Papers Relating to Foreign Affairs, Accompanying the Annual Message of the President to the Second Session Thirty-eighth Congress, Part IV
Mr. McMath to Mr. Seward.
Sir:Herewith I beg to enclose a copy and translation of a communication received from the governing committee of the Hebrew congregation of this city, (enclosure No. 1.)
I believe it unnecessary to enter into a lengthy detail of the cause of complaint, for I beg to presume you are already in possession of a communication from the same committee through the agency of the Jewish committee of New York. However, I feel it to be my duty to say that the representations made to the board of deputies in London and the Israelitish alliance in Paris, instead of mitigating, (if not from some other cause,) have certainly aggravated the condition of the Jews of this country.
I have expressed no opinion, but in the strictest sense have observed the rule of non-interference throughout. I await your instructions. Enclosed you will please find extracts from the Jewish Chronicle and Morning Advertiser, both London papers.
I have the honor to remain, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State.
[Enclosure No. 1.]
Sir: The governing committee of the Hebrew community of Tangier solicit, in the name of humanity, your good offices in behalf of our persecuted brethren in Morocco.
You will not ignore the Barbary cruelties, which, without any reference being had to the usual forms of justice, have lately befallen some of our brethren, and in consequence of which we have had recourse to the Board of Deputies of British Jews in London, as well as to the Central Consistory, and the “Alliance Universal Israelit at Paris,” which (corporations) have given effect to their customary zeal, and addressed themselves to their respective governments with a view to put a stop to the said act of persecutions.
It appears, however, that their action has had the effect of aggravating rather than mitigating the cruelties which are daily committed upon our co-religionists, and that this state of things is owing to the determination to show how little regard is paid to the representations made in England and France, and to the disapprobation expressed by the government and press of said nations.
Owing to the intervention of the representatives of foreign powers, many years have passed since the punishment by torture and unjust and barbarous proceedings have ceased in this country, as is proved by the fact that up to the time when these unfortunate Jews who had been accused at Saffi were subjected to a cruel death, and the recent bastinado infliction took place, without even a light cause, the penalty of death has not been for many years past carried into effect by the Moorish government on the persons of Jews, nor at Tangier, even, that of the bastinado; but unfortunately we see with much pain that this description of punishment has been re-established, and, what is more to be regretted, that this is done under the inspiration of the representative of a civilized nation. We cannot believe that this is done with the consent of the government of her Catholic Majesty, since in addition to the kindness, benevolence, and kind reception which our brethren who took refuge in their country received from her Majesty the Queen of Spain, her ministers, generals, officers and subjects, during the war, and the occupation of Zetnow, as well as from the unctionaries who have before now represented that government in Morocco, who (the latter) have always shown themselves to be the friends of the Jews, and favored our brethren whenever they had the occasion to apply for their good offices.
You are informed of the act of barbarity and tyranny committed two days ago upon two of our co-religionists, without sufficient cause. The same has been originated in a trifling dispute they had had with a groom of the Spanish minister, Señor Merry, which proceeding, according to the statement of the local authorities, took place at the instigation of her Catholic Majesty’s minister, and surprises us very much, as we cannot understand what the intentions may be of that legation and consulate, operating against a race so weak and defenceless as that of the Jews in Morocco.
Under these circumstances we implore you to take our case under consideration, to lend to us your well-known aid and protection, and adopt whatever measures may be necessary to do away with these acts of barbarity.
The object which we hope to attain we do not think we shall accomplish un less all the civilized powers interest themselves in our favor, and assist us to ward of the calamitous events with which our poor co-religionists, who are subjects to the jurisdiction of the Moorish government, are threatened. We therefore hope you will have the goodness to submit to your government this our [Page 416] bumble representation, and employ all your influence in order that the justice of our cause may be taken into consideration.
I avail myself of this opportunity to assure you, in the name of this committee, of our high and most sincere consideration.
I have the honor to be, sir, respectfully, your obedient servant,
[Seal of Hebrew Congregation, &c.]
MOSES PARIENTE, President pro tem.
Hon. Jesse H. McMath, Consul General for the U. S. of America in Morocco, Tangier.
