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The Southern Israelite
L. S. GILBERT
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What Is Behind the Dreyfus Revival?
(Continued from Page 10)
ican readers who probably have for
gotten the details of the "affaire” com
pletely. There is no doubt in my mind,
after having perused an immense
amount of documents on the subject,
that the general staff of France, nearly
all of whose members were pupils of
the Jesuits, picked on Dreyfus as the
scapegoat. Suspicion of treason rested
on five officers. Dreyfus was the only
Jew among them, the only Jew on the
general staff, moreover. He held this
position in spite of the violent oppo
sition of the majority of his chiefs.
On the certificate of his appointment
the chief of staff had written: "Ac
cepted, but account is taken of his gen
eral principles and conceptions.” It is
clear what this meant. A Jew could
never be considered as a part of the
army, lie always remained an alien cle
ment. The monarchist-clerical-reaction
ary clique that made up the superior
military corps in France during the
twelve years that the "affaire” lasted
covered every one of its own satellites,
even at the price of falsified documents
and the basest imposture, always in
voking the pretest that the honor of
the army warranted the silencing of
the worst charges against its members.
This, of course, is the Jesuit doctrine of
the end justifying the means, pure and
unadulterated.
They would have put the damper on
the theft of valuable military papers
right at the beginning, but they had a
Jew on whom they could unload the
scandal. A Jew’s condemnation would
not dishonor the army. Dreyfus wasn’t
considered one of the army, anyway.
But in the eyes of outsiders, to the con
trary, the army would tend to gain in
honorability by delivering up one of its
own. And then Dreyfus was a demo
crat, a man in opposition to the ideol
ogy of the clerico-military caste. Every
other guilty officer would have embar
rassed the entire army. This one was
good riddance.
After than followed an amazing dec
ade of falsifying, stealing, substituting
papers in the records bearing on the
case. Having once accused Dreyfus the
general staff had first to invent charges
and then back them up with proofs.
This sordid game went on for ten years,
until finally the light broke through
and the man was set free.
What does Dreyfus personally say of
the new rumors about his case? Al
though a quiet, shriveled little man who
lives on the fashionable Avenue Friend-
land, extremely wealthy himself as a
member of a well-known family of
bankers, he is still the “cocardier” mili
tarist whose personal attitude always
exasperated Clemenceau. Dreyfus has
said again on this occasion that he
wants the thing hushed up—not prin
cipally because it might revive hatred
and racial prejudice, but because he, of
all men, thinks that a revival of the
"affaire” cannot but harm the honor
and reputation of the French army.
I have seen Dreyfus but twice. Once
at the nocturnal funeral of Clemcn-
ceau last year. He stood in the crowd
that paid a last tribute to the man who
championed his cause with relentless
energy until truth triumphed.
The other occasion came several years
ago, when the execution of Sacco and
Vanzetti seemed imminent. In the com
pany of another newspaperman I raced
out to Deauville one Sunday afternoon
to the Dreyfus country home to ask
the "captain” to give his signature to a
petition for a new trial for the two
Italian anarchists. Caillaux had signed.
Clemenceau cabled to Massachusetts on
his own hook; the Tiger needed no
prompting. Herriot came in. At the mo
ment the United States embassy in
Paris was surrounded by protective
cordons of troops. Every American
newspaper office in Paris was under
heavy police surveillance. The two
Italians maintained they were in
nocent. Millions both in America and
Europe thought the same. A w'ord
from Dreyfus, the man who had once
been in the same terrible predicament,
might, we thought, have some weight in
mellowing the heart of Gov. Fuller.
Dreyfus refused his signature point-
blank. It was then recalled that he
had also refused to say a word on be
half of Beiliss in the infamous ritual
murder trial of almost a quarter cen
tury ago.
"But, Monsieur Dreyfus, these men
say they are innocent,” I pleaded. "The
entire world is protesting against the
callous sentence. All we want is a new
and impartial trial to arrive at the
truth. It is only through the pressure
of world public opinion that this can
come about. Won't you say one word
—you, who have yourself gone through
hell?”
The C aptain shook his head and dis
appeared into another room. "Go
away!” said his son, Pierre. "My father
cannot be bothered. This is not his
business!”
Ah, to be sure! But that was not
the way Zola talked and Clemenceau
acted when Dreyfus was a prisoner on
Devil’s Island.
Copyright 1931 by S. A. F. S.
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