THE TOTTERING GOVERNMENT IN FRANCE.
THE French Chamber that now is, seems, after all, determined to model itself on the Chambers that have been. For a time it was differently minded. It had realised, to all appearance, that a Ministry is too useful a tool to be lightly parted with. It may not be all that a Chamber wishes, but it does at any rate do what the Chamber by itself cannot do. It governs the country. The existing Cabinet, moreover, seemed fairly to represent the prevailing temper of the Republican Party. It had no particular aims and no particular policy. It favoured moderate measures, while it was willing to conciliate the Extreme Left by occasional immoderate speeches. It had no conception of a really comprehensive Republic, a Republic which should open its arms to Frenchmen of every creed and every party; but then, the possession of anything of the kind would have placed it far in advance of its supporters. The majority of the Deputies seemed at last to take in the situation, and France promised to enjoy a long exemption from her recurrent malady, a Ministerial crisis.
This was the state of affairs down to the middle of last week. The Session was all but over; there only remained three more days during which the Chamber would have to go on denying itself the pleasure of putting Ministers in a minority. But the difficulty of self-restraint is cumulative. It becomes more irksome with the length of time it has been endured, and the fewness of the opportunities for throwing it off that still remain. The very fact that the Chamber had only three days in which to behave well, made the temptation of behaving ill irresistible. On Thursday week it inflicted a wholly uncalled-for and perfectly mischievous defeat on the Minister for Foreign Affairs, and two days later it inflicted a still more uncalled-for defeat on the Prime Minister. It is true that on the intermediate day it returned to its senses, and did not insist on a debate which could have had no other result than enabling Germany, if she were so minded, to demand explanations. The French Chamber will do much that it had better leave undone, but it will not go the length of risking a war. But its action on the Saturday is only made more significant by its action on the Thursday and the Friday. It would have been only natural if the consciousness of their blunder in insisting on a discussion of which M. Ribot would not share the responsibility, had made the Deputies additionally careful to avoid embar- rassing the Cabinet any further. Instead of this, they were additionally anxious, chiefly to show that the recanta- tion of Friday was prompted solely by alarm for them- selves, and not at all by regard for the Ministry. There was something singularly marked in the rejection of a trifling vote—X24,000—for the Polytechnic School. The Exchequer would not be benefited in any appreciable degree by so small a saving, and the only conceivable reason for in- sisting on it was the probability that M. de Freyeinet would take its rejection as a special slight to himself. This was the temptation to which the majority yielded, and when such an inducement as this proves irresistible, it is pretty clear that the Cabinet has no longer any hold upon its supporters.
It is said by French critics that Ministers have come in for nothing more than they deserve, that they are simply a collection of heads of Departments with no common policy and no consistent attitude upon the questions that successively come before them. The attitude of the Cabinet is the attitude of the particular Minister who happens to be on his legs. Sometimes it is Conservative, sometimes it is Radical ; one day it is Protectionist, the next it is Free-trade ; and there is never any obvious reason why it should be one or the other. That seems to us a very fair comment on the action of the Ministry, but it hardly constitutes an excuse for the action of the Deputies.
Whatever charges may be brought against Ministers, no one can say that they do not fairly reproduce the average disposition of the party which until lately seemed willing to maintain them in office. If they are continually wavering between fear of revolution and fear of reaction, or trying to reconcile the incompatible demands of a producer who wants to be protected, and a consumer who wants to get his goods cheap, what is this but a description of the Republican Party ? At one moment, it is all for conciliating the Conservatives and doing justice to the Church. At another, it is trembling before the Extreme Left, and ready to say or de anything which may save it from the disgrace of relying on Conservative or Clerical votes. During the long discussion of the new Tariff, the Chamber has listened, now to the industries which profit by cheap materials, and now to those which aim at keeping up the price of manufactured goods. Upon every question that presents itself, the Republican majority shows the same absence of principle or consistency, the same uncertainty as to its real purpose or desire, the same disposition to seek its friends in different camps, with the same result,—that it does not find them long in any. A majority of this type does not deserve a good Cabinet, and is not likely to get one. Its influence on the Ministers it creates is invariably deteriorating. M. Ribot enjoyed a much higher reputa- tion when he was a private Deputy than he enjoys now that he is Minister for Foreign Affairs. M. de Freycinet and M. Constans have, to say the least, not beaten their previous records since they have been in office this time.
A principal reason for these shortcomings on the part alike of the Republican Cabinet and the Republican Party, is the want of any sense among Frenchmen of the duties which belong to an Opposition. Whenever there is a change of Ministry, M. Carnot has nothing to guide him in making a fresh choice. In this country, we know in a general way what the Opposition propose to do if they come into office; and the defeat of a Ministry, either in a critical division or at a General Election, means that the majority, whether in the House or the country, prefer the Opposition policy to the policy of the Government. No such conclusion can be drawn in France. There, Oppositions are exclusively critical ; construction they regard as a function altogether beyond them. The consequence is, the majority act under no proper sense of responsibility. A defeat of the Ministry is not tantamount to a defeat of the party which placed the Ministry in office, or of the policy they have carried out while in office. It only implies that the party is tired of seeing that particular disposition of persons which goes by the name of a Ministry, and prefers to arrange them differently. Supposing that the Chamber had voted a second time with M. Laur, M. Ribot would have resigned, and possibly, as a matter of con- venience, his colleagues would have resigned also. But this would not have implied the exclusion of any one from office except M. Ribot ; nay, it would not necessarily have implied the exclusion of M. Ribot from any office save that of Foreign Affairs. So with the vote on the Polytechnic School. If M. de Freycinet had adhered to his first intention and resigned office, an epoch of reconstruction would have followed. But it would have been only a reconstruction of existing materials. M. Constans, perhaps, would have become Prime Minister, M. de Freyeinet would have taken the Foreign Office, and some other portfolio would have been found for M. Ribot. When the Chamber knows that this is all that can come of a Ministerial crisis, it is naturally careless about provoking one. It supplies food for those personal speculations which have for politicians an in- terest quite out of proportion to their real importance, and it involves no substantial change in the management of public affairs. We can see no prospect of any improve- ment in this respect so long as the Republic remains iden- tified with a particular party instead of embracing the great body of French citizens.
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