P. S.—Equal representation has been made to all the representatives for foreign nations in this country.
I hereby certify that the above is a true and correct translation of the Spanish original.
Cruelties by Spanish officials.
An act of horrible and heathen atrocity has just been perpetrated only a narrow lattitude beyond the borders of Europe at the instigation of a Christian power. It will be the less astonishing, however, when we record the fact that this atrocious outrage against all human nature was committed by an agent of the country of the inquisition—Spain. We call attention to it in order that, if possible, the Spanish government may be brought to disavow the crime of its representative, a crime worthy of the most savage and gloomy tyrant that ever occupied the throne of Constantinople, or wallowed through a sullen career of slaughter in the blood-stained capital of the Persian Shahs. The Spanish receiver general of customs at Saffi, on the coast of Morocco, recently died, and upon a mere whisper of scandalous suspicion his servant, a Jewish youth, only fourteen years of age, named Jacob Benionda, was accused of having poisoned him. There was no post-mortem examination; there were no medical authorities called in; there was no judicial investigation whatever. The Spanish consul, in a fit of Popish fury, instantly, summarily, and peremptorily demanded that the poor Hebrew boy, with three of his co-religionists should be arrested and condemned. Accordingly, submissive to the fiat of this execrable little despot, the child was seized and tortured, until amid the shrieks and groans of his agony some vague and in all likelihood involuntary expressions escaped him, which the gloating consul of Spain at once distorted into a confession of guilt, and he forthwith demanded that the miserable mangled victim should be prepared for death. It was done at his behest; this functionary of a Christian nation stood by while the unhappy boy, protesting to the last breath of life his innocence, underwent the appalling doom prescribed for him by the consul of her Most Catholic Majesty to the cities on the shores of Morocco.
If the enormity had ended here, all Europe might have been justified in protesting against a deed of vengeance and injustice so utterly inconsistent with the decency, humanity, and civilization of the age. But the Spanish consul was not yet satiated with blood. Much more torture and much more death were necessary to appease and glut his indignant spirit. There was a man named Benelous whom it was his pleasure to charge as an accomplice of the child whose body lay mutilated in a pool of blood at the place of execution. This unhappy man was first submitted to a tremendous infliction of the bastinado as it has been inflicted from time immemorial in the most barbarous regions of Asia. The effect of this torture on the fla yed and bleeding soles of the feet is an anguish indescribable; and, as [Page 417] we shall reiterate again and again, a Christian official was standing by to witness and aggravate its administration. But that did not suffice. Poor Benelous, over whose writhings the Roman Catholic functionary of Spain so unctuously presided, remained inflexible. The bloody rod would not abate his protestations of guiltlessness in the matter of the Spanish collector general’s death. They next hung him up by the feet naked, and continued scourging him until, under the force of the blows, his body swayed to and fro like a pendulum. Still the miserable Jew persisted in declaring his innocence, with that of the youth and the two other men who had been impeached as his accomplices in a crime which had probably never been perpetrated at all. Then the bigotry of the Mohammedan reconciling itself with delight to the exulting and congenial fanaticism of the Roman Catholic, a third species of agony was invented for the deplorable victim. They thrust him, like Regulus, naked as he was, into a cask through the staves of which a thousand small and sharp nails inverted their lancet-like points, and, the barrel being violently rolled upon the ground, he endured a suffering which the human imagination fails to realize. At last, exhausted and maddened, delirious with pain, broken in spirit, and utterly reckless of results, he, to escape the terrible torture, shrieked out to his butchers something which they eagerly interpreted as a confession. The fate of the poor Jew was sealed. They dragged him to where the carcass of the young Benionda still lay shamelessly exposed, with a hundred traces of brutal cruelty upon it, and there a long, double-edged dagger was plunged, mercifully it may be said, from behind the left clavicle bone right through his heart, and the man was dead. [This is a mistake.]
