Chapter 382: , Laws of 1889, to read as follows (13)

"The weapon used for the purpose of paralyzing the government
was the general strike. It may be questioned to which class
belongs the chief part of honor in this struggle. A marvelous
unity characterized the whole movement. While post, telegraph,
and railroad traffic was stopped the entire light supply was
cut off. The strike extended even into the private kitchen,
and this was one of the reasons which hastened the departure
of the Russian officials. In the meantime the question was not
only should Russian guns be directed on Helsingfors, but also
should personal safety be maintained. That so few
transgressions of the law occurred with the whole police force
on strike is a splendid testimony for the Finnish people. The
revolution in Finland stands hence as an unparalleled example
of a popular upheaval."

{272}

FINLAND: A. D. 1906.
Political Enfranchisement of Women.

See (in this Volume)
ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: WOMAN SUFFRAGE.

FINLAND: A. D. 1908-1909.
Russian Measures for the Destruction of the
Constitutional Autonomy of Finland.

The reactionary determinations of the Russian Government,
since it mastered the revolutionary movements of 1905-1906, are
revealed in nothing else more plainly than in its steady
pursuance of measures to extinguish the degree of autonomy
which belongs to Finland, under the constitution that was
confirmed to its people by the Tsar Alexander I., after he had
taken their country from the Swedish crown.

See, in Volume IV. of this work,
SCANDINAVIAN STATES: A. D. 1807-1810.

One of the most arbitrary of the early measures in this
direction was the assumption by the Tsar, in June, 1908, of a
right to confer on the Russian Council of Ministers certain
powers of control over Finnish legislation. The protests of
the Diet and Senate of Finland against this and other attacks
on their constitutional rights led to a dissolution of the
Diet, and the election of a new representative body, early in
May, 1909. The election produced substantially the same
popular representation in the new Diet that had characterized
its predecessor, and its attitude toward the autocratic
invasion of Finnish rights was the same. The Socialists
received 79,447 votes. The party of the Old Finns which
inclines to submissiveness polled a total of 52,396. The
Constitutional parties, the Young Finns and the Swedes,
received respectively 28,711 and 15,885 votes, while the
Agrarian-Socialists got 13,648 and the Christian Workmen 6172.
The Old Finns stand alone against the other parties.

Meantime, the Tsar, in sanctioning an Act of the previous
Diet, after its dissolution, had done it in terms that were
deemed contrary to the Constitution of Finland, and the
Senate, which is composed of members appointed by the Tsar,
petitioned him for a modification of them. His reply was a
rebuke and a command that they promulgate the law, and thus
accept his misconstruction of the Constitution. Thereupon the
Vice-President of the Senate and four of its members resigned.
The remaining five, pliant to the imperial will, voted with
the presiding Governor-General for the promulgation of the
law.

In the course of the next few months other demands were made
on the Finns which even the imperial appointees of the Senate
could not yield to. In October, an Imperial rescript decreed
that military service legislation for Finland should be
withdrawn from the competence of the Finnish Diet and
transferred to the Imperial Legislature; and that until such
legislation is enacted Finland should pay into the Russian
exchequer an annual contribution of 10,000,000 marks
($2,000,000), to be increased gradually to 20,000.000 marks.
This left the Finnish Diet no voice in the appropriation. The
five members who had remained in the Senate when their four
colleagues resigned now intimated their intention to withdraw.
On the 14th of October the four vacant seats were filled by an
appointment of naval and military officers who were said to be
"technically Finnish citizens," but all of whom, save one, had
spent their lives in Russia. A month later, November 17, a
Press despatch from Helsingfors made the following
announcement: "At an all-night session which ended to-day the
Finnish Diet rejected the government bill providing for
Finland’s contribution to the Russian military appropriation.
A resolution was adopted requesting the Emperor to reintroduce
the measure in a constitutional form. The dissolution of the
Diet is expected. The Emperor has accepted the resignations of
the Finnish Senators who refused to remain in office if the
Russian demand for a big military appropriation by Finland was
pressed." The expectation of another dissolution of the Diet
by the Tsar, as the consequence of this action, was realized
the next day.

Some months prior to this time a joint committee of Russians
and Finns had been appointed to formulate rules or principles
that should apply with authority in future to legislation for
Finland. Agreement between the two constituents of this
Russo-Finnish committee appears to have been impossible from
the beginning. They were hopelessly opposed in their views of
the relation existing between the constitutional Grand Duchy
of Finland and the autocratic Empire of Russia, by virtue of
their having a common sovereign. Toward the end of November
their failure to come to any agreement was made known; and on
the 22d of December a despatch from St. Petersburg announced
that "the conclusion of the labours of the Russo-Finnish
Commission, resulting in a perfunctory majority vote of the
Russian members in favour of the reduction of the Finnish
Constitution to a provincial autonomy, is deplored by most of
the newspapers. The Finnish members apprehend a military
dictatorship."

The St. Petersburg correspondent of _The Times_ had
previously stated what the prescription of the Russian
majority of the Committee would be. They maintain, he wrote,
that "there never was a Constitution granted to Finland
binding on Russia as the Sovereign Power, and that, therefore,
a new order of procedure can be established independently of
the Finnish authorities by an Act of legislation passed by the
Russian Legislature alone. They have drawn up a list of
matters to come under the new procedure. According to this
list all legislation on such matters as the Russian language
in Finland, the principles of Finnish administration, police,
administration of justice, public education, formation of
business companies and of associations, public meetings,
Press, importation of foreign literature, Customs tariffs,
literary and artistic copyright, monetary system, means of
communication, including pilot and lighthouse service, and
many other subjects, shall be enacted by the Imperial
legislative organs. The Finnish Diet shall be entirely ignored
in such matters, while there is a provision for some cases
that the opinion of the Finnish Senate shall be taken.

"It is difficult to understand what legislative matters are to
be left for the Finnish Diet to deal with; but it seems that
the Russian members are not sure that they have covered the
whole ground, for their project contains a clause to the
effect that additions to their list may be made by means of
Imperial legislation.

