PARIS — With its presumptive presidential candidate in a New York jail awaiting resolution of sexual assault charges, including attempted rape, the Socialist Party moved on Tuesday to try to reassure its troops, while President Nicolas Sarkozy was reported to have told his party’s legislators that the arrest of Dominique Strauss-Kahn was a disaster for the Socialists, who had lost “the moral part of the battle for the presidency.”

France’s political world began maneuvering in earnest on Tuesday.

Martine Aubry, the Socialist leader, told her party leadership on Tuesday that it must pull together, look beyond the trauma of the scandal and focus on the presidency.

“Unity, responsibility, combativeness — these are the three words which came up the most this morning,” Ms. Aubry said afterward. “There was emotion, of course, and the shock we all feel, but it is our responsibility to be up to the task.”

It is necessary to “wait for the facts” and Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s version of events in a Manhattan hotel suite, she said, but also to “respect the young woman” who accused him of attempted rape and other sexual charges.