BELGIUM: Moderates In

Two months ago a petty issue—appointment of a doctor named Adrian Martens to the Flemish Academy of Medicine—cut through Belgian politics like a hot knife through lard. Patriotic War Veterans objected to Dr. Martens' appointment on the grounds that he was 1) a mediocre medical man, 2) one who had worked during the War to split the Flemish districts from the rest of Belgium and set them up as an autonomous State. Soon the Flemish-Walloon issue had all Belgium so divided that King Leopold dissolved Parliament and ordered a new election.

By the time the election was held last week, external pressure had molded the lump of lard back into one solid piece. Belgians were so frightened by what happened to an internally weak Czecho-Slovakia that they crowded to the polls to elect a Parliament of unity, moderation, stability. Most extremist parties lost seats while the moderate Liberals and Catholics gained. Socialists lost more than a quarter of their strength, and the fascist Rexists were almost completely wiped out. Even Eupen, Malmédy and Saint Vith, supposedly ardent pro-Nazi districts nearest Germany, voted 55% nationalist and anti-German.

Most striking incident in Belgium's sudden unification: Dr. Martens resigned from the Academy. He announced his resignation at one o'clock the afternoon of election day—just when the polls closed, so as not to influence the vote but in plenty of time to remove his irksome issue from Belgian politics before the new Parliament meets.