The Daily Worker Newspaper, November 11, 1933, Page 4

Paze Four DAILY WORKER, EW YORK, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 1933 SCOTTSBORO LYNCH CONSPIRACY AIDED BY ALABAMA OFFICIALS Startling Rise in Lynching Features Fourth Crisis Year Thirty-Nine Lynch Victims Listed by LL.D. Declared to Be By No Means Complete By l. L. D. NEW YORK.—The spectacular rise in lynchings during the fourth year of the crisis is shown in the following list of thirty-nine reported lynchings | compiled by the International Labor Defense. Of the 39 victims 37 cai Negroes. Tt must be emphasized that this List is by no means complete, since it oe incluges only those ly press is forced to report was being compiled, reached the national o L. D. of three lynchings wh curred in one week in a single pel of Georgia, and which are not hére. Detailed infor! n on t and many other ly whlch | were never re d geois press is LL. D. white| improper proposals to Fe t him, when he 2—Fell Jenk death by thr cock, La had be of one of tt the @ | one of “Crowd j in Subway | Aids Negro Worker |Defends Him Against False Accusation (By a Worker Correspondent) NEW YORK—I had just stepped n und express at Penn- Station, IR.T, at 8 am. There was an unusual commotion. Three guards stepped from the train pulling with them a tall slender man. | Gianei ng back I observed the man to be a Negro. I stopped, hurried soon became one of a wing crowd. “Do you want him arrested,” yelled he burly guards. oung well.dressed man , “he stole my wallet.” “Just a minute,” a voice demanded, | “how do you know he took it?” Ringgold, La 8 George from a bt white men, who la “stolen th 9—Levon Ca February 25. prostitute to , at a s ear-old Missis- men, April 17, had been jailed | an argu. 11—John Williams, during first week of M by a mob} of 75 led by sheriff. It was charged | he had sto! og Mary's, Ga. _12—Will K lynched May | 2, by a mob of 40, following a dis- jute with his landlord in which his | ther and the landlord were both | Milled. Kinsey, wounded by the land- Yord, was taken by a mob from a Physician’s office. Warrenton, Ga. 13—Duffy Barksdale, farmer, shot to death in front of his home in Clinton, 8. C., May 22, by a mob of White men, including a policeman, Because he had dared borrow money | direct from the government instead af through the bank. 14 and 15—Jerome Boyett and Har- vey Winchester, both white, held on Murder charges, were taken out of) Huntsville, Tennessee jail, and Iynched by a mob of armed men, | June 8. 16—T. J. Thomas, lynched at New~ ton, Ga., June 14, following # quarrel hetween Negro and white children in the town. 17—Richard Marshall, lynched in Newton, Ga., June 19. No official ex euse given or discovered 418—Flizabeth Lawrence, killed by a mob and her home just outside Birmingham, Als., late in June, efter she scolded white chil- dren for throwing stones at her. 19—-Norris Bendy, held in Clinton, . O. jail, on charges of having struck @ white man in an altercation, taken out on the night of July 14, beaten and strangled to death. 20—On July 21, an unidentified | Negro was hanged by a mob in Cale- | donia, Miss. after some white men | Rad overheard a white woman make @n appointment to meet him. 2i—Joe Soles, tenant farmer, whipped to death by five white men, is landlord among them, at Ben- ton, Ala., August 9. 22 and 23—Dan Pippen, Jr., 18, and A T. Harden, 16, shot to death while in custody of deputies, supposedly taking them from the strong Jai] in Tuscaloosa, Als., over a wild circuit. out route, to Birmincham, for “safe- Keeping.” August 13. 24—Henry Jackson, shot to death by sheriff's posse at Pine Bluff, Ar- kansas, August 18. 25—James Royal. shot to death by gang of men in Decatur, Alabama, after they failed in an attempt to lyfich Thomas Brown, acused of at- tackinz a white woman, August 21. 426—“Doc” Rogers, 45.vear old farmer, killed by posse at Willard, N. C., August 27. He was said to Have been “suspected” of wounding white woman in the shoulder. _21—Paul Orthe, shot and his body ed by Sheriff Hobbe and his lends, at Panama City, Fla, Sep- ber 3, after he threatened to bring suit against the sheriff. Before yas killed, he was seared with hot and his flesh torn from his body with pliers. 