Volume 4 No 1 - Journal for the Study of Antisemitism

268 JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF ANTISEMITISM [ VOL. 4:259
the desire for justice and restoration of truth and the good name of his family,
who suffered with him before and after his death on account of a disgraceful
decision.
Then, even more surprising, the opinion that led to the decision
rejecting the request of the widow supposedly uncovers a discrepancy
between the facts alleged and what happened in 1937, expressly stating that
“the problem the petitioner focused on in the spirit of Decree Law no. 173/
74, of cases of political and religious segregation, especially when occurring
at a time when, as is generally known, antisemitism raged in Europe,
have much interest in being discussed; however, the facts would completely
refute such a claim.”
And then, in section 4 of the same opinion, it is clarified to what extent
the decision of the Supreme Council of Military Discipline of 1937 had
been substantiated by facts different from those in the application of
Azancot Lea Monteiro Barros Basto, “the facts justifying the decision,
which came to be approved by ministerial decree, render themselves into
homosexual practices with several students of the Israeli Theological Institute
of Porto, of which he was the director, which practices were maintained
for a long time—over two years and less five—which have nothing to do
with the ceremonies prescribed by the Semitic religion.”
It should be noted that this decision of 1975 was not elaborated in the
same context of antisemitic hatred that characterized the thirties in the
twentieth century in most of Europe (although such an environment can
never serve as a mitigating factor), but in a period of post revolution after
April 25, 1974, in which Portugal woke up to freedom and respect for fundamental
rights, values that today color our rule of law, making this decision
a historical and legal paradox very difficult to understand.
The author of the opinion/decision of 1975 wanted to avoid the issue
of political and religious segregation, perhaps realizing that it blurred the
decision of the Supreme Council of Military Justice, 1937. He exerted all
his argumentative strength in focusing it on the facts of homosexual practices,
abjuring, as expressly and irrevocably illegitimate, all evidence taken
in 1937 by the Supreme Council. He distorted the facts and remade them as
he thought best to defeat the petition of the widow of Barros Basto. As
already stated, the opinion/decision constitutes a second conviction, much
more than a confirmation of the first and in an impossible parallel position
with it.
c) Human rights and fundamental rights affected
The classical distinction between human rights and fundamental rights
results from the different legal and historical perspectives into which these