Poujadists Under Fire

The Assembly president rang his silver bell, the Communists and Socialists banged their desks, the Poujadists sang the Marseillaise, and the center looked on in shocked silence. "You are a danger to the Republic," one aroused Deputy shouted at the Poujadists. "Yes--to the republic of cronies," retorted Poujadist Jean-Marie Le Pen. The Chamber of Deputies, which had been stunned to discover the voters of France had elected 53 vulgar persons called Poujadists to their republic of cronies, was trying to get rid of the fellows by other means.

Poujade had run his candidates under three different labels to catch votes. Several other parties had done the same thing. But now, on this technicality, the Assembly was trying to displace 13 Poujadists. Snapped Poujadist Le Pen: "People cannot be expected to obey laws if the Assembly does not do so itself. If you cannot respect the constitution, at least respect the will of the people."

The Filibuster. From a conference room deep in the maze of the Palais Bourbon's corridors, Demagogue Pierre Poujade (who is not a Deputy) directed the battle, rapping out orders, getting reports relayed from his wife in the public galleries, barking into the telephone. To a suggestion for a mass walkout, he snorted: "What then? You want to return next day like a beaten dog with your tail between your legs?" Poujade's orders to Le Pen, his unofficial floor manager: filibuster.

Demanding the floor, young, hulking Le Pen announced: "I am going to remind you of some of the rights which you may have forgotten," and began reciting the French constitution. Communists hooted, thumped their desks, and Le Pen read on. Expelled from the tribune by President Le Troquer, Le Pen yielded the floor to "the second of my 52 comrades." "This is sabotage," moaned a Deputy.

At 27, Le Pen is France's youngest Deputy, a handsome, tough tavern brawler with a law degree, a kind of lowbrow intellectual primitive who is currently the darling of Paris cafe society. Son of a fisherman, he won a scholarship to study law in Paris, cut an impressive swath through the Latin Quarter's bistros and student clubs. After graduation, he volunteered for service in Indo-China as a parachutist ("I was tired of amateur fighting"), but got there too late to fight.

Bitter Man. Returning last fall to his Latin Quarter room with its nude prints, Le Pen installed the new mistress he had picked up in Saigon--an elfin artist with inch-long silver fingernails and two-toned hair (blond on brown). He was bitter about the Communists, about Mendes France's "betrayal" of Indo-China, scornful of France's Deputies, whom he labeled degenerates. Poujade, with his chaotic down-with-taxes, down-with-Parliament protest movement, seemed just what he was looking for. Accused during the campaign of keeping a mistress. Le Pen sneered: "I suppose I am different. I like women."

But in the Assembly, despite Le Pen's best efforts, the Communists and Mollet's left-center forces joined to vote the displacement of first one, then another of his comrades. It was a dangerous victory. It gave Poujade fresh ammunition in his attack on the Assembly itself. After his first loss, Poujade cried, "We lost one Deputy, but we'll win 100,000 more followers." In France's present mood, he might be right.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.