THE ADMINISTRATION OF ARMAND FALLIERES
February, 1906, to February, 1918
The international conference for the regulation of the Moroccan question
met at Algeciras in southern Spain, in January, 1906. Twelve powers
participated, including the United States. The negotiations were
prolonged until the end of March owing to the unconciliatory German
attitude, and resulted in an arrangement which the Germans looked upon
as totally unsatisfactory to themselves. In the shaping of the general
results the United States had considerable influence. The agreement put
out of discussion the sovereignty of the Sultan, the integrity of the
empire, and the principle of commercial freedom, and was largely devoted
to the question of the establishment of a state bank and the
organization of the police in international ports of entry. In the bank
France was to have special privileges, and the police was to be under
the supervision of France and Spain. Germany was eliminated.
In the midst of the uncertainty over the outcome of the Conference two
important events took place in France, the second of which came near
seriously weakening the French position. These were the election of a
successor to President Loubet and the downfall of the Rouvier Ministry.
M. Loubet's term expired in February and he did not desire re-election.
The two chief candidates were Armand Fallieres and Paul Doumer. M.
Fallieres was an easy-going, good-natured, and well-meaning but
second-rate statesman. Doumer was far more brilliant and vigorous, but
was accused of self-seeking and was thought a less safe person to elect.
Unfortunately, M. Fallieres, when chosen, had his master, and was
largely under the control of Clemenceau.
Meanwhile the almost unprincipled vacillation of M. Rouvier and his
spineless policy caused increased dissatisfaction to the Chamber. During
the discussion of a riotous episode connected with the enforcement of
the Separation law, which had resulted in the death of a man, Rouvier
was overthrown. He was succeeded by a colorless person, Sarrien, who
included Clemenceau in his Cabinet as Minister of the Interior. The
latter gradually pushed his chief aside and finally replaced him before
the end of the year as Prime Minister.
Clemenceau showed himself during his lengthy control of power an astute
politician. In the public eye ever since the days of the Commune, he had
had success during the eighties as a destroyer of cabinets. Driven into
the background by the Panama scandals, he now came forward again to try
his fortune in holding the power from which he had often driven others.
With a Cabinet thoroughly under his dictatorial control, he announced a
programme which was to depend for success on the Radicals, rather than
on the Moderates or the Socialists. It was a departure from the policy
of the _Bloc_, though to conciliate the advanced parties he created the
new Ministry of Labor and put M. Viviani, a Socialist, in charge of it.
In practice, Clemenceau's policy was that of one determined to stay in
office, showing alternately conciliation and severity, explaining his
actions to the Chamber often with a flippancy which seemed out of place
and did not help the prestige of parliamentary government.
Apart from the diplomatic tension with Germany, which was not settled by
the Act of Algeciras, the history of the Fallieres Administration is
largely taken up with the final disposition of the religious controversy
and with labor questions. The constant advance toward radicalism and
socialism, the lack of great statesmen in Parliament and the presence of
professional politicians, the progress of anti-militarism and the
relegation of the question of Alsace-Lorraine to the background, left a
free field for the growth of social unrest. The tendency was encouraged
by the elections for the renewal of the Chamber of Deputies in May,
1906. To the religious disturbances and the efforts of the Conservatives
to prove themselves persecuted, the country answered at the polls by an
increased anti-Clerical majority.
In 1906 the Dreyfus case was at last settled. The Cour de Cassation
finally annulled the verdict of the Rennes court-martial. In consequence
Dreyfus was restored to the army with the rank of Major which he would
normally have reached had it not been for his great ordeal. Colonel
Picquart, to whom more than to any one he owed his rehabilitation, who
had been driven from the army in 1898, was now made Brigadier-General.
Promoted a few weeks later to Major-General, he became Minister of War
in Clemenceau's Cabinet. The remains of Emile Zola were also transferred
to the Pantheon. Such were the dramatic changes wrought in half a dozen
years.
The troubles over the application of the law for the disestablishment of
the Church lasted more than two years. The Vatican was determined to
make itself a martyr. It would undoubtedly have been glad to see a
forcible closing of the churches in order to cause a reaction in its
favor. Moreover, it objected to the diminution of priestly power and the
participation of the laity as prescribed in the formation of the new
_associations cultuelles_. The Ministry, and particularly Briand, were
just as determined not to give it an opportunity to raise the cry of
persecution.
The first opportunity for a conflict came when the Government tried to
make inventories of religious property, including valuables. This
measure was for the protection of the Church, but the Clericals chose to
call it inquisitorial and a first step to confiscation. In some parts
of France armed resistance, often systematically prepared, was made to
the authorities, army officers again occasionally refused to carry out
orders, and on March 6, at Boeschepe, a man was killed. It was this
incident which caused the downfall of the Rouvier Cabinet.
It was the policy of M. Briand, entrusted with the application of the
new law, to employ the most conciliatory means face to face with the
Vatican, determined to be persecuted. As a matter of fact the French
bishops, after plenary consultation, had decided by a considerable
majority, to accept the law in a good spirit, with reservations as to
its justice, and to organize the _associations cultuelles_. Suddenly the
Pope intervened by an encyclical directed against any such acceptance,
and prescribed a continuation of the contest. These orders the bishops
felt constrained to obey.