3 28—Richard Roscoe, deacon, shot to hi September 18, at Minter City, iss. His body was dracged throuch the streets tied to the sheriff's auto- mobile. He had seized a plantation hg gun after being shot three Dennis Cross, 50-year old para- Tytie, out on bail on a charge of “attacking a white woman” was lynched September 24. He was the remaining witness to the mur- of a Negro in Tuscaloosa, Ala. had been unable to move hand foot for 20 years, but had to be sed and undressed. .30—Jdhn White, youth, lynched at usa, La., September 26. He was | insisted, burned down, | “Well? he was the only one near me and when the train pulled in I discovered my wallet was missing. Yes, he picked my pocket.” “I ain't got nothing, not even a f my own,” the Negro worker sted. “C’mon, search me and see.” “T’ve not got a right,” the guard “the police will do that.” By this time a large militant group rs surrounded the guards. Yegro worker grasping this ow of solidarity, especially by the te workers, vigorously protested. “It's because my face is black, that’s why you pick on me.” The workers grasped and repeated this militant defiance, shouting their support of this contention. ‘The young fellow pressed by these angry protests made a show cf going through the pockets of the Negro worker, and found nothing but some | papers, (a copy of the election plat- | form of the Communist Party in- | cluded.) ‘The guard made a last effort to | pull him along, but the workers hur- | ried him along into an outgeing train | and closed shut the door to another oo at railroading Negro work- ol by quick, militant action can we di these low-down attempts to victimize our class brothers with a black skin. —J. R. By BILL D DUNNE IL The mass of evidence in the hands of the Daily Worker shows that the murder terror against Negroes in and around Decatur, Alabama, is part of a | conspiracy to lynch the innocent Scottsboro boys, and part of a gen- eral campaign of lynch and murder terror throughout the South. Three recent events link the evi- dence in the hands of the Daily Worker, showing organized lynch sentiment in and around Decatur, Alabama, encouraged directly by At- | torney-General Knight, to name only | one of the Alabama state officials, | with the Tuscaloosa lynching and the torture and murder of George Armwood on the Eastern shore of Maryland, with Governor Ritchie, who gives the same kind of open and covert support to the lynch gang as Attorney-General Knight furnishes | them in Alabama. The first event is the refusal of Attorney-General Knight to allow the recently formed committee of Southern liberals to examine the grand jury records in the Tuscaloosa case and his refusal to furnish pro- tection for the committee. The second event is the statement made in the report of the Southern Commission on the Study of Lynch- ing which, while saying “a consum- ing fear of Communism, injected by the attempt of the International La- bor Defense to force its way into the case,” was a factor in the Tusca- loosa lynchings, has, because of facts that could not be concealed, to make the following statement: “Immediate responsibility for this | situation and probably for the lynch- ings themselves, rests ypon a local secret organization with an elaborate system of espionage and intimida- tion.” The International Labor Defense has proved that the deputies and a private detective shot down the Tus- caloosa prisoners themselves, carry- ing out a well-organized murder plot aided and abetted by Sheriff Sham- blin, The third event confirming the charges of the Daily Worker, is the cynical and impudent letter sent by Governor Ritchie of Maryland to Robert Minor, trying to deny respon- sibility for the legal and extra-legal lynch terror in Maryland when the evidence collected by the Daily Worker shows that Governor Ritchie had knowledge of the preparations to lynch Armwood hours before the lynching occurred. The state of Alabama now intends to go through with the trial of the innocent Scottsboro boys in Decatur. This in spite of, and certainly be- cause of, the guilty knowledge Attor- ney-General Knight and other state officers have of the whipped-up lynch | Existence of Negroes Threatened | Te the Opecsonsk ! Negre People! States! All Willing to Fight Against Lynching and Persecution! The renewed murderous onslaught by the ruling class upon the Negro | people calls for immediate and de- \cisive action if a whole nation of 12,000,000 is