“I find no better proof of this than an article furnished me this morning by ‘L’Intransigeant.’ The article is from the pen of M. Clemenceau. It was hoped to embarrass him by showing that in December, 1894, or in January, 1895, he was one of those who showed the greatest irritation against the man whom they called the traitor. I fancy that it gives him no embarrassment; for my part, I note only this,—that, like many people then, like many people even today, he believed in the justice and the legality of the verdict rendered, and that his contrary opinion of today has for me, and should have for you, only the greater value. But, if the majority doubted, some who had approached this family which they despise when they are not acquainted with it, and which they respect when they approach it,—some who had approached this family, or its counsel who has never wavered in his conviction of his client’s innocence, harbored a doubt, yes, cherished a hope. And, in uttering this word hope, do you know under what authority I place myself? Under the authority of a man who for many days has spared us neither accusations or insults, but whom I regard as an honest man. I mean M. Paul de Cassagnac, director of ‘L’Autorité.’
“Hear, gentlemen, what he says, and in admirable language. For my part, I cannot believe that a man who writes thus is really an enemy of truth and justice. Hear what he said of the sadness which must have invaded all French hearts on the day after the conviction of Dreyfus.
This judgment is going to fill the country with profound sadness and bitter disappointment. In the first place, profound sadness. For the great mass of the French people, in spite of their hostility to the Jews, do not carry the blindness of religious hatred so far as to wish that a traitor may be found in the ranks of our officers, though this traitor should be a Jew. They would have welcomed with joy a complete, absolute acquittal, establishing indisputably that it was a cruel blunder to have believed, on the strength of false indications, that a French officer had betrayed his country. For the love of country, in its grand and holy solidarity, knows neither Jew or Christian. France is a mother, and necessarily suffers atrociously at the public dishonor of any of her sons.
“You see that I was not wrong in saying that those who harbored a doubt cherished also a hope; and this doubt continued in the minds of all who knew anything of the matter, however little. Others, knowing nothing, but accustomed to observe, harbored at least an anxiety. Why? Because there was too much darkness and too much light as well. For the trouble in this matter has been that, while the proof remained hidden in obscurity, public opinion took possession of the affair, determined to know all. Never from the first has there been complete silence; the discussion continued, assertions were made, falsehoods were spread, or suffered to spread, thus creating that anxiety and anguish the fruit of which the country now is reaping. Am I wrong in saying that? Again I place myself under the authority to which I appealed just now. On the eve of the trial of 1894 the entire press, even the press of M. Drumont himself, called for a public trial. Listen to what M. Paul de Cassagnac said in ‘L’Autorité’ on December 8, 1894.
Must I say it? The farther I go, the more perplexed I feel, and I ask myself if perchance Captain Dreyfus is not innocent. Do not cry out, friendly readers, but reflect. Is not this solution, if it result from the trial itself, the solution to be desired? For my part, from the beginning I have been unable to reconcile myself to the idea that a French officer could have sold his country to the enemy. And no hatred that I feel for the Jews can make me prefer to find a guilty man in the uniform of a soldier, rather than an innocent man. What fills me with doubt is what they say about the document on which this charge rests. The document in question is one said to have been written by Dreyfus. It was found, they say, by a secret agent, in the waste-basket of a foreign military attaché, into which it had fallen. Dreyfus denies that the writing is his, and four experts have examined it. Three say that he wrote it; the fourth holds the contrary opinion.
“This is an error. The document was examined by five experts, three of whom declared Dreyfus the writer, the two others dissenting.
If this had been the only proof, the charge against Dreyfus would have been an imprudent one. Who does not know, in fact, that, even when experts are agreed, it is far from sure that they are right? And the public, very incredulous in regard to this pretended science, has not forgotten the famous trial of la Boussinière at Angers, in which the experts in handwriting made anything but a brilliant spectacle. Now, two of the experts who were so unfortunate in that case are of the three who declare that this document was written by Dreyfus.
Unhappily for Dreyfus, there seems to be something else. There is talk of another document found in the office of the same military attaché, which is said to be overwhelming. But the government, it seems, has not the courage to publicly confess how and where it procured this document, and so they hesitate to produce it. Then what remains of the charge? Is it because the government does not feel sufficiently well armed that it proposes to call for closed doors. Is it because it fears the foreign power whose military attaché has played an ignoble rôle? We do not know. But what we do know is that public opinion will not tolerate concealment, and will insist on an open trial. It would be really strange, were France, after her indignation at the closed doors behind which the Italians strangled the Romani case, were to use the same wretched means toward Captain Dreyfus. A French officer in France must have the right to publicly defend his honor, and the government which accuses him is bound to grant him the favor of the open day. Let the government have a care. The people will not be satisfied with a minimum sentence based on presumptions, and formulated behind doors closed to stifle the affair. Somebody here is guilty. If it is not Captain Dreyfus, it is the government. And what a terrible responsibility would weigh upon the government of the republic if it were proved that, without proofs convincing to the most sceptical, it had committed the horrible crime of sullying the whole French army in accusing an officer of the most frightful of misdeeds, of having sold his country to the enemy. If Captain Dreyfus is acquitted, the minister of war becomes the traitor. Dreyfus acquitted, Mercier must be driven in shame, not only from the war department, but from the ranks of the army, for having cast suspicion upon an innocent officer.
Though perplexed today, I believe in the guilt of Dreyfus. For I cannot imagine that they would have arrested this officer, that they would have preferred such a charge against him, that they would have submitted him for months to the frightful torture of the nation’s censure, to suffer which is a hundred times worse than to be shot,—I cannot imagine that they would have so tortured this living man, unless they were absolutely certain of his guilt. So a public trial is indispensable. Acquittal in the darkness would leave Dreyfus under the stain of suspicion. It would look as if he had been acquitted through fear of a foreign power. Or it would be said that the Jews bought the consciences of the judges. An acquittal behind closed doors is not an acquittal; it is a sort of hypocritical and shameful condemnation. As for condemnation, who would dare to hope for it in the absence of those irrefutable proofs that in our day society is obliged to spread before the eyes of everybody, before mortally and materially killing one of its children. To take from a man, from a soldier, his honor and his life without saying why? Nonsense! It is impossible. Human reason forbids such a return to the darkest traditions of the secret tribunals of Spain and the Netherlands. The government of the republic renewing and aggravating the mysterious and unavowable processes of the Inquisition and of St. Vehme when the fate of a French officer is in the balance! And from pusillanimity! I repeat, it is impossible, for it would be too ignominious.
“It is impossible, and yet, gentlemen of the jury, it happened. The doors were closed, and the doubt continued. It continued even in the mind of M. Paul de Cassagnac, as I shall show you presently; you will not be astonished, then, if it continued in the minds of others.