Evening star., 1924-06-22

lists for the disastrous check on the
Aisne in April and May and the SUBJ
sequent confusion in the French army
which almost brought supreme disas-
ter. True Painleve had defended him
self against this charge very ably.
but his defense was not accepted. He
stood. therefore, as the symbol of the
politicians interference with the
army. Now, the war being over, the
politicians had their revenge
The parallel between British and
French events, therefore, is up to
this point pretty complete. Public
sentiment in both countries had about
boxed the compass and Painleve in
France and Macdonald in Britain
were definite expressions of the pop
ular and the political changes. Had
Painleve been chosen president. as
the chamber attempted, the analogy
would have been, as 1 have said
startling. This did not happen be-
cause the French Left itself became
divided, the majority favoring Pain
leve, the minority Doumergue.
BLOC NdTfOnh Gf" Cn1nCc.
This gave the defeated bloc ma
tional its chance Since Painleve was
the choice of the bloc of the Left and
Herriot, the coming premier. had un-
dertaken to lineup the whole COM
bination for Painleve, the Right vot-
ed solidly for Doumergue and their
votes. together with those of the
minority fthe Left, were enough to
elect him. But precisely this situation
could occur in the British House
of Commons any day. should Tories
choose to support the Liberals against
Labor. Potentially the conditions are
still the same.
Changes in America.
Now I am not attempting to assert
that there are very strong points of
resemblance between the American
situation on the one hand and the
French and British on the other. In
fact, there are striking differences.
We, for example, got rid of our war
leaders in the election of 1890, when
the Democratnc party was swept out
of power by a 100000 majority. Since
the late Woodrow Wilson would be
considered in Europe as a Liberal, as
belonging to the Left by contrast with
either the late President Harding or
President Coolidge, it is probably ac-
curate to say that at the first chance
after the war the United States, like
Britain and France, turned to con-
servative leadership. OF course, po-
liticalIy speaking, the war did not
touch us and for the first time since
the Mexican war an administration
and a party which had successfully
conducted a war derived no political
advantage therefrom.
Thus we went back to domestic
politics with bang in 1920, while
end of last year and the French only
last month. On the other hand. be-
tween the Republican party and the
Tories in Britain and the bloc Ma
tional in France there is much in
common. There is the same funda-
mental opposition to radicalism
which is expressed by labor in Brit
ain and by socialism in France. Un-
der Bryan and under Wilson, in vary
ing degrees, the Democratic party
has been the left in this country, and
what is even more significant is that
it stands to benefit strikingly by the
rise of La Toilette third party.
But back of all else in both Brit
ain and France one can easily detect
a WEAKNESS with the conservative
leaders and politicians. The drift to
the left i'm both Britain and France
has been very strong apart from the
war questions altogether. The de-
sire for something new, for new men
new ideas, new parties, is unmistak-
able, particularly in Britain, where a
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