Chaos

The extreme gravity of the present fiscal crisis in France (TIME, Dec. 28 et ante) was again made evident last week by the failure of Premier Briand and Finance Minister Doumer to secure the unanimous support of the Cabinet for M. Doumer's fiscal program for the coming year.

Throughout the week the Cabinet held frequent sessions, and interminable dickering and wrangling ensued behind closed doors. Despatches reported that the causes of dissension within the Government itself were two: 1) The refusal of the Cartellist Ministers,* headed by Minister of the Interior Chautemps, to approve the heavy increase in indirect taxation which is the keynote of M. Doumer's scheme. 2) The alleged success of M. Herriot in bringing M. Blum, the leader of the Unified Socialists (TIME, Nov. 23) back into the Cartel. Since the present Briand Government was formed on the basis of a majority in the Chamber which depended upon the Blum faction's having veered away from the Cartel (TIME, Dec. 7), the possibility of keeping the Government majority intact appeared doubtful. Thus the Cabinet refused to indorse M. Doumer's program, fearing that the Government might fall if he carried his measure before the Chamber last week.

The situation was further complicated by the fact that the allegedly reunited Cartel announced a fiscal program of its own based upon rigorous Government economies and a heavy screwing down of the present tax machinery upon tax-dodgers. Critics opined that if the Cartel had actually been brought into line behind such a program, the present. Government would have to become exceedingly pliant toward the wishes of the Cartellists if it could continue to exist at all.

Meanwhile the Senate shoved its continued hostility toward the Cartel by defeating Senator Pasquet (a Cartellist sympathizer) when he was nominated for the post of Reporter to the Senate Finance Committee, and electing instead Senator Cheron, leader of the United Republican group. Senator Millies-Lacroix was elected President of the Commission to succeed his intimate friend, Finance Minister Doumer.

Observers remarked that with the Cartel pulling the Chamber to the Left, and the Senate doing its perennial Squads Right, the politico-fiscal situation retains all the characteristics which have brought about the fall since November of three Finance Ministers (Caillaux, Painleve, Loucheur) and two Governments (both headed by M. Painleve).

*Those affiliated with the political bloc in the Chamber known as Le Cartel des Gauches (coalition of the Left Parties), which is headed by the Radical leader, former Premier Herriot.