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The Popular Front in France: Prelude or Interlude?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 September 2013
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“Frenchman, too conservative to go communist, too anarchistic to like fascism, what are you going to do with yourself?” Thus was concluded a penetrating diagnosis of contemporary social trends in France published about a year ago. It is significant that such a survey should have come from the pen of a brilliant young journalist belonging to what may be called the post-war generation. For, whatever else recent dramatic developments in French public affairs may portend, there is no doubt that political control is passing to a new set of leaders, as well as, perhaps, to new ideologies.
France is now twenty-two years removed from the outbreak of the World War. Men born as late as 1900 are approaching middle age. Among the eighth of the population now over sixty years of age, only a handful of persons remain who can remember the Franco-Prussian War. Most of the men who were directing national policy through the World War and the peace settlement have died—Clemenceau, Poincaré, Briand, Painlevé, Barthou, Viviani, and Ribot.
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- Copyright © American Political Science Association 1936
References
1 Frédérix, Pierre, L'État des Forces en France (Paris, Gallimard, 1935)Google Scholar.
2 Since 1933, Tardieu has written one critique of the French parliamentary system after another, each more vehement than its predecessor. His present position is well summed up in his France in Danger (London, 1935)Google Scholar.
3 Plan du 9 Juillet (Paris, Gallimard, 1935)Google Scholar. In essence, this plan contemplated a strengthened parliamentary executive, a periodic reexamination of the constitution every fifteen years, a fuller collaboration of the National Economic Council and Council of State in the legislative process, administrative decentralization, a general training school for public administrators, control of the press by the organized profession of journalists, long-range planning of public works, a regional and corporative organization of producers under state guidance [similar to the NRA code authorities], minimum wages and a shorter work week, and a program of social hygiene and low-cost housing. The similarity of this plan to the program subsequently evolved by the Popular Front in January, 1936, is striking.
4 Cf. Kayser, J., “France and the International Situation”, International Affairs, July-Aug., 1936Google Scholar. The official name of the Popular Front has thus far remained merely the Rassemblement Populaire.
5 This internal crise de doctrine had led in 1934 to the secession of a number of leaders, including Déat and Marquet, who established their own neo-socialist party (Parti socialiste de France). Later, in 1935, this group united with Paul-Boncour's Republican Socialists to form the Union sociale el républicaine.
6 In 1935, a “green-shirted,” quasi-fascist movement known as the Front Paysan appeared in rural France, especially Brittany. Led by the picturesque Henri Dorgères, it condemned parliamentary “ineptitude,” urged tax strikes, resistance to mortgage foreclosures, and proposed a reorganization of the French state on a corporate and regional basis. (Cf. Jouvenel, B. de, “Le Front Paysan”, Revue de Paris, Dec. 1, 1935)Google Scholar. Running counter to this movement is the Confédération Nationale Paysanne, with the objective of organizing agricultural workers, on a syndicalist basis, into États généraux de la paysannerie. (Cf. La Tribune du Fonetionnaire, Mar. 7, 1936, for a summary of its purposes.)
7 Laval was succeeded on January 24 by Albert Sarraut, whose cabinet had a left-center focus and could count on the entire Radical Socialist bloc, Flandin's Left Republicans, and Déat and Paul-Boncour's dissident Socialists for a majority in the Chamber.
8 Le Temps, April 20, 1936.
9 The organization of the French radio includes both private and government stations. The latter are managed by the P.T.T. and financed by a tax on receiving sets. In 1934, only 1,400,000 French sets were in operation, in contrast with over 5,000,000 each in Germany and Great Britain. Political broadcasting is regulated by a special commission under the P.T.T. In principle, all party groups are guaranteed equal treatment; in fact, government parties appear to have some advantage in the selection of time on the air. In the 1936 campaign, political speeches were ordinarily broadcast from 8 to 8:30 p.m.—“les demi-heures étectorales,” as the press called them.
10 Of 11,927,852 registered voters, 10,054,749 exercised their suffrage on the first ballot, according to Le Temps of May 3, 1936. From 1881 to 1924, non-voting consistently exceeded 20 per cent in French national elections.
11 On April 30, Radical Socialist, Socialist, and Communist national party head quarters issued instructions of this character to their local organizations.
12 In an interview quoted in l'Ordre, May 2, 1936.
13 L'Echo de Paris, April 30, 1936. After the final voting had revealed the amazing proportions of the Popular Front victory, Le Temps caustically referred to the “fate” of the Radicals as follows: “Les responsables sont en même temps les victimes.” (May 5, 1936).
14 Ravage, M. E., “The French Socialists in Power”, N. Y. Nation, June 3, 1936Google Scholar.
15 From an editorial in Le Temps, April 8, 1936.
16 For the full text of this manifesto, cf. Le Populaire, April 6, 1936.
17 Compeyrot, J.-F., “Reflexions sur les Elections”, Revue Pol. et Parl., May 10. 1936Google Scholar.
18 As reported in Le Temps, April 19, 1936.
19 J. Kayser, op. cit., International Affairs, July-Aug., 1936.
20 This was but 30 per cent of the total number, as against 42 per cent in 1932 and 31 per cent in 1928. Only three départements in metropolitan France elected all their representatives au premier tour, while in 22 départements ballottage was necessary for the entire quota of seats. Le Temps, May 3, 1936. Of the 185 men elected on the first ballot, 149 were members of the old Chamber.
