COMBES (JUSTIN LOUIS), EMILE French statesman, was born at Roquecourbe, Tarn, on Sept. 6, 1835. He was a doctor by profession, practising at Pons, Charente Inf erieure. In 1885 he was elected to the senate by the depart ment of Charente-Inf erieure. He sat with the democratic Left. On Nov. 3, 1895, he entered the Bourgeois cabinet as minister of public instruction, resigning with his colleagues on April 21 follow ing. He actively supported the Waldeck-Rousseau ministry, and upon its retirement in 1903 he was himself charged with the formation of a cabinet. In this he took the portfolio of the interior, and devoted himself to the struggle with clericalism. The parties of the left in the chamber, united upon this question in the Bloc republicain, supported Combes in his application of the law of 1901 on the religious associations, and voted the new bill on the congregations (1904), and under his guidance France took the first definite steps toward the separation of Church and State. The defection of the Radical and Socialist groups induced him to resign on Jan. 17, 1905, although he had not met an adverse vote in the Chamber. He sat in the Briand cabinet of 1915-16 without portfolio. He died on May 25, 1921, at Pons.