The French Premier, M. Coin bes, made on Sunday last
a rather remarkable speech on M. Pelletan's indiscretions. He declared that the enemies of the Government had made the most of a sentence in an impromptu speech uttered " in the infectious warmth of a banquet," and having " in the speaker's mind only the value of a literary ornament, a figure of rhetoric." They made the most, though they ought to be aware that by the unbroken tradition of the Parliamentary system the Government was bound only by the declarations of its head. The individual Minister has jurisdiction only in his own Department. We have discussed the Constitutional ideas of M. Combes elsewhere, but may mention here that he qualified them in some degree by admitting that in foreign policy the Government would be bound by the declarations of its Foreign Minister. It is supposed that the speech is intended to let M. Pelletan down easily, and a reactionary Deputy who had threatened an interpellation has withdrawn his menace ; but it is improbable that the Opposition will forego so good an opportunity. It is something for them to show that the Cabinet is so badly selected that the Premier has to explain away his Minister of Marine. The incident would only have annoyed M. Waldeck-Rousseau, but it may shake M. Combes's position.
