Shoot the Messenger?

Judge Baltasar Garzon achieved international prestige in 1998 when he pursued the perpetrators of crimes committed in Argentina against Spanish citizens and began proceedings for the arrest of the Chilean ex-dictator Augusto Pinochet. But when he transferred his attention to his Spanish homeland he was put on trial for opening an investigation into crimes committed by Francoists. As result he now (February 2012) finds himself on the point of being expelled from the judiciary. The Garzon case is neither so absurd nor so difficult to understand if the record of the Spanish judiciary is examined through the prism of a series of representative cases since the transition to democracy. Key is the way the judiciary has dealt with those who have investigated cases of people murdered by the military rebels from July 1936 onwards. This book relates thirteen judicial cases that took place between 1981 and 2012. They range from the banning of the documentary film Rocio by Fernando Ruiz Vergara, because it named the person responsible for one of the massacres in southwest Spain, to the recent trial of Judge Garzon. The judicial outcome in each case reflected the prejudices and ideology of the judge in charge. The Francoist repression still constitutes a dead weight in Spanish politics as heavy as the gravestone that covers the remains of the dictator in the Valle de los Caidos. The nature of the transition from autocracy to democracy has made it difficult to overcome a black past that not even the post-Franco democratic governments -- Rodriguez Zapatero's "memory" policy included -- have dared confront. The potential defrocking of Judge Garzon puts the Spanish polity/judiciary back in the realm of Franco's end-of-year message on December 30, 1969, with what became the nautical catch-phrase of his twilight years, "all is lashed down and well lashed down" (todo ha quedado atado, y bien atado).

“"In conclusion, there are various reasons this book should be considered required reading. I will stress only two of them. In the first place because, by highlighting some aspects the Transition left open and unresolved, it emphatically contradicts those who sing the praises of that Transition. The author reminds us that the Transition armor plated the "right to honor" of Spanish fascism, leaving its memory intact, while it forgot the "right to honor" and restitution of the victims of the long and terrible military dictatorship. In the second place, this book offers solid legal arguments to put a stop to the lawsuits and trials against historians some of them still in progress who, with absolute respect for the methodological principles that should guide historiographical endeavors, continue dedicating their time and energy to rescue the victims of the Francoist repression from oblivion and silence. Historians who, by their labors, contribute in a decisive manner to building a democratic memory that is respectful of human rights." … We owe that to the persons whose personal and family tragedies are described in these pages." -Rafael Escudero Alday, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid”

"In conclusion, there are various reasons this book should be considered required reading. I will stress only two of them. In the first place because, by highlighting some aspects the Transition left open and unresolved, it emphatically contradicts those who sing the praises of that Transition. The author reminds us that the Transition armor plated the "right to honor" of Spanish fascism, leaving its memory intact, while it forgot the "right to honor" and restitution of the victims of the long and terrible military dictatorship. In the second place, this book offers solid legal arguments to put a stop to the lawsuits and trials against historians - some of them still in progress - who, with absolute respect for the methodological principles that should guide historiographical endeavors, continue dedicating their time and energy to rescue the victims of the Francoist repression from oblivion and silence. Historians who, by their labors, contribute in a decisive manner to building a democratic memory that is respectful of human rights." ... We owe that to the persons whose personal and family tragedies are described in these pages." --Rafael Escudero Alday, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

Francisco Espinosa-Maestre is a Spanish historian based in Seville. He has published various works on the Second Spanish Republic, the Spanish Civil War, Franco's repression and historical memory -- especially on the territory of Andalusia and Extremadura.

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