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Grandjean's Appeal - The Outline of the Defense

Friday, October 14, 2022 - 08:00

This is a relatively short installment because I want to put each of the lawyer's points into it's own installment.

Major category: 
Full citation: 

Vermeil. 1765. Mémoire pour Anne Grandjean. Louis Cellot, Paris.

Publication summary: 

The original text, translation, and commentary on the appeal record of Anne Grandjean against a charge of "profaning the sacrament of marriage" by marrying a woman.

Appeal

MOYENS.

L’Accusé demande à être renvoyé de l'accusation intentée contre lui, & cette accusation le suppose profanateur du Sacrememt de mariage. Il faut donc établir, pour la justification de l’Accusé, qu'il ne s'est point rendu coupable de cette profanation.

MEANS.

The Accused asks to be dismissed from the charge brought against zir, and this charge presupposes that he is a profaner of the Sacrament of Marriage. It must therefore be established, for the justification of the accused, that he was not guilty of this profanation.

{HRJ: One thing I’d like to pause to notice here, is that, to some extent, the narrator has represented Grandjean’s gender based on the context of the narrative: sometimes female, sometimes male. But at this point, when medical examination has identified Grandjean’s anatomy as feminine, the narrator still consistently represents them as male. Setting aside the question of how Grandjean may have understood their own gender, their lawyer’s willingness to gender them according to public presentation is significant. It may, however, simply reflect the lawyer’s position that—until the question of physical gender has been thoroughly reviewed and discussed—his responsibility is to assert the gender (masculine) that would support his client’s innocence. And perhaps the narrator is hedging a bit. For as he tackles the question of how to categorize Grandjean’s gender, it feels like he’s using language deliberately designed to avoid gender references.}

{Another thing to note here is that Grandjean is not accused of cross-dressing. They are not accused of engaging in “female sodomy” (the question of sexual activity has not been touched on). The charge is that, by entering into a marriage while not meeting the required conditions for that marriage to be valid, one is disrespecting the institution itself. As we will see, this is perhaps the easiest to refute of the possible charges that could have been brought.}

Pour remplir ce point de vue, nous examinerons d'abord quel est, dans le physique l'état de l'Accusé.

To fulfill this point of view, we will first examine what is, in physical terms, the state of the Accused.

{HRJ: That is, one point to establish is how the accused relates to that “required condition for the marriage to be valid.”}

2°. Dans le droit, nous verrons ce que c'est que la profanation du Sacrement de mariage.

2. In the law, we will see what the profanation of the Sacrament of Marriage is.

{HRJ: The second step is to establish the necessary and sufficient conditions for “profanation of the sacrament of marriage” to exist.}

3°. Dans le fait, nous démontrerons qu'il n'y a point ici de profanation à reprocher à l'Accusé.

3. In fact, we will demonstrate that there is no profanation to be reproached to the Accused.

{HRJ: The defense counsel is, perhaps, giving away the weakness of point #1 by indicating that the defense will focus on negating the definition in point #2.}

Chacun de ces objets demande une discussion séparée.

Each of these objects requires a separate discussion.

Time period: 
Place: 
Event / person: 
historical