{273}

"It is proposed that Finland shall be represented in the
Russian Duma by five members, one of whom shall be elected by
Russian residents in Finland who are not Finnish citizens,
whilst the Finnish Diet shall send one member to the Council
of Empire."

The first movement, probably, on these new lines of imperial
government for Finland, was that reported in a Reuter message
from St. Petersburg, December 24, as follows:

"The Cabinet has approved new regulations whereby all
documents issued by the Chancellery of the Governor-General of
Finland shall be worded in Russian without a Finnish or
Swedish translation."

FINLAND: A. D. 1910.
Fresh Elections to the Finnish Diet.
The Russian Duma assuming authority over Finland.

A new Diet, chosen at elections held early in February, 1910,
is composed as follows:
Old Finns, 42;
Young Finns, 28;
Swedish People’s party, 26;
Social Democrats, 86;
Agrarians, 17;
Christian Labor party, 1.

Fifteen women were elected, nine of them by the Social
Democrats.

Just as this matter goes into type, a despatch from St.
Petersburg, March 30, 1910, announces the introduction of a
bill in the Russian Duma assuming authority in that body over
Finland.

FINSEN, Niels Ryberg.

See (in this Volume)
NOBEL PRIZES.

FIRE, Great calamities of.

See (in this Volume)
BALTIMORE;
CHICAGO;
NEW YORK CITY;
SAN FRANCISCO;
OSAKA.

FISCAL REFORM, Mr. Joseph Chamberlain’s programme of.

See (in this Volume)
England: A. D. 1903 (May-September).

FISCHER, Emil.

See (in this Volume)
NOBEL PRIZES.

FISHER, Andrew:
Prime Minister of Australia.

See (in this Volume)
AUSTRALIA; A. D. 1908, and 1909 (MAY-JUNE).

FISHERIES:
Newfoundland.

See (in this Volume)
NEWFOUNDLAND.

FISHES, FOOD:
Convention for their Preservation and Propagation in the
Waters contiguous to the United States and Canada.

See (in this Volume)
FOOD FISHES.

FIVE CIVILIZED TRIBES:
End of their Autonomy.

See (in this Volume)
INDIANS, AMERICAN.

FLOODS.

See (in this Volume)
CHINA; A. D. 1906-1907, and
FRANCE: A. D. 1910.

FOLK, Joseph Wingate:
Prosecutor of Municipal Thievery and Corruption in St. Louis.
Governor of Missouri.

See (in this Volume)
MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT.

FOOD FISHES:
Convention respecting their Protection, Preservation, and
Propagation in the Waters contiguous to the United States
and Canada.

The following are the articles of a Convention negotiated at
Washington and signed by Ambassador James Bryce, for the
Government of Great Britain, and by Secretary Elihu Root, for
that of the United States, on the 11th of April, 1908.
Ratifications of the Convention were exchanged on the 4th of
June:

"ARTICLE 1.
The times, seasons, and methods of fishing in the waters
contiguous to the United States and Canada as specified in
Article 4 of this Convention, and the nets, engines, gear,
apparatus, and appliances which may be used therein, shall be
fixed and determined by uniform and common international
regulations, restrictions, and provisions; and to that end the
High Contracting Parties agree to appoint, within three months
after this Convention is proclaimed, a Commission to be known
as the International Fisheries Commission, consisting of one
person named by each Government.

"ARTICLE 2.
It shall be the duty of this International Fisheries
Commission, within six months after being named, to prepare a
system of uniform and common International Regulations for the
protection and preservation of the food fishes in each of the
waters prescribed in Article 4 of this Convention, which
Regulations shall embrace close seasons, limitations as to the
character, size, and manner of use of nets, engines, gear,
apparatus, and other appliances; a uniform system of registry
by each Government in waters where required for the more
convenient regulation of commercial fishing by its own
citizens or subjects within its own territorial waters or any
part of such waters; an arrangement for concurrent measures
for the propagation of fish; and such other provisions and
measures as the Commission shall deem necessary.

"ARTICLE 3.
The two Governments engage to put into operation and to
enforce by legislation and executive action, with as little
delay as possible, the Regulations, restrictions, and
provisions with appropriate penalties for all breaches
thereof; and the date when they shall be put into operation
shall be fixed by the concurrent proclamations of the
President of the United States and the Governor-General of the
Dominion of Canada in Council.

"And it is further agreed that jurisdiction shall be exercised
by either Government, as well over citizens or subjects of
either party apprehended for violation of the Regulations in
any of its own waters to which said Regulations apply, as over
its own citizens or subjects found within its own jurisdiction
who shall have violated said Regulations within the waters of
the other party.

"ARTICLE 4.
It is agreed that the waters within which the aforementioned
Regulations are to be applied shall be as follows:
(1) The territorial waters of Passamaquoddy Bay;
(2) the St. John and St. Croix Rivers;
(3) Lake Memphremagog:
(4) Lake Champlain;
(5) the St. Lawrence River, where the said River constitutes
the International Boundary;
(6) Lake Ontario;
(7) the Niagara River;
(8) Lake Erie;
(9) the waters connecting Lake Erie and Lake Huron,
including Lake St. Clair;
(10) Lake Huron, excluding Georgian Bay but including
North Channel;
(11) St. Mary’s River and Lake Superior;
(12) Rainy River and Rainy Lake;
(13) Lake of the Woods;
(14) the Strait of San Juan de Fuca, those parts of
Washington Sound, the Gulf of Georgia and Puget Sound
lying between the parallels of 48° 10' and 49° 20';
(15) and such other contiguous waters as may be
recommended by the International Fisheries Commission and
approved by the two Governments.

It is agreed on the part of Great Britain that the Canadian
Government will protect by adequate regulations the food
fishes frequenting the Fraser River.

"The two Governments engage to have prepared as soon as
practicable charts of the waters described in this Article,
with the International Boundary Line indicated thereon; and to
establish such additional boundary monuments, buoys, and marks
as may be recommended by the Commission.