Fancy, however, a Spanish gentleman, a Christian officer, a countryman of Cervantes, not only beholding, but urging on and insisting upon atrocities like these! Fancy him outdoing even the natural and hereditary barbarisms of Morocco, and that in the presence of a Spanish ship-of-war from whose mizzen flew a pennon which pretends to be the emblem of civilization! These acts ought not to pass without protest and execration. That boy and man were accused upon no evidence whatever, were literally tried upon the rack, were condemned by no legal tribunal, and were executed without having been judicially condemned. Suppose an English consul, upon a fanciful suspicion of some wrong done to a countryman, were to insist, in China, that a man should be buried up to his neck in the earth and bowled at, might he plead that such was the custom of the country, and that he was only exacting justice after the aboriginal fashion? We rather think that, if not hanged or condemned to chains for life, he would be permanently expelled from society; although we remember, with humiliation, that Cabrera has danced and been popular in English drawing-rooms. We may be reminded that there was an immense outcry, right or wrong, when Sir James Brooke began his crusade against the pirates of Borneo; but here we have the fiendish apathy of the savage executioner imported into Europe; for the Spanish consulate at Saffi, in Morocco, is virtually no less a part of Europe and beneath the jurisdiction of European and Christian law than Madrid itself. Both these laws, however—that of Europe, excepting Russia, and that of Christianity, with the same exception—have been flagrantly broken. And although the victims were two unfortunate and friendless Jews, belonging to a race which has not lately attracted very strongly the sympathies of the world, the flagitious conduct of the Spanish official was not mitigated by that fact. Spain, indeed, appears determined in isolating herself from among the progressing civilizations of the earth. The old gloomy rancor against religious liberty which once haunted the Escurial, and breathed itself forth in pitiful mutterings beneath those gorgeous cathedral roofs which an ignorant eye might deem dedicated to holier and nobler purposes, still haunts the stucco palaces in which Queen Isabella flaunts, despised and derided by the world. It was long ago said that she was the only continental monarch who would not dare to propose a visit to the pure Court of St. James. The teachings of her nefarious mother [Page 418] have made her the scorn of humanity; but if the agents of her ministers are permitted to wreak abroad cruelties copied from the Red Indian school, a still deeper degeneracy will become the characteristic of Spain. Is it not enough that the Bible is persecuted and prohibited as though it were an emanation from the spirit of evil, that free worship is denied to Christians, and that an illiterate, intolerant, and merciless priesthood, drugged with the refuse of middle-age legends, tyrannize over a peasantry whose condition, under the sway of a woman and a mother, is exemplified by the fact that they share the acorns of the Valencian hills with the swine that are happier than they? Is it not enough that Spain is the barbarous paradox of Europe, and that in her present state her population might almost yearn backwards towards the day of Cid? The Spanish kingdom is a vast, solemn, and mournful ruin, whose very monuments of ancient splendor contrast with the squalid intrigues, the degraded morals, the lost place in Europe, and the famished industry of Spain, in the nineteenth century; but are we to witness, as a climax of this melancholy decay, the breeding of another Spanish race, which shall go forth, as of old, in partibus infidelibus, to play the parts of hangmen and torturers, and even improve upon the cruelty which at all times has characterized the tyrants of Morocco?—Morning Advertiser.
Board of deputies.–Atrocities in Morocco.
The board held a special meeting on Thursday, the 8th instant, at the vestry rooms of the Spanish and Portuguese synagogue, Bevis Marks; the president pro tem., J. M. Montefiore, esq., in the chair.
The minutes of the last meeting having been read and confirmed, and the secretary having reported that £200 had, as a first instalment, been despatched to Turkey for the suffering co-religionists by the fire at Monastir,
The president explained that the meeting had been convened at an unusually short notice (24 hours) in consequence of a most urgent case detailed in the letter lying on the table. The Spanish original had been addressed to Sir Moses Montefiore, although intended for the board. It had reached the worthy baronet at his country seat, Ramsgate, in the course of the latter holidays; and its contents showing that not a moment was to be lost if the further execution of innocent men was to be prevented, he at once communicated with the Foreign Office, requesting Earl Russell to interpose in behalf of the innocent survivors in Morocco, condemned to death by the Spanish consul, and he had now the satisfaction of announcing that, in a prompt reply from the Foreign Office, Sir Moses was assured that telegrams had at once been forwarded to the proper officials in Morocco energetically to interfere in behalf of the prisoners. The meeting had been convened at the earliest day possible in order to ask it to ratify the steps taken by Sir Moses, and to adopt such additional measures as might be deemed expedient.
