Bloc National Redivlvus

Bloc National Redivivus

M. Alexandre Millerand, ex-President of France, eyeing the Conservative victory in Britain, noting the Republican success in the U. S., decided that the time was opportune to make his entrance on the stage of national politics.

The manner of the entrance was entirely Millerandian. As President of a newly-formed National Republican League, successor to the Bloc National, whose birthplace was the Ba-ta-clan* and whose epitaph was written in the May elections, M. Millerand, backed by 13 of his faithful henchmen, stood not on the order of his coming. In language, pointed and strong, he denounced the Herriot Government in a carefully prepared manifesto. He objected to:

1) Abandonment of the Ruhr guarantees without a settlement of inter- Allied debts.

2) The financial policy of the Government, which has neither reduced taxation nor halted the upward march of prices.

3 Anti-Clericalism and pro-Communism.

The policy of the N. R. L. is defined as favoring a "just and solid peace, fiscal justice, liberty and religious peace"; as opposing "demagogy, revolution and anarchy."

The manifesto continues:

"Frenchmen, your common sense, your patriotism, your innate love of or- der, your hope for the future, your children, dictate your duty. You must unite with us."

* The Ba-ta-clan is a theatre in Paris where M. Millerand made a famous speech in 1919 when the Bloc National was formed.