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F.D.R. & P.M.F. Mendès-France direly needs all the popular appeal he can get. He has no political following in the Assembly. Though his fellow Assemblymen are impressed with the clarity of his thinking and the austerity of his character, few love him. He acquired respect by refusing time and again to enter governments whose economic policies he considered disastrous; he was admired for the brilliance of his economic analyses, and for his courage in his Cassandra role of proclaiming unwelcome truths. But like Roosevelt, whose New Deal he greatly admires, he has won a small, enthusiastic coterie of youthful intellectuals and dedicated supporters who see him as a man of destiny (and sedulously cultivate the parallel with F.D.R. by referring to him as P.M.F.). Typically, when he received the word of his investiture, there were no emotional embraces or victory celebrations. To the small group of disciples waiting with him, he said in his hard, flat voice: "This is now behind us. For us, the clock is already turning."
Secretaries in Bathrooms. Mendès moved fast as the clock turned. Scorning the magnificence of the Hotel Matignon, traditional quarters for French Premiers, he moved himself and entourage into the stately offices of the Quai d'Orsay. Being his own Foreign Minister, he felt that he needed the mechanism of the French diplomatic service. Also, he did not fully trust the diplomats who have for so long been disciples of Georges Bidault. Mendès shook the suave Quai d'Orsay to its foundations. He ordered its well-groomed officials to get to work at 8:45 a.m. instead of sauntering in at 11. He rushed in his own office staff, installed secretaries in bathrooms, and put an Under Secretary of State in Bidault's old dining room.
He shocked Quai d'Orsay chefs by ordering sandwich lunches served at his desk. Five or six times a day he was on the phone to Geneva, or talking by radiotelephone to the French headquarters in Hanoi. When the Geneva negotiators told him of bickering delays, he snapped: "Never mind. We must not change our course. We must show them our nerves are stronger than theirs."
He began calling quick, informal Cabinet meetings presided over by himself—instead of by the President of the Republic—a practice unused since De Gaulle. If Cabinet members were long-winded, Mendès cut them short with: "Could you summarize the rest of your remarks?" or "Perhaps you can give us the meat of your argument with less of the details." He rationed his time, told visitors he could give them three minutes, or if there was protest, he might add: "All right, take seven, but you've already used up one and now you have only six left." Not until 9 at night did he drive off to his apartment in fashionable Auteuil, where he hurried through a late dinner. After all, his days were numbered.
Young Riser. Pierre Mendès-France has been in something of a hurry all his life. Born in Paris 47 years ago, an only son of a small clothing manufacturer whose Jewish family traces its genealogy in France back to 1300, Pierre attended Paris public schools, grew into a serious, bookish boy.