not to be trampled into |the dust. With rope in one hand and torch | | To land abetted and organized by the powers that be. In the very shadow of the White House, on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, the charred body of George Armwood has been tossed upon the scrap heap of King Lynch as the 34th victim of the year. In |preparatton for the wholesale legal- \ized lynching planned for the Scottsboro boys, the State of Ala- jbama has thrown back into the teeth of the mass movement of pro- test the lynched bodies of its vic- tims at Decatur and Tuscaloosa. It has released murderous rifle and machine gun fire against the indom- itable and courageous Negro share- |croppers of Tallapoosa County. U. 8. Supreme Court Directs Terror Rising to the occasion, the Su- preme Court has ordered that Craw- ford be returned to the lynch-in- jfested courts of Virginia and that | Buel be sent to the electric chair. The date of execution has seen set for Willie Peterson of Bir. mingham, Gecreia, which has already dungeons to serve a 20-year sen- tence, is now moving to invoke the death sentence against the six Ne- gro and white labor organizers. Not to be outdone, the authorities in the North are deporting Negroes to the homeland of lynch terror, [filling the jails with the victims of the preacher, shot to death by a’ boot- legging gang in Clarke's a At- lanta County, Ga., September 23. 32—Bennie Thomson, taken out of jail at Ninety-Six, S, C., October 8, by four men who had requested his arrest, and who testified Chief of Police Rush agreed to leave the door open for them. He was beaten to death with rubber hose. 33—An un-named Negro plantation worker was taken out of jail and lynched in Labadieville, La., Oct. 11, He was held for investigation in the death of a white girl. 34—George Armwood, lynched in Princess Anne, Maryland, Oct. 18, by mob which beat, tortured, hanged, and burned him. 35—Sevis Davis, 45-year-old Negro, died in Lumpkin, Ga., Jail, Oct. 23 of wounds inflicted previously by a gang of lynchers, 36, 37, 38 and 39—Four Negroes, three of them women, lynched near to death. He had been charged | attacking & white woman. lenry Jordan, farmer and Arcadia, Fla. Identified as Jackson, his sister, Lessie Prong ‘Therese Mor- gan and Jessie Strawman, . in the other lynch terror stalks the | body thrown Angelo Herndon into its|in any ‘Murder Gangs Organized to ‘to Lynch Scottsboro Boys and International Labor Defense Attorneys The Nine Scabtuhore 0 Boys ‘Thesabaned el Alabama sinbasah Mobs sentiment against the Scottsboro boys in and around Decatur, and of the preparations made to lynch them through a farcical trial or by extra- legal means. The intentions of the state author- ities of the State of Alabama are shown in a telegram just received by | Osmond K, Fraenkel from Thomas E. | night, Alabama’s Attorney-General, and the moving spirit in the whole lynch conspiracy. The telegram states: “Have recommended payment of costs taxed against State of Ala- bama Scottsboro cases. My recom- mendation approved by Governor. Costs will be forwarded to the clerk of the Supreme Court.” Since one of the main tssues locally was the cost of a new trial, the deci- sion of the state authorities to pay the costs indicates their decision to bring the Scottsboro boys before the bar of lynch justice again. ‘The overwhelming proof of the in- nocence of these boys does not sway the Alabama authorities. They are going to bring the boys to trial once more in a county where the Daily Worker can prove preparations are ander way to lynch them, The Daily Worker yesterday pub- lished a few statements of residents of Morgan County in the towns of Decatur and Hartselle. They were chosen at random from more than five hundred such statements secured during a three-week investigation in ond around Decatur. More than this: The evidence in possession of the Daily Worker shows that through use of the Jewish issue sentiment has been created and the foundation laid for organizing the lynching of attorneys for the Scotts- boro boys and anyone else who ap- pears in their defense. Today the Daily Worker furnishes further unimpeachable evidence, tak- conspiracy and of the connection of Attorney-General Knight with this conspiracy: “The restaurant owner on Main Street, Hartselle, said that they ought to ‘burn Ruby Bates