The secretary then read the translation of the Spanish letter, which was lengthy, and which gave minute details of the atrocities committed and of the fruitless steps taken by the Jewish communities and several consuls in order to induce the Spanish consul to delay the execution of the iniquitous sentence pronounced by him, until his government could be communicated with. The account of the cruelties resorted to by Señor Merry to extract from the prisoners a confession of the crime imputed to them, as well as the terrible and lingering death inflicted on them, extorted from this grave body a cry of horror, and, but for the irrefragable evidence lying before them, they would have been strongly disposed to disbelieve the statements made, as it was scarcely conceivable that the representative of a civilized nation could have indulged in such cruelties.
[Page 419]A vote of thanks was passed to Sir Moses Montefiore for his prompt action. It was further resolved to memorialize the Foreign Office on the barbarities committed on two innocent Jews at Tetuan, at the instigation of the Spanish vice-consul, and which were likewise detailed in the letter alluded to. It having transpired during the meeting that the lives of the two surviving prisoners in Morocco would be spared, in consequence of the representations made by Baron James de Rothschild, of Paris, to the Spanish government, it was resolved, before taking any further steps, to await additional information from Morocco, promised by the writer of the letter referred to. The meeting then separated.
We observe that we have omitted the various details given in the letter on the origin of these proceedings, and the means taken by Señor Merry to obtain his object, as we have, in another column, inserted communications addressed to us which give full particulars.
All accounts of these atrocities hitherto published by us have reached us through Jewish quarters, which may be suspected of partiality. We will, therefore, insert one emanating from a Christian residing at Mogadore, who gives it as he has heard it, evidently from those to whom the guilt or innocence of the prisoners is a matter of indifference. We may consider his version as that of Señor Merry’s partisans. We will not alter one single word in it. Let our readers judge in how far Señor Merry’s own version justifies his deeds. The Mogadore Christian writes: “A very shocking affair has occurred at Saffi, a town about sixty miles distant, which, if proved to be true, is very discreditable to the Jewish community of this country. The Spaniards have a Spanish collector of customs, and each port receives half-duties on account of the Moorish debt to them. In Saffi the collector was a gentleman about fifty years of age, and lately a colonel in the army. He resided by himself, having a couple of Jewish servants, one a lad of fourteen and the other a woman. It appears, so it is affirmed, that they conspired, with three or four others, to murder and rob him. They gave him arsenic, but as he, not liking the food, ate little of it, and it took no effect, they then gave him corrosive sublimate in some milk puddings, which effectually destroyed him: he died in three or four days. They have been taken on suspicion, and beaten. They then acknowledged and confessed to have been guilty. There are seven in prison—five Jews and two Jewesses. I think the authorities acted wrong in beating them till they confessed, as it is very likely the lash would make them confess to almost anything. The body ought to have been analyzed. They await the decision of the Emperor, at Tangiers. I expect they will be decapitated; but I believe there is a great deal of poisoning carried on in this country.”
The atrocities on the cost of Morocco.
To the Editor of the Jewish Chronicle:
My Dear Sir: I have further details to hand on the tragedy and outrages at Saffi, Tangier, and Tetuan. I enclose translation of the copy of letter I read to you addressed by Messrs. S. Benhayon and Haim Labos from Tangier to Mr. Judah de Azar Serfaty, Gibraltar, whose hearts bleed at seeing our brethren of Morocco so much exposed to the repetition of scenes so awful and disgraceful. Poor Morocco Jews! their lot is most distressing, inasmuch as they are living in a country where the local government is quite a nullity. The Tetuan congregational committee are cautious how they complain; this, of course, arising from that timidity which is so natural to a people who have no rights to protect them and no laws to apply to for redress whenever they are so very roughly handled. They are now afraid of exciting the resentment of the Spanish representative at Tangier, or that of his subalterns along the coast, as these [Page 420] have always opportunities to avenge themselves upon individuals. They are invariably acting most arbitrarily in that country, actually trampling upon sovereign rights. It is to be wondered that the representatives of Great Britain and France should show themselves so indifferent, and tolerate gross injustices so revolting to every feeling person. The general opinion, however, is, that if Sir John Drummond Hay, her Britannic Majesty’s minister, had been at Tangier perhaps these awful occurrences might not have taken place; but he was absent.
