Talk:Aristides de Sousa Mendes

Introduction & Number of Visas

In the opening section there is too much detail about conflicting reports on the number of visas, all of which is repeated later. An acceptably accurate number can be given, and the dispute alluded to. The Sousa Mendez foundation has names for 3,900. I have never contributed so I am hesitant to rewrite the intro myself, if someone gives me the thumbs up or no one responds I'll give it a shot. Jeffwack111 (talk) 02:20, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

The number of Visas advanced by the Sousa Mendes Foundation is debatable. This foundation claims that "Portugal, officially neutral, yet unofficially pro-Hitler", which is the opposite of what most historians say about Portugal's neutrality. The foundation also claims that "Sousa Mendes was severely punished by Salazar, stripped of his diplomatic position and forbidden from earning a living" while historian Tom Gallagher, and other historians, argue that Sousa Mendes was never actually expelled from the foreign service", Tom Gallagher says that "However, a foundation instrumental in keeping alive his memory claims he was ‘stripped of his diplomatic position and forbidden from earning a living, It seems that ill health prevented him from returning to diplomatic work and he figured on the roll of diplomatic staff up to his death. This makes sense since he was paid a full salary by the state until the end of his life. One of his most sympathetic biographers, Rui Afonso, has reckoned that he continued to receive a salary at least three times that of a teacher". As to the number of Visas the thing is that Sousa Mendes was actually supposed to issue Visas, because it was his job to issue Visas. And by doing his job he did issue visas to British Citizens, American Citizens, etc... and for issuing this visas, as it was his duty, he was paid his customary personal compensation fees. For each visa he issued he received a fee for his own pocket. So it does not make sense to include all this regular visas in the counting as the foundation does. In fact Sousa Mendes and all other consuls had received instructions "not to hinder the arrival in Lisbon of passengers going on to other countries "(Gallagher 2020). On another turn, there are cases of visas where indeed Sousa Mendes was supposed to have asked prior authorization to the authorities in Lisbon to issue the visa, but he decided not to ask that permission. Tom Gallagher says that "Long before the crisis of May 1940 he [Sousa Mendes] had been issuing visas to people whose right to stay or not was the foreign ministry’s responsibility. The numbers increased in June 1940 but fell far short of the thousands of visas which his later admirers claimed had been issued by him. Evidence that his efforts were especially directed towards fleeing Jews is also speculative. British, Portuguese and American citizens, often people with means, figured prominently as recipients of visas."--J Pratas (talk) 18:52, 24 March 2022 (UTC)