and them nig- gers all together’. He also said: ‘Tom en from sworn affidavits, of the lynch | them niggers ‘mister’ ” E. L. Perryman, Danville, said that he believed “the Scottsboro niggers should be sent to the hot seat,” and that he hoped that Attorney-General] Knight would send them there, On the 3ist day of August “Mr. Couch, of Falkville, said that he was a good shot with the pistol and that he would like to kill all of the Scotts- boro negroes. He said that if he got chance he would kill them and that every white man should do the same.” Between the 29th and 30th of Aug- ust “A clerk in ‘Brothers Meat Mar- ket,’ in Hartselle, said that ‘the peo- ple wouldn’t stand for them New York lawyers come down here again ; and do as they did before. They were trying to tear down our customs of the South and make ths niggers have social rights with the white people.’ ” An officer of the National Guard, a resident of Hartselle, said he would like to see the Negroes taken out and killed and that he didn’t “have no use for any of the black bastards.” Raymond Moore, Route 2, Decatur, stated between October 22nd and 27th, that “all of them niggers and their Jew lawyers should be killed and the country wouldn’t miss any- thing, and it would learn the other niggers to stay in their places.” Griffith, Route 2, Decatur, said be- tween the above dates that “if all of the niggers was dead, why the South! would be better off and them Scotts- boro niggers has caused lots of trouble with the rest of the niggers.” Joe Burt, Route 2, Decatur, said | between the above dates that “if they ever turn those niggers loose, why it will make the rest of the niggers | do worse than ever before.” C.R. Penn, , Route 3, Hi rtselle, sald | 1 t not; only should the Negroes be killed, but the lawyers also. Patrick, Falkville, said that the | Negroes should be hanged, “by their necks and that it would end this trial | and teach the rest of the niggers a} lesson.” W. T. Tucker, Route 1, Hartselle, | said that if “the New York Jews come here again, they ought to be Knight should have hit that damn| taken and lynched along with the Jew lawyer in the mouth for calling! niggers.” tims of police brutality. Each new insuit and degradation is sharper and more stinging than the last. The bloodhounds of terror seek out every head raised above its fel- lows in protest against poverty, hun- | To the White Tollers of the United|;or, unemployment, starvation wag- es, disease, death which has set- tled with a double weight upon the Negro people, All the suffering and degradation which have been visited upon the white masses by the crisis have been applied with double force against the Negro masses. N.R.A, Blood-Stained Slavery The eagle of N.R.A. has buried its claws with a firmer grip upon the of Negro labor. The “New Deal” of 1933, administered by the Democrat Roosevelt, recalls the “New Deal” promised the Negro people by the Democrat Wilson. Then Wilson, seeking the co-opera- tion of the Negro people, in the waging of & war which benefitted only the rulers and the rich, prom- battlefield of the crisis, Roosevelt gives his official sanction to the double standard of American de- mocracy by condemning, in offi- cial legal action, the Negro worker ‘o the lowest paid category; by signing the death warrant for Negro croppers in the under and cereage reduction program; by ruin- ing the bust cial and political rights by Negroes, He has, instead, signified his alle- giance to the Southern slave-drivers by appointing an outstanding white Southern bourbon as “guardian” of the Negro in the industrial recovery machinery. The Bill of Rights, pre- sented rig ‘the League of strug for Negro Rights in the Scottsboro March on Washington, has been thrust into the waste basket by the President. Chains of Serf Labor Extends to the North Chattel slavery has given place to serfdom on the Southern planta- tions; the slave regime, to all forms of legalized and tacit utions and oppression. To day the small farmer and sharecropper does not own land, the Negro worker is handicapped, the Negro professional people and business men are being driven out, The right to free and Son iblic_ education, to vote, to to be an equal citizen, |Manifesto Decl QTC |trameup, the hoeplits With the vie- i docled. The slave conditions which reign |fact. They have excluded