{274}

"ARTICLE 5.
The International Fisheries Commission shall continue in
existence so long as this Convention shall be in force, and
each Government shall have the power to fill, and shall fill
from time to time, any vacancy which may occur in its
representation on the Commission. Each Government shall pay
its own Commissioner, and any joint expenses shall be paid by
the two Governments in equal moieties.

"ARTICLE 6.
The Regulations, restrictions, and provisions provided for in
this Convention shall remain in force for a period of four
years from the date of their executive promulgation, and
thereafter until one year from the date when either the
Government of Great Britain or of the United States shall give
notice to the other of its desire for their revision; and
immediately upon such notice being given the Commission shall
proceed to make a revision thereof, which Revised Regulations,
if adopted and promulgated by the President of the United
States and the Governor-General of Canada in Council, shall
remain in force for another period of four years and
thereafter until one year from the date when a further notice
of revision is given as above provided in this Article. It
shall, however, be in the power of the two Governments, by
joint or concurrent action upon the recommendation of the
Commission, to make modifications at any time in the
Regulations.

"ARTICLE 7.
The present Convention shall be duly ratified by His Britannic
Majesty and by the President of the United States, by and with
the advice and consent of the Senate thereof, and the
ratifications shall be exchanged in Washington as soon as
practicable."

FOOD LAWS.

See (in this Volume )
PUBLIC HEALTH: PURE FOOD LAWS.

FORESTS, Conservation of.

See (in this Volume)
CONSERVATION OF NATURAL RESOURCES.

FORMOSA:
Earthquake in.

See (in this Volume)
EARTHQUAKES: FORMOSA: A. D. 1906.

FORMOSA:
Japanese Dealing with the Opium Problem.

See (in this Volume)
OPIUM PROBLEM.

FORTIS MINISTRY.

See (in this Volume)
ITALY: A. D. 1905-1906.

FOSTER, John W.:
On the American Violation of Treaties with China.

See (in this Volume )
RACE PROBLEMS: UNITED STATES: A. D. 1905-1908.

FOSTER, Volney W.:
Delegate to Second International Conference of
American Republics.

See (in this Volume)
AMERICAN REPUBLICS.

FOUNDATION FOR THE PROMOTION OF INDUSTRIAL PEACE.

See (in this Volume)
LABOR ORGANIZATION: UNITED STATES: A. D. 1907.

----------FRANCE: Start--------

FRANCE: A. D. 1870-1905.
Increase of Population compared with other European Countries.

See (in this Volume)
EUROPE: A. D. 1870-1905.

FRANCE: A. D. 1896-1906.
Encroachments of the French Algerian Boundary on Morocco.

See Morocco: A. D. 1896-1906.

FRANCE: A. D. 1900.
Comparative Statement of the Consumption of Alcoholic Drink.
Its Increase.

See (in this Volume)
ALCOHOL PROBLEM.

FRANCE: A. D. 1902.
Purchase of Franchises and Property of the French Panama
Canal Company by the United States.

See (in this Volume)
PANAMA CANAL.

FRANCE: A. D. 1902.
Favored footing in Abyssinia.
Railway Projects.

See (in this Volume)
ABYSSINIA: A. D. 1902.

FRANCE: A. D. 1902.
French Central Africa.
Explorations.
A Land-locked Empire.

See (in this Volume)
AFRICA: FRENCH CENTRAL.

FRANCE: A. D. 1902 (April-October).
Elections to the Chamber of Deputies.
Resignation of Waldeck-Rousseau.
Formation of a Radical Ministry under M. Combes.
Enforcement of the Law of Associations.
Closing of unauthorized schools.

The first ballot in elections to the Chamber of Deputies was
cast on the 27th of April, producing 413 conclusive elections
and leaving 178 to be decided by a second vote. The new
Chamber met on the 1st of June, and elected for its president,
M. Leon Bourgeois, by a vote of 303 against 267. On the
following day M. Waldeck-Rousseau, who had been at the head of
the Ministry for three years—an exceptional term of
premiership in France—resigned, on the plea that his task was
done. A new Radical Cabinet was then formed by M. Émile
Combes, which announced a moderate programme on the 10th, and
received the declared support of 312 members, against 116 in
opposition and 149 who took neutral ground. Of the previous
Cabinet, M. Delcassé retained the portfolio of Foreign Affairs
and General Andre that of War. The session was short and
little was done.

In the following months great excitement and much disorder in
parts of the country, especially in Brittany, was caused by
proceedings taken to enforce the law concerning Associations,
passed in the previous year.

See in Volume VI.
FRANCE: A. D. 1901.

Some religious orders—teaching orders and others—had refused
or neglected to register themselves and obtain authorization,
as required by the law, and these were now to be closed. In
many cases there was resistance to the closing of the
unauthorized schools. In a few cases there was a refusal by
military officers to obey commands for the assistance of their
soldiery in enforcing the law. Magistrates, too, opposed the
government, and a majority of the councils in the departments
of France withheld their support. Nevertheless the government
proceeded firmly in the matter and the provisions of the law
were carried out. When the Chambers were reconvened in October
the burning subject came up for fierce discussion, and the
attitude and acts of the Combes Ministry were approved in the
Chamber of Deputies by 329 against 233.

FRANCE: A. D. 1902 (May).
Courtesies at the unveiling of a Monument to
Marshal de Rochambeau, at Washington.

See (in this Volume)
UNITED STATES: A. D. 1902 (MAY).

FRANCE: A. D. 1902 (October).
Strikes in the Coal Mines and on the Docks at Marseilles.

See (in this Volume)
Labor Organization:
FRANCE: A. D. 1902.

FRANCE: A. D. 1902 (October).
Treaty with Siam.
Acquisition of more territory.

See (in this Volume)
SIAM: A. D. 1902.

