Violence came last week to the usually stolid city of Brussels (pop. 960,000). Tens of thousands of demonstrators fought with police, some 80 were hurt, 1,000 arrested. It was the worst civil disorder since the Leopoldist riots of 1950, which preceded the abdication of King Leopold. At that time Belgium's powerful Roman Catholics were in power, and the Socialists did the rioting. This time the tables were turned, and the Catholics were the attackers.
The seat of the uproar was a familiar but far from extinct political volcano: the conflict over state-school funds between Socialists and anticlericals on the one...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