Negroes | in the Southern Black Belt have | plagued the Negro wherever he has | white workers to this fundamental from unions. They are supporting jthe special codes which assign low- 4 | ever returns to Labadieville, and at- T and take him back there. gone. The chains of serf labor in jer wages to those industries where the South end to the cities in the | Negroes are chiefly employed; they North and enshacklie the Negro in-|have accepted dustrial worker. The shackles that | wage scales and working conditions {bind the Negro also bind the white |for the North and South, They are worker. The Negro worker in the!a part of the Roosevelt machinery. North cannot free himself as long|They are doing their best at the as the Negro masses are chained. |present time to halt the widespread The blow that strikes the shackles |mass revolt against the N.R.A, They from one must strike the shackles|are doing their best to divide the from the other. | white and Negro workers even fur- The leaders of the American Fed- | ther. eration of Labor (Woll, Green, Lew-| Of the same mould is the leader- is, ete.) have blinded the organized! ship of the Socialist Party (Thomas, Negro Farm Haus Reveals Story Of Lynching After Escaping Mob NEW ORLEANS, La. Nov. 7—,cusation should be levelled in the Freddy Moore, a Negro plantation | direction of her step-father, who was worker of Labadieville, Louisiana, | opposed to her marriage because by was hung from the girders of a bridge | it he would lose her services. near that town, by a lynch mob or- | ——_—___—_ ganized by white plantation owners. “Niggers, let this be an example to you. Do not touch for 24 hours, Mean it.” Norman Thibodeaux was hung from the same bridge on the same night, Oct. 11. Poor white farmers cut him down and he escaped alive. The lynching was dismissed by capitalist newspapers with brief mention and {t was not until Thibodeaux had made his way to New Orleans that he dared relate details of the occur- ence to the International Labor De- fense. He is now in this city. Threats have been made to lynch him if he Lynch Victim tempts have been made to find him ‘The excuse for the lynching was that Moore and Thibodeaux were friends of Anna May LaRose, a white girl of the neighborhood, who was murdered while on a visit to her swectheart in Labadieville. Moore was arrested and held in the parish jail at Napoleonville. | Plans were immediately made for his lynching, but it was postponed until the next day because the landlords wanted to invite some friends from New Orleans to enjoy the orgy. ‘The jail was unlocked, Moore taken out, beaten, tortured with red- hot branding irons, then hung from the bridge. Beside the sign on his body, an- other one was posted on the front of the post-office, saying: “WARNING TO NIGGERS! No niggers allowed on bridge, in front of church, In front of post-office. Keep moving.” ‘This sign remained there for nine days on U. S, Government property, directly opposite the Roman Cath- olic church of the community. No evidence was ever brought for- ward connecting either of the youths with the murder of the LaRose girl. It was openly sald that any real ac- the difference in| On June 27th, W. G. Roberts, agent for the Louisville and Nashville Rail- way Company, said that he would be very glad when they burn those nig- gers so it would stop the noise front the North and so the niggers would be kept in their place without any trouble. On June 28th, Oscar Pearson, 615 Vine Street, said he would like to see all of them niggers burned and all of their lawyers with them. On November 3rd, “The Community Builder” of Huntsville, said editori. ally: “And in the face of the feeling that exists at Decatur, as well as through- out the Tennessee Valley, against any lawyer claiming to represent the In- ternational Labor Defense League, we suggest that it would not be well for these lawyers to again show up on any soil at any point within this valley. We do not need that type of cattle down here, and their further appearance is wholly unnecessary.” It is with such indisputable evi- dence of sentiment and organized ef- forts, involving officers and men of the National Guard called by the Governor to furnish “protection,” to lynch the Scottsboro boys and their attorneys, that the state officials con- tinue the preparations for holding the trial