Hue and Cry

Recently Premier Herriot returned to Paris from visits to London and Brussels (TIME, July 7). He declared that the British Premier and himself were entierement d'accord. He "enthused" serenely about the proposed Premiers' Conference, which (commencing July 16) is to settle the means of putting into effect the Experts' Plan.

As Premier MacDonald had invited Premier Herriot to confer at Chequers Court and as it 'had been decided to hold the Premiers' Conference in London, the matter of inviting the other Nations was left to the British Premier.

Premier MacDonald forthwith invited the Premiers of all the interested Powers to attend the Conference and incautiously made a suggestion to the effect that a new committee should be empowered to determine default by Germany under the Experts' Plan. It was later declared that the new committee suggested was the Permanent Court of International Justice, which was construed to mean a transference of power from the Reparations Commission to the League of Nations.

The critics in France raised a hue and cry. The Reparations Commission consists of a French, British, Italian and Belgian member; but M. Barthou, the French member, is Chairman, and in that capacity has a casting vote which permits France to control the Commission, Belgium being completely under her thumb, in so far as reparations are concerned. The Opposition was not going to see the valuable power of France in the Commission destroyed. They declared that Premier Herriot must have been a party to the British suggestion, because he had stated that he was d'accord with the British Premier ; they declared that he was therefore guilty of neglecting French interests.

In Britain, the summary of semi-official reports and press editorials established the fact that Premier MacDonald had proposed a new body to consider possible German default as a mere suggestion, that he had not thought of prejudicing the issues to be discussed at the Conference. It was thought, however, that the Premier was guilty of an exceedingly clumsy piece of diplomacy.

At all events, Premier Herriot was forced by the Opposition press to recede from his former position and to declare that he was not d'accord with the British suggestion and, as the result of a special meeting at the Quai d'Orsay (French Foreign Office), the Premier decided to send to all Governments invited to the Premiers' Conference an explanation of the French viewpoint.

Despite this, Premier Herriot's political adversaries promised to make things hot for him in the Senate and Chamber of Deputies. It was even asserted that his fate depended upon whether ex-Premier Briand would decide that the time had come for him to be Premier for the ninth time. His Cabinet never in a secure position, began to wobble.

An illustration of the Government's insecure position is contained in the following list of defeats which Premier Herriot has had to endure since the elections (TIME, May 19) :

His candidate for the Presidency, ex-Premier Paul Painleve, defeated; le Senateur Gaston Doumergue elected. His candidate for the Presidency of the Senate, le Senateur Bienvenu-Martin, defeated; le Senateur Justin de Selves, Poincareist, elected. His candidate for the Presidency of the Army Committee of the Chamber of Deputies defeated; le Depute Maginot, Minister of War under Poincare, elected. His policy of withdrawing the French Embassy to the Vatican (TiME, June 16) and that of granting amnesty to political exiles and prisoners were met with strong opposition in the Senate. Finally, ex-Premier Poincare gained a point of vantage by being unanimously elected a member of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the Senate.