21 As given in Le Temps, April 28, 1936.
22 Well over half of the candidates in the second voting were men whose names did not appear on the first ballot. Le Temps, May 1, 1936.
23 As reported in the Journal Officiel, June 10, 1936. These totals do not include nine deputies not affiliated with any official party group.
24 On a proportional basis, the popular vote on the first ballot would have given the major Popular Front parties the following quotas of seats:
The total number of Popular Front seats would have been reduced from 387 to 346. The Communists, in particular, suffered from the existing electoral system because their vote was concentrated in a comparatively small number of industrial constituencies. Over half of the Communist contingent in the new Chamber represents the region of Greater Paris. In contrast, the Socialist vote was widely distributed throughout provincial France, including a considerable rural strength.
25 With the exception of the Bloc National election of 1919, when 370 new deputies were elected, this figure represents the highest turnover of legislative personnel since the first parliament of the Third Republic.
26 In this connection, cf. the suggestive editorial comments of l'Europe nouvelle, May 9, 1936.
27 As reported in the New York Times, June 14, 1936.
28 Cf. Le Temps, May 16, 1936.
29 Ibid., May 18, 1936. Presumably, M. Blum wanted M. Jouhaux for the portfolio either of Labor or of National Economy.
30 It was the largest since the Clemenceau government of 1917–20.
31 Quoted in the New York Times, June 5, 1936. Another deviation from timehonored custom was the designation as vice-president of the council of ministers, not of the minister of justice, but the minister of national defense.
32 Quoted in New York Times, August 15, 1936.
33 Ibid., June 6, 1936.
34 Cf. Pinon, R., “Histoire Politique”, Revue des Deux Mondes, July 1, 1936Google Scholar.
35 Werth, A., “France's New Leaf”, New Statesman and Nation, June 27, 1936Google Scholar.
36 For an interesting discussion of the attitude of rural France, cf. Dominique, P.'s editorial in l'Europe nouvelle, July 25, 1936Google Scholar.
37 Cf. Dominique, P., in l'Europe nouvelle, June 20, 1936Google Scholar.
38 As reported in the New York Times, June 15, 1936.
39 Issue of July 8, 1936.
40 New York Times, July 12, 1936.
41 Journal Officiel, June 26, 1936.
42 The amount of this Auriol loan was not fixed in advance.
43 It is noteworthy that, preoccupied with its program of social, economic, and fiscal reform, the government let two electoral reform measures fall by the wayside. One was a bill granting woman suffrage, which was passed for the ninth time by the Chamber of Deputies (by a vote of 488 to 1), but which was permitted to die in the Senate. The other was a bill to establish proportional representation which the Socialists and Communist deputies insisted should be postponed until the fall session. “Bread for the workers first, and then P. R!” Le Temps, August 1, 1926.
44 Many observers both inside and outside France have compared the first phase of the Popular Front experience with Mr. Roosevelt's “New Deal” as it looked at the close of the 1933 session of Congress. For the past two years, the French press has been full of discussions of “l'expérience Roosevelt.”
45 M. Charles Rist, the eminent French economist, reported last June, after eight months of study as president of a special committee set up by the Minister of Commerce, that there was a twenty per cent differential between French and foreign prices which must be eliminated if French trade was to revive.
46 In a speech made late in July, M. Charles Spinasse, the new Minister of National Economy, indicated that the government recognized this dilemma, and that it intended to do everything it could to moderate economic nationalism. (New Statesman and Nation, August 1, 1936.) Cf. also the clear analysis of the French economic outlook in the London Economist, July 4, 1936.
46a Devaluation was voted by Parliament at the end of September.
47 Four decrees issued on June 18 ordered the dissolution of the Croix de Feu, the Parti National Populaire (formerly the Ligue des Jeunesses Patriotes), the Parti National Corporatif Républicain (formerly la Solidarité Française), and the Parti Franciste (an openly fascist organization). De la Rocque at once announced the formation of a new “National Social party” which would be “neither white nor red, but blue, white, and red,” in defense of the national flag against the red. By August there were signs that the right wing elements in the French fascist camp might desert the “aristocratic” and rather ineffective de la Rocque for the dynamic renegade Communist, Jacques Doriot, who has built up during the last two years the most vehemently anti-soviet organization in all France.
48 This possibility was suggested by Paul Jaure, secretary-general of Blum's party and minister of state in his cabinet, in a public speech on June 14. Le Temps, June 16, 1936.
49 The C. G. T. reported in August that its membership had reached 4,300,000, nearly twice as large a figure as at the previous peak in 1921. On the other hand, the registered membership of the Communist party had increased from 80,000 in January to only 183,000 in July. Le Temps, July 10, 1936.
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