in Decatur. ‘The Daily Worker has thrown a search-light into the lynch-ridden | community of Decatur and the State of Alabama. | the lynch sentiment comes from and by whom it is being organized. It has published only bits of the great collection of this kind of evidence | it has on hand. It will continue to | publish more of it day by day. The main thing now is to organize 1 mass support for the Scottsboro | se, to 1d the state authorities Jand President Roosevelt with de- mands that this murder conspiracy | end at once and the Scottsboro boys be released unconditionally, with whatever arrangements to protect them from the lynchers and lynch |**aders may be nece: including the right of Negroes to arm in self- | defense. On the 18th and 19th of this Leet there will be held a public TUhronology of the 34-Month Mass Fight for 9 Negro Boys Nine Innocent Lads Menaced by New Lynch Trials and Organized Lynch Gangs By CYRIL BRIGGS The nine Scottsboro Boys, facing a new lynch trial on Nov, 27, an@ further menaced by the State-fostered lynch-gang conspiracy exposed by the “Daily Worker,” have been in the shadow of the electric chair for the past two years and eight months. ‘Their lives have been several times It has found out where | $1.80 a Week in South Carolina Get Six Hours Work) in Seven Days (By a Negro Worker Correspondent) COLUMBIA, S. C.—Enclosed please find something as a payment for the Daily Worker. We Negroes are catching hell now in South Carolina. We get only one day’s work per week. $1.80 for six hours. We must pay rent out of this, also eat something. This is what we are getting now all over South Carolina. This is part of the New Deal. investigation and trial in Baltimore of the Armwood lynching on_ the Eastern shore of Maryland. There will also be an anti-lynch conference, organized and held under the aus- pices of the League of Struggle of Negro Rights. The common attitude of Governor Ritchie and Attorney-General Knight in states so widely separated show the spread of lynch and murder ter- vor throughout the Scuth and its en- couragement by the reonsible au- thorities, The increase In lynch and murder terror, and the growing mountain of evidence of the connection of the authorities with it, as part of the drive against the living and social conditions of the Negro masses, the increasing use of force against all sections of the working class, both white and Negro, in their struggles for better lviing conditions, has made it necessary to begin at Baltimore a mass counter offensive against lynch and murder terror. This will be the main purpose of the confer- ence of the League of Struggle for Negro Rights, ae R CALLS. FOR RELENTLESS FIGHT ON LYNCH TERROR Solomon, Crosswaithe). At bottom | contemptuous of the Negro masses, they are compelled by their desire to keep their hold upon the rank and file Socialist Party members to gloss over their. support of white supremacy with such hypocritical remarks as: “Let us first liberate the white workers; then we'll work for the Negroes.”, This is the answer that only those can give who are quite content to see the Negro people enslaved, who support the |white ruling class in keeping the Tregro peon'e enslaved. NAACP. Levers Betray Negro Peeple In this emergehcy have the so- called leaders of the Negro people taken up the cudgels for the rights of the masses? Many of them grovel at the ante-room to President Roosevelt's chamber seeking a place of honor at the feast of the rulers. Some of them, like the leaders of the NAACP. and the Urban League (Walter White, Dubois, Spin- garn, Pickens, Euzene K. Jones, etc.) murmur against the wage differen- tial, but the’s necens of simnctt to the “New Deal” drown out even these feeble whisperings. Major Mo- ton, in that domain at Tuskegee, left as a heritage of the betrayal of Booker T. Washington, continues his same grovelling and scraping before the feet of the mighty, Dr. DuBois, the so-called Socialist, has found that the path of enli¢htenment leads to nene other than B. T, Washing- ton, and he is now preaching the gospel, so long ago discredited, of nulline on-ra't wo by fhe bootstrans. No moetter that the N.A.A.C.P. was born in a movement of protest against the betrayal policies and ac~ tions of the “great” Washington. “New times, old songs’—the mis- leaders are now almost unanimously