The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 10, 1933, Page 3

| | es RED DAIL Unik, Nw tuna, MUNDAY, APRIL 10, 1933 MassPressure |, HasSaved the |Boys So Far (The following article by Loren Miller, Negro journalist of Califor- nia, was written before the verdict in the case of Haywood Patterson was rendered—Editor’s Note.) By LOREN MILLER issue of the Scottsboro boys’ edom rests on the success or re in completing the task of g the case from the hands abama courts. Thanks to the efforts of the International Labor Defense, that process has saved the boys thus far. The com- | ion of the job rests with those ho I of the sting that ne boys must not die. I need not linger over the point t the courts of Alabama, and r ican courts too, for igged stice” that comes se courts is recorded all in the dry records of those thousands of Negroes drag- ging out their lives on chain gangs, rotting a in jails and murdered in prisons—for the basic offense of being poor and black in an America dominated by the white and rich. re than that, American “justice” is reflected by the universal denial of common everyday rights and privileges. The sacrosanct supreme court of the United States has had a big the It overthrew the . It added its judi- jessings to Jim Crow schools, and toilets. Other courts have been no less hostile. Bewhiskered justices of e unemployed e on vagrancy with clock-like regularity. rms of violence, such as the ones presided’ over by Judge Hawkins, are as numerous as judicial dis- tricts. OR would I give the impression that the courts have done these hings beeavse of the cussedness of the judges. It goes deeper than that. ‘These Judges, are simply who select them. te are those who reap the profits that flow from keeping Negroes chained to the soil as peons or share crop- pers or in the cheap labor class in the industrial centers. The whole rotten business has_ been covered up by bought and paid for testimonials from preach- ers, publishers, politicians, p.ofes- sors and other parasites—black and white—who -have been, and are, willing to testify, for $198 and ther good and valuable considera- hat the exploitation and i ity of the Negro has been lained from on high and justified ty Blackstone. ETURNING to the case in point, that of the Scottsboro boys, let me point out that the first attempt | to take this case out of the hands of the courts met with stiff op- position. Led by N.A.A.C.P. lead- ers, who pretended a Simple Simon faith in courts and refuse to per- a Negro to serve on the jury, this opposition tried to stifle the honest protest that went up when the world learned the facts about the near legal lynching. It is to the everlasting credit of the work- ers and intellectuals of the world that th vposition was brushed aside. Th: —rotests continued. Protests rolled in on Alabama, They're still rolling. These pro- tests rolled in on the United States Supreme Court. ‘Today the boys have a new trial. That new trial is in the offing not because of leg- alistic formulae, but because the high court understood that the protestors were in no mood to coun- tenance the butchery of boys on so fiimsy a pretext. But the Alabama courts still have their masters, the profit takers, to serve. So they are digging up new ie more inyolved judicial and »gal technicalities. ‘They hope to ‘ise such a smoke screen of legal- is that they will obscure the real issue: the oppression of Negroes, with its consequent demand for legal and extra-legal violence to “keep us in our places.” The ever obliging—for cash— preachers, publishers, professors, Politicians and other parasites are performing their chores with new gusto. They are screaming that the International Labor Defense and the rest of us who have en- listed to save the boys are trying to hang them! They want us to still our voices and deliver the boys to the tender mercies of district and abit court. eens Hawkinses. In other words, they want lynching with due process of law. and Eeptrignorant region will enlist on our sides. Mass protest—from England, Ger- many, France, Africa, America, all corners of the world—has saved the boys thus far. SOUTHERN EDITOR: PLUNGES IN THE FIGHT TO KILL He’s Absolutely Not in Favor of Negroes on the Jury (By Our Special Correspondent) ECATUR, Ala. (By Mail)—The editor of the only newspaper in Limestone County, adjoining Mor- gan, is a chubby, red-faced, high- browed farmer. He is a leading citizen of this poor-white, cotton county, having served twice in the state legislature and he was a teacher in the graded school. He is representative of the fairly well- to-do farmer and -the city middle caught sufficiently between hammer and anvil of the crisis | to