estrictions which she had enacted respecting foreigners in general, and
which were on the point of being repealed, did not exceed those which
the United States and the Dominion of Australia still apply with
remarkable tenacity. Why should the Cabinets of London and Washington
take so much to heart the lot of ethnic and religious minorities in
certain European countries while they themselves refuse to admit in the
Covenant of the Society of Nations the principle of the equality of
races? Their conduct is awakening among the states 'whose interests are
limited' the belief that they are the victims of an arbitrary policy.
And that is not without danger."[369]

Another eminent Frenchman, M. Denis Cochin, who until quite recently was
a Cabinet Minister, wrote: "The Conference, by imposing laws in favor of
minorities, has uselessly and unjustly offended our allies. These laws
oblige them to respect the usages of the Jews, to maintain schools for
them.... I have spent a large part of my career in demanding for French
Catholics exactly that which the Conference imposes elsewhere. The
Catholics pay taxes in money and taxes in blood. And yet there is no
budget for those schools in which their religion is taught; no liberty
for those schoolmasters who wear the ecclesiastical habit. I have seen a
doctor in letters, fellow of the university, driven from his class
because he was a Marist brother and did not choose to repudiate the
vocation of his youth. He died of grief. I have seen young priests,
after the long, laborious preparation necessary before they could take
part in the competition for a university fellowship, thrust aside at the
last moment and debarred from the competition because they wore the garb
of priests. Yet a year later they were soldiers. I have seen Father
Schell presented unanimously by the Institute and the Professional Corps
as worthy to receive a chair at the College de France, and refused by
the Minister. Yet I hereby affirm that if foreigners, even though they
were allies, even friends, were to meddle with imposing on us the
abrogation of these iniquitous laws, my protest would be uplifted
against them, together with that of M. Combes.[370] I would exclaim,
like Sganarelle's wife, 'And what if I wish to be beaten?' I hold
tyranny in horror, but I hold foreign intervention in greater horror
still. Let us combat bad laws with all our strength, but among
ourselves."[371]

The minority treaties tend to transfo