Therefore, at the advent of the Clemenceau Cabinet in October, 1906, M.
Briand had achieved nothing but compulsory inventories. He got
Parliament to allow the legality of the proposed religious organizations
under the Associations Law of 1901 or under the general law of 1881 on
public meetings, as well as under the special legislation of 1905. Again
the Holy See refused to obey, and ordered the clergy to continue their
occupancy of the churches, but to refrain from any legal declaration or
registration whatsoever. Then M. Briand did away with the declaration.
So the contest went on without agreement until it finally lapsed. The
clergy continued to occupy the churches, but without legal claim to
them, under the law of 1881 on public meetings, amended by the law of
March 28, 1907, suppressing the formality of a declaration. The Catholic
Church was stripped, by its own unwillingness to help organize holding
bodies, of all its possessions. By the good-will of the Government it
continued to occupy the religious edifices, but the maintenance and
repair of these was dependent on the good-will of the _commune_ or
administrative division in which the churches were situated. On the
other hand, nothing has materialized of the prophesied religious
persecutions, civil war, and martyrdoms.
Apart from the annoyances caused by the separation of Church and State,
the history of the Clemenceau Ministry deals largely with labor
disturbances and social unrest. This was partly due to parliamentary
demagogy. A succession of weak and ineffective ministries had been
followed by Clemenceau's incoherencies and alterations of policy, though
it remained consistently _Radical_ and not socialistic. The Ministers
were often at loggerheads (even Clemenceau and Briand over the
Separation bill), and the Deputies were often mediocre politicians,
quick to vote themselves an increase of salary, but dilatory in other
achievements. The growth of socialism, with its theories of pacifism and
international brotherhood, encouraged the anti-militarists. The
brilliant leader Jaures openly advocated the abolition of the army and
the creation of a national militia. Some anti-militarists, like Herve,
carried their theories beyond all bounds and rhetorically talked of
dragging the national flag in the mire. Meanwhile the political methods
in the past of men like Andre in the War Department and Camille Pelletan
in the Navy had weakened those services, as Delcasse had found to his
cost in the controversy with Germany. The battleship _Iena_ blew up in
March, 1907, there was a suspicious fire at the Toulon Arsenal, and
many other things disquieted people.
The Government tried to cater to the labor parties, brought forward
plans for an income tax and for old-age pensions, and carried through a
law making compulsory one day of rest out of seven for workingmen.
Especially active were the efforts of the syndicalists and the
organizers of the anarchistic _Confederation generale du travail_, or
"C.G.T.," to promote every contest between capital and labor and to
bring about, if possible, a general strike of all labor. There were
strikes of miners, longshoremen, sailors, electricians among others.
Even more alarming was the formation of unions, affiliated with the
C.G.T., among state employees such as school teachers and postmen, and
efforts to disorganize the public service. These different movements
Clemenceau met with his customary seesaw of friendliness and harshness,
and the Government was usually victorious. Not less troublesome but
somewhat more picturesque was the quasi-revolutionary movement, in 1907,
of the wine-makers of the South, driven to desperation by overproduction
and low prices, attributed to the competition of adulterated wines. The
municipalities where these disturbances occurred were often in sympathy
with the creators of disturbance, not only in small towns, but in large
places like Beziers, Perpignan, Narbonne, and Carcassonne. Municipal
officials resigned or refused to carry out their duties, and some
regiments, made up of men recruited from one of the districts, mutinied.
The troubles at last quieted down.
In the beginning of 1909 an important agreement was signed with Germany
which seemed to promise an end to the long disputes over Morocco. The
Moroccan question had continued to dominate French foreign policy even
after Algeciras and that conference had not ended the commercial
rivalries of the two countries. In March, 1907, a Frenchman, Dr.
Mauchamp, was murdered by natives at Marrakesh and the French in reply
occupied Ujda near the Algerian frontier. In July, after the murder of
some European workmen at Casablanca, the French sent a landing corps. In
1908 the Sultan Abd-el-Aziz, a friend of the French, was overthrown by a
rival, Muley-Hafid, egged on by the Germans. These also raised a
dispute over some deserters from the French Foreign Legion at
Casablanca, who had taken refuge at the German Consulate and whom the
Germans claimed as their subjects. For a moment war clouds seemed to
appear on the horizon until dissipated by mutual expressions of regret
and after a reference to the Hague Tribunal, which, on the whole,
justified the French. It was, therefore, good news for Europe to hear of
the agreement of February, 1909, which acknowledged the predominance of
French political claims, and tried to facilitate economic co-operation
instead of rivalry between France and Germany. Unfortunately, this
agreement was destined to prove ineffective.
The Clemenceau Cabinet lasted until July, 1909. During a discussion on
the Navy, Clemenceau and Delcasse had an altercation as to their
relative responsibilities for the French surrender to Germany in 1905
when Delcasse was driven from the Rouvier Ministry. The Chamber sided
with Delcasse and Clemenceau discovered that his sarcasm had overreached
itself. The new Premier was Briand, the Socialist and former bugbear of
the moneyed classes, who had shown by his management of the Separation
bill the abilities of a true statesman and who became more and more
moderate in his views under the increasing responsibilities of power.
