Selling the Constitution

In all France no paper save the Communist L'Humanite has denounced Premier Charles de Gaulle more outspokenly than Paris' frisky young L'Express. But looking on at the 39 old parliamentarians who were studying De Gaulle's proposed new constitution, L'Express sighed: "To see again these men and their methods, to have looked at them for the last time at work, gives one a desire to scream 'yes' to any new regime, to any constitution, provided it changes things."

Discontent with the past, as much as concern for the future, underlay France's passive acceptance of De Gaulle's severe formulas. Last week the special parliamentary commission meekly approved De Gaulle's proposed new constitution by a vote of 30-0 (with nine abstentions and absences), even though it spelled the end of parliamentary ascendancy.

To be sure, the commission had a few changes to suggest. On controversial Article XIV, it proposed that the Constitutional Council pass on the President of France's right to assume dictatorial powers whenever, in his judgment, national security was gravely threatened. The parliamentary commission also thought too harsh De Gaulle's implied ruling (TIME, Aug. 18) that any overseas territory casting a majority vote against the new constitution in next month's referendum would be considered to have voted itself clean out of the French Union. Instead, they proposed that, in such a case, the territorial assembly be allowed to decide whether or not to hold a second, local referendum on the specific issue of independence.

Of, By & For. De Gaulle's new constitution begins with words from the constitution of the old Fourth Republic: "France is a Republic, indivisible, secular, democratic and social." It continues with the echoing phrase, "of the people, by the people, for the people." Minister of Justice Michel Debre, who had a big hand in writing the new constitution, denies that De Gaulle opposes a democratic Parliament. Says he: "French democracy threatened to perish because Parliament was also the government, the administration, and even sought to administer justice. The role of a Parliament is not to govern. It is to vote laws and the budget and to be the final recourse of sovereignty and liberty."

Creating the Myth. Experts in Paris expect the new De Gaulle constitution to get 60% to 65% of the vote in the Sept. 28 referendum, for which 45 million people (including 18 million residents of Algeria and the overseas territories) are already registered. Like shrewd politicians anywhere, De Gaulle and his aides are taking no chances. In Algeria the army is already hard at work on psychologically preparing the voters. ("To condition the Moslem populace, one has to create a De Gaulle myth," declares a recently published directive of the south Algerian military zone. "The picture of the general must appear everywhere.")

In France itself, where the republican tradition is particularly strong in the southwest, the Gaullist campaign is largely in the hands of tough Information Minister Jacques Soustelle, who has launched a series of radio, TV and newsreel presentations to explain the proposed constitution. To ensure that his message does not get garbled in transmission, Soustelle has already replaced some ten key members of the government-run Radio-Television FranC,aise. Increasingly, French radio, television and newsreels are becoming sycophantic in praise of De Gaulle. When a parliamentary committee accused Soustelle of imposing on France "unilateral and partial information," ex-Marxist Soustelle's brushoff reply to this accusation recalled to Figaro Soustelle's youthful training in Communist dialectic.

But the No. 1 salesman of the new way is the general himself--proud, dedicated, remote, positive, full of paternal silences and prestigious mysteries. This week he is off on a 14,000-mile jet tour of Madagascar, Equatorial and West Africa, to sell a simple yes response to his package that with one word will commit all Frenchmen, whatever their questions and reservations, to the course he has set for them.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.