{275}

FRANCE: A. D. 1903.
Elections to the Senate.
Execution of the Associations Law.
Closing of Schools and Houses of the Religious Orders.
Resistance and Rioting encouraged by Magistrates.
State Monopoly of Education established.
Building new Schoolhouses.

Elections for a section of the Senate, occurring early in
January, 1903, went favorably for the Government. M. Fallières
was reëlected President of that body, while M. Bourgeois was
seated again in the presiding chair of the lower Chamber. The
Combes Ministry was strengthened in its hold of power by the
continued agitation that attended the execution of the
Associations Law as applied to the religious orders and
brotherhoods.

See in Volume VI. of this work,
FRANCE: A. D. 1901.

Its support was a shifting one, made up sometimes by one
combination of the many party divisions in the Chambers and
sometimes by another; but it did not fail throughout the year
to find somewhere a majority that would not allow a political
crisis to be brought on. Everywhere the closing of the schools
and houses of the unauthorized associations was resisted with
increasing determination, and the proceeding became too much
retarded to satisfy the supporters of the law. Objection was
raised to the separate dealing with questions of authorization
for this and that order or congregation, and the Government
was called upon to name at once to the Chambers the whole list
of institutions which it would have authorizations refused to.
In March this demand was acceded to, so far as concerned the
male congregations, and a great debate, of a fortnight’s
duration, in the Chamber of Deputies, resulted in the refusal
of authorization to all the teaching, preaching, and
contemplative orders, of Redemptorists, Capuchins,
Benedictines, Dominicans, and Passionists. A few months later
the same entire refusal of authorization to the teaching
orders of women was voted, but by a diminished majority.

The Clericals, on their side, were as energetic as the parties
of the Government, and were supported very generally by the
magistracy of the country at large, which dealt so leniently
with the resistance and rioting provoked by the enforcement of
the law that the Government was left practically dependent on
the army and the police. The army, too, was a doubtful
instrument of authority in many cases, numerous officers of
all grades resigning to escape the repugnant mandate of law.
The most threatening situation arose in Brittany, consequent
on the inauguration of a monument to Renan, which the
Catholics regarded as an insult to the Church.

One final step in the secularizing of education in France was
taken late in the year, by the passing of a bill which
practically established a State monopoly of education, by
repealing a law of 1850 that abolished such monopoly. By the
new law all members of any religious order, authorized or
unauthorized, were forbidden to engage in teaching.

The extent to which the schools of the religious congregations
were being closed involved a great expenditure for building
new schoolhouses, and the Government had difficulty in passing
an Act which laid the cost of this provision on the communes,
instead of accepting it for the state at large. It carried the
Act, however, notwithstanding the opposition of M.
Waldeck-Rousseau.

FRANCE: A. D. 1904.
Rivalry with England in the Persian Gulf.

See (in this Volume)
PERSIA: A. D. 1904.

FRANCE: A. D. 1904 (April).
The Agreements of the Entente Cordiale with England.

See (in this Volume)
EUROPE: A. D. 1904 (APRIL).

FRANCE: A. D. 1904 (June-July).
Groundless charges against the Premier.

A great public scandal was raised in June by charges against
the Premier, M. Combes, that he had tried to force the
Chartreux monks to buy the right of remaining in France.
Investigation showed that bold swindlers had attempted to
obtain money from the monks on the pretence of being able to
buy such permission for them. As the result of the
investigation the President of the Council and his colleagues
were vindicated by an almost unanimous vote of the Chamber of
Deputies.

FRANCE: A. D. 1904-1909.
General Consequences in Europe of the Weakening of Russia in
the Russo-Japanese War.

See (in this Volume)
EUROPE: A. D. 1904-1909.

FRANCE: A. D. 1905.
Action with other Powers in forcing Financial Reforms in
Macedonia on Turkey.

See (in this Volume)
TURKEY: A. D. 1905-1908.

FRANCE: A. D. 1905-1906.
The Separation of Church and State.
Preceding Contentions.
Measures and Proceedings of the Separation,
as recounted by writers of each Party.

The separation of Church and State in France involved the
nullification of the Concordat, negotiated by Napoleon I. with
Pope Pius VII. in 1802, and of what are known as the Organic
Statutes, promulgated by the French Government at the same
time.

See (in Volume IV. of this work)
PAPACY: A. D. 1808-1814.

The former was in the nature of a treaty; the latter was not.
The French Government claimed rights under both; the Roman
Church acknowledged no force in the Statutes that could be
binding on itself. This difference, which entered into much of
the controversy preceding the measures taken by the Government
to separate the State from the Church, is explained in the
first quotation below,—following which, two accounts are
given of some among those controversies, and of the
proceedings connected with the adoption and execution of the
Act of Separation,—one account written from the view-point of
the Government and the other from that of the Church:

"The Concordat consists of a preamble and seventeen statutes.
It is a reciprocal contract between the temporal and spiritual
powers, and is therefore at the same time State law and Church
law. The preamble states that the Catholic, Apostolic, and
Roman religion is that of the great majority of the French
people; it does not say that it is ‘the religion of France,’
as the Holy See would have wished, and consequently it does
not restore to the Catholic religion its former character of
being a State religion. After establishing a new distribution
of the French dioceses, it directs that the bishops shall be
‘nominated’ by the Government and ‘installed’ by the Pope. The
alienation of ecclesiastical property, effected by the
Revolution, is definitely sanctioned. In return the Government
undertakes, as had already been done by the Constituent
Assembly, to secure ‘a reasonable allowance to the bishops and
curés, whose dioceses and parishes will be included in the new
arrangement,’ and to take ‘measures to allow French Catholics
to make foundations in favour of churches if they wish.’