harbor some resentment against against | us to enforce our judgment, protest is our only weapon of en- forcement. Its volume must swell @ million fold. The lives of nine tnnocent boys are in our hands! the rich and Wail Street. all the easier for him since both the rich and Wall Street are asso-~ | ciated in his mind with the North. | He is old enough to feel more keenly than other what the Bour- bon south considers to be the de- gradation of Reconstruction—the period that followed the Civil War in which the North with the aid of the Negro people and by means of an armed dictatorship subjected the former slave-holding class. In the minds of such gentlemen Recon- struction is synonomous with “Ne- gro domination” with “uppitty ni gers,” with widespread rape of white women by Negroes, with social equality. And in the minds of such people the Scottsboro case, particu- | larly the issue of the right of Ne- groes to sit on juries so sharply presented by the International La- bor Defense at the Decatur trial, is nothing more but Reconstruction reborn. “] ET them sit on juries and vote and,” he added significantly, “the next thing you'll have is social equality.” “I have nothing against niggers, T like them—if they know their place and keep it. A nigger mammy brought me up and one takes care of my children now. A nigger can come into my house—but he must come in by the back door. “A nigger just can’t think. He is made different: trons White men— I really don’t think he is a human. He looks so much like an ape, the shape of his skull 4nd everything.” And he adds judiciously: “He even smells different.” “I'm not a Baptist.preacher and don’t claim to know the bible thor- ough. But there it is written that Ham was cursed by Noah and this curse was a black skin. And he has borne it ever since. . .” Then very. seriously he wants .to. know what the people in the North would think about repealing the Fourteenth Amendment. His idea is that just as the question of beer is left to each state to decide, each state should also determine. wheth- er or not~it should” observe” the Fourteenth Amendment. “That's the point at issue—and it might lead to Civil War, yes sir!” eT HIS is greater than Ghandi and the untouchables in India.” Tt is a Negro of Decatur speaking in the solitude of his small living room to the rear of the doctor’s of~ fice. He is a tall, husky man, his whole huge frame animated by the perspective opened up by the events in the Decatur courtroom. “There has not been much trouble between the whites and Negroes in this particular town. We have ‘kept our place’-—but don’t misunderstand me—without scratching our heads and bowing down before the white folks. Of course, this is the South and we are Niggers.” His eyes shine brightly as he re- lates for the hundredth time the way Dr. Brooks had told Attorney- General Knight “I refuse to answer that question” and how the attor- ney-general had turned red as @ turnip and recoiled like a rubber ball. He laughed with delight de- scribing how the dignified, pot- bellied jury commissioner Tidwell squirmed in the witness chair try- ine to avoid telling the truth about the exclusion of Negroes from the juries. a fie . LAPPING his knee with his broad of his cot revealing some Jects. “I feel that those boys to get off. And if anyone tries any monkey business we are ready for This is | LYNCH “JUSTICE! By Burck i"Daily” Is Deluged | | With ’Phone Calls | On Scottsboro Case So great was the interest of New York workers in the events in} | Decatur in connection with the Scottsboro case, that the tele- phones in the Daily Worker edi- {torial office kept ringing all day- Saturday and Sunday, with re- quests for information. Many of the calls were made on behalf of workers’ organizations. | On Saturday night thousands of || copies of the SCOTTSBORO SPECIAL were sold on the streets of the city by Daily Worker “Builders.” WORKERS AID FIGHT OF LL.D. = NEW YORK—From every part of the country, from the South and the in to the International Labor Defense Scottsboro New Trial Emergency Fund, in response to the appeal of the I. L. D. The letters, enclosing contributions for the Scottsboro de- fense, are from individuals, schools, clubs, and churches, Negro and white. Most of them indicate that it is the poor who will share their little most readily, to save their own. Many of the letters were in response to letters enclosing sheets of the Scottsboro stamps, at one cent each, issued by the L. L. D. “For the Scottsboro boys, enclosed you will find a money order for one dollar for the stamps you sent me,” Miss Rose A. Wilson, an unemployed Negro worker, wrote. “I am a poor woman sick in bed with no support, and I am