Civil rights in relation scottsboro trial

They were immediately arrested by a posse, thrown into jail in Gadsden, Alabama, and threatened by a lynch mob. Then, all but one were swiftly convicted by all-white juries and sentenced to death. At this point, an unlikely ally swooped in to mobilize on their behalf: the American Communist Party. At the time, the party was working to make inroads in the United States. The group also took on labor disputes and free speech cases. Throughout the s and s, the ILD began to tackle prominent cases related to lynching, the KKK and other racially motivated crimes.

These cases helped make the party more palatable to marginalized groups who traditionally lacked the financial and social resources to defend themselves in court. And when the Scottsboro case emerged, the ILD saw an opportunity not just to fight for racial equality, but to take advantage of the national spotlight and further their cause.

What needs and issues does it address, and what has it accomplished since it was founded in ? Despite its commitment to fighting for equal rights for African-Americans, the NAACP shied away from cases where a black man was accused of raping a white woman. At the time, the group also had financial issues, and historians like James R. Supreme Court. Despite evidence that exonerated the accused and even a retraction by one of the accusers, the state pursued the case and all-white juries delivered guilty verdicts that initially carried the death penalty.

Several of the accused were sentenced to prison terms and all endured long stays in prison as the case made its way through the legal system. Scottsboro Trial Defendants The saga began on March 25, , when a fight broke out between groups of young black and white passengers riding a freight train through Jackson County.

The white boys were forced from the train and wired ahead to the next stop on the line to have the black youths apprehended. When the train stopped just outside the town of Paint Rock, local police and a mob apprehended nine African Americans ranging in age from 13 to Only four of the young men knew each other and were traveling together. The police also questioned Victoria Price and Ruby Bates, two white women who also were hitching a ride on the train looking for work.

The accused were arrested and transported to Scottsboro , the Jackson County seat, to await trial. In the process, the Scottsboro case in many ways inaugurated the modern civil rights movement. The first set of trials took place in four groups over the course of just four days in early April Thousands of angry whites gathered outside the courthouse to monitor the proceedings and at the request of the local sheriff, Gov.

Before an all-white jury and a hostile judge, the defendants' court-appointed attorney put up a meager defense, repeatedly declining to cross-examine witnesses and failing to scrutinize the prosecution's key pieces of evidence.

Each of the four juries returned guilty verdicts in a matter of hours. Eight defendants were sentenced to death, but the jury split over whether to sentence the youngest defendant, year-old Roy Wright, to death or life imprisonment, and a mistrial was declared. Wright remained in prison, awaiting the verdicts in the trials of his co-defendants, until The judge set the executions for July 10, the earliest possible date the law would allow.

The ILD recognized the case's potential to become a lightning rod for a national struggle against racism, as well as a powerful propaganda vehicle and recruitment tool for the Communist Ruby Bates Party. ILD lawyers quickly won the trust of the defendants and their parents, as well as a stay of execution until the case could be reviewed by the Alabama Supreme Court.

This action was aided by a flood of letters from non-Communists, black and white, from across the country who learned of the case through ILD promotional efforts. The participation of the Communist-affiliated group significantly intensified the already charged atmosphere in Alabama and around the nation.

Meanwhile, the nation's leading African American civil rights organization, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People NAACP , reacted slowly to the case because of initial doubts about the defendants' innocence.

For their part, Alabama officials defended the verdicts and wanted no interference by either outside organization in what they considered a local affair. The ILD pursued the case through the conventional legal channels of state and federal courts of appeal. However, it did not believe that justice could be secured through litigation alone. As a result, the group mounted a relentless media campaign, sponsoring rallies, parades, and nationwide speaking tours designed to raise money for the defense and to expose the gross inequities in the Alabama justice system to the court of public opinion.

ILD publicity efforts transformed the case from a local matter into an international spectacle. The group then turned to the U. Supreme Court, which in November overrode the Alabama decisions and granted new trials to all of the defendants. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. Loving v. Virginia was a Supreme Court case that struck down state laws banning interracial marriage in the United States.

The plaintiffs in the case were Richard and Mildred Loving, a white man and Black woman whose marriage was deemed illegal according to Virginia state law. The details of their skirmish with a group of white men and two women on the train are still unclear. But by the end of the train ride, nine young men—all African American, The Great Migration was the relocation of more than 6 million African Americans from the rural South to the cities of the North, Midwest and West from about to Driven from their homes by unsatisfactory economic opportunities and harsh segregationist laws, many Black The Rosewood Massacre was an attack on the predominantly African American town of Rosewood, Florida, in by large groups of white aggressors.

The town was entirely destroyed by the end of the violence, and the residents were driven out permanently. The story was mostly During the Tulsa Race Massacre, which occurred over 18 hours from May 31 to June 1, , a white mob attacked residents, homes and businesses in the predominantly Black Greenwood neighborhood of Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The event remains one of the worst incidents of racial violence in The TVA was envisioned as a Roosevelt that aimed to restore prosperity to Americans.

When Roosevelt took office in , he acted swiftly to stabilize the economy and provide jobs and relief Live TV. This Day In History. History Vault. Who Were the Scottsboro Boys? Initial Trials and Appeals In the first set of trials in April , an all-white, all-male jury quickly convicted the Scottsboro Boys and sentenced eight of them to death.

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