The Sultan is said to be a good and most affable person, and that he loves the Jews; but he is so weak-minded, and dreads war so much, that he cannot evince his sense of justice to the Jews when a foreign consul demands, with or without a cause, their punishment. He is in a most critical position, as it is said, “between the sword and the wall,” especially as he has made it a rule to avoid the least imbroglios with foreign nations, thinking that by this policy he will obviate every possibility of aggressions upon his dominions by European powers. Some of the representatives, as well as their countrymen, whose mischievous propensities blind them, take advantage of this known weakness, and the former and the latter have become so many petty despots, and the evil-disposed never lack opportunities in which they make sad use of the uncontrolled power of their unscrupulous consuls to gratify their resentment by basely avenging the least pretended personal offences, forcing the local government, which is only their tool, to be the executive of their malicious machinations and artful devices. The Moors know nothing of the European machinery of justice, and literature and journalism are quite sealed books to them. This fact led the European powers to stipulate by clauses in their treaties with that empire, investing thereby their consuls with judicial authority in questions wherein their respective subjects might be concerned. But at present the native Jews have no appeal whatever for wrongs endured, nor any claims to fair play. Consequently they are openly trodden down with barefaced impunity by all parties, and their lives, liberty, and possessions are totally disregarded; naturally they live in constant dread. Even those Jews who are protected by consuls are likewise haunted by that fear, lest they should lose that protection by incurring the least displeasure of their protectors.
Hence they must adopt every mean artifice, if necessary, in order to ingratiate themselves, and thus obtain protection for their persons, families, and possessions. This frightful state of things, some believe, might be easily removed if proper measures were taken by the board of deputies for the establishment of a competent tribunal, composed of three or more of the consuls, for instance the English, French, and Italian, to take cognizance of important matters affecting the Jews, who would thus be relieved from that timidity which degrades them; and it would be the most efficacious check upon that tyranny and despotism created by the uncontrolled actions of some of the consuls along the coast, when Jews or even Moors are concerned, inasmuch as they are now perfectly irresponsible for the awful consequences arising from that unnatural assumed power so recently displayed, as we see it, in the tragedy of Saffi and Tangier, in which two lives have been sacrificed after enduring torments too harrowing to be detailed; and though dying innocently as they did, what redress can their bereaved and afflicted families obtain? Public opinion, no doubt, will be telling in this case, but it is necessary that the European press should take up the matter, and this will promote the endeavor to place the native Jews under the control of a properly constituted tribunal in cases, at least, where corporal or capital punishments are involved.
Yours, truly,
[Translation of letter.]
Dear Sir and Esteemed Friend:By your letter to our friend, Mr. S. Benhayon, we are informed of the great zeal and warmth with which our countrymen have taken up the disastrous catastrophe which occurred on the 10th instant. [It was on the 13th.] Mr. S. Benhayon and myself have written to M. Cremieux, president of the Universal Israelitish Alliance, communicating to him all that has taken place. At the same time we acquaint you with the deeds of the minister of her Catholic Majesty, Sir Don Francisco Merry y Colon, who, knowing the weak points of the Moroqueen government, which has latterly succumbed to the force of arms, and which is smarting painfully from the payment of the indemnity, bends to everything that is asked for; and the consul, prompted by his pride, imposes capricious laws without justice, (and there are facts to prove it.) I shall speak out without reserve—these are the deeds of the people in charge of her Catholic Majesty’s legation in this country; hence he demanded the immolation of those two victims against all law. The confession of these has been extorted by the rack, calling to mind the latter part of the 15th century, and resuscitating Fray Tomas de Torquemada, who has been dead 365 years. There are rumors to-day in Saffi and here that it is not certain that the collector died from the effects of poison, but from illness. There was no post-mortem examination, although two governments’ surgeons were taken there for that purpose; but Señor Merry would not allow it, alleging that the prisoners had already confessed. The young man of fourteen years, Jacob Benyudah, confessed under palos, (lashes or cudgelling,) and, as he lacked experience, he caught at the offers of liberty that were made to him. He made six declarations, each different from the other. They did not take his tender age into consideration, but subjected him to a horrible death, mutilating his body.
