Take A Stand



Sophie Scholl

 Most Americans have never heard of Sophie Scholl.  Yet in Germany she is  regarded as highly as Joan of Arc is in France.  Sophie and her brother Hans were member of the White Rose, an underground group that distributed anti-Hitler literature at the university.  Unfortunately, they were captured and interrogated. 

During this time, both Hans and Sophie refused to give out information on their comrades, insisting they did all the work themselves.  Sophie especially impressed her interrogators with her intelligence and when she was informed that if she would  say that Hans had coerced her into this action, she would get off with a lighter sentence.  Not only did she refuse to do so, she let the Nazis know she was proud of what she had done.  The judge at her trial was a maniac, and well known for being so.  When she was allowed to make a statement before her sentencing, Sophie said to him that someday soon, he would be standing where she was.

Generally, a defendant was given 99 days to appeal their sentence.  Between their arrest and executions, Hans and Sophie had a total of three.  The Nazis realized what a powerful propaganda weapon freedom had in the Scholls, and they wanted to get rid of them as quickly as possible.  And in doing so, they thought they won.

But Hans and Sophie, in their deaths, won.  They made a stand, showing that while they weren't looking forward to what was happening, they preferred death to living under Nazism, something their interrogators couldn't understand.  They became martyrs for freedom throughout the world, and their final pamphlet, smuggled out of the country, was dropped over Germany several years later by Allied bombers.

The Scholls and others like them were resolute in their convictions, and inspirations for those fighting the Axis powers.  You don't have to be a freedom fighter to be an inspiration, but merely stand up for the right thing.  Many times, it's not the easy one to do, but the right choice often is not. 

As the Aaron Tippin song goes, "You've got to stand for something, or you'll fall for anything."