Europe 1 with AFP 17:59 p.m., December 21, 2023, modified at 18:01 p.m., December 21, 2023

The administrative court of Pau on Thursday rejected the request of the association Mémoires et Partages to have the district of Biarritz renamed "La Négresse". The association, which initiated the request for a change of name, has announced, through its council, that it will appeal this decision to the Council of State.

No change of name for "La Négresse": the administrative court of Pau rejected on Thursday the request of the association Mémoires et Partages to have this district of Biarritz renamed, with the title "racist and sexist" according to it. In the judgment, it is considered that the naming of this district and of a street in the city cannot be seen as "an attack on the principle of safeguarding human dignity", despite "the semantic evolution of the term 'negress' towards a pejorative connotation".

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Appeal to the Council of State

"It's mind-boggling, this term is much more than pejorative, it's racist. No one can dispute that a racist name is not detrimental to dignity," reacted the association's lawyer, William Bourdon, pointing to a "timid" decision of the Pau administrative court "which did not take its responsibilities". He announced that he would appeal the decision to the Council of State. In 2020, the Bordeaux association had asked the mayor of Biarritz, Maider Arosteguy, to introduce on the agenda of the city council the repeal of two deliberations, those fixing the name "La Négresse" for a district near the station, in 1861, and a second introducing a new "rue de la Négresse" in 1986.

However, "the mayor of Biarritz did not err in law by refusing" this request, the administrative court said.

A "memorial perspective"

Based on the history of the name of this Biarritz district, which would have it that "La Négresse" was a nickname given by Napoleonic soldiers around the years 1812-1813 to a woman who served in an inn in the district, the court saw in it "a memorial perspective, in tribute to the person in question and to local history" and not the aim "to present in a degrading way, humiliating or degrading a black-skinned slave or descendant of a slave or stigmatizing members of a community on racist grounds."

The court also noted that it had not been established that the name "La Négresse" had been such as to offend the sensibilities of the inhabitants of the commune.