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On Christmas Eve the Chamber gave Premier Laval a straight vote of confidence 315 to 255, then adjourned to the second Tuesday in January, leaving the Man of the Year unshaken, triumphant. How great is his achievement may be measured by the fact that only four French Premiers since the War have been able to remain in power for as much as one year.
Pierre Laval in his year-end public address at Chapelle-la-Reine nailed to his Cabinet's mast a French policy (practical or impractical) respecting Reparations which was endorsed next day by virtually the whole French press: "We will not allow Reparations to be sacrificed to private debts!"
"Tenez ban! Hold tight!" shouted a delighted auditor.
"I always do!" cried the Man-of-the-Year. "We will not let the Young Plan be torn up!" (see below).
Nation of the Year? France closed 1931 with vastly greater gold stocks than any other European state (the U. S. has half again as much); she could count her unemployed in hundreds of thousands while Britain and Germany counted theirs in millions; but her trade balance has turned adverse: her U. S. tourists dwindled from 300,000 in 1929 to 100,000 in 1931. The conviction is strong among Frenchmen that they are just entering hard times.
*TIME's portrait of the French Premier and Man of the Year was painted by Harris Rodvofrin from a photograph of Pierre Laval as he faced Herbert Hoover in the Lincoln Study at the White House. The photographer: famed Dr. Erich ("Candid Camera") Salomon whom TIME and FORTUNE brought to the U. S. from Germany (TIME, Nov. 9).
*Never understood in the U. S., the French position was and still is that President Hoover had a perfect right to be as "sudden" as he liked about sacrificing for one year $257,000,000 due the U. S. (that being his own business and Congress not being in session); but that the President had no right "brutally" to insist that France make a similar abrupt sacrifice of $97,000,000. that being Premier Laval's business and the French Chamber being not only in session but twice as angry as Congress when Congress finally convened and voted (see p. 8).