The persecution of Jewish Children in Southern France - a humanitarian emergency at the junction of State, Church and the German Occupation

 

What makes French Grad students join an interdisciplinary project on legal history?

Several reasons do:

Our teacher told us about this project on legal history and offered those who wanted to participate to work on one of the submitted files.

But – and this might be a point all of us share – it is an interest in history, human rights, and the perspectives our yesterday provides for today.

So, what were we working on? We prepared a report on the persecution that Jewish children had to endure in southern France during World War Two. In our paper, we pointed out the role of the Catholic Church as an actor in French politics during the German Occupation. In the aftermath of the 1905 bill on laicity, this concept was severely criticized both by right-wing politicians and the church itself. The access to power by Philippe PETAIN as head of the southern part of France (“Vichy-Regime;” the northern part being directly governed by the German occupants) was the opportunity to re-establish connections between the Church and State. Philippe PETAIN’s plan to found a state on the Christian principles of work, family and child protection was therefore welcomed by religious leaders who saw in PÉTAIN the signs of an acceptance of the imprint of a moral order.

This led to an inclination of Church hierarchy – both French and Vatican – in favor of the Vichy Regime. As the humanitarian situation even in the Vichy-France grew increasingly tense and the persecution of Jews grew steadily, this positive regard of the Catholic Church for the regime contrasted with humanitarian principles; all the more so as some men of the Church had even approved the antisemitic legislation.

In our paper, we describe how this contrast originated and which theoretical concepts underline it. In the first instance, we present the policies put in place by the Vichy Regime to meet the demands of the Occupier, but also the justifications put forward by the French government to organize the deportation of foreign and then French Jewish children. We note and analyze the stark contrast existing between “Christian” and secular conceptions of human rights, the secular concept being based on certain inalienable, truly human, rights and the other formulating an ethics based on the concept of men’s’ likenesses with God.

We analyzed the example of the church-orchestrated rescue of Children from Venissieux Camp during the August 1942 raids. We pointed out that in the aftermath of the raids, the children “rescued” by the Church did undoubtedly have their physical integrity preserved. Nevertheless, we raised the question, regarding the forced baptism some of the children had to endure, if the Church’s resistance in “returning” the children after the end of the Occupation didn’t make the whole intervention a missionary rather than a humanitarian mission.