To the Editor:

I recently stopped to think about my old high school history teachers, Sister Bridget Mary and Sister Margaret Joseph who both loved their subject and taught us as if we should too. Of course we didn’t all love learning World History and American History but now too many years later than I want to tell you, it comes back to me. I can see Sister “Maggie Joe” with her head tilted in her characteristic way saying “if you don’t respect and work for the freedoms that you have, you will someday lose them”.

Just a few weeks ago from the time I am writing, news broke that some of Donald Trump’s supporters in Arizona and Michigan had filed forged election documents with the National Archives that falsely certified President Trump and Vice President Pence as winners of the 2020 election. Shortly after this shock wave hit we learned that several other states have found incorrectly filed documents making the same claim.

Forging documents to increase support for a particular political ideology is a tactic that has been used by anti-democratic movements across the world for a very long time. Called “patriotic forgeries,” the attempt to pass off falsified documents in the name of love of country has long been used to undermine democratic systems.

Let me give you an example of one such episode known as the Dreyfus Affair. The term “patriotic forgery” was coined during this historic event that occurred in France in 1894. Here’s what happened. Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a military man in France was falsely accused of passing military secrets to Germany. He was innocent of the act but another French military officer, Hubert-Joseph Henry, forged official documents supporting treason charges against Dreyfus.

Why? Because Dreyfus represented France’s liberal democratic culture, which fostered support for diversity, civil rights and expanding secularism. He was Jewish and a liberal thinker; two strikes against him. Henry, on the other hand was known for his anti-liberal views. Henry was able to win a following among other like minded political activists for passing his condemning forgery.

Unfortunately even though Henry’s forged documents were recognized for what they were by the French military, high ranking officials were able to cover up the evidence so they could make an example of Dreyfus. It’s fairly easy to see how the forged documents became central to his conviction. The anti-Dreyfusards as they became known, were out to prove that democracy and civil rights were inherently corrupt.

Dreyfus was ultimately proven to be innocent. The forgeries were uncovered and Hubert Henry was arrested in 1898. Henry chose to take his own life rather than face a trial.

However, the truth about Dreyfus and the revelation of the forgeries coming out did not decrease unethical behaviors by those who stood against democratic France.

A French author, critic and antisemite named Charles Maurras took up Henry’s cause after his suicide. Unconcerned with the facts of the forgery case, Maurras defended Henry and announced to the newspapers that Henry’s forgery was justified as a “patriotic forgery” thus inflaming the enthusiasm of anti-democratic protestors. Other anti-Dreyfusards wrote and published similar articles and as the writings multiplied so did attacks on Jewish people in France. Meanwhile conservative far right activists held sway over many in the public as they continued to organize and even to threaten war if the conviction against Dreyfus was overturned. Dreyfus was therefore re-convicted but little changed in the activities of the anti-Dreyfusards. (Dreyfus was finally cleared of wrongdoing and returned to the military in 1906.)

But here is the slowly evolving big deal though……

This seemingly isolated affair, the Dreyfus Affair, and the support for Charles Maurras, created excitement and reinforced many minds that were willing and already fearful that diversity, civil rights and secularism were corrupt ideals. Maurras was able to establish the anti-semitic, antidemocracy, proto-fascist Action Française movement, an influential right-wing monarchist political group in France responsible for waging violent attacks on democracy throughout Europe for nearly four decades.

How about one more “patriotic forgery, “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion?” This one hits close to home, you may be aware of some of the proclamations set forth in the document even if you don’t actually know of the Protocols. Put together in the early 20th century, this document falsely claims that Jews among others are plotting a world take over. Many frightened and twisted minds have been taken over by what they think is a rational revelation about Jews being bent on destroying the Christian civilization, and the means to this destruction is going to be through liberal and socialist ideas. I think of Bernie Sanders who hoped wealth could be better distributed, or how about the message in Acts from Gospel writer Luke about sharing Acts: 4:32-35……no one claimed private ownership of any possessions…. not a needy person among them…these ideas would certainly qualify under the Protocols as subversive messages.

A couple of famous followers of the “Protocols” Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels, are a more recent example of men who also knew the document they were following was forged. Like Maurras in his attacks on Dreyfus, Hitler and Goebbels were undaunted by the false “Protocols” papers. Goebbels’s biographer, Peter Longerich, wrote that the Nazi propaganda minister “accepted the ‘inner’ authenticity of the protocols” because the message was favorable to pushing the Nazis’ hyper-national patriotism. Hitler boldly claimed “Jews invented the mass seduction of liberal democracy.” Nazis used the “Protocols” to support their actions throughout the 1920s.

“The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” is a false document that lingers on into the 21st century and peppers present anti-democratic rhetoric. According to a Morning Consult Poll…nearly 80 percent of U.S. respondents who agreed with the “Protocols” also agree with QAnon, another “patriotic forgery” based on a conspiracy theory organized around undermining American democracy.

We know that fake news and conspiracy theories, are not necessarily subject to legal action, but forgeries are. Forgeries are a giant leap toward banking on the collapse of American legal institutions and processes.

Consider this: the fact is we have people in this country who feel justified in forging elector certificates to support a man, who against all the proof presented by the courts to the contrary, continues to refuse to accept this fact.

Consider this: the increase in the number of members of the Republican Party involved in antidemocratic activism indicates a dangerous move away from democracy toward their desired outcome of one party rule.

We live in a time of clashing ideologies about the meaning of democracy. We are making choices from within ourselves to change democracy as quickly as possible. There are people who say they want to take back this country… away from people of color, away from people with progressive ideas, away from civil rights leaders, away from anyone who does not espouse the views of white supremacy, take it back by refusing to turn over power to the duly elected president, take it back by limiting voting for the next election, take it back by rewriting history and not allowing teachers to teach anything but superficial lessons that will not disturb the vision of the far right and they're telling of the American story,

Consider: This highlights the danger American democracy continues to face and should be a serious wake up call to the reality that there are people among us who are counting on the collapse of America as a free nation. American Democracy rests upon the principles of majority rule and individual rights. ... a form of government in which power and civic responsibility are exercised by all adult citizens, people choose leaders by voting; every citizen should have the right to vote because in a democracy everyone should be treated equally and have equal rights.

Sister Margaret Joseph was right, if we don’t respect and work for the freedoms that we have, we will someday lose them.

Patricia Lennox
Potsdam