The Law: A Franc for France

Onto millions of French TV screens flashed the martial visage of Napoleon, resplendent in his braided uniform and two-cornered hat. Then the camera descended to bare thighs and legs furiously pumping a bicycle. Eh bien! Nappy was in a closely contested race, panting beside Marshals Ney, Murat and Massena. The Duke of Wellington was gaining fast amid cries that “The Englishman is right on our rear ends!” Worse, Nappy’s teammates refused to help when his front tire went pffft. “If I win at. Waterloo, I’ll give you a big share of the prize money,” whined the Emperor. Mais non! Who should hit the tape first at the Waterloo velodrome? That Prussian ringer, Marshal Blücher. Merde alors!

Saint Stripper. Most Gauls guffawed last March when France’s state-owned TV network spoofed two of the country’s solemn passions, Bonaparte and bicycle racing. But so outraged at the “indecent parody” was retired Toulouse Lawyer Francois Bousgarbiès, 79, that the peppery little patriot haled the network into court for what the French press gleefully called “the new Battle of Waterloo.” Demanded Plaintiff Bousgarbiès: the network must apologize to the nation, destroy the film and pay him 1 franc (20¢) in symbolic damages.

No enemy of topical TV farce, Bousgarbiès even suggested “a better subject”—a TV race between Charles de Gaulle and Ben Bella, both in shorts and “bicycling madly in the Algerian velodrome, with Ben Bella winning.” As for historical hilarity, Bousgarbiès said he could even stomach a current Paris revue that portrays Joan of Arc hearing those voices and then yanking a transistor radio out of her bodice. But tax-paid satire of Napoleon? “Scandalous,” bristled the aged avocat. “I would be just as upset to see Joan of Arc doing a striptease or Clemenceau wrestling on government television.”

Perpetual Glory. As the trial dawned in Toulouse last week, millions of Frenchmen were still reeling from what one proud Corsican politician called the “idiocy” of Lyndon Johnson’s recent reference to Napoleon as “a son of Italy.” Hundreds of irreverent students dressed up in Napoleonic hats and racing shorts pedaled endlessly around the courthouse. Inside, three costumed judges bravely subdued their grins, prepared to try the defamation of Napoleon under the Code Napoleon.

For the network, Defense Lawyer Yves Perisse scornfully declared that Plaintiff Bousgarbiès (who saw the show in a restaurant) did not even own a TV set, had not paid a TV tax, and thus had no right to complain of being “psychically traumatized.” Not only is it perfectly legitimate to satirize historic figures, said Perisse, but the Toulouse court lacked jurisdiction over a show originating in Paris. Equally scornful, Bousgarbiès’ lawyer, Georges Boyer, replied that the Code Napoleon entitles every Frenchman to bring suit in his own city. And Boyer solemnly added: “There is no statute of limitations on the historic glory of France. The plaintiff was sorely hurt in his deeply patriotic convictions.”

With French frugality, the judges will take several weeks to decide whether Bousgarbiès’ injury is worth 1 franc. Appeals may drag on for a year. Despite the general levity, though, Bousgarbiès has received hundreds of letters from French patriots who seem just as mad as Americans would be at a TV bike race between Abe Lincoln and Jeff Davis.