{276}

"As regards the Organic Statutes, promulgated at the same
time as the Concordat, 18th April, 1802, they proclaim that no
bull, pastoral letter, or writing of any kind from the Holy
See shall be published in France without the authority of the
Government; no council, general or special, shall be held
without this authority. There must be no other delegate from
Rome in France besides the Nuncio, the official representative
of the Sovereign Pontiff. Any infraction on the part of the
clergy of the provisions either of the Concordat or of French
law is referred to the Council of State, who must decide if
there has been any abuse. The Organic Statutes were equally
concerned with questions relating to discipline, doctrine, and
even dogma—which are purely spiritual questions. They
therefore not only upheld the Declaration of 1682 as a
declaration of the principles of the Gallican Church, but also
expected all the professors to teach it in the seminaries.
According to the Concordat, bishops had a right to appoint
curés; the Organic Statutes obliged them to obtain the
approval of the Government for their appointments.

"Although the Organic Statutes are, with the Concordat, part
of one and the same State law, they must not be considered to
be entirely on the same footing. The Concordat concluded
between the two powers binds them together; the Organic
Statutes, an exclusive product of the French Government, never
received the sanction of the Papal authority. They were, on
the contrary, a source of further quarrels with the Roman
Court. Even in our days, they frequently lead to conflict, the
representatives of the Church having refused, on various
occasions, to recognise the validity of decisions made in
virtue of these Statutes by the French Government."

_Jules Legrand,
Church and State in France
(Contemporary Review, May, 1901)._

FRANCE:
Measures and Proceedings of the Separation as recounted
by its Advocates.

"The action of the Republic in suppressing the religious
orders had produced strained relations between it and the
Vatican. This was intensified by the ‘nominavit nobis’
controversy. In the Bulls instituting some bishops whom the
President had nominated, and which had to have the sanction of
the Government before they could be published and be valid in
France, the Vatican had inserted the word ‘nobis,’ implying
that the President had merely nominated the bishop to the Pope
for appointment and that the appointment was really in the
hands of the Pope. The French Government, under the guidance
of M. Combes, the Premier and Minister of Public Worship,
insisted that this word must be removed before the bull was
sanctioned, and as both sides refused to yield no bishop was
instituted. Relations were still further strained by the visit
of the President to the King of Italy. … To visit the King was
to insult the Pope by disregarding the protest made by him
against the occupation of Rome. President Loubet was the first
Roman Catholic ruler who ventured to disregard the feelings
and protests of the Pope. From the 24th to the 28th April,
1904, M. Loubet was the guest of King Victor Emmanuel, and
gave no intimation to the Pope of his intention to visit Rome,
and did not include a visit to the Vatican in his programme.
On the 28th of April, Cardinal Merry del Val sent to the
representatives of the Curia at the Courts of all the Roman
Catholic powers in the world, to be communicated to the
Governments to which they were commissioned, a protest against
the action of the French Government. … The French Government
replied by recalling its ambassador from the Vatican and
breaking off diplomatic relations with the Pope.

"In the summer of the same year the friction between the
French Government and the Vatican was increased by the cases
of the bishops of Laval and Dijon. Bishop Geay of Laval, in
his opening discourse in his cathedral, had proclaimed his
adherence to the Republic and his desire to be the shepherd of
all his flock. He denounced Orleanism and refused to support
reactionaries at the elections. … He was summoned to appear at
Rome. He submitted the summons to the Government, as he was
required by the Organic Articles to do, and he was refused
permission to leave his diocese. Subsequently, under threats
of excommunication, he went, and was immediately informed by
the Minister of Public Worship that his salary was stopped
from the day he left his diocese without permission. A similar
summons to Mgr. Le Nordez, Bishop of Dijon, led to similar
results. …

"In the month of October, 1904, M. Combes, replying to several
interpellations addressed to the Government, reviewed the
history of the relations of the Vatican to the Republic since
its foundation in 1870, and showed that there had been a
continuous disregard of the Concordat and of the Organic
Articles by the Vatican, and that clericalism had been the
most inveterate enemy of the Republic. He showed that no
stipulations could safeguard the rights of the State, which
were denied by the doctrines of the Catholic Church. The
confidence of the Chamber was expressed by a vote of 548 to
88. In November he introduced a Bill for the separation of
Church and State, which was referred to a Commission, by which
it was adopted on the 2nd December. In the middle of January,
1905, M. Combes, owing to resentment at certain incidents in
connection with the administration of the army, carried a vote
of confidence by a majority of only ten votes and resigned.
Before the end of the month a new Cabinet under the presidency
of M. Rouvier, retaining several members of M. Combes’
administration, was formed, which asserted its determination
to carry out the policy of its predecessor in its relations
with the Vatican. The Chamber of Deputies referred to a new
Commission all the Bills dealing with the question of Church
and State which had been presented to it, including that of M.
Combes. Instead of adopting any one of them, the Commission
decided to draft its own Bill, and shortly afterwards
presented to the Chamber a Bill which engaged the close
attention of the deputies for several months in the spring and
summer of the year 1905. It passed through the Chamber on the
3rd of July, and was sent to the Senate the following day. …
The Senate made no alterations in the Bill, and it became law
on the 6th of December, 1905."

_John A. Bain,
The New Reformation, chapter 17
(T. and T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1900)._

{277}

"The law of the 9th of December, 1905, which put an end to the
regime of the Concordat and substituted that of separation
between Church and State, had been promulgated on the 11th of
December, 1905. It was to come into effect a year after its
promulgation. The Protestants and the Israelites had accepted
it even before it was passed; but they represented an
infinitesimal minority, and it was not that minority that the
legislators had had in view when they framed the law of
separation. The one question in the matter was that of the
attitude that would be taken by the Catholics,—the counsels
that would come to them from Rome.

"In the French Episcopate there were two opposing currents of
opinion, one for acceptance of the law, under certain
reserves, the other for resistance. In the latter part of
November, 1905, some bishops met in Paris and agreed that
energetic efforts must be made to prevent action at Rome on
misinformation as to the situation of the Church in France and
the state of mind prevailing in it. Monseigneur Fulbert Petit,
Archbishop of Besançon, was their chosen envoy, and in the
following January he repaired to Rome. There he met other
bishops who had come to give counsels to the Pope that were
not pacific; and he met, also, the Père Le Doré, former
superior of the dissolved congregation of the Eudistes, well
known for his uncompromising opinions and his aggressive
temper, but who had been commissioned to convey to Rome the
proceedings of the meeting of French cardinals at Paris, on
the 28th of December, which showed a majority in favor of the
acceptance of the law. At the same time, an important meeting
of bishops was held at Albi, under the presidency of Monsignor
Mignot, the majority at which meeting, notably the Archbishop
who received them and the Archbishop of Toulouse, Monsignor
Germain, made no secret of their desire to adjust themselves
to the law, according to the expression of Cardinal Lecot.