preaching the gospel of alliance with the ruling class, of maintaining in all its basic conditions the present order of things, of rejecting the proffered alliance of the white work- ers in the struggle against oppres~- ston and tyranny. Time Has Ceme for Courageous Fight The League of Struggle for Negro Rights calls upon the Negro masses to reject the treacherous policies of these misleaders and to establish a close alliance with the militant white workers. The time has long since come for a clear, courageous, basic struzgle on the part of the Negro and white masses for equal rights for Negroes, against lynching and_ persecution. For Land, Freedom, Equality! The League of Struggle for Negro Rights proclaims Land, Freedom and Equality as its watchwords, We hail the struggles of recent years as the forerunner of the decisive struggle for land and freedom—a struggle which was betrayed in so dastardly a fashion by the Northern ruling class after the Civil War. Such struggles are the fight for the free- dom of the Scottsboro boys which has made clear before the whole wotld the conditions of oppression of the Negro people and a program | Proclaime . Watchword Of “Land, Freedom And Equality” for fighting against it; the strug- gles of the sharecroppers in Ala- bama against serfdom, which is only a first step in the struggle for land; the growing solidarity of white and Negro workers as shown in the struggles of recent years. Thus extends the path to free- dom. No utopian dreams of escape to Africa preached by Garvey, but a struggle here for the freedom and land in the Southern Black Belt, for the right of the millions of Negro people there to say: This land which we have tilled for generations belongs to us; these counties which hold our majorities we will weld into a new state where we shall have authority and where the whites as a minority will have equal rights with us, It is here that the Negro people shall have the right of self- determination—the right, if they choose, to proclaim an independent country. Only then will the American Ne- groes appear upon the world stage as an independent and free people, equal to all and subservient to none. A Call to White Toflers And to the white workers it must be said: Without the Negro masses you cannot be free, with them the future belongs to you. The Negro workers are your powerful black hand. Would you go to battle with one arm severed? Would you not equip that arm with the best of bcc ae Berets the ue sl ler against ¢ Negro people which has been foisted upon you. step forth free from the filth of race hatred, to claim the Negro masses as your friend and ally, Step forth to strike out for Negro freedom, to strike out for Negro rights. Only in this way can you convince the Negro masses that you are worthy of an alliance, that they can entrust their battle to you as you entrust your battle to them. United, in mass effort, you can then shatter the chains from your legs, thrust the burden from your shoul- ders. Especially now, when the Ne- groes are struggling as they never did since the Civil War period, can you mend a century of error, by extend- ing your arm in fraternal clasp. Support Struggles of African and Other Colonial Slaves ‘Throughout the whole world col- ored and oppressed peoples are also struggling for freedom. The fight for the independence of Africa and the West Indies, for freedom in South and Central America and in Cuba is also our struggle. Our victory is also their victory: in solid phalanxes we battle the same enemy-—world imperialism. To support the struggles that are now going on and to extend them, there is a crying need for a militant threatened by lynch gangs and by prison guards and gangsters introduced a into the prison. Arrested on March 25, 1931, the boys were first charged with hoboing, This charge later changed to rape when two white girls were discovered on the freight. Girls at first refused to accuse the boys of rape. But later, threatened with prosecution on their widely known record as prostitutes, one of the girls, Victoria Price, ac- cused all nine boys of having raped her. Ruby Bates still held out, but later gave in to the coercion of State officials. On April 2, the Daily Worker began the first expose of the Scottsboro frame-up. Rush Through Lynch Verdicts April 6—Trials of the boys open at Scottsboro