Great Little Gaston

Only one statesman is able to take the microphone in France and talk successfully to the entire nation as "My dear fellow citizens and friends." The people call him affectionately Gastounet ("Little Gaston"). They sympathized when he was a lonely bachelor and President of France. They appreciated his delicacy in waiting until his next to last week in office before marrying a lady of wealth with a chateau in southern France. When President Gaston Doumergue retired his popularity remained such as utterly to eclipse his two successors. There was no one else whom sad-eyed, colorless President Albert Lebrun could call to the Premiership in the bloody days of last winter when le peuple seemed rising against a Government hopelessly corrupt. Last week beloved Gaston Doumergue went to the microphone and gave an accounting of his stewardship as Premier in the last six fateful months.

"Dear fellow citizens and friends," came the calm, reassuring voice from every radio in France. "Tonight I ask you a question which you must take to your hearts. Is the general situation in France today better than it was on Feb. 8 when, despite my advanced years, I responded to President Lebrun's summons?*

"God protect me from vanity and pride which dull the reason! But I believe--without pride--that my Cabinet colleagues and I have improved the situation of France which previously was comparable to that of a house of cards.

"Inevitably I cannot please everyone. I am not a dictator. I am a simple citizen who loves Liberty and who has the utmost confidence in your wisdom and your love of France. When I began my labors last February interior and exterior peace was threatened. To avert immediate danger we were forced to the recourse of extraordinary parliamentary procedure. [Gastounet forced Chamber and Senate to vote him power to put through the budget by decree] Thanks to Parliament we have balanced the budget; effected fiscal reforms; so improved our trade position that since March 1 500 million francs in gold have entered France. We have averted the danger of inflation and consequent bank closings. Because we have restored the health of the State's finances we have been enabled to extend important credits to the farmers. Finally we have reduced unemployment which endangered France socially and morally. . . ."

Political Rupture. Thus Premier Doumergue went before the people on the general record of his stewardship, which is undeniably good. He left up in the air the specific failure of his Cabinet to clear up the Stavisky scandal which is still in the dawdling hands of its Parliamentary Committee. Convinced that le peuple blame chiefly the Committee and not himself, Gastounet left the microphone to begin his summer vacation. Next evening as he was about to catch the sleeping car for his wife's estate near Toulouse the Stavisky scandal blew up in Committee and excited Cabinet Ministers came tearing to the station.

The blowup had been touched off by smart, ruthless onetime Premier Andre Tardieu, now a Minister of State (without portfolio), who thought he saw his chance to stage a political comeback by posing as the one Cabinet Minister who would "speak the truth about Stavisky" and tear the veil of official discretion.

In recent weeks the Parliamentary committee investigating I'affaire Stavisky has glossed over even such startling admissions as one by Inspector Le Gall of the Surete (Secret Police) that "I would have had 99 chances out of a 100 to capture Stavisky alive if I had been allowed to." This strengthened public conviction that $30,000,000 Swindler Alexandre Stavisky was no suicide but was shot by the Surete because highly placed politicians thought he knew too much. For months the Rightist Paris Press has been hammering insinuations of guilt at dapper Deputy Camille Chautemps who was Premier when the Stavisky scandal broke. M. Chautemps is now leader in the Chamber of the biggest Left bloc, the Radical Socialists whose Party President is Edouard Herriot, perpetual Mayor of Lyons, onetime Premier and today, like M. Tardieu, a Minister of State. One morning last week despondency at the slime being flung at the Chautemps family caused Niece Jacqueline Chautemps to commit suicide. She may or may not have known that that morning M. Tardieu would go before the Stavisky Committee and launch a vitriolic attack upon Uncle Camille Chautemps.

M. Tardieu called M. Chautemps a liar, an associate of criminals and a forger. He charged him with forging the stub of a Stavisky check for 300,000 francs to make it appear that this sum had been paid to a person called "Tardi," promptly assumed by the Left Press to be Tardieu. For six hours M. Tardieu's scathing attack went on. He produced little or no evidence to support his charges but vilified radical Socialist Leader Chautemps to such an extent as to involve the prestige of the Party and of Boss Herriot. Plainly M. Tardieu was playing to disrupt the Cabinet and force a general election which he hoped to win. When M. Chautemps was finally called to confront M. Tardieu he accepted the challenge. "I take note," he declared, "that a member of the Cabinet has accepted responsibility for rupturing the political truce."

That sent the statesmen scampering to stop Premier Gaston Doumergue before he could leave Paris for his vacation. "M. le President!" they panted at Gastounet, "your Cabinet is threatened. You must not go."

As the engine whistled Gastounet made a lightning decision. "Tell the boys to be good!" he snapped. "This quarrel must be limited to the men involved, not their parties or the Government. I shall leave now on my vacation and should anyone act rashly they must bear the blame. Au revoir, Messieurs!" and the train chuffed off with Gastounet.

Over the week-end Great Little Gaston remained obstinately at his holiday retreat, but it became obvious that he must return to Paris and intervene between Minister of State Herriot and Minister of State Tardieu, each of whom was demanding that the other resign. The shock of M. Tardieu's attack sent prices down on the Paris Bourse and many editors condemned as reckless and unpatriotic his attempt to rupture the Cabinet. In an effort to give Great Little Gaston all possible support President Albert Lebrun praised his "wisdom and prudence" in a formal speech at Aurillac, then declared:

"Public opinion will not accept a situation that stops his beneficial work. It will be severe toward those who do not do everything to assure for the future what the wisdom of the efforts of today already is permitting us to hope is being achieved."

Stewardship. Little notice has been taken abroad of Premier Doumergue's manifold stewardship. In the realm of diplomacy his Government has all but isolated Germany, won Russia's strong support and obtained the backing of Britain and Italy for the Eastern Locarno Pact (TIME, July 23). When Premier Doumergue took office France was embroiled in bitter tariff and quota disputes with Britain, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Switzerland. Now all of these have been ironed out by trade treaties. Only in arming France has Gastounet been extravagant. He has forced through supplemental appropriations of over three billion francs to complete the French system of superfrontier defenses by 1940. But in this present year he has saved over four billion francs by discharging 85,000 superfluous Government employes, slashing Government salaries and veterans' pensions, and paring down the State Railways' chronic deficit by drastic reorganization and coordination of rail and road transport. Recognizing that prices must be forced down if the franc is to remain on gold, Gastounet has attacked cautiously the fantastic artificial price of wheat, fixed in France by a previous cabinet at $2.07 per bu. The new fixed price is $1.95 and Premier Doumergue has only begun his price lowering campaign. Whether such a policy can be put through without a dictator remained last week one of the biggest question marks in France.

*In his radio speech to the U. S. last month President Roosevelt asked much the same question: "Are you better off than you were last year?" (TIME, July 9).

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