dividing with you. I only wish I could send more but I hope they will be freed and brought away from that place where they can be safe and useful citizens.” Leo Peck, white worker, wrote: “I received your letter and the pen- ny stamps. I will distribute them among my friends. I am not working for a long time, but when I read the letter you sent me I think it’s my | duty and every worker, white and Ne- gro to protest and send money to save the nine innocent Scottsboro boys, I donate three dolars.” ‘The teachers and pupils of five Negro schools in South Carolina, the pastors of five Negro churches in the same state, schools in small towns and cities of Delaware, Tennessee, Maryland, and Texas, sent contrib- utions. The names of these contrib- utors from the South are not pub- lished for fear of retaliations against them by the white bosses. Funds are still badly needed, to carry on the new Scottsboro trial, the I, L. D. announced, Without more and increasing contributions, the le- gal defense of the Scottsboro boys is in danger of being seriously crippled. Send all funds to the Scottsboro New Trial Emergency Fund, International Labor Defense, Room 430, 80 East llth Street, New York City. Minimum Wage Bill NEW YORK, April 7.—The Wald Eberhard minimum wage bill passed the N. ¥. Assembly today and will go to the Governor for signature. Leh- man’s approval is assured. This bill, while called a minimum wage bill, merely sets up a state board which will investigate the conditions in each industry where women and children are employed and will recommend a minimum wage. The bill carries with ih gare gn Hooda seh who violate the decisions of Board, | North, hundreds of letters have come | Victoria Price on the Stand Pliant Tool of Prosecution _y STANLEY GIBSON tion is stimulated. An innate sense (Special Daily Worker Correspondent) | f the dramatic shows in her tes- ECATUR Ala, (By Mail).—Vie~ timony. She embellishes her orig- ‘gti Piles tabetha We: inal evidence with descriptions of For two years the eyes of the Scenes that might have come from working class of the world have | * Melodramatic movie. been turned upon the frame-up “Why did you not tell these de- tails in your testimony at the first system of Negroes by the state trial,” the defense counsel shoots at her. “I did,” she retorts sharply “It’s not in the record,” he re- | minds her. “I don’t know what's in the rec- ord,” she returns coldly. “Tf it ain’t in the record it should a-bin.” She does not look at the defense attorney. She never looks at the defense attorney, Her face is al- ways turned towards the attorney- general's table, quick to watch for his objections or forms of ques- tions. She scarcely moves as she sits there answering nimbly, coldly. When Leibowitz scores a telling at him but swiftly resumes her cold, iron self-possessed control. The girl is a steel machine, wound up and set to work as part of the frame- up apparatus, by the State of Ala- bama. eis which she now represents in court. ‘The United States Supreme Court has ordered that her story of | ‘UT new the eyes of the world are for a day turned upon her. The state has created a tool out of its oppression, and is using it now to support its system. It is playing with nine lives, lying at the expense of nine innocent “rape” in the Scottsboro case, the story she was forced by police to tell, even though it is a lie, be heard again. Newspapermen from the North | and South, scribble hastily. Uni- formed messenger boys rush with copy to flash to the four corners of the world. Photographers turn their cameras upon her. Samuel 8, Leibowitz, chief of the International Labor Defense trial attorneys defending Heywood Pat- terson and the other boys prods her with questions. When a question is put, she sees the danger immediately and seeks refuge ina high pitched “wha-a-t?” It gives her the moment she needs to escape from the trap this shrewd | lawyer has carefully set to catch | the truth, | She has told her story and in- tends to stick to it. Her's is the world’s spotlight, even though she shares it as part of a frame-up sys- | tem and only as a tool—and she enjoys it even though this Northern lawyer rakes up her past, tells of her arrest for lewdness in Hunts- ville, tells how she broke up a mar- ried man’s home, probes whether she had not been an inmate in a notorious house of prostitution. There is not the flicker+of an eye jash when she uses words that would make an average woman stammer in embarrassment, Cais anit” FFE tins & working at tult speed with the swiftness and the hard- ness of a steel trap, Her imagina- boys on trial—but the lives are those of Negroes, and as part of their program the landlords and mill-owners have taught her that they don’t count. So to her, a de- graded product of a corrupted cap- italist world, it does not matter. MADRID, Mar. 26. (By Mail)—Hun- dreds of workers demonstrated in front of the German Consulate in Vigo, where all the windows were smashed. The demonstrators then marched to the Italian and Portu- guese Consulates to protest against the Fascist regimes in those countries. 