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Raymond Poincaré (January, 1922, to March, 1924, and March, 1924, to June, 1924. See above). As victorious leader of the Right, he reversed the conciliatory foreign policy of Briand and attempted coercion and strangulation of Germany by occupying the Ruhr. The growing potency of the Left forced an abandonment of this policy, the fall of Poincarè and the resignation of President Millerand, who was accused of sullying the traditional impartiality of his high office to aid the Right against the Left.
Frédéric Francois-Marshal (June, 9 to 13, 1924), 52, Senator, potent banker, appointed to tide over the crisis just described. He served for only four days, until President Doumergue and Premier Herriot took office.
Edouard Herriot (June, 1924, to April, 1925), 54, demagog, Mayor and "boss" of Lyons, creator of Le Cartel des Gauches or Coalition of Left Parties which he formed after the Left victory at the last general election (May 11, 1924). Wielding the Cartel as a mightful sword, he cut his way through the Right to the Premiership, secured the election of M. Doumergue as President, and reigned for a year as "boss" of France.
His downfall came when it was discovered that he had evaded the problem of the depreciating franc by concealing inflation through countenancing the "fixing" of the books of the Bank of France.
Since then, until last week (see below), he has stood by and cut down Cabinet after Cabinet with his Cartel, though unable to command its loyalty sufficiently to retain the Premiership himself.
Paul Painlevé (April to October and October to November, 1925), 63, "the foremost French mathematician," a World War French War Minister. During the first term in question his Finance Minister, M. Caillaux, failed either to negotiate a debt settlement with the U. S. or to bolster up the franc. During: his succeeding term Premier Painlevé took the Finance Ministry himself but with no better success, and "fell with the franc."
Aristide Briand (four times Premier between November, 1925, and July 1926. See above). The four Cabinets in question have been bolstered up by M. Briand's prestige as "the man of Locarno"* and successively wrecked by the impossibility of finding a majority in the Chamber to support any save-the-franc program whatever.
Edouard Herriot (see above) succeeded in overthrowing the last Briand Cabinet by attacking Finance Minister Caillaux's save-the-franc-by-dictatorship program, and formed a weak Cartel Cabinet at an hour when France trembled on the brink of fiscal collapse, with the franc at 50 to the dollar.
Last week the situation had become so desperate that the Chamber overthrew Herriot, 290 to 237, while a mob estimated at 10,000 persons shouted, "A bas Herriot! A bas le Cartel!" outside the Palais Bourbon. So disastrous was "Boss" Herriot's toboggan from power that he was obliged to enter the Elyseeèeby a back entrance to escape the mob when he sought President Doumergue to tender his resignation. Tidings, possibly premature, spread far and wide that the Cartel had been smashed at last.
Raymond Poincaré. (See NEW CABINET, below.)