THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE RESOLUTION AND THE PERILS OF STATE-SPONSORED HISTORY
JURIST
Oct 11 2007
JURIST Guest Columnist Dr. Laurent Pech, Jean Monnet Lecturer in
European Union Law at the National University of Ireland, Galway,
says that the experience of France – and some principled reflections –
should make the US House of Representatives think twice before adopting
any resolution labelling the early twentieth-century killings of
Armenians in the Ottoman Empire (now Turkey) as "genocide"…
To quote Justice Stewart, the "camel’s nose is in the tent." Indeed,
the 110th US Congress appears willing to follow in the footsteps of
the French Parliament by attempting to legislate on past historical
events. The numerous advocates of House Resolution 106, the so-called
"Affirmation of the United States Record on the Armenian Genocide
Resolution", want the US President to acknowledge that the mass
killings of Armenians committed in Turkey between 1915 and 1923
constitute, this is the controversial aspect, a "genocide", i.e. the
intentional destruction, in whole or in part, of a national, ethnic,
racial or religious group.
This attempt to use the force of the law to promote a particular
historical interpretation is reminiscent of the 2001 French law which
acknowledges the existence of the Armenian genocide in 1915. One may
hope, however, that Resolution 106 will not have the votes to pass
on the House floor and that history will be left to historians.
Principled and pragmatic reasons may be offered to justify this view.
One should note, in passing, that I do not intend to debate here
whether the term "genocide" – a crime under international law since
1948 – is the accurate term to a posteriori characterize the 1915-1923
massacres. My general position is that no Parliament should legislate
to promote or worse, enforce particular historical truths.
In France, the statutory characterization of the mass slaughter of
Ottoman Armenians as a genocide led to the introduction in 2006 of
several bills (yet to be adopted) whose purpose was to punish with
criminal sentences those who "dispute" this characterization. Such
content-based prohibition on free speech is certainly and thankfully
unthinkable in the US, since the First Amendment precludes the
government from prohibiting "the expression of an idea simply because
society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable" (Texas
v. Johnson, 491 US 397, at 414). Yet, the "mere" statutory recognition
of the Armenian genocide may encourage diverse groups to lobby the
US Congress to have their historical narratives enshrined in the law.
Generally speaking, it is important to be wary about the slippery
slope effect of such laws. And indeed, the French Parliament, since
it first acknowledged the existence of the Armenian genocide, seems
to have found a new raison d’etre in legislating with the view of
promoting and eventually compelling people to accept state-sponsored
historical interpretations. For instance, another law passed in
2001 obliges people to describe the slave trade as "a crime against
humanity" and a provision of a 2005 law – later struck down by the
French constitutional court – also required school history teachers
to stress the "positive aspects" of French colonialism.
The American congressional resolution may also be opposed on the
grounds that no individual country has the moral authority to sanction
particular historical truths regarding events in which it is not,
directly or indirectly, involved. On the contrary, what I would call
"historical imperialism", the action of legislating to sanctify a
particular interpretation of a past event which took place in another
country, appears to be counterproductive. First of all, historical
imperialism may lead to a vicious circle where each country tries
to expose each other’s past crimes and hypocrisy. For instance,
Turkey may be tempted to push for the adoption of bill aimed at
punishing anyone who does not characterize as genocide the killings of
Algerians under French colonial rule or the mass slaughter of American
Indians by European settlers. Secondly, the passing of time and the
promotion of free speech values is more likely to help the Turks to
"arrive at the truth on their own" as a former chief of Armenia’s
National Security Council put it. The French Republic, known for its
persistent refusal until 1995 to recognize the responsibility of the
French State in the deportations of French Jews to Nazi Germany under
the Vichy regime (1940-44), would have been well-advised to show more
self-restraint. The atrocities committed against the Armenians in
Turkey took place before Ataturk proclaimed the Turkish Republic. If
the French Republic could distance itself from the actions of the Vichy
regime, the Turkish Republic should also be entitled to distance itself
from the actions of the so-called Committee of Union and Progress at
the time of the Ottoman Empire.
If the causes of historical truth and the prevention of future
genocides are the genuine concerns of those in favor of adopting
Resolution 106, strict adherence to human rights standards at home and
the non-selective defense of those standards abroad would certainly
constitute a wiser policy than legislating on other countries’
historical misdeeds.
Laurent Pech is Jean Monnet Lecturer in European Union Public Law
at the National University of Ireland, Galway and the author of a
comparative study (in French) on the right to free speech in the
US and in Europe: La liberte d’expression et sa limitation (PU
Clermont-Ferrand/LGDJ, Paris, 2003). He is currently preparing an
article on the 2007 EU framework decision on racism and xenophobia.
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