French far-right political leader Jean-Marie Le Pen died this week. In 1972, Le Pen founded the Front National (National Front) and gradually built it into the preeminent far-right political party in France.

Jean-Marie Le Pen was a former military intelligence officer in the Algerian War who was accused of torture and war crimes and who was an ardent proponent of the French Empire. Le Pen became a major force in French political culture, running for the office of president five times.

The New York Times reports that “For decades, Mr. Le Pen was a pariah of French politics, considered so odious that many opponents refused to debate him. That had much to do with the party’s history: Its founders in 1972 included former Nazi soldiers, collaborators with the wartime Vichy regime and onetime members of a group that carried out deadly attacks meant to thwart Algeria’s struggle to free itself from French colonial rule. Mr. Le Pen’s openly racist, antisemitic and anti-gay comments cemented the public’s perception of the party.”

The Front National party was later renamed as Rassemblement National (National Rally) in 2011 after Jean-Marie Le Pen was ousted from party leadership by his daughter, Marine Le Pen, in a bid to revamp the party’s image and make the far-right more marketable to a broader section of the French citizenry.

“For years, the far-right National Rally tried to distance itself from Mr. Le Pen’s racist and antisemitic remarks. But after his death Tuesday, it hailed him as a visionary,” according to The New York Times.

Now that Jean-Marie Le Pen has died, Rassemblement National party members have been praising his legacy in effusive eulogies.

The New York Times reports that “the party’s glowing remembrance of Mr. Le Pen was also a way to recast his image — and its own, some experts said.”

“‘Paying tribute to Le Pen ‘undemonizes’ the party even further’ by portraying him as an excessive but prescient politician, unfairly condemned for warning about the dangers of immigration, said Nicolas Lebourg, a historian who specializes in the far right. ‘People who voted for the first time last year have almost no memory of him,’ Mr. Lebourg said.”

The historical memory of Jean-Marie Le Pen and the Front National political party are clearly being reshaped again in the wake of his death this week. French historians are following the political discourse and are already weighing in on Le Pen’s historical legacy. I aim to update this post as more French historians publish analyses.

The New York Times has published an article on “In Death, Jean-Marie Le Pen of France Is Embraced by Far-Right Party He Once Led.”