"But nothing said or done drew the Pope from the silence which
he kept. Then it was rumored that the head of the Church would
reserve his decision until a general assembly of the French
episcopate, which the French cardinals had advised, could be
held, to propose a solution of the question. This, however,
was contradicted positively by the party which urged
resistance to the law.

"Such was the situation when the Government, obliged to
act,—since the period of delay fixed by the law was only a
year,—came to the first proceedings which the Act prescribed.
Article 43 of the law provided for administrative rules, of
which the part relating to inventories appeared logically the
first, that being the operation which needed consideration
before all others. The second part of the regulations had to
do with the life pensions and temporary provisions accorded to
the ministers of religion. The regulation concerning pensions
and provisions was published in the _Journal Official_ of
January 20, 1906. [Article 11 of the Act assigned to priests
or ministers of more than sixty years of age, who had been not
less than thirty years in an ecclesiastical service salaried
by the state, a yearly life pension of three-fourths of their
former stipend. To those under sixty years of age and above
forty-five, whose service had been for less than thirty years
but not less than twenty, it assigned one-half of their
previous compensation.] …

"The first executive act imposed on the Government was the
inventorying of the property, movable and fixed, belonging to
the State, to the departments or to the communes, of which the
establishments of public worship had had the use. Article 3 of
the law required this to be proceeded with immediately after
its promulgation. This article had been voted in the Chamber
and in the Senate by very large majorities, and, so to speak,
without discussion, so rational and judicial it seemed to be.
In fact, as the existence of the public establishments of
worship came to an end with the regime of the Concordat, the
succession to them was left open, and an inventory,
descriptive and estimative, of their property, was a necessary
measure preliminary to any devolution of such property,
dependent on that succession. … Being one of those
conservative measures which attack no right and leave a
continuous state of things, there was no expectation of much
feeling about it among Catholics. … Apparently, the consistent
attitude on the part of Catholics, provisionally, at least,
and until the Pope had spoken, would be one of calm, of
prudence, of expectancy. Such was the purport of the
instructions given by the bishops, even by the most combative.
These latter, while condemning the law with vehemence, did not
counsel a recourse to force against the agents appointed to
make the inventory. They required but one thing of their
priests and of the administrators of parish property, which
was that they should not coöperate in the work, and that they
should make declaration that their non-resistance did not
imply acceptance of the law.

"On the 29th of December, 1905, a first decree for regulating
the procedure was issued by the Council of State. This was
followed by a circular from the Minister of Finance which, it
must be confessed, roused a justifiable feeling among the
Catholics. From one phrase in that circular it could be
understood that the officials making the inventory were
authorized to demand the opening of the tabernacles. M.
Groussau questioned the Minister on the subject, and M. Merlou
cleared away all misunderstanding by replying that officials
were to accept the declaration of the curé of a church as to
the contents of its tabernacle; and that they had been
instructed to avoid everything that could give pain to pious
minds. The Abbé Gayraud recognized that these decisions of the
Government were in conformity with the instructions of the
Cardinal Archbishop of Paris, and the interpellation was
withdrawn.

"The inventories were begun at once after this decision of the
question of the tabernacles. At first there was no disorder.
The bishops, notably those of Toulouse, of Rouen, of Albi, of
Besançon, of Arras and Chartres, and their curés, from their
example, confined themselves to the reading of a protestation
to the receiver of the registration, after which the receiver
was left free to fulfil his mission. But soon, in some
dioceses, particularly in Paris, in the West, and in one part
of the Center, the inventorying was made the pretext for
demonstrations more political than religious, organized by
enthusiasts or by political cliques. Generally the clergy were
passively present at these demonstrations. …
{278}
These tumultuous manifestations, at the head of which the most
conspicuous personalities of the reactionary opposition were
often seen, ended by degenerating into veritable riots,
necessitating the intervention of troops, and leading finally
to bloody conflicts."

_René Wallier,
Le Vingtième Siècle Politique, Annee 1906,
pages 123-132._

It was not until the 17th of February that the silence of the
Pope on the matters that were agitating France and the Papal
Church was broken. Then the "Encyclical Vehementer," so named,
according to custom, from its first word, was published.

FRANCE:
Measures and proceedings of the separation as recounted
by opponents.

"In the first period of his premiership M. Combes was not
prepared either to denounce the Concordat or to separate the
churches from the State, simply because he found public
opinion not yet ripe for either measure. Later he thought he
saw in adopting this course a means of prolonging his official
existence, a matter of considerable importance to a country
doctor like himself without large private resources. Having
slaughtered nearly all religious congregations or prepared
their ultimate extinction, Combes appeared to seek no further
occupation for himself and to fortify his position by
attacking the Church itself, whose secular clergy he had so
recently praised and sought to protect from unfair and ‘unjust
concurrence or competition with the regulars!’ Like
Waldeck-Rousseau, Combes saw here an opportunity to ‘save’ the
Republic from ‘clerical reaction.' Throughout its whole
discreditable history this third Republic of France has only
been kept alive by being periodically ‘saved’ by some clever
politician from ‘perils’ conjured up to terrorize the
peasantry, who still recall the misery of their ancestors in
the old _régime_ and the misfortunes of France in the
downfall of the first and second Empires. … The Pope
protested, in March, 1904, against the bad faith and infamous
aggressions of the French Government in the matter of
religious education and those imparting it, and M. Delcassé,
through the French Ambassador at the Vatican, protested
against the Papal protest. In the following month M. Loubet,
as President of the French Republic, visited the King of Italy
at Rome, at the same time politely, but significantly,
ignoring the existence of the Pope and the Vatican, at which
court France then had accredited an Ambassador! Then followed
the protest of the Vatican, addressed directly to the French
Government, and the protest simultaneously sent to all the
powers where Papal Nuncios are in residence. …

