trature. Judges are delegated by the King; in a manner they represent him, for they dispense justice in his name. Accordingly any attack on their dignity must be promptly and severely suppressed.
“I regret that the respondent did not see fit to follow my advice. Every citizen anxious for the social order will regret it as I do. Th editors and collaborators of the respondent’s three papers contend that they are serving the interests of their French-Canadian compatriots in demanding the expulsion of the Jews and treating of them, against all common sense, as assassins and thieves. Recent history should make them more circumspect and better advised. They forget that the French-Canadians form a small minoritq in North America. These emerge still bruised from a secular struggle during which the strong legal armature which assures the maintenance of their institutions and the survival of group was constituted. Placed by the conquest in an almost desperate position, by their tenacity and the example of their virtues they have created this ensemble of social virtues whose fruits they enjoy today. Atavistic hatred has been softened. But the conflict of souls has sometimes terrible and disconcerting repercussions. Instincts are only with difficulty suppressed. It was by an appeal to tolerance that the compatriots of the respondent brought their rights to the level of those of the conqueror, in this province at least.”
POSSIBLE BOOMERANG
Should the day come, His Lordship continued, when it would be necessary to appeal again to this spirit of tolerance in their British brothers, did they not run the risk of hearing the voice of the past, grown great by that of a race recently introduced and exacerbated by unjustifiable attacks, crying, “You seek tolerance? Why have you refused it to others.” From a campaign such as that being carried on might emerge a new drama in which the French-Canadian might lose the best that is in him. “Revolutions,” His Lordship added, “surge always at the precise moment when power passes from the persecutors to the persecuted….”
His Lordship cited from the work of Paleologue “The Russia of the Czars,” to indicate that part of the downfall of the Empire might have been due to its treatment of the Jews. He referred to the pogroms and added, “And these were going on at a time when hundreds of thousands of Jews were shedding their blood on the battlefields of Russia, at a time when thousands of Jews were in the trenches of Flanders and Piccardy.”
During the horrible tragedy which took place in the cellars of the house of Ekaterinburg, did the poor haemophilic child, heir to the throne of the Czars, feel instinctively that he was the innocent price paid for the paternal and ancestral crime? The respondent’s papers even went the length of pronouncing anathema against the University of Montreal for teaching medicine, law and philosophy to its Jewish students. “Do not all people come within the scope of the Gospel teaching?” His Lordship asked. “Must Catholics be reminded of that?”
Justice Desaulniers cited some of the charges made against the Jews; among them, that they are assassins. “Le Miroir” insisted on the absurd accusation of ritual murder, of which the Pope himself had disposed. Moreover, he asked, of what value in the eyes of historians is evidence compelled by torture? What proof existed of these things? Less than a century after the French Revolution writers were in conflict with one another on the men and events of that great epoch. Even if it were true that a few cases had occurred in two thousand years through the action of fanatics aroused by persecution and expulsion, was the present generation to be taxed with the sins of the past?
One of the papers went so far as to say that in any case historical and contemporary facts permitted Christians to be afraid for themselves, particularly at Passover. “Who,” His Lordship asked, “does not see in this an audacious appeal to riots? Has the petitioner Abugov not the right to fear for himself and his family a blind and bloody rising of popular feeling?
“It might occur during Passover that a Christian child should disappear. Who then could calm the impressionable masses, their imagination raised to white heat by incendiary articles. A foolish word escaping might precipitate a popular rising whose disastrous consequences for the social order are obvious.”
His Lordship quoted from Bossuet, who in turn had cited the writings of St. Paul, and concluded that the campaign of these three papers was anti-Christian. After citing the tragic case of Spain, His Lordship expressed regret that the law had not placed in the hands of the magistrature the weapons necessary to lead this campaign into decent paths. There was the question of stifling the liberty of the press. This was a precious conquest of the modern spirit and to strike at abuses of it might lead to striking at the freedom itself. His Lordship understood the scruples of the legislators.
Examination of long established jurisprudence on Article 957 of the Code of Civil Procedure made it clear that he did not have power to grant the injunction. It was incumbent on the Legislature to find the remedy he could not apply. “But I hope,” he added, “that reflection will lead the respondent to more Christian sentiments, that he will realize for himself the irreparable wrong he is doing to a race in the eyes of public opinion on this continent.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