before Judge E. A. Hawkins. Denied the right to select their own attorneys, tried by all- white juries, eight of the boys were speedily condemned to bura in wie electric chair. A mistrial in the case of Roy Wright, 14 years old at the time, prevented a unanimous lynch conviction. ‘he trials were doiubcr- ately set for horse-swapping day in Scottsboro as an additional atuwrac- tion to draw visitors from the out- lying districts. Outside the court, a brass band furnished by the local mill bosses, hailed the verdicts with a rendition of “Happy Days Are Here Again.” April 9—Death sentences pro- nounced on eight of the boys, and date of execution set for July 10. Masses In Indignant Protests The International Labor Defense enters the case. Its attorney, Gen. George W. Chamlee, gives notice of appeal. The Communist Party, the | LL.D. and the League of Struggle for Negro Rights roused the white and Negro masses to angry protests. A thunder of protest rises all over the country and is echoed throughout the world, June 22—Judge Hawkins overrules all motions for new trials. ILD. gives notice of appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court. Jan, 21, 1932, Supreme Court of Alabama hears the appeal. Ala. Supreme Court Upholds Verdicts March 24, 1932, Alabama Supreme Court upholds lynch verdicts against 7 of the boys, grants new trial to Eugene Williams. Chief Justice An- derson in dissenting opinion admits that none of the boys had had a fair trial. March 25—I.L.D. files petition in U. 8. Supreme Court for new hear ing. Oct. 10—U. 8. Court hears arguments on appeal. Defers decision. Mass Fight Wins New Trials Nov. 7—U. S, Supreme Court hands down decision, on eve of presidential election, granting new trials to the boys, but ignoring constitutional ques- tions raised by the LL.D. Scottsboro protest demonstrations held through~ out the world. Demonstrators before U. S. Supreme Court building at- tacked by Washington police. Nov. 21—J. Louis Engdahl dies in Moscow following strenuous European Scottsboro defense tour with Mrs. Ada Wright, Scottsboro mother. March 7, 1933—Change of venue granted. New trial set for Decatur. March 28, 1933—New trials open in Decatur, Ala. LL.D. challenges jury system of South on exclusion of Ne- groes from jury. Haywood Pattere son first of boys to be re-tried. April 7—Ruby Bates appears as de fense witness, repudiating her former testimony, causing great sensation, Lester Carter, one of the male come panions of the two white girls, also appears for defense. Attorney Gen- eral Knight attacks Ruby Bates as having “sold out” the South. Mass Upsurge Answers Patterson Verdict April 9, 1933—Palm Sunday. Grin- ning, all-white jury brings in lynch verdict against Haywood Patterson. Harlem in angry upsurge. White and Negro toilers throughout country answer lynch verdict with indignant protests and iron determination that “the Scottsboro Boys Shall Not Die.” April 17—Judge Horton postpones indefinitely further lynch proceedings. May 8-9, 1933—5,000 Negro and white workers in Scottsboro protest march to Washington place demands on President Roosevelt and Congress for release of the boys, and for adop- tion and enforcement of Bill of Civil Rights for Negroes drawn up by LS. NR. and carried to Washington by the marchers, white or black, determined to sgl for the liberation of the Negro ple. Such a center will unite and centralize the efforts of the various organizations and individuals on the basis of a definite program, welding them into mh Lhd dt Lice force seein-t Nowro oppressi Militant Unity ‘agaist impertalist The League of Btrugele for Negro Rights is such an organization. Its and platform shows the way for the liberation of the Negro peo- ple, to which all sincere fighters in this cause can adhere. The terrific needs of the Negro people have dictated this program. It is based upon the experiences and. traditions of three centuries of strug- gle against oppression, Its sharpness ,, has been tempered in the blood of Negroes murdered by the white rul- ing class oppressors. Turn it into a powerful weapon in the struggle for Equality, Land and Freedom! Join the League of Struggle for Negro Rights! Affiliate Your Organization! National Council central organization around which can be grouped all those organiza~ tions and League of Struggle for Negre Rights —