THE ADMINISTRATION OF SADI CARNOT
December, 1887, to June, 1894
The successor of Jules Grevy was Sadi Carnot, in many ways the best
choice. As has been seen, the transition was less easy than the two
ballots of the National Assembly seemed to indicate (December 3, 1887).
The intrigues of the so-called "nuits historiques" (November 28-30) had
been an endeavor of the Radicals to keep Grevy, in order to ward off
Jules Ferry as his successor. Finally, Carnot was a compromise
candidate, or "dark horse," a Moderate acceptable to the Radicals still
unwilling to endure the leading candidate Ferry.
[Illustration: SADI CARNOT]
President Carnot, hitherto known chiefly as a capable civil engineer and
a successful Cabinet officer, was the heir to the name and traditions of
a great republican family. His integrity was a guarantee of honesty in
office, and his personal dignity was bound to heighten the prestige of
the chief magistracy, somewhat weakened by his predecessor Grevy. On
the other hand, Carnot's conception of the constitutional
irresponsibility or neutrality of his office was an insufficient bulwark
to the State against the intrigues of petty politicians and the
inefficiencies of the parliamentary regime. Consequently his term of
office saw the Republic exposed to two of the worst crises in its
history, the Boulanger campaign and the Panama scandals, while the
legislative history records the overthrow of successive cabinets. These
followed each other without definite constructive policy, and aimed
chiefly at keeping power by constant dickerings and playing off group
against group.
The demoralization of parliamentary life had reached a climax. The
Republicans were divided into the Moderates, former followers of
Gambetta, the Radicals with Floquet and Brisson, the Extreme Left with
Clemenceau and Pelletan, the Socialists with Millerand, Basly, and
Clovis Hugues. The Royalists and Bonapartists worked against the
Government and the Boulangists took advantage of the chaos to push their
cause. The Socialists, in particular, were a new group in the Chamber,
destined in later years to hold the centre of the stage. In their
manifesto of December, 1887, signed by seventeen Deputies, they
advocated, in addition to innumerable specific reforms or practical
innovations, schemes for the reorganization of society: state
monopolies, nationalization of property, progressive taxation, and the
like.
The year 1888, characterized by intense political and social unrest, was
critical. The trial and conviction of Grevy's son-in-law Wilson involved
washing dirty linen in public. The steady growth of Boulangism testified
to dissatisfaction, even though, as it proved, the enemies of the
established order had united on a worthless adventurer as their leader.
General Boulanger had been first "invented" as a leader by the extreme
Radicals, and especially by Clemenceau, the _demolisseur_ or destroyer
of ministries. Then, being gradually abandoned by them, he went over to
the anti-Republicans and took heavy subsidies from the Monarchists,
while continuing to advocate, at least openly, an anti-parliamentary,
plebiscitary Republic.
Early in 1888, in February, the candidacy of Boulanger to the Chamber
was started in several departments. The electioneering activities of a
general in regular service and sundry deeds of insubordination on his
part finally caused the Government, as a disciplinary measure, to retire
him. The result was that his partisans raised a cry of persecution, and
his actual retirement gave him the liberty to engage in politics which
his service on the active list had prevented. In April Boulanger was
elected Deputy in the southern department of la Dordogne and the
northern le Nord. His plan of campaign was to be candidate for Deputy in
each department successively in which a vacancy occurred, thus
indirectly and gradually obtaining a plebiscite of approval from the
country. At the same time he raised the cry in favor of militarism, not
for the sake of war, he said, but for defence. He attacked the impotence
of Parliament and, as a remedy, called for the dissolution of the
Chamber and the convocation of a Constituent Assembly to revise the
constitution. His opponents raised the answering cry of dictatorship and
Caesarism. The election in the Nord was particularly alarming because of
Boulanger's majority.
Boulanger now had both Moderates and many Radicals against him,
including the Prime Minister Floquet, and was, on the other hand,
supported openly or secretly by the Imperialists and Monarchists,
advocates for varying purposes of the plebiscite. The Royalists, who
thought their chances of success the most hopeful, wanted to use
Boulanger as a tool to further their designs for the overthrow of the
Republic. Not only did he receive funds from the pretender, the comte de
Paris, but an ardent Royalist lady of rank, the duchesse d'Uzes,
squandered millions of francs in furthering Boulanger's political
schemes as leader of the Boulangists: the "National Party" or
"Revisionists."
