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THE GIST OF LOCARNO

BY J. RAMSAY MACDONALD

[THIS article is the former Labor Premier's introduction to George Glasgow's From Dawes to Locarno (Harper and Brothers, 1926) which we notice in Our Own Bookshelf.]

In its last act of foreign policy, the negotiation of the Locarno Pact, the British Government has done something which deserves a welcome. At Geneva, it is true, it did about as badly as any important Government could do; and the effect of Geneva upon Europe was only too apparent. But after Geneva came Locarno. I know what can be said against Locarno; and what can be said against it must be said. It is important that we should understand it.

Locarno does not face any of the problems that could be, in the widest stretch of imagination, an immediate cause of a European war. I have never met anybody yet and I think I know most of them- who sits in a European Foreign Office and who believes that in our lifetime, or in anybody's lifetime, there is going to be a war between France and Germany directly and specifically caused by the Rhine frontier. That is not how the war will come in Europe. If anybody thinks that by getting agreement on the Rhine frontier we have made European war impossible, he should think again. If there should be another European war, it is perfectly true that the Rhine frontier will be an element in it, but it will be raised only after war has broken out. Therefore it is true from one point

of view that the Locarno Treaty, by settling the Rhine frontier, has dealt with something that never could become a prime cause of a European war. Moreover, if war breaks out, and if the conditions have been prepared for Germany to have her revenge on France, as France prepared her revenge on Germany between 1872 and 1914if that should be the evil fate of the next generation or of the generation that is to follow, then the Locarno Treaty will not prevent Germany from fighting France over other people's quarrels, and, when that has begun, from fighting it over its own.

It is perfectly true that Locarno has not stopped up all the gaps and the back doors through which war may come; that there are loopholes in the Locarno Treaty; that Locarno has gone back to the old mistake of making machinery for peace in Europe by individual agreements between little groups of nations; that the moment we come to the Danubian problem we find it impossible to draft pacts on the same principle as Locarno and ask this country to guarantee them; that Locarno methods are not altogether a strengthening of the moral authority of the League of Nations. It is equally true that nine tenths of the objections that Mr. Chamberlain took to the Protocol appear also in the Pact.

There are, however, three things about the Locarno Pact to which I should like to draw attention. The first thing it has done is to get Germany into the League; I say to them, "Thank

you and bless you for having done it.' The second point is that arbitration is enshrined there, though imperfectly; and the third, that Locarno, apart from its substance, and apart from its merits, has given Europe new hope.

It has been the most magnificent example of mass Couéism that I have ever known. From the day when the Locarno treaties were initialed, the nations of Europe, after their morning prayers, I hope they indulged in them; there was much need of them, got up and said, 'I am good; I am getting better day by day.' Locarno may not be great as an accomplished achievement; but Locarno does give a magnificent opportunity. It is the opportunity of Locarno that I welcome, and Locarno is going to be fruitful for peace only in so far as that opportunity is taken.

Under Locarno our people have undertaken a tremendous responsibility. They have taken risks upon themselves which are greater actually, although they appear to be less on

paper, than they were willing to take under the Protocol.

We have no business to put our signature to Locarno unless we intend to carry out the spirit of the thing - the spirit we communicated to the people who initialed with us. We must remember what we led them to expect, not the ways open to us, in accordance with the imperfect letter, to get out of our responsibilities. We have handed over the British Army and the British Navy to other Powers under Locarno, as we did it under the Protocol, and to the extent we did it under the Protocol. There is no mistake about it. The Couéism of Locarno must be supplemented by a real building-up of peace. The Rhineland must be subject to a new agreement. The Ambassadors' Conference in Paris ought to be disbanded. That Disarmament Conference must be held, and we must strive to make it a success. We could reduce our armed forces enormously if we had the moral courage. The spirit of Locarno must be used up to its maximum.