"In March, 1904, had arisen the trouble in the Diocese of
Dijon, France, which culminated in students of the diocesan
seminary refusing to receive ordination from the hands of the
Bishop, Monsignor Le Nordez. The Bishop of Dijon was,
unfortunately, not the only one of the French episcopate
claiming to be a ‘victim of hatred, deceit and calumny.’
Almost from the commencement of his episcopate Monsignor Geay,
Bishop of Laval, was attacked by accusations filed at Rome,
charges which were examined into during the Pontificate of Leo
XIII., and which led the Holy Office to advise the Bishop to
resign his see. It was then (in 1900) thought at Rome that in
the local conditions actually then existing it was impossible
for Monsignor Geay to govern the diocese with the necessary
authority and efficacy. Monsignor Geay agreed to resign,
provided he received another bishopric in France. This
condition appeared unacceptable to the Vatican, but no further
action was taken in this case until May 17, 1904, when by
order of Pius X. the request for the Bishop’s resignation was
renewed, and in case it was not forthcoming within a specified
time an ecclesiastical trial was intimated as inevitable.
Notwithstanding the secret and private character of this last
letter emanating from the Holy Office, Monsignor Geay
communicated its contents to the French Government. Combes and
Delcassé, jealous of the prerogatives of the French State and
presumably caring little for the honor of the French
episcopate, notified Cardinal Merry del Val (by the acting
Charge d’ Affaires) ‘that if the letter of May 17 is not
annulled the government will be led to take the measures that
a like derogation of the compact which binds France and the
Holy See admits of.’ The Papal Nuncio at Paris explained to M.
Delcassé that this was not a threat of deposition of the
Bishop without a decision of the French Government, but an
invitation to the Bishop to meet the charges by a voluntary
resignation.

"As regards Monsignor Le Nordez and Monsignor Geay,
respectively Bishops of Dijon and Laval, their long hesitation
between the wishes of the French Government and the will of
the Holy See ended by the departure of both of them for Rome.
The government then promptly suppressed their salaries and
after they had (under virtual pressure) placed their
‘voluntary resignation’ in the hands of the Holy Father, an
allowance from the funds of the Vatican was made to each of
them. They have since lived in France in a retirement, varied
at first by interviews of Monsignor Geay with reporters that
have since happily ceased. The severance of diplomatic
relations with the Vatican was completed by a note from M.
Delcassé to the Papal Nuncio at Paris stating that in
consequence of the rupture of diplomatic relations between
France and the Vatican ‘the mission of the Nuncio would
henceforth be deprived of scope.’ In the parliamentary session
of November 26, 1904, the credit for the Embassy at the
Vatican was stricken from the budget. …

"After the downfall of Combes, through the odium attaching to
his spy system, the Minister of the Interior and of Public
Worship presented to the Chamber of Deputies on behalf of the
Rouvier Ministry a project of law to establish the separation.
If for Combes separation had signified little else than
spoliation, aggravated by oppression, the Rouvier plan sought
to render spoliation less unjust, less intolerant. The
ministerial project having been somewhat altered by the
commission, conferences were held and a final agreement having
been obtained, the proposed law was reported to the Chamber of
Deputies in March, 1905. It is unnecessary to follow the
parliamentary evolution of this immature project, forced as an
issue by two successive Premiers who had far less solicitude
for the permanent interests of their country than to assure
their own continuance in power. M. Briand, speaking for the
commission, took great trouble to throw upon the Pope the
responsibility of a law which he at the same time declared to
be perfectly good, beneficent for the Republic and honorable
for its authors! Alas! for separatists, in an unguarded moment
Combes betrayed the utter falsity and ridiculous insincerity
of this pompous and solemn pretence of the anti-religious
majority, that the Pope forced the separation upon France. In
the parliamentary session of January 14, 1905, Combes
declared: ‘When I assumed power I judged that public opinion
was insufficiently prepared for this reform. I have judged it
to be necessary to lead it to that.’

{279}

"When the law of separation, as finally adopted in the Chamber
of Deputies, was referred to the Senate, the Senatorial
commission, under ministerial pressure, adopted the law as
passed in the Chamber, without change of a single word.
Although the law was the most important of any passed in
France for a hundred years, and though it is fraught with
grave influences upon the destinies of the country, this
hastily matured, ill-framed measure, with all its unjust and
vexatious provisions, was swallowed whole by a commission of
cowardly, truckling Senatorial politicians, who disregarded
their plain duty at the dictation of Radicals and Socialists
on the outside. Separationists both in and out of Parliament
were eager to see the law become operative before the
universal suffrage of France could have an opportunity of
passing judgment upon the principle of the separation in the
parliamentary elections of May, 1906. …

"In the Papal Consistory of December 11, 1905, the Pope
pronounced an allocution protesting against the law of
separation in mild and temperate language, announcing his
intention of again treating upon the same subject ‘more
solemnly and more deliberately at an opportune time.’ The Holy
Father evidently waited for the regulations of public
administration that would indicate in what manner the
Government of France intended to administer and enforce the
law. …

"Immediately after the adoption of the law of separation the
government appointed a special commission to elaborate rules
of public administration by which the law was to be
interpreted and applied. This commission being stuffed with
the anti-religious element, its work was worthy of its
authors. … The first details of the regulations officially
promulgated governed the taking of inventories of all movable
and real property of churches, chapels and ecclesiastical
buildings, including rectories, chapter houses, homes of
retreat for aged and infirm priests (even pension endowments),
etc., ostensibly to facilitate the transfer of these
properties to such associations for the maintenance of public
worship as might be formed under the provisions of the law of
separation. These inventories were imposed upon all religious
bodies—Catholic, Protestant and Jewish—and the law was made
applicable to Algiers, where there is a large Mahomedan
population. Viewed in the abstract, the taking of inventories
was a formality necessary to an application of principles
inscribed in the law. As estimates of value such inventories
are worthless, because compiled by agents of the
administration of Public Domains or treasury agents, unaided
by experts in art, architecture and archivial paleography. The
Director General of the Register prescribed to agents taking
these inventories a request for the opening of tabernacles in
churches and chapels to facilitate completeness and accuracy.
This order aroused a storm of indignation throughout France
and the government realized that a stupid blunder had been
made, and it was announced that agents would content
themselves with gathering and incorporating into their report
declarations of the priests upon the nature and value of
sacred vessels contained in the tabernacles.

