The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1933-04-10
BY LOREN MILLER


BY LOREN MILLER
THE issue of the Scottsboro boys
L freedom rests on the success or
failure in completing the task of
wrestling the case from the hands
of the Alabama courts. Thanks to
the efforts OF the International
Labor Defense, that process has
saved the boys thus far. The COM
apetion Of the job rests with those
Us who have been insisting that
ne boys must not die.
I need not linger over the point
that the courts of Alabama, and
the other American courts too, for
that matter, are rugged against
Negroes. The Justice" that comes
out Of these courts is recorded all
too wildly in the dry records OF
those thousands of Negroes drag
ging out their lives on chain gangs,
rOtting away in iails and murdered
in priSons-for the basic offense Of
being poor and black in an America
dominated by the white and rich.
More 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 big
thumb in the pie. 1t overthrow the
civil rights bills. 1t added its judi
cial blessings to Jim Grow schools,
cars, and toilets.
Other courts have been no less
hostile Bewhiskered justices of
ne peace heave unemployed
Negroes into jailS on vagrancy
1 charges with clock-like regularity.
Worms Of violence, such as the ones
presided over by Judge Hawkins,
are as numerous as judicial dis
tricts.
NOR would L give the impression
~ that the courts have done these
things because of the cussedneSs
Of the judges It goes deeper than
that. These judges are simply
carrying out the orders Of those
who select them. And the solicitors
are those who reap the profits that
flow from keeping Negroes chained
TO the soil IS poems 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
er5, publishers, politicians, F. ofes-
s0rs and other parasites-black and
White-who have been, and are,
willing to testify. for Sl96 and
other good and valuable considera-
ton, that the exploitation and in
feriority of the Negro has been or
sained from on high and justified
~ Blackstone.
DETURNING to the case in point,
II that of the Scottsboro boys, let
me point out that the first attempt
to take this case out of the hands
5of the courts met with stiff OPP
! position. Led by NAA.CP. lead
ers, who pretended a Simple Simon
faith in courts and refuse to per-
NIT a Negro to serve on the jury,
this opposition tried to stif1e the
honest protest that went up when
the world learned the facts about
the near legal lynching. 1t is to
the everlasting credit of the work
ers and intellectuals Of the world
that tn pposition was brushed
aside. Til, 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 formulate, but because the
high court understood that the
professors were in no mood to coun-
tenance the butchery of boys on
so fiimsy pretext.
But the Alabama courts still have
their masters, the profit takers, to
serve. So they are digging up new
md more involved judicial and
Isgal technicalities. They hope to
SaiSe such a smoke screen of legal
Ssms 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 theml They