Edgy Nerves

The North Atlantic Treaty was ratified last week by the French National Assembly (397 to 189) and by the Italian Senate (175 to 81). All signatories had now ratified the pact except The Netherlands, whose upper house is expected to do so next week.

In Paris, Communist Yves Peron denounced the pact's advocates as "men who collaborated with the Nazis and who are now ready to collaborate with the Americans on the same basis." Angry anti-Communist deputies chased him to the lobby; a Gaullist slapped him across both cheeks, drawing blood with a signet ring. Reinforcements rushed up and in no time a yelling, swaying free-for-all was on. Perspiring ushers in wing collars and tail coats barely managed to restore order.

In Rome, Italy's senators got similar exercise. Just before the Atlantic pact debate, Interior Minister Mario Scelba discussed Communist charges that he had used his police force illegally during the recent farm strike. Said he: "Idle talk to make us lose our nerve. But the government in general and I in particular have stronger nerves than some quarters." Communist nerves had been edgy all day. When a Christian Democratic senator called a Communist senator "an unworthy child of Sardinia," the Sardinian demanded that his opponent retract the remark on pain of having his ears cut off. The opponent did not retract. After Scelba's speech, as if by signal, the Communist front benches rose and (in the words of the Communist paper L'Unit`a) the "senators of the Left flung themselves against the provokers to teach them a lesson."

Sirens wailed the alarm; ushers, as formally dressed as their French colleagues, charged into the fray, tail coats flying. The Communists seized chairs, broke them up into clubs. Senators doubled up as fists and feet hit their stomachs.

Mario Scelba sat impassive, surveying the battlefield with agate eyes. It was the worst brawl the Italian Parliament had seen in a long time. Some believed the Communists had deliberately started the fight. Said Il Popolo: "... A deliberate maneuver to debase the dignity and efficiency of Parliament."

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