FRANCE: Stay of Execution

Premier Rene Pleven's precarious four-month-old French government last week risked a vote of confidence. Pleven had had the courage to make the issue France's new austerity program : a 200-billion-franc tax increase, a 40% cut in dollar imports. He knew that he would be fought by Communists on the left and Gaullists on the right. He could not count on the help of the Socialists, who had announced that they would abstain. "If we get less than a ten-vote majority, we'll resign," said Pleven. "If we get more than twelve, we'll talk it over." The vote was 246 to 228—a majority of 18.

"It was not really a vote of confidence," said one deputy, "just a stay of execution." Many deputies apparently felt that it would be unseemly to topple the government while the U.N. was meeting in Paris. Also, it wouldn't do while the U.S.'s W. Averell Harriman was still in town and there was a chance at a $200 million U.S. grant to tide France over.