The other atrocity is their having brought the second supposed criminal to be executed here, among a population which had not any complicity in the supposed crime. He confessed under the following tortures: 1. He suffered with fortitude and patience a great number of lashes, and without confessing. 2. He was hung with his head downwards, yet remained firm. 3. He was put into a box, with the points of nails inside, piercing his body. Under this infamous and fatal torture he shrieked in desperation, “I have killed ten, not one.” This was taken as a confession, and he was sentenced to death. Horror! there must have been thirst for Hebrew blood.
Immediately, and without the loss of a second, after the unfortunate Elias Beneluz was executed, we took possession, almost a viva fuerza, of the body, head, and blood of our brother, having during the execution administered the religious consolation of the Shemang. As soon as Señor Merry knew this he sent a message to the governor, asking why he allowed the Jews to possess themselves of the executed so soon, when he ought to have left him cast on the ground, exposed to the public gaze, for at least two hours. This is, dear brethren, the clemency and grace to be obtained from the petrified heart of Señor Merry.
To corroborate the deeds of these employés, I shall tell you that at Tetuan, on the eve of Rosh Hashana, a robbery was committed in a shop belonging to a Spaniard, in which an old shoe was found. Señor Fantom, the Spanish vice-consul, repaired to the governor, demanding the punishment of the thieves. The governor sent for all Jewish shoemakers. On presenting themselves, he asked who made the shoe that was found. One replied, “Sir, it is mine.” The governor dismissed the others and sent this one to prison. Then the vice-consul accused a young man, a Jew, who was formerly a servant to the Spaniard. He was produced and sent to prison. On Wednesday after Rosh Hashana they were taken to the meshuar, in the presence of the governor, who ordered the man to [Page 422] say to whom he had sold the shoe, since he knew it was his own making. “Sir,” he answered, “it is impossible for me to bring to recollection to whom I sold it, as I am an old man, and as I make many every day and sell them. It is impossible for me.” The governor, not satisfied with this, nor the vice-consul either, and seeing that the young man made no confession, shut them up in the meshuar, and they were punished with the lash. On the report going abroad, the young man’s father came to implore mercy in behalf of his son, but the soldiers at the gates opposed his entrance; and on his insisting, a soldier came up to him with a cudgel, and with one blow inflicted a severe wound on his head. The unfortunate man fell senseless to the ground, was thence taken to the hospital, and is said to be in danger.
Hasten, dear brethren, to use without delay, and with ardor, all the means that your intelligence may suggest. Do not depend on the gentlemen of this Junta. They do not possess the energy or unanimity so much required. They are full of dread lest they should come into collision with one or the other government. There being no unanimity for any purpose, the spirit evaporates, the energy. is lost, and the affair dies out.
In us the Jewish blood boils, more so when we think of the blood of our brethren shed. God will help you, dear brethren, and we trust that the Lord of the universe will help you on in your good deeds, and from our home we shall pray for your prosperity.
We are your humble servants,
Señor Don Judah de Azar Serfaty.
Cruelties by Spanish officials.
