By Matthew Temme

It made me sick to think that the Swiss town where I had lived and taught school, attended university, owned a home, and raised a family was at the center of this sordid “Iran-contra affair” which blatantly violated the constitutional safeguards that guaranteed the United States’ principle of the separation of powers. The Swiss Constitution of 1848 was based on the American Constitution. Why then were the Swiss so eager to help Americans do what they would never do themselves? This affair only increased my resolve to leave Switzerland. The previous summer, my wife and I had decided that we would leave her home town and return to my bithplace in Pennsylvania where we had lived when we were newlyweds in 1968. Even though I had tenure at the canton’s premier lycée, and we had recently put an expensive addition onto our house, we decided that we had to leave Fribourg—at least on a leave of absence.