Kulturkampf in France.

FROM THE early 1870s to the middle 1880s, Germany's imperial government under Otto von Bismarck clashed repeatedly with the leaders of the Roman Catholic Church over the control of educational and ecclesiastical appointments. Perhaps the most enduring reminder we have of the confrontation is the word Kulturkampf ("fight for culture"), which was coined by Rudolf Virchow, a supporter of Bismarck's, to describe the struggle.

Catholics accounted for slightly more than one-third of the total population of Germany, but they were considered leaderless and backward--in short, no match for the Iron Chancellor. But the German Catholics reacted courageously, and, aided by the rise of socialism on the Left, to which Bismarck was forced to turn a large part of his attention, Germany's two Catholic parties were able to gain a key position in the Reichstag in Berlin. In the end, the Church in Germany survived the struggle; whereas Bismarck was eventually dismissed by Wilhelm II.

In France today the Socialist government of Francois Mitterrand is heading toward a Kulturkampf of its own. During his election campaign in 1981, Mitterrand promised the French people "des ecoles laiques et uniques" (secular and uniform schools). Alain Savary, Mitterrand's Minister of Education, has been assigned the unpleasant task of actually fulfilling his chief's campaign promise.

Savary's proposed bill would bring the budgets of private schools under the control of regional bodies and also would limit the number of private-school teachers, as well as require them to have civil-servant status. Savary also hopes to "democratize" the schools by giving janitors as much say in running the schools as professors. To be sure, his "democratization" won't extend to every level of schooling; the great graduate schools--the Ecole Polytechnique, the Ecole Normale Superieure, the Ecole Nationale d'Administration--won't be included in the democratizations because the protests would have been too loud. But the universities will be affected, as well as the ecoles libres (independent schools). In the case of the former, the government should be able to ride out the storm of protests; but in the case of the latter, it may have overreached itself.

More than two million French children are taught in the ecoles libres. Though most of these schools are Catholic, they still receive state support. The wall of separation between church and state in France, made final in 1905, has been crumbling over the years and doesn't compare with the wall of separation in the United States.

In France, catholicism is strongly alive in the far north, the east, the west, and parts of the south; it is weak in the center, especially in Paris. Yet Catholic ecoles libres exist almost everywhere for the simple reason that they are better than the state-run schools; they have higher intellectual standards, impose more discipline, and are considered more prestigious. Many parents, though lukewarm in their religious convictions (or, sometimes, not Catholic at all), prefer to send their children to them.

The ecoles libres have been able to maintain their autonomy even though, since the early 1950s, they have received indirect state aid. Parents who send their children to ecoles libres receive a check from the government equal to the per capita cost of educating a student in the state-run schools, plus 2 per cent, but the checks are cashable only by the schools--a French voucher plan.

To a genuine egalitarian, it goes without saying, these schools are "sectarian" and "elitist," and Mitterrand played on this theme during his election campaign. What Mitterrand seems to have forgotten is how hard the Catholics fought for their schools in the early 1950s, when they actually threatened the government with the use of force. In the very religious west of France, church bells were rung furiously, as they were in the old days in times of war and rebellion.

It hasn't reached that stage yet, but there is a lot of general opposition to the Mitterrand government. Part of it can be attributed to the innate anarchism of the French; part to disillusionment with the Socialists and their Communist allies. Given the government's low standing, it seems unlikely that Mitterrand will persist in a fight that is increasingly unpopular.

THERE WAS a mass demonstration in Versailles, with at least half a million participants, attended by Jacques Chirac (the mayor of Paris) and Mme. Giscard d'Estaing, and demonstrations have taken place in Lyons, Lille, Rennes, and Bordeaux. More is at stake than the fate of religious schools. Many Frenchmen feel outraged because they sense that Savary's "democratization" is one part of a strategy directed against the pluralistic character of their country and their spirit.

Mitterrand capitalized on the French tendency toward egalitarianism to win the presidency (aided by the split in the Right, with Chirac challenging Giscard d'Estaing), but there has always been a strong countercurrent in France, especially in the realm of intellect and art.

Already many are looking toward the 1986 parliamentary elections. It could easily happen that the Right will win control of the General Assembly, while the presidency will be held by a leftist with two years remaining in his own term. If, under those circumstances, Mitterrand chose not to step down--or to change his political views (he has done it before)--France could find itself facing far more than a Kulturkampf.