The first impression produced on our mind by the report of the proceedings of the board of deputies, and the perusal of the letter on the same subject, inserted in another column, is no doubt that which they will make on every one of our readers. We saw Spain as of old revived—cruel, fanatic, and panting after the blood of unbelievers. The spirit of the sanguinary visigoths, with its fierce war of extermination against the Jews, strode once more over the blood-stained soil of the peninsula, and, finding no longer victims at home, sought them on the coast beyond the Straits of Gades. It seemed as though Spain’s darling institution— the inquisition—unable to gratify again the eyes of the faithful with the pleasing sight of racked and burnt heretics either in Europe or America, had transferred its seat to the country of the Moors, and there commissioned Torquemada Redivivus to renew his atrocities. It seemed all but impossible to believe that the representative of a power within a few hours’ sail from his government should have dared, on his own authority, to torture and butcher persons accused of a crime for which there is not a tittle of evidence, save the admission extorted by the rack from the prisoners, and for the commission of which no reasonable motive could have existed. Yet, on the other hand, how is it conceivable to suppose that these crimes against helpless individuals should have been sanctioned by a goverment which only four short years ago evinced so much humanity toward Jewish fugitives from the same coast, who sought, and found, temporary safety on Spanish ground, and which so efficiently protected the Jewish inhabitants of Tetuan while the city was occupied by its troops? By what process of reasoning can be reconciled the line of conduct pursued by the same government in releasing from their confinement Spanish subjects guilty of the crime of having propagated heresy at home, with that prescribing the extermination [Page 423] of unbelievers abroad, who never owed allegiance to the Spanish crown? Would it not be sheer madness, in a great nation just emerging from an unparalleled state of prostration and barbarism, the consequence of the terrible crimes of the past of which it is now conscious, striving hard for its rehabilitation, and taking again its stand by the side of Europe’s mightiest states, to rouse the indignation of the civilized world by misdeeds that might throw doubts on its resolution to break forever with the ignominious past, and represent all its modern enlightened institutions as a mere sham, as a slight varnish intended to conceal the dark ground-color, and thus to alienate from it that public opinion which within the last few years began to veer round, and to believe in the extinction of the race of those delighting in the shrieks of men and women—ay, of youths and maidens—expiring in the flames?
In this perplexity of deciding whether the Spanish representative at Tangier, in enacting the tragedy described elsewhere, proceeded on his own sole personal responsibility, without communicating previously with his government, or turned torturer and murderer by direct orders of his superiors—there being no tertium medium—we prefer the former explanation, presenting as it does less insuperable difficulties than the second alternative. Individual fanatics, even in authority, have unfortunately existed under liberal governments even in modern times. Some twenty-three years ago the chief agent in the atrocities then perpetrated on innocent Jews in another Mahometan city, through the instrumentality of a Mahometan court of justice, was the representative of enlightened France. If Damascus had its Ratti-Menton, who, armed with the power of the mighty nation represented by him, lashed, racked, and tortured to his heart’s desire, until he extorted the confession of the murder of a man of whom it has never been proved that he was murdered, why should not Tangier be afflicted with a Merry, following in the same bloody track in order to avenge the death of a man of whom it has not even been shown that he died by any other means save the visitation of God? There is a circumstance inclining us still more to the alternative adopted. The Spanish government, at the intercession of Baron James de Rothschild, through its ambassador at Paris, we learn, at once interposed, ordering the lives of the two prisoners, still in the power of Señor Merry’s Moroqueen hangman, to be spared. It is not likely that the Spanish government would have so quickly complied with the request of the Baron had the execution of the two murdered prisoners taken place by the direct order of his superior authorities, as stated by Señor Merry to his colleagues of Italy, France, and England, when they urged him to defer the carrying out of the iniquitous sentence pronounced by him until the ministry could be communicated with.
But this explanation proposed by us, however plausible, must remain a conjecture as long as the Spanish government does not express by an overt act its disapprobation of the proceedings taken by its representative, washing its hands publicly of the innocent blood shed by him, and which cries up for vengeance from the ground which has opened its mouth to receive it. If the Spanish government wishes to clear itself from the very suspicion of having in any way participated in this terrible crime—if it wishes convincingly to prove that the order to spare the lives of the two survivors, still in prison, is not the consequence of second thought, of a vague dread of Europe’s public opinion horrified at such deeds, reminding of the darkest century of the dark middle ages—it cannot allow matters to rest where they are; it cannot, for its own credit, but institute a rigid inquiry into the proceedings taken by its representative, and cannot but preliminarily remove him from a post which he has so sadly disgraced, for which he has proved himself so wofully incompetent, and which, if he be permitted to retain, would unfortunately offer to him such a vast field for other outbursts of his fierce fanaticism. These are matters of the utmost gravity, deserving the earnest consideration of the Spanish government. But the families of the victims of its representative have also a duty to perform. They are most concerned by [Page 424] the crime committed; they are the chief sufferers. They are, therefore, primarily called upon to vindicate the cause of justice, to protect their community from similar atrocities, and to obtain for themselves compensation, in as far as pecuniary compensation can atone for the terrible wrong inflicted.
