I'm writing this on Wednesday night, January 19 -- the night before "Not a Damn Dime Day" and the counter-inaugural extravaganzas in Washington DC and San Francisco and Ukiah, Philo, Boonville, Fort Bragg and my own home town of Albion. Oh, yes, and the re-inauguration of George W. Bush too. I went and bought my veggies and gasoline today, so that I can withhold my couple of damn dimes and support the shutdown of the national economy (!) And I'm home thinking about resistance and about an article I read the other day that just won't leave me alone.
I have been reading an anthology of essays, many by lawyers, about torture ( Torture: A Collection, edited by Sanford Levinson, Oxford University Press 2004 .) The closing article, by Richard H. Weisberg, tells a story not about torturers but about lawyers. Weisberg is the Director of the Holocaust/Human Rights Center at the Cardozo Law School of Yeshiva University. (I had no idea that such a Center even existed -- fascinating!) Weisberg's story: In 1940 the Nazis occupied half of France, and the legislators in the occupied area immediately got busy promulgating various racist laws against Jews. The interesting thing was that the Vichy government was even more aggressive than their Nazi occupiers in their anti-semitic legislation. Apparently many local lawyers were privately appalled by the enthusiasm of these anti-Jewish regulations. One attorney, Jacques Maury, protested publicly, articulating what he knew was the opinion of most of his colleagues. He wrote plainly and passionately that it was unacceptable for the government to establish these discriminatory anti-Jewish laws. He published two articles in 1940 in what Weisberg said was the equivalent of the Yale Law Journal.
Even though Jacques Maury was obviously taking a risk in publishing these clear statements, he was never punished. But neither, apparently, was he ever supported by others in his profession. His colleagues, when they entered the discussion about anti-Semitic laws, split hairs, found "middle ground" and rationalized the laws. Weisberg writes, "most Vichy-era lawyers would say wistfully: 'Nobody in France likes official discrimination on the basis of race and religion. But' Everything that really counted in the discourse that followed Maury's late-1940 strict professionalism began with that word but."
And the end of the story is that Maury gave up. "Documents show that, in the absence of any help at the beginning from his confreres at the bar or in academia, Maury himself dropped the discourse of principled protest and instead (like those others) worked within the laws and made them live."
I take two lessons from Richard Weisberg's cautionary tale. The primary lesson is that if we are in the position to do so, it seems admirable to speak out clearly and without equivocation against injustice. But the secondary and more subtle lesson here is that at the very least, when another brave soul takes the personal risk and makes a principled stand, we need to support them.
So, by way of example, let me say how proud I am today of Senator Barbara Boxer for challenging Secretary of State nominee Condoleezza Rice about her justification of torture under US jurisdiction. I'm not in the position to question Dr. Rice myself in front of the whole country -- but at the very least I can support Senator Boxer for having the courage to do so. Barbara Boxer is the one who took the risk today. But if she isn't encouraged to keep speaking out by others of us who believe as she does, she may well give up. If she retreats from her principles and starts saying "but" and splitting hairs and looking for middle ground, then we who agreed with her privately but said nothing will share the blame.
When we hear someone speaking the truth as we understand it to be, bravely and clearly, this would be a good time to think of Jacques Maury and not leave that person to hang out there alone with his or her principles. Even the strongest people need support.
Tomorrow will be the inauguration and the counter-inauguration, and the themes spoken on both sides of the barricades will surely continue to be voiced in the days following by all of our various leaders. We shouldn't underestimate how afraid even those fierce-sounding spokespeople may actually feel. It doesn't always happen that we are in a position to address the world or the nation or even our own community with our moral convictions. But we can, at the very least, support those who do it for us.
It is a nice piece of Jewish etiquette to repeat statements and teachings and insights that we like "b'shem omro" -- in the name of the one who spoke it. At the very least this tradition tells us that we shouldn't plagiarize. But in today's political climate maybe it says a bit more than just that. Perhaps it reminds us that it is meritorious to repeat the words that have inspired us and to salute the names of the ones who stepped forward to say those words. When someone takes the risk and the trouble to speak out publicly, saying what we would say if we could, they deserve affirmative honor and support, not just our private nods of agreement.
Thank you, Barbara Boxer, for speaking out in front of the nation and in front of your colleagues in the Senate today, asking the questions that I've been thinking in my head.
Thank you oh so belatedly, Jacques Maury, for speaking out against the anti-semitic legislation that your neighbors were so enthusiastic in instituting in Vichy France. Thank you, Richard Weisberg, for telling Jacques Maury's story today in the context of talk about torture, at a time when we see our leaders splitting hairs and rationalizing and saying that there is a middle ground about a practice concerning which there certainly should be none.
We've been working hard in our community to learn how to speak respectfully and to listen compassionately to our opponents. All this is essential. But we mustn't, in the course of guarding our tongues, forget to speak at all.
© 2005 Rabbi Margaret Holub
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Updated 01/27/2005 (rge)