1 WILL NOT LET THE International Labor Defense, Room 430, 30 East ith Street, New York City. Enclosed find my contribution of §..... Scottsboro boys. I want to join the I. L. D. to fight to save the Scotisboro boys, SCOTTSBORO BOYS DIE! wenvresone + to help save the Street point and she darts a look of hate | |Jew-Baiting in Ala.| | Denounced by Jewish | | today. |War Vets, NEW YORK—On behalf of the | | Lawyers Jewish War Veterans, Fredman, its comr patched a wire to Solicitor Wade | | Wright of Decatur, Ala., demand- \| ing an apology for his reference | to “Jew money” in the latter's | speech to the jury in the Scotts- boro trial on Friday. At the same time a group of New York lawyers, headed by Nel- | son K. Scherer,*sent a sharp wire | to Gov. Miller of Alabama, de-| |manding the removal of Wright| for his speech, JOSEPH RB. BRODSKY] ¥ ite jury last week, returned a ver- | ‘The Stench 1 | about a year ago, after a peri of) | publication duri t played a \tremendous role in breaking down | their ‘AN White Jury i in Third Degreed hard) to school because I have books, shoes fit to wear or sufficier food to eat | In Columbia schools, colored and | | white, the children have to furr all books, and other school | tools. They a | CHATTANOOGA, “Tent n, | Negro toilers, | white. | sented as evidence of his guilt was |extorted from him Py brutal third | | , degree methods by the police. No| sf Rotrinaar direct proofs was offered to connect | Weiler } Ross Whee ae: eb seer oe he Remaining Eight Scottsboro Lads--for a Ne ew Trial "Yor Patterson of Southern Slave Market’ Joie Our Special ( DEC ted ch of the upheld t Neg prrespondent nto of the 004 on their will teach those r T 1 @ grin faces, We will forces that wil dead v itself y remove Sein Worker | Will Re- Appear (CNA ker, a Commur formerly pul i resume ection shortly, it The Southern weekly news| jin the South in thi The paper discontinued publi lice the barriers of race prejudice and « | ganizing Negro and white wo! | together for joint struggle to bette’ It was cordia | hated by the white ruling class, but had built up a large Negro and white workers and poor | farmers. Together with other agita- tional work of the Communist Party | in the South it helped to prepare} the ground for the magnificent soli- darity of the white and Negro crop-| @& pers in the recent bloody struggles} in Tallapoosa County, Ala. many workers ons in the South the th have donated fund: able the paper to resume publication, especially in view of the new Scotts: boro trials now proceeding in Deca-| 3 tur, Ala.. the recent indictment of} five Tallapoosa Negro share-croppers, | the approaching trial in Atlanta, Ga‘;| of six Negro and white organizers and the struggle for the freedom of Angelo Herndon, young Negro orgar al izer, sentenced to Georgia chain gang. realizing the necessity of ra | white Southern workers to port of growing sti Ss | have donated to the| penne, | and the’ ir| and in| Jackson Convicts JACKSON, Tenn. | (CNA).—An all-| dict of guilty against Roy Ross, accused of killing Ernest Be The jury ignored Ross’ sworn | testimony that the “confession” pre-| Dron im DLtaliw va bor ik Condition of Negro | Students in South | (By a Negro Worker Correspondent) | | COLUMBIA, S. C.—I have been| reading the Daily Worker and like it | better than any other paper I have | ever read. T am a student of the| Booker T. Washing High Colores d School of Columbia Cc. T ca | have to buy their own lunches. ‘The children have to| walk two and thre miles to school} through rain, sleet or snow. T am hoping the time will come when Columbia and all over South Carolina will be organized into a Communist Party to fight for all workers’ rights, — and white Lynch 1 Evidence NEW YORK. — That the lynch gangs that have been organized in Decatur and vicinity are continuing their activity is seen from a wire re- ceived by the “Amsterdam News,” New York Negro newspaper from two of its correspondents now in Decatur who telegraphed that they have re- ceived “assurance of protection from any mob action.” The correspondents, who, incid- entally, are being jim-crowed at the trial, are William N. Jones, manag- ing editor of the Baltimore Afro-Am- erican, and P, Bernard Young, son of the owner of the Norfolk, Va. Jour- nal and Guide. > Ce