435 J "^^^ PLEBISCITES IN THE PEACE TREATIES 1 37 



The Allied reply reminds the German Delegation once 

 more of the reparatory character of the Saar settlement. 

 It justifies the extension of the frontiers beyond the coal 

 lands by the desire " to secure the least possible interfer- 

 ence with the present administrative units or with the daily 

 vocations of this complex population." The Governing 

 Commission is responsible to the League of Nations, not 

 France. The territories will have their whole revenue ap- 

 plied to their own administrative unit and for the first time 

 they will have "a government resident on the spot which 

 will have no occupation and no interest except their 

 welfare." 



" The German note," the answer concludes, " constantly 

 overlooks the fact that the whole arrangement is tem- 

 porary, and that at the end of fifteen years the inhabitants 

 will have a full and free right to choose the . sovereignty 

 under which they are to live." 



In point of fact the German Government does not over- 

 look the temporary character of the present arrangement, 

 but its comment shows clearly the fear that the final out- 

 come will be influenced and determined by the temporary 

 arrangement. France has the right to employ French labor 

 and thus is at least potentially in the position to swamp the 

 territory. This would force the German population either 

 to emigrate or to apply for French nationality, if in their 

 opinion, this would seem to promise them opportunity for 

 work. Since the Treaty provision for the plebiscite to be 

 held at the end of the fifteen years of foreign rule gives 

 the vote to all "'persons without distinction of sex, more 

 than twenty years old at the date of the voting, resident in 

 the territory at the date of the signature of the present 

 Treaty," those inhabitants of the Saar Basin, who, for 

 economic reasons and against their wishes and desires 

 might have assumed French nationality, would be entitled 

 to vote. However, the assumption of French nationality 

 under conditions assumed would in no way bind the voter 

 to declare for union with France. In otiier words, in spite 