In June, 1888, Boulanger brought forward in the Chamber a project for a
revision of the constitution. He advocated a single Chamber, or, if a
Senate were conceded, demanded that it be chosen by popular vote. The
power of the Chamber was to be diminished, that of the President
increased, and laws were to be subject to ratification by plebiscite or
referendum. The measure was naturally rejected, but Boulanger renewed
the attack in July by demanding the dissolution of the Chamber. In the
excitement of the debate the lie was passed between Boulanger and the
President of the Council of Ministers, Floquet. Boulanger resigned his
seat and in a duel, a few days later, between Floquet and Boulanger, the
dashing general, the warrior of the black horse, and the hero of the
popular song "En rev'nant d'la revue," was ignominiously wounded by the
civilian politician.
But Boulanger's star was not yet on the wane. He continued to be elected
Deputy in different departments, and the efforts of the Ministry to cut
the ground from under his feet by bringing in a separate revisionary
project did not undermine his popularity with the rabble, the jingo
Ligue des Patriotes of Paul Deroulede, and the anti-Republican
malcontents. In January, 1889, after a fiercely contested and
spectacular campaign, he was elected Deputy for the department of the
Seine, containing the city of Paris, nerve-centre of France. It is
generally conceded that if Boulanger had gone to the Elysee, the
presidential mansion, on the evening of his election, and turned out
Carnot, he would have had the Parisian populace and the police with him
in carrying out a _coup d'etat_. Luckily for the country his judgment
or his nerve failed him at the crucial moment, and from that time his
influence diminished. The panic-stricken Government was able to thwart
his plebiscitary appeals by re-establishing the _scrutin
d'arrondissement_, or election by small districts instead of by whole
departments. Moreover, when the Floquet Cabinet fell soon after on its
own revisionary project, the succeeding Tirard Ministry was able to pass
a law preventing simultaneous multiple candidacies, and impeached
Boulanger, with some of his followers, before the Senate as High Court
of Justice. Instead of facing trial, Boulanger and his satellites Dillon
and Henri Rochefort fled from France. In August they were condemned in
absence to imprisonment. Boulanger never returned to France, and with
diminishing subsidies his following waned. The elections of 1889
resulted in the return of only thirty-eight Boulangists and, when in
September, 1891, Boulanger committed suicide in Brussels at the grave of
his mistress, most Frenchmen merely gave a sigh of relief at the memory
of the dangers they had experienced not so long before.
The International Exposition of 1889 afforded a breathing spell in the
midst of political anxieties, and helped, by its evidence of the
Republic's prosperity, to weaken Boulanger's cause. But unsettled social
and religious problems remained troublesome. The successive cabinets
after the Floquet Ministry, and following the general election of 1889,
pursued a policy of "Republican concentration," combining Moderate and
Radical elements, disappearing often without important motives, and
replaced by cabinets of approximately the same coloring. The Clerical
Party was hand-in-glove with the Royalists and the Boulangists. It took
advantage of governmental instability to try to undermine the Republic,
but its own harmony of purpose was in due time diminished by the new
policy of Leo XIII. That astute Italian diplomat was himself
temperamentally an Opportunist. He conceived the idea of controlling
France by advances to the Republic and by feigning to accept it in order
to get hold of its policies, especially the educational and military
laws. He realized, too, the harm done to the Vatican by the stubbornness
of many French Catholics. He felt the necessity of making amends for the
behavior of the Catholic Royalists in the Boulanger affair. Certain
prelates, including the Archbishop of Aix, Monseigneur Gouthe-Soulard,
attacked the Government violently at the end of 1891 in connection with
disturbances by French pilgrims to Rome who had manifested in favor of
the Pope and written "Vive le Pape-Roi!" at the tomb of Victor Emmanuel.
The French Catholics tended to resent the interference of the Pope, but
the latter, who had for some months received the support of Cardinal
Lavigerie, Archbishop of Algiers and Primate of Africa, tried to bring
pressure on the leaders of the French clergy. In February, 1892, as a
rejoinder to a manifesto by five French cardinals, came his famous
encyclical letter advocating the established order of things. "The civil
power considered as such is from God and always from God....
Consequently, when new governments representing this new power are
constituted, to accept them is not only permitted but demanded, or even
imposed, by the needs of the social good." This encyclical was followed
by a letter to the French cardinals in May and by other manifestations
of his wishes. Thus a certain number of Catholics, among whom the comte
de Mun and Jacques Piou were leaders, cut adrift from the Right and
adhered to the Republic, forming the small group of "Rallies." They were
never very numerous or powerful, and the Dreyfus affair, a few years
later, showed how the Pope's desire to rally the Catholics to the
Republic was thwarted by the French clergy and the reactionaries.