Señor Merry is a Spaniard, and as such amenable to the law of his country. We are not acquainted with this law. But as the country of a civilized nation, claiming kindred with the civilized nations of the earth, it must be governed by a code which offers the innocently persecuted legal means to call the wrong-doer to an account, and to obtain redress for just grievances. Surely the Spanish law cannot permit a man to be charged with poisoning when there is no proof that anybody has been poisoned. Surely the Spanish law does not permit a prisoner to be tortured, in order to extort a confession; nor can it receive such a confession as evidence, and still less inflict capital punishment on such evidence. All this, however, Señor Merry has done. His own will has been a law to him, for he has set aside both the procedure of the country in which he is, and of that which he represents. Surely the circumstance that these atrocities were not enacted on Spanish soil cannot insure to him impunity, and still less so the fact that he commissioned Moroqueens, and not Spaniards, with the perpetration of the crime. Spain has a law, and by this he must be judged. Our earnest advice, therefore, to the families of the victims is to appeal to the law. This may be expensive; but the congregation of Tangier offered to pay to the Spanish consul any sum he might ask as a ransom for the lives of the two murdered persons. Let the sum which the congregation was ready to pay as a ransom be employed in the legal proceedings which we advise. And if an appeal by the families of the victims were made to Europe, we have no doubt but it would be responded to. The necessary funds for defraying the cost of the trial would be forthcoming, and contributions might even be expected from liberal-minded Spaniards. We should not be afraid of the issue of such a trial. We have full confidence in the sense of justice of the Spanish tribunals, which would thus have an opportunity afforded for vindicating the national character, and wiping out the blot with which the lawless proceedings of the representative of the country has stained it.
But even if, contrary to all expectations, the course of justice should be obstructed, the criminal protected, and the innocent condemned, the attempt at seeking redress would not be without advantage; for there is a tribunal higher than any court of justice, which can neither be blinded by corruption, intimidated by dictates of tyranny, nor misled by the sophisms of special pleadings. This tribunal is the supreme court of public opinion, which, heedless of any other sentence, would decide that a man who in the second half of the nineteenth century accuses before it has been proved that a crime was committed, tortures in order to extort a confession of guilt, condemns on such evidence, and at last kills in virtue thereof, is, in the eyes of God and the laws of all civilized nations, worse than he that should waylay his victim, pounce upon and assassinate him. No amount of evidence brought forward after the deed could justify the deed itself, since every man must be held as innocent until he has been proved guilty by the laws of the country which judge him; and no amount of evidence brought forward after the deed would be free from the grave and well-founded suspicion of having been moulded, twisted, and perverted, if not devised for the very purpose of justifying the crime. The verdict of public opinion, therefore, could not be doubted. Such a trial, whatever its issue, would further serve as a check upon the lawless proceedings of unprincipled Europeans, in authority or not, who we are assured, as matters now stand on the coast of Morocco, but too often work on the fears of the Moors, using them as tools, in order to lord it, for purposes of their own, over the unfortunate Jews. These Europeans would find that, although not amenable to the laws of Morocco, they can yet be reached by those of their own country, and the wholesome dread that it might not [Page 425] always be to the interest of their country to throw over lawless men the mantle of her protection would not lose its effect.
In whichever aspect, therefore, we regard the counsel which we tender our Moroqueen brethren, we cannot but earnestly urge it on their attention. Their own government would have no reason to prevent them from pursuing a course which their own safety requires, which liberal Europe would applaud, and in which they might look forward to the energetic support of all friends of justice, and of all enemies of fanaticism, be they Jews or Gentiles.—Jewish Chronicle and Hebrew Observer, October 16, 1863.