In France, Public Praise of Notorious Antisemite Causes An Uproar

A French parliamentarian, Jean-Louis Thiérot, has aroused considerable anger by praising a notorious nineteenth-century French antisemite. More on this act of deliberate provocation can be found here: “Row in France As Leading News Outlet Attempts Rehabilitation of Notorious Antisemite,” by Ben Cohen, Algemeiner, August 14, 2023:

An article praising one of the most notorious antisemites in French history has resulted in a storm of condemnation of its author, a parliamentarian from the conservative Les Républicains (LR) Party.

The article — titled “Maurice Barrès, the herald of the sacred union” —”le héraut de l’union sacrée” — was published on Saturday, August 12, in the weekend magazine of the prominent media outlet Le Figaro and extensively discussed in its weekly podcast. The article’s author, Jean-Louis Thiériot, argued that Barrès, a writer and politician who stoked violence against Jews during the show trial of the French Army Captain Alfred Dreyfus during the 1890s, deserved a more generous interpretation of his legacy despite his well-known antisemitic views.

According to the late scholar of antisemitism, Prof. Robert Wistrich, Barrès was among a crop of leaders who advocated “street-fighting antisemitism,” since this was “the weapon which had the most attraction for the plebeian masses.” Yet according to Thiériot, Barrès’ antisemitism should not diminish his contribution to the “construction of our national imagination…what a role he played!”

Responding to Thiériot on social media, several commentators highlighted viscerally antisemitic statements uttered by Barrès. “Dreyfus is a traitor; I deduce that from his race,” he wrote of the Jewish army officer who was framed in 1894 on false charges of spying for Germany in a case that unleashed a wave of antisemitic violence across France. In another essay, he wrote: “‘Down with the Jews!’ Will it be the title of a particular chapter of our history? The crowd always needs words of war to rally, it wants some cry of passion.”

Barrès did not even bother to examine the case made against Captain Dreyfus; it was enough that Dreyfus was a Jew, and therefore automatically “ a traitor.” He needed no other evidence. And Barrès whipped up antisemitic violence against Jews in France, who were tarred with the same brush as that “traitor,” Captain Dreyfus. The people of France needed a rallying cry? So be it: “Down with the Jews!” An extreme nationalist, he regarded Jews as a foreign body who could not be considered as part of the French nation. In 1906, when Dreyfus was exonerated, Barrès still refused to accept the fact of Dreyfus’ innocence. And antisemitism remained central to his political views until his death in 1923.

Left-wing parliamentarians Thomas Portes and Matthias Tavel respectively denounced Thiériot for “praising a notorious antisemite” and for keeping “despicable company.” Ronan Loas, the mayor of a small town in Brittany, separately criticized the leadership of the LR Party for remaining silent regarding Thiériot’s article, slamming Barrès at the same time as the “herald of antisemitism and racism.”

It is good that two parliamentarians denounced Thiérot for “praising a notorious antisemite.” But where were all the others? Where were the leaders of Les Republicains? Why did Eric Zemmour not immediately denounce him? Or Marine Le Pen, who has been seeking ways to distance herself from the antisemitism of her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen? And why did President Macron himself not take the occasion to denounce the unacceptable moral calculus of Thiériot?

Thiériot argued that while Barrès had “greatly contributed to the mosaic of hatreds” during the previous century, as demonstrated by his actions during the Dreyfus trial, he deserved respect for having pushed through a law that mandated “the maintenance of the churches in France, despite the law of separation [of religion and state].”

So Thiériot praised Barres for having pushed for a law to “maintain the churches in France.” But Barres was hardly the only one supporting such legislation; a host of French historians, architects, and others called for the state to preserve these monuments of French civilization. In light of such widespread support, Barrès deserves no special credit for helping to push the law through the Assemblée Nationale.

Opposition to Barrès during his lifetime came from several sources, among them the artists of the subversive “Dada” movement, who staged a mock trial in 1921, two years before his death, charging him with an “attack on the safety of the mind.”

Thiériot is a deliberate provocateur, seeking to gain attention for himself by writing a defense of the hitherto beyond-the-pale antisemite Maurice Barrès, knowing that it would create a stir. in the pages of France’s leading centrist paper, Le Figaro. He describes Barrès as an “antisemite,” but fails to note just how violent his antisemitism had been — it was an antisemitism not of the study but of the streets — and how both in print and in speeches, Barrès, recognized as the “most articulate of the anti-Dreyfusards,” whipped up the moral simpletons who listened to him, as he urged them to act physically against the Jews. It is also worth noting that Barrès was attracted to Shi’ism, and also wrote sympathetically of “Moorish” Spain — that is, Spain under Islamic rule. That part of his thought — his interest both in aspects of Islam and in Islamic rule in Spain, about which he had only good things to say — needs to be explored.

When Thiériot praises Barrès for helping to pass legislation that would commit the French state, despite the 1905 Laicité law mandating the separation of church and state, to providing financial support for French churches, he claims that this should be enough to win our praise. He puts one in mind of other moral idiots who manage to find ways to praise even the worst political criminals. You know the type, the dreary type. They praise Mussolini because, despite his murder of Giacomo Matteotti, the violence of his Blackshirts, and the leggi razziali, he made the “trains run on time” and drained the Pontine Marshes; they praise Stalin because the Great Leader, whatever his faults, did manage to build the Moscow Metro and the White Sea Canal; they believe we should keep firmly in mind that Fidel Castro, though a ruthless dictator, provided free medical care for all Cubans; as for that other despot Hugo Chavez, kept in power by violence, let’s no forget that he gave generations of young Venezuelans the chance to learn to play the violin.

And Maurice Barrès? Oh, he hated Jews and preached violence against them for most of his adult life. But just think: he — along with millions of other Frenchmen — wanted to provide state support to maintain the churches of France. Does this second aspect of his life in any way make up for the first? I know what I think. What about you?