The most prevalent theme in this book is clearly pointed out all through out the book. Racial prejudice of not just the town’s men, but also of President Roosevelt is made evident through Weaver’s writings. Despite serving in the U.S. Military the men of the 25th were denied the right of a trial. They had no way to defend themselves against their accusations. The people of Brownsville despised the fact that a black regiment was coming to town long before the men got there. This prejudice seemingly led to the framing of the 25th in order to remove their unwanted…
The case, of which I choose to present, is that of Emmet Till. In the summer of 1955, 14-year-old African-American Emmett Till had gone on vacation from Chicago to visit family in Mississippi. He was shopping at a store owned which was owned by Roy and Carolyn Bryant and someone said that Emmett Till whistled at Mrs. Bryant, a white woman. At some point around August 28, Emmett Till was kidnapped, beaten, shot in the head, had a large metal fan tied to his neck with barbed wire, and was thrown into the Tallahatchie River. His body was soon recovered, and an investigation was opened. It took less than four weeks for the case to go to trial; Roy Bryant and his half-brother J.W. Milam were accused of the murder of which an all-white, all male…
Price claimed she was raped by six of the young men, while Bates claimed the other three raped her. The nine men, from Chattanooga and different parts of Georgia, ranged in age from 12 to 20. They were roped together and taken to the Jackson County Jail in Scottsboro, Alabama. That night, a mob gathered outside the jail, but the governor sent in the National Guard to protect the young men, later known as the Scottsboro Boys.…
To begin with,the Scottsboro Boys are 9 African American boys.It all started March 15, 1931 during The Great Depression. The 9 boys was hanging off the side of the train illegally when a white guy stepped on his hand. Immediately a fight broke out between the blacks and whites.After the fight the whites got off the train and told the police that they were assaulted by 9 blacks. Eventually the black boys were forced off the train. The police somehow managed to find 2 white girls Ruby Bates and Victoria Price and persuade them to accuse the blacks of rape. Rape was a huge conviction like murder. During an 8 week time span the nine boys were convicted of rape and sentenced to death except the youngest one age 13 who was sentenced to life in…
A History That No Self-Respecting Marxist Historian Would Consider Reinventing the Wheel The History of the Scottsboro Case as Prelude Reshaping Humanity for Utopia For Kids: The Radical Historian as Super-Hero Zinn’s Real Scholarship…
In 1931, nine black teenage males were convicted of raping two white females on a freight train in Tennessee. It was traveling from Chattanooga to Memphis; however, the case was initiated in Scottsboro, Alabama. Thus, the nine defendants became known as the Scottsboro Boys. In the initial court hearing, eight of the nine boys were issued the death sentence. As the author indicates, this case was a strong illustration of the intense prejudice towards black men and women in the early 1900s, and it demonstrates whose word prevailed when it involved black versus white.…
The case was widely known throughout the country. The International Labor of Defense supported the Scottsboro Boys and help raise money for them. The ILD brought their case all over the media to gain support and awareness for the boys’ mistreatment. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) helped the boys’ family and in court, though in January 1932, the organization withdrew from the case. The Scottsboro Boys set a legal precedent and becomes an influential force to the Civil Rights Movement. The Scottsboros’ became the stimulant for the powerful movement. The Court’s decisions gave civil rights’ activists power to end racism in the South. The phrase, “Free the Scottsboro Boys!” became the public outcry for all…
The rape of two white girls by nine black teenagers on a freight train on March 25, 1931 was the most controversial trial eve . Over the course of the two decades that followed, the struggle for justice of the "Scottsboro Boys," as the black teens were called, made celebrities out of anonymities, launched and ended careers, wasted lives, produced heroes, opened southern juries to blacks, exacerbated sectional strife, and divided America's political left.…
Eugene “Bull” Connor, Police Commissioner of Safety of Birmingham, Alabama, clearly failed in his own hate-driven campaign against desegregation. Coupled with this failure to extinguish a handful of peaceful protest marches, Bull Connor also failed to appropriate the South’s senselessly racist worldviews with that of the sensible reactionary precautions that would be more relatable to the mainstream media. Bull’s disregard for context and lacking desire to find a progressive solution to the problem exposed the weak-mindedness of those moderates in Birmingham calling for sympathy from the country. Subsequently, Eugene Connor became the catalyst for situational understanding in the region. The media’s freedom during these events allowed a narrative that reflected true human morality and the juxtaposition of tenured human beings with peaceful resistance training involved in positive civil rights reform and the dog-wielding, fire hose-wielding, power-wielding police force gave way for ethical reflection. Quite obviously, in hindsight, Eugene “Bull” Connor’s crusade on Birmingham’s weakest population seemed, to the national public, an atrocity conveying the true instability of desegregation. To characterize his response as anything but listlessly immoral would give credence to an unthinking way of living in which one’s own values have no basis in reality and therefore no respectable place in modern society. One could say Eugene “Bull” Connor was simply following the laws promoting segregation in his state and that that was just but, to the contrary, he was not. Eugene Connor and his police force weren’t even just in the eyes of the law. Eugene and the segregation laws he upheld were not protected by the Supreme Court. In the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court case segregation in public schools was deemed unequal and unconstitutional. Eugene’s regime for keeping Alabama segregated went against the Supremacy Clause. This allowed his…
In the year of 1931, nine black boys, as young as the age 13, were falsely accused for raping…
By the 1950’s Birmingham, Alabama had represented the best of the new south, but became determined to maintain old racial ways. Political leaders maintained white supremacy with a ferocious combination of arrests, harassment, and violence among black…
The authorities in the Scottsboro trial were totally wrong. They based their accusations on segregation. If it was white men raping white women they would’ve been let off after learning that the women were lying.…
The 1930’s in the United States could be described as a reformation period in response to the worst economic collapse in national history. The Great Depression was a battle for all aspects of the American society and in particular, the South, because of its meager efforts for racial equality. The South is well known for being a stronghold of reactionary principles and in To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee composed an earnest tale focused on the lives of two children in Maycomb County. The consistent bigotry exposed in the narrative reveal a principle that African Americans did not receive- the opportunity to receive a fair trial and a slim chance of being found innocent. But who is responsible for not enforcing the laws that are written in the Constitution? The duty of this action falls highly into Maycomb’s restraints on tolerating change and diversity. Whether it was the poor farm families, the middle class townspeople, or the civil force, the historic racial complications set by the slave era established a dreadful social system that unfortunately underlies the rules that operate Maycomb.…
(2009). “Fight the Power!” The Legacy of the Civil Rights Movement. The Journal of Southern History 75.1: 3-28.…
Claude McKay and Langston Hughes use their writing skills to vocalize a major social issue during the 1920s. They construct the poems with personification, mood, and tone.…