Moderate Gains

In most countries extremist parties, left or right, usually show their greatest gains when times are hard. In evenminded Belgium, however, this trend is often reversed. Last week, a time of international if not national stress, the Belgian electorate voted overwhelmingly for the moderate parties in the municipal elections held every six years. Heaviest winners were the Socialist and Catholic Parties, supporters of Premier Paul Henri Spaak. Even the pro-French Liberal Party, thought to be losing its hold, showed wide gains. Heaviest losers were the Communists, Rexists and Flemish Nationalists. The pro-Fascist Rexists blamed their losses on the fact that their Fuehrer, dynamic Leon Degrelle, suffering from congestion of the lungs, failed to orate.

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