The procedure of Leo XIII was thus a proof that the Vatican wanted to be
on good terms with the Republic. The _rapprochement_ with Russia was
another proof that France, in spite of its troubles, was to be reckoned
with in Europe. France and Russia felt it necessary to draw together in
answer to the noisy renewal of the Triple Alliance. There had been
tension in the spring of 1891, in which the French were not wholly
blameless, as a result of the private visit to Paris of the dowager
empress of Germany, the Empress Frederick. In the summer of 1891 a
French fleet under Admiral Gervais was invited to Russian waters. It
visited Cronstadt, and the Czar and the President exchanged telegrams of
sympathy. On the return to France the same fleet visited Portsmouth by
invitation, and was welcomed by the Queen and the authorities. The visit
to England did not, however, have the same meaning as the Russian one.
"Portsmouth" meant an expression of England's freedom of action
face-to-face with the Triple Alliance, and an endeavor to smooth French
susceptibilities recently ruffled by Lord Salisbury. After an
Anglo-French compact, in August, 1890, for the partition of
protectorates and zones of influence in Africa, the British Prime
Minister alluded rather scoffingly in the House of Lords to the lack of
value of the Sahara assigned to the French. "Cronstadt," as opposed to
"Portsmouth," meant an active understanding, to be followed in 1892 by a
military defensive compact negotiated in St. Petersburg by General de
Boisdeffre, head of the French General Staff.
The return visit of the Russians took place at Toulon in 1893, and
Admiral Avellan with his staff visited Paris, which went wild with
enthusiasm. At that moment French relations with Italy were strained,
partly because the Italian Government was jealous of the cordiality
between the Pope and the Republic. The Franco-Russian manifestation was
a new veiled warning.
In 1892, under the leadership of Jules Meline, the Chamber adopted a
protective tariff policy. This resulted in several tariff disputes and
engendered bad feeling with various countries, including Italy.
The desperate attack of the Royalists, engineered mainly against the
Republic in the Panama scandals, helped to bring the Pope and the State
still closer together, so that at certain times the Rallies or
Republican Catholics and the Royalists fought each other violently. The
Panama scandal was planned in view of the elections of 1893. During the
decade following 1880 Ferdinand de Lesseps, the successful builder of
the Suez Canal, had organized and tried to finance a company to
construct a canal at Panama. The prestige of Lesseps's name and the
memory of his previous achievement made countless Frenchmen invest huge
sums in the company. But the expenses were enormous and the financial
maladministration apparently extraordinary, for the directors of the
company were led into illegal steps in order to influence legislation,
or pay hush money to the press to hide the condition of affairs, and
then were blackmailed into further outlays. The company failed in 1888,
and efforts to put it on its feet proved abortive. Hints of the scandals
leaked out, and the Government played into the hands of its opponents by
trying to conceal matters.
In November, 1892, some Royalist members of the Chamber brought matters
to a head and the Government was obliged to do something. It was decided
to proceed against Ferdinand de Lesseps, his son Charles de Lesseps,
Henri Cottu, Marius Fontane, members of the board of directors, and G.
Eiffel, an engineer and contractor and the builder of the famous Eiffel
Tower. At this juncture a well-known Jewish banker of Paris, Baron
Jacques de Reinach, died suddenly and most mysteriously on November 20.
He was openly charged with being the bribery agent of the company, and
his sudden death was by some called suicide, while others hinted that he
had been put out of the way because of his dangerous knowledge.
Under these exciting conditions a Boulangist Deputy named Delahaye made
an interpellation in the Chamber hinting at the campaign of corruption
carried on by the company through the agency of Reinach and two other
Jews of German origin, Arton and Cornelius Herz, the latter a
naturalized American citizen. By this campaign it was charged that three
million francs had been used to corrupt more than a hundred and fifty
Deputies, and much more had been spent in other ways.
A commission of thirty-three was appointed under the chairmanship of
Henri Brisson. The Royalists and Radicals were having their innings
against the Government, and their newspapers continued to publish rumors
and "revelations." The commission called for the autopsy of Reinach. The
Loubet Cabinet, refusing to grant it, was voted down and resigned. The
Ribot Ministry was then constituted, but at intervals lost successively
two of its most prominent members, Rouvier and Freycinet, accused of
complicity in the scandals. Even the leaders of the Radicals, Clemenceau
and Floquet, in time found themselves involved. The former was charged
with tricky dealings with Cornelius Herz, the latter was shown to have
demanded money from the company, when Minister, in order to use it for
political subsidies.
