Evening star., 1924-12-22
FRANCE TOPAy:U.S
MORATORIUM VITAL,
JUSSERAND HOLDS
Envoy Reveals He Told Mel
lon His Country Must Have
"Breathing SPELL"
EXPECTS PREFERENTIAL
TREATMENT, HE CLAIMS
Declares Payment Will Be Effected
by Attitude of Nations
Own Debtors.
RY FREDERIC WILLIAM VILE.

France needs "a breathing time.
She requires moratorium. When
1t has been granted her, France car
and will begin the payment of hel
$4,000, 100000 debt to the United
States.
That was the burden of a speech
by Jules J. Jusserand, French Am
bassador in Washington, today be-
fore current events class In the
first public statement made by Mr.
-Iusserand since his recent informal
Interchange of views with Secretary
Mellon, the French envoy spoke with
uncommon frankness regarding the
I economic conditions and necessities
of France. and told how they require
the French government and people
10 ask period of further grace from
America.
Losses of France.
The Ambas assador also made plain
indication that France expects pref
erential treatment, as compared to the
terms of settlement which the United
States has granted to other of her
World War debtors. France suffered
The gravest loss in blood and life u
said Mr.. Jusserand in passionate ac-
cents. Our relative national wealth
considered, we suffered the heaviest
loss in fortune. And finally, it must
tlefeld"
After recounting that the French
national economic situation was
steadily stabilizing itself, Mr.. JUS
serand declared that if Frances own
debtors show no inclination to pay
and he said he saw no sign of that
French policy with regard to pay
I ment of Frances debts to others nat
urally would be affected.
Need Breathing Time.
What we need" the ambassador
continued, ''is a certain moratorium
a breathing time. That is why 1 have
1ary of the Treasury. Various versions
of those talks have gained currency.
Sometimes they have been called con-
versations. and sometimes negotia-
tions. But the upshot of II all is that
we mean to pay. We have always
paid. We are one of the nations that
mean to settle with you We want to
pay. We paid our enemies after 1871.
The more we are determined TO pay
our friends.
II am confident our particular con-
ditions will be taken into account.
We are not hoping for a different set
Element, but rather for equita biz
terms. 1t is simply fair terms that
we seek-fair in sense of terms that
A moratorium is one of the things
that we need, which the others do
not need. We supplied more blood to
the common cause than any one. We
supplied more money than any other
nation, based on our national wealth.
We supplied the battlefelds. If the
war had taken place in the United
States, over an area stretching from
South Carolina to Maine, or in Eng
land, over a territory reaching from
Dover to York, France would have
paid her debts already"
Has Two Objectives.
Ambassador Jusserand told his
audience, which numbered 500 or 500
of the leading women of the Capital,
that he was going back to a France
that had two primary. postwar OBJ
jectives-"to work hard and to keep
peace" To keep peace, the ambassa-
dor said, France must also keep
ready" Workmen and peasants from
the Pyrennes to the Alps. Mr.. Jusse-
rand declared, are united in the de-
termination to rehabilitate the land
of their birth and love.
The French treasury had already
made prodigious efforts in the direc-
tion of restoring the vast regions
devastated by the Germans. For that
purpose, France herself has already
spent $1,000, 100000 francs, toward
which giant disbursement the Ger
mans to date had paid only 1000, 0oo,-
600 marks.
1t was because of these extraordi-
nary demands upon the French ma
tional treasury and taxpayers that
the republic had not yet been able to
approach more tangibly the question
of liquidating its external obligations
incurred for the war.
Raises Loans Internally.
France, NJ. Jupsserand pointed out,
IS in the habit of raising her own
loans internally. The recent $780,
100000 loan foated in the American
money market was an unusual trans
action 1t was burden thus to add
TO the already enormous national
debt, but 1t is q burden which France
is determined bravely to shoulder, In
order more and more to put her Geo.
nomfc house in order and meet the
obligations undertaken with Great
Britain and the United States in the
common cause of the rescue of civili-
zation.
Life Loss of War.
''The eloquent Solicitor General of
the United States. James NJ. Beck, In
u speech in New York the other day
said Mr.. Jusserand. explained In
thrilling-indeed, almost heartbreak-
ing-figures something Of the life
loss the war had brought to France
Mr.. Beck reminded his hearers thai
ii all the glorious dead of France
could rise from their tombs beneath
the poppy fields and march in ar
unbroken line beneath the Arc de
Triomphe, they would be marching
10 days and nights
The French Ambassador spoke Wig.
orously of Frances determination tc
hurl back the red peril of communism
which has raised it's head in hi.
country. He said he did not believe
it was a real or grave danger. I'VE
are a steady nation" he asserted
'''The soil on which the French revolu-
tion battened is not the soil of modern
France. There are no centuries OF
abuses to give rise to red revolu-
tfon there today. AS we said to the
Germans at 'Verdun, Thou shalt not
pass we say to the Bolsheviki and
the Communists, Thou shall not
come" -
Says Taxes Are Heavy.
Mr.. Jusserand said mistaken no.
tion was abroad in the world that
France does not tax herself as other
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