
Who ran the War Ministry when the paper called for an army built on matériel
The column arguing that matériel must be the basis of army organization appeared while Paul Painlevé was Minister of War. Painlevé had held the post in Aristide Briand's governments and stayed in office after Raymond Poincaré took power in 1926; he remained Minister of War until July 1929. In those years he was a key figure in building the Maginot Line, the fortifications along France's eastern border. The excerpt does not name the minister or a particular bill. Its argument that the quality and composition of equipment, not the excellence of the soldiers alone, decides modern battles belongs to the years in which Painlevé, as Minister of War, was instrumental in creating the Maginot Line.
Original
L'ARMÉE QU'IL NOUS FAUT
Une fois de plus, constatons-le, sur les champs de bataille modernes d'Europe où se rencontrent les nations dites civilisées, le matèriel est la condition première du rendement des combattants, si excellents soient-ils. Sa qualité, sa nature et sa composition sont les bases sur lesquelles doit s'asseoir l'organisation d'une armée de bataille pour conduire à la victoire.
Le parti socialiste et les élections sénatoriales
A vrai dire, les socialistes sont comme ce mari qui n'aime pas sa femme, se plaint d'elle à tout venant, mais qui aime la dot de sa femme et le confort qu'il y trouve attaché. D'où naissent, chaque fois qu'il importe, d'ingénieuses raisons pour un modus vivendi. Aussi, dans les diverses propositions qui seront soumises au Conseil national touchant la tactique électorale, ne voyons-nous rien qui interdise absolument l'alliance des socialistes avec les radicaux. La proposition de M. Renaudel et de ses amis recommande franchement l'alliance au premier tour de scrutin.
MADAME LEFEBVRE EST CONDAMNEE A MORT
Mais voici de longues années qu'on n'a point exécuté de femmes, et, Mme Lefebvre ayant plus de soixante ans, la peine des travaux forcés serait pour elle la réclusion.