M. Herriot's Choice While it becomes increasingly certain that France
can be equipped with no effective government before the middle of next month—the Lausanne Conference begins on the 16th—the political strategists are hard at work tugging both at M. Herriot's right hand and his left. The alternatives before the Radical Socialist leader, who can form no administration without the support of other groups, are a Government of Concentration, formed by leaning towards the Right, and a revival of the Cartel des Gauches with the Cabinet honours fairly evenly shared between Radical Socialists and Socialists. In that connexion the Socialist leader, M. Leon Blum, has thought it opportune to state again his terms of alliance— a 25 per cent. cut in armament expenditure, development of social insurance and nationalization of the insurance companies, and nationalization of the railways. This is a rather stiff prescription for the less progressive of the Radical Socialists, particularly nationalization of the insurance companies, which the Socialists could well afford not to press. Nationalization of railways raises no new principle, in view of the existence of the State Railway of the West, but it may mean raising more money, and that is not calculated to commend it in France to-day. The formation of a Government of the Left would ease the international situation in more directions than one, but the chances in favour of it are not at present much better than the chances against.
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