The history of the Briand Ministry was largely taken up by internal
questions and the elections of May, 1910, for the renewal of the Chamber
of Deputies. To propitiate the electorate the expiring Parliament passed
a law providing old-age pensions for workingmen. The elections left the
Radicals and the Socialistic Radicals (as opposed to the Socialists) on
the whole masters of the situation, but the general parliamentary
instability continued to prevail. The country felt the reaction. In the
autumn of 1910 far-reaching railway strikes broke out, resulting in
violence and injury to railway property or _sabotage_. Briand met the
difficulty energetically by mobilizing the employees still subject to
military duty, and making them perform their work under military orders.
The act of "dictatorship" was approved by the Chamber, but Briand went
through the ceremony of resigning and accepting the mission to form a
new Cabinet. It proved not very homogeneous and withdrew in February,
1911. The Monis Cabinet, of more advanced Socialistic-Radical
principles, lasted only a few months and faced new disturbances with
wine-producers. This time the trouble was in the East, where many were
dissatisfied with the artificial limitation of districts entitled to
produce wines labelled "champagne." The Socialistic-Radical Ministry of
Joseph Caillaux (June, 1911) encountered a new and dangerous crisis in
the relations with Germany.
The mutual agreement between the two countries for the economic
development of Morocco had, through financial rivalries, not worked
well. There was also friction over similar attempts for the development
of the French Congo. In this state of affairs, the French sent a
military expedition to Fez in the early summer of 1911 for the
ostensible purpose of protecting the Sultan from attack by rebels and of
relieving the French military mission. The Germans, backed up, indeed,
by the French anti-militarist press, declared that this was a mere
pretext for encroachment. Spain also took the opportunity of asserting
its rights to parts of the North in accordance with its reversionary
claims by the Treaty of 1904. Thereupon Germany declared that the
agreements of Algeciras and of 1909 had been nullified by France and
demanded compensations. The gunboat _Panther_ suddenly appeared in the
port of Agadir (July 1) and the Germans began to call for their share in
the partition of Morocco.
Difficult negotiations were carried on between France and Germany
through the summer of 1911, and at moments the two countries were on the
very brink of war. The English Government backed up France. Lloyd George
and Premier Asquith made public declarations to that effect. French
capitalists also began calling in their funds invested in Germany and a
financial crisis threatened that country.
Thus brought to terms the Germans became more moderate in their demands,
and it was finally possible to reach a compromise, unsatisfactory to
both parties. Germany definitely gave up all political claim to Morocco
and acknowledged France as paramount there. On the other hand, a
territorial readjustment was made in the Congo by which Germany added
to the Cameroons about two hundred and thirty thousand square kilometres
of land with a million people, and the new frontiers made annoying
salients into the French Congo. The treaty was signed in November, 1911,
but the Pan-Germanists were angry at any concessions to France, the
Colonial Minister resigned, and the Emperor, who had thrown his
influence on the side of peace, lost much prestige for a while. On the
other hand, the French were correspondingly dissatisfied at the losses
in the Congo. The opponents of the Prime Minister, Caillaux, had often
taunted him with too close a relation between his official acts and his
private financial interests. They now accused him of tricky concessions
to Germany in connection with the Congo adjustments. M. Caillaux denied
in the Chamber that he had ever entered into any private dealings apart
from the negotiations of the ministry of Foreign Affairs. However,
Clemenceau asked the Foreign Minister, M. de Selves, point-blank if the
French Ambassador at Berlin had not complained of interference in the
diplomatic negotiations. M. de Selves refused to answer, thus
implicitly giving the lie to M. Caillaux. The consequence was a cabinet
crisis and the resignation of the Ministry (January, 1912).
The upshot of the Agadir crisis was increased irritation between France
and Germany and the feeling in each country that the other was seeking
trouble. The French were now convinced that, some day or other, war
would inevitably result and the nation dropped its strong pacifist
tendencies and rallied to the army. The Germans were, above all, furious
against the English, whom they considered responsible for their
humiliation.
So far as Morocco was immediately concerned, the French took steps to
develop their new privileges. In March, 1912, they imposed a definite
protectorate on the Sultan Muley-Hafid and soon replaced him by his
brother Muley-Yussef. They came to an agreement with Spain as to the
latter's claims in the North and entrusted to General Lyautey the
administrative and military reorganization of the country. The
pacification of the hostile tribes was not an easy task and went on
laboriously through 1912 and 1913.
After the downfall of M. Caillaux, Raymond Poincare became head of a
Cabinet more moderate than its predecessor, the Socialistic Radicals
seeming somewhat discredited in public opinion. M. Poincare was a strong
partisan of proportional representation, and a measure for the
modification of the method of voting was, under his auspices, passed by
the Chamber, though it failed the following year in the Senate.
In foreign affairs, Morocco having dropped into the background, the
Eastern question became acute. Fear lest the conflict in the Orient
should involve the rest of Europe led France to draw again closer to
Russia and England.