Letter to Émile Armand on the Bonnot Trial

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 22, 1913

My Dear Armand:

I have before me your letter of … and the information I asked you for. I love the frankness with which you discuss our defense. I’ve never taken offense at any criticism that might be made of me concerning my words and acts as long as they’re friendly and cordial, as is the case here.

But how difficult it is to avoid misunderstandings! And how wrong you and the comrades are concerning our sentiments. Of course we want to live again soon, have the passionate desire to see the end of this imbecilic and undeserved nightmare if ever there was one. But it seems to me that everything in our previous attitude must tell you that in order to reach a good end we will do nothing and will not allow anything to be done that is contrary to our sentiments. What do I have to say? I admit that I find all this infinitely disagreeable.

Already, in the previous detailed letters, I laid out our defense to you, for up until now I’ve been in perfect agreement with Rirette. On the whole it will not be modified. And if you didn’t give me your opinion, Philippe, who read my manuscript, found nothing wrong with it. So I think that all your fears and the remarks they lead you to make grow out of misunderstandings about us that are created from without, but without our knowing about it.

Of course the courtroom will be neither the time nor the place to discuss illegalism. And I don’t plan on doing that. No, we don’t plan on doing that. But if the indictment tries to say that I am in solidarity with acts I find repugnant (and this is the mot juste) then I will have to explain myself. In that case you can rest assured that I will do it in terms clear enough that they won’t be able to use my words against our fellow defendants. I wouldn’t have taken the trouble of weighing every word during the investigation for fear of implicating some unfortunate comrade to then provide the attorney general with weapons against them. And if they were to want to make use of some possible slip, I would know how to rectify it. It’s not concern for my interests that makes me refuse an imposed solidarity at whatever the cost. If it was only a matter of my interests the defense would be able to get around the difficulty. But no. It’s that I am—we are—sickened, saddened to see that comrades, comrades for whom I’ve had affection since the time of their original and beautiful enthusiasm, were able to commit acts as shameful as the butchery of Thiais. I am saddened to see that the others, all the others, madly threw away and wasted their lives in a sad, dead-end fight that beneath an appearance of courage they are unable to defend with pride.

I will seek to avoid discussing or having discussed by M. Le Breton in the courtroom the question of illegalism, about which these sorrows seem to have given a too obvious conclusion. If I’m not able to I will not say this. I will limit myself to proving that I never advocated or was even a supporter of that theory. I will add that I nevertheless wanted to defend the rebels every time it had to be done.

If I am soon free it goes without saying that I will explain myself on this subject without beating around the bush. I believe it is necessary, after these experiences, to reach a conclusion. I regret not having done this in the past. Perhaps if I’d been firmer Valet would be alive and poor Soudy free. I simply lacked combativeness.

And yet, you write me:

“They can still object after your articles in l’anarchie, invoking certain details of your past that …”

No they couldn’t. If I allowed myself before the jury to judge the acts of comrades who are no longer enemies in their ideas but “the crushed,” to use Méric’s term, they could certainly object to many things I say.

But if I say that I’ve never been the supporter of a disastrous method of action, if I say it later, as I count on doing, of if I’m forced to say it to the jury, there can be no objections to what I say because it’s true. My articles in l’anarchie? Have I ever done anything but defend the illegalists or make use of circumstances to make known our way of reasoning and the legitimacy of all revolts (which doesn’t mean I advocate all of them)? Didn’t I write in the most combative of them (“The Bandits”) that “the bandits are the effects of causes situated beyond them?”

At the Libre-Recherche, at the Causeries Populaires (rue de Clignancourt) in Romainville, in many talks I said how much I dreaded illegalism. I obviously couldn’t insist, given that I would have had to back my arguments with documents that have no place in public meetings. I opposed Lorulot on this theme on an evening which the comrades must remember. (And that time I had three opponents, our excellent Fallières—five years, Valet—dead, Jacob—in custody in Mantes.) Don’t you remember that at the time of your first visit to Romainville we spoke of illegalism and I told you I had many reasons to be against it? A bit before taking over the editorship of the paper the publication of an article by me on this subject that was very clear, too clear, was refused. And a few days before my arrest I explained to Liénard (of La Vie Anarchiste) why paper I didn’t want to publish my feelings about illegalism in our paper. He even offered to have Butaud insert in his paper the copy I’d showed him.

You see that nothing either from my articles or my past can “be invoked,” This in any case constitutes a chapter about which I will allow no discussion. Without being a supporter of wage labor I have been paid wages. Without being a supporter of theft I might have been forced to make use of it. This concerns only me. If people want to discuss my ideas, I desire it. If they want to discuss my acts, which concern only me, I will not allow it. In other words, I allow people to speak and to speak ill; I don’t agree to discuss.

What I remind you of above is only to show you that you shouldn’t see any “change in attitude” in our conduct, as you write.

And even if there was a change in attitude this would be understandable. The experiences that we have just been through are made to abolish illusions and to rectify theories. Alas! But in this case it is obvious that I wouldn’t have the right to say I never advocated and even fought against such misguided ways and ideas among us. And I would be scrupulous enough toward myself to not allow myself to do so.

If I can eventually speak in this way it’s because it is perfectly exact. A number of comrades know this and I think you are among them.

Do me the favor of making this letter known to the comrades with whom you discussed our defense.

As I was ending this I received a note from Rirette where she expresses precisely this opinion, that we should not enter into explanations of this nature unless we are forced to.

Attached are a few copies for Les Réfractiares. It does me good to use some of my notes (four short articles). If I’m not too preoccupied—impatience—I will talk to you about your newspaper. Continue sending it to M. Le Breton.

I’ll send you a letter for publication after the trial in case I am acquitted: I give myself sixty chances out of a hundred. Not one more.

Yours,

Le R

P.S. Important. Attached are two questions (information) to which an answer is urgent.