"The taking of inventories of churches and their contents
commenced simultaneously in many parts of France in the latter
part of January, 1906. Instead of the simple formality hastily
accomplished without general observation, of which separatists
had dreamed, this proceeding was characterized in various
places by scenes of the wildest disorder. When officials of
the Registry presented themselves for the taking of the
inventories, the clergy, surrounded or attended by trustees of
the building, read formal protests against what most of them
styled ‘the first step in an act of spoliation.’ … If these
protests had not been accompanied by physical violence, the
country might have been spared the shocking scenes that took
place in Paris and the provinces. In many churches free fights
took place between militant Catholic laymen, opposed to an
inventory, and police, firemen and troops, who burst open the
doors of churches or broke them down with fire axes in order
to make an inventory possible. While at the doors chairs and
fragments of broken confessionals were flying through the
air, pious women within sang:

‘We will pray God that the Church may be able to teach the
truth, to combat error which causes division, to preach to all
charity!’"

_F. W. Parsons,
Separation of Church and State in France
(American Catholic Quarterly Review, July, 1906)._

FRANCE: A. D. 1905-1906.
The Morocco Question.
Sudden hostility of Germany to the Anglo-French Agreement.
Demand for an International Conference.
The Conference at Algeciras.
The resulting Act.

See (in this Volume)
EUROPE: A. D. 1905-1906.

FRANCE: A. D. 1905-1906.
Claims against Venezuela.

See (in this Volume)
VENEZUELA: A. D. 1905-1906, and 1907-1909.

FRANCE: A. D. 1906.
President Fallières succeeds Loubet.
Fall of the Rouvier Ministry.
Rise of M. Clemenceau.
The Elections of May.
Conformity to the Separation Law prohibited by the Pope.
Sequestration of Church Property.
The Socialists and the Bourgeois.
Justice at last to Dreyfus.
Honors to Picquart.

The presidential term of M. Loubet, who had been elected on
the 19th of February, 1899, would expire on the 18th of
February, 1906. M. Loubet declined a reflection, and M.
Fallières, the chosen candidate of the various groups of
Republicans, was elected President of the French Republic at a
joint session of the two chambers of the National Assembly, on
the 17th of January, by 449 votes of a total 848. The new
President was inducted into office on the 18th of February,
and, according to usage, was offered the resignations of the
existing Ministry, under M. Rouvier, which, however, he did
not accept. M. Rouvier and his colleagues continued in office
until the 7th of March, when a vote in the Chamber of Deputies
which expressed want of confidence compelled a resignation
that could not be declined.

{280}

The new Ministry then formed, and announced on the 14th, was
nominally presided over by M. Sarrien, President of the
Council and Minister of Justice, but its real chief was known
to be M. Clemenceau, Minister of the Interior. Other important
members of this Cabinet were M. Bourgeois, Minister of Foreign
Affairs, and M. Aristide Briand, Minister of Public
Instruction and of Worship. Sarrien and Bourgeois were classed
politically as Radicals, Briand as a Socialist, and Clemenceau
as a Socialist-Radical. The Ministerial declaration read in
both chambers on the 14th was criticised as colorless, and as
indicating an incongruity of political material in the make-up
of the administration. On the burning question of the
execution of the law for the separation of Church and State
its language was:

"The law on the separation of Church and State has met, in the
execution of the provisions relating to the inventories, a
resistance as unexpected as it is unjustified. There is no one
among us who wishes to assail in any manner whatever the
freedom of religious belief and worship. The law will be
applied in the same liberal spirit in which it was adopted by
the Parliament. … But it is our duty to insure the execution
of all laws throughout the land. Under a republican government
the law is the highest expression of national sovereignty; it
must everywhere be respected and everywhere obeyed. The
Government intends to apply with all necessary circumspection,
but with inflexible firmness, the new legislation which
certain parties of opposition strive vainly to misrepresent."

On the 14th of April the Chamber of Deputies was adjourned
_sine die_, and fresh elections to it were to be held in
May. "The seventh legislature held under the Constitution of
1875 came to an end amid a domestic confusion unparalleled in
France since 1871. In the Nord and the Pas de Calais there
were miners’ strikes, at Clermont-Ferrand strikes in the
building trade; at Lorient and Toulon there was a general
strike, and there were strikes also at Alais and Bordeaux. At
Paris the compositors, the excavators and the railway men on
the Metropolitan had left work, and the postmen also had
joined the movement, though they were servants of the State.
M. Clemenceau paid two visits to Lens to treat with the
strikers; following his example and by his orders the
magistrates, officers and soldiers exhibited admirable
coolness as well as energy in controlling the excited crowds
without resorting to force. … Attempts were made to form what
were virtually revolutionary governments, and these announced
openly that on May 1, capitalism would be assailed, a general
strike proclaimed in Paris, and the Government swept away if
it showed signs of attempting to interfere. These threats set
up an unprecedented panic, which was intensified by the
measures taken by the Government to get rid of it. Troops
guarded the Metropolitan Railway workshops, the printing
establishments, the bakeries. All the cavalry and infantry
available were concentrated at Paris, and schools and empty
houses taken up for their accommodation."

_Annual Register, 1906,
page 270._