Thousands of French took to social media to express their pride after a top court ruled that a farmer who helped migrants enter France illegally had acted on the “principle of fraternity”, thereby reviving the very essence of France’s motto, reports FRANCE 24.
Just moments after Friday’s ruling by the Constitutional Council, the hashtag #fraternité (fraternity) started trending on Twitter, and by early afternoon it had garnered more than 3,000 mentions.
“Thanks to the Constitutional Court which by its decision means that France still remains (but for how long?) the country of human rights,” a Twitter user going by the handle Thierrydu12 wrote.
Paris’s Mayor Anne Hidalgo also took to Twitter to thank the court for “recalling the principle of #fraternity on the issue of receiving refugees and thereby strongly reaffirming the motto of our Republic”.
And green party (EELV) senator Esther Benbassa tweeted: “Fraternity. Against camps, walls, barbed wire and closed doors to migrants. Against persecution at every single moment. Against the criminalisation of solidarity … A fragile but real hope, against the dark wave sweeping over #Europe.”
Up until now, anyone assisting migrants to illegally enter France, or helping them move around once already in France, have faced up to five years in prison and €30,000 in fines.
Laurence Blisson, of France’s second largest magistrate’s trade union Syndicat de la Magistrature, told FRANCE 24 in an emailed response that the French court ruling is unique and could potentially pave the way for a more permissive view towards migrants, at least in France.
“It’s the first time that this principal has been recognised as such by a supreme jurisdiction, that is to say the freedom to help a person, without having to worry about whether he/she is illegally in France. It’s the first time this is being recognised as a constitutional right,” she said.
In August last year, French olive farmer Cédric Herrou was fined and handed a four-month suspended prison sentence for helping roughly 200 migrants illegally enter France from Italy, as well as sheltering many of them once they arrived in France.
But according to Friday’s ruling, the principle of fraternity – which along with the values of liberty and equality make up France’s revered, and constitutionally enshrined, motto – should have protected him from prosecution altogether.