THE POLITICAL CRISIS IN FRANCE1

BY LUDOVIC NAUDEAU

PARLIAMENTARY institutions have never before been as unpopular in France as they are to-day. We are accustomed to hearing reactionaries decry them, but it is a new thing to hear even the Parties of the Left denouncing them so bitterly. Listen to conversation on the street, at social gatherings, in family circles, in the

1 From Illustration (Paris illustrated literary weekly), December 12, January 23

cafés, upon the trains, and even among the workingmen, and you will hear all kinds of contradictory opinions, to be sure, as to what we should do to better our situation, but they will all be unanimous on one point-that our deputies are 'blowhards,' 'muddleheads,' 'puppets,' 'hot-air artists,' 'mountebanks,' 'phrase-makers,' men intent upon party or pecuniary advantage at the cost of the general wel

fare. All these people will tell you that the atmosphere of the Palais Bourbon is 'vitiated by the spirit of petty factional cliques' and poisoned by all sorts of machinations contrary to the public interest.

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To be sure, such assaults upon parliamentary government are no thing in France. We had them back in the days of the early Royalists, at the time of the anticlerical agitation, and again during the unhappy period of the Panama scandals and the Dreyfus case. But this earlier unpopularity was visited upon particular groups and parties, while the present crisis, which affects the property and the prosperity of every citizen, threatens democracy itself.

Before proceeding further, let me describe the Chamber of Deputies as it has impressed me whenever I have returned to Paris from the long sojourns abroad that have occupied a large part of my life. What first greets my ears at the opening of a session? A rattle of drums announcing the entrance of the Speaker, who marches in between two lines of bayonets and makes his way toward the platform attended on either side by an officer with a drawn sword. What does it all mean? Is revolution lurking at the door? I can easily imagine the impression this spectacle produces on a stranger, and whenever I witness it after a long absence it suggests the thought that a Speaker thus escorted must exercise unbounded authority over the body over which he presides. Imagine my shock, then, when only a few minutes later I see M. Herriot leaning forward over the assembly, like a captain on a ship's bridge of a stormy night, trying to make his voice heard above the fury of the storm. M. Herriot performs his duties with unusual tact and authority, but he must shout himself hoarse, he must plead and threaten, he must gesticulate

like a semaphore, he must pound his desk incessantly with his gavel, to keep the slightest show of order. We should be better democrats if we let the Speaker walk into the Chamber unescorted like an ordinary mortal, without so much military pomp, and showed him more respect and consideration after he has taken the chair.

I observe other things at the Palais Bourbon which are picturesque enough in their way but which hardly lend dignity to the assembly; for example, the custom the deputies have of lifting up and slamming down the covers of their desks to express their feelings. Bald-headed, gray-bearded old gentlemen who are models of respectable deportment elsewhere seem to think it quite proper to rattle their desk-covers in the Chamber like riotous schoolboys.

I have seen many lively sessions in other parliaments, but our Chamber has manners peculiarly its own. A member who makes a witty interruption is hailed with laughter even by his opponents. The House of Commons is generally dignified and dull; the Reichstag is apt to be surly and unamiable; but the Chamber is mischievous and obstreperous. But are not the members chosen freely by the French people? Has n't every nation the kind of parliament it merits? Why then should we abuse that body?

When I hear a man declaring that the Legislature of my country is composed of scoundrels and blockheads in about equal proportions, I resent the slander, as should any Frenchman. Isn't that a charge that even a foreigner would be loath to make? When we denounce democracy, are we not in effect denouncing ourselves?

People cry out against the Chamber's interminable debates that lead to nothing. I recently followed one of these debates in the Tables des travaux

parlementaires. It was upon teaching the classics in the public schools, a subject that has been discussed at unusual length and apparently without much result. But on closer inspection I confess I was decidedly impressed by the amount of thought and labor and conscientious inquiry the debates revealed.

At the same time, examination of the Tables shows clearly that Parliament does seem powerless to settle the pressing practical questions of the day. How many times has it discussed within the past year or two such subjects as the fluctuation of the currency and the rising cost of living, without in any way bettering the situation?

I have visited the Chamber a number of times of late to hear the debates upon the Budget. I went there prejudiced by the criticisms of Parliament I had heard on every side. Now you may laugh at these orators, but I came away with a feeling that most of the men who addressed the Chamber on the state of our finances were well qualified to speak upon the subject. It is easier to ridicule a member of Parliament than to equal his knowledge and ability. The trouble was not that the speeches were poor, but that the subject is so complicated and has so many apparently irreconcilable aspects. At any rate, the Chamber did not impress me as an incompetent or ignorant body of men, but as a gathering of intelligent, competent gentlemen whose honest differences of opinion prevent common action.

As a matter of fact, we are facing problems that cannot be solved except by immense sacrifices on the part of every citizen, regardless of his wealth or his class. When we mobilized in 1914 we called upon every man to serve his country. We did not ask a soldier if he wanted to go to the front, the way we now ask the taxpayer if he will consent

to pay his taxes. To-day, however, every social group, every profession and trade, every private interest, demands that its representatives shall get it special favors and put all the burden of supporting the Government upon someone else. Under such conditions Parliament becomes a sort of stock exchange, where men dicker for the popular vote, instead of a true legislature laboring in behalf of the nation as a whole.

This powerlessness to take positive action is what gives force to the arguments of those who demand a dictator. They claim that parliamentary institutions work only in normal times when the country is prosperous, but that at the moment serious dangers arise we must have recourse to a strong man to compel us to settle our conflicts of interest. Now there are seven or eight million French voters, each of whom thinks himself an intelligent, wellinformed, sensible man. He imagines that a dictator would do the things that he himself would do. He would be exceedingly surprised to wake up some fine morning and discover that we had a dictator whom we could not shake off, whose ideas were quite different from his own. Yet the chances are a thousand to one that this is just what would happen.

At Petrograd in September 1917 the author of the present article saw with his own eyes Kronstadt sailors, Finnish sharpshooters, and Red Guardists expel the Russian Constitutional Convention, elected by the free will of the people, from the Tavricheskii Palace. It was a black night. Bayonets glittered everywhere. The members of the Convention scattered hither and thither, trudging off through the snow. During this terrible scene, Lenin, as I know from a reliable eyewitness, lay on the floor of the little anteroom to which he had retired after giving the fatal order,

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laughing so wildly that his most devoted followers were frightened.

What had happened? Simply this. About one fifth of the members of Parliament, getting control of the armed forces of the country, had expelled from the Convention the other four fifths-the talkers, who imagined that they had met to deliberate, to weigh arguments, to be a parliament.

Lenin's dictatorship put a prompt end to indecision and delay by destroying Parliament. It suppressed all criticism in the press and imprisoned or executed independent journalists. No man dared breathe a word in opposition to the Bolsheviki. There was no more talking; there was silence. But it was the silence of the graveyard. The Government could not feed the hungry, it could not remedy a single one of the great evils that were afflicting Russia. All that the suppression of Parliament meant was suppressing the right of the citizens to discuss their own affairs.

Later another freak of chance took me to Rome on the very day that Mussolini entered the capital for the purpose of shutting the mouths of Italy's talkers. Many people think that his Government has so far been a pretty good thing for the country. I hope so. But what I have heard of the reign of terror in Florence during the night of the third of last October has set me thinking - twenty-eight people killed, shops plundered. Certainly there are still dark spots in the Fascist régime. Mussolini tolerates no opposition. He had made the deputies his puppets. He has made newspapers official gazettes. Fascism restored order in Italy at a critical time. That was a great service; but order is not everything. The acme of order is in a prison. Parliamentary government can be the best or it can be the worst of governments. It is the worst of governments when its members are divided, as they are to-day,

into two groups of about equal power, whose oscillations render consistent policies impossible. Our present difficulties are the fruit of our indecision. In the situation where we find ourselves at present any system, if it be administered with vigor, continuity, and unity of purpose, would be better than our present hesitation.

Either we must have a parliament capable of reforming itself and giving the country the feeling that it at length has a firm-handed government, or else France in her instinct to survive will create impromptu some organ of order and authority. No nation can go on indefinitely as a mere plaything of political caprice. It must steer a definite course. The Republic must govern, or it will vanish.

In France the Legislature has gradually undermined and destroyed the power of the Executive. It has usurped all the authority of the State. It was created to control public expenses and to keep them within bounds. To-day it piles up those expenses higher and higher. Cabinet ministers are chosen without regard for their qualifications for their posts. The same individual may be Secretary of the Navy in the morning, Secretary of Public Instruction at noon, and Secretary of Public Works at night. Moreover, our deputies have fallen more and more into the habit of allotting high offices to themselves-colonial governorships, embassies, places on high commissions. Upon becoming members of the Chamber, men who had never written a line before their election have blossomed out as journalists, encumbering our press with dull and mediocre prose. It is high time for some gentlemen to get back to their regular jobs and stick to their lasts.

Were our Parliament in England, it would have been dissolved long ago and we should have appealed to the electors

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