In December the Cabinet decided to arrest Charles de Lesseps, Marius
Fontane, Henri Cottu, and a former Deputy, Sans-Leroy, accused of having
accepted a bribe of two hundred thousand francs. At the same time, on
the basis of the seizure of twenty-six cheque stubs at the bank used by
the baron de Reinach, the Minister of Justice proceeded against ten
prominent Deputies and Senators, among whom was Albert Grevy, former
Governor-General of Algeria, and brother of Jules Grevy. The Government
seemed panic-stricken in its readiness to sacrifice, on mere suspicion,
prominent members of its party. All the parliamentaries accused were, in
due time, exonerated.
The directors of the company came up for trial twice. The first time,
with M. Eiffel, in January-February, 1893, and the second time, with
other defendants, in March, before different jurisdictions on varying
charges, they were condemned to fine and imprisonment. On appeal, in
April, these condemnations were revised or annulled. One person became
the scapegoat, a former Minister of Public Works named Baihaut,
condemned to civil degradation, five years' imprisonment, and a heavy
fine.
Scandal was, however, not satisfied with these names. There was also
talk of a mysterious list of one hundred and four Deputies charged with
accepting bribes from Arton. Moreover, it was felt that quashing the
indictments against prominent men like Rouvier and Albert Grevy was poor
policy. If they were innocent they could prove their innocence. Under
the circumstances suspicion would still be rife. The state of general
anarchy was also revealed by the evidence of the wife of Henri Cottu,
who testified that agents of the Government had offered her husband
immunity if he would implicate a member of the Opposition.[14]
The Panama scandal was largely the work of the Monarchists angry at the
failure of the Boulanger campaign. It did them no good, as the elections
to the new Chamber proved. On the other hand, it worked havoc among the
leaders of the Moderates, who, innocent or blameworthy, fell under
popular suspicion, and were in many cases relegated to the background in
favor of new leaders. Moreover, it helped the Socialists, and even, by
throwing discredit on parliamentarism, it encouraged lawless outbreaks
of anarchists.
New men in party leaderships came in the composite Cabinet of Moderate
leanings led by Charles Dupuy in April, 1893. He seemed at first to
incline toward the Conservatives and treated with considerable severity
some street disturbances. A prank of art students at their annual ball
(_Bal des quat'-z-arts_) was magnified into a street riot and was not
quelled until after the loss of a life. The _Bourse du travail_
(Workmen's Exchange) was closed by the Government after other
disturbances.
The elections in August and September resulted in a large Republican
majority and a corresponding decline in the anti-Republican Right. On
the other hand, the Radicals rose to about a hundred and fifty, and the
Socialists were about fifty, forming for the first time a large party
able to make its influence felt. The "Socialistic-Radicals" represented
an effort toward a compromise between the advanced groups.
The desire of the Moderate leaders of the Republic to meet the Pope
halfway in his policy of conciliation was expressed in a noteworthy
speech made in the Chamber in March, 1894, by the then Minister of
Public Worship, Eugene Spuller. Answering the query of a Royalist
Deputy, the Minister declared that the time had come to put an end to
fanaticism and sectarianism, and that the country could count on the
vigilance of the Government to maintain its rights, and on the new frame
of mind (_esprit nouveau_) which inspired it, which tended to reconcile
all French citizens and bring about a revival of common sense, justice,
and charity.
But the anarchists were not moved by any spirit of conciliation.
Borrowing methods of violence from the Russian nihilists, they used
bomb-throwing to draw attention to the vices of social organization and
to themselves. During 1892, 1893, and 1894 they tried to terrorize
Paris. The deeds of various criminals, including Ravachol, Vaillant (who
threw a bomb in the Chamber of Deputies),[15] Emile Henry, among others,
culminated at last in the cruel murder of President Carnot. On June 24,
1894, while at Lyons, whither he had gone to pay a state visit to an
international exhibition, President Carnot was fatally stabbed by an
underwitted Italian anarchist named Caserio Santo, and died within a few
hours. Never were more futile and abominable crimes committed than those
which sacrificed Carnot and McKinley.
FOOTNOTES:
[14] The Panama affair was a violent shock to the Republic. People were
amazed at the charges of widespread corruption and the tendency on the
part of the Government to smooth things over. Suspicions aroused were
not fully satisfied because Reinach was dead and Herz and Arton in
flight. Cornelius Herz successfully fought extradition from England on
the plea of illness. Arton was arrested in 1895 and extradited. His
arrest caused a renewal of talk about Panama and the newspaper _la
France_ undertook to print the famous list of one hundred and four
Deputies. This publication was recognized to be a case of blackmail and
its promoters were punished. Arton was also condemned to a term of hard
labor, but his trial did not bring out the longed-for revelations.
[15] M. Dupuy, then President of the Chamber, got much credit for his
calmness and his remark, as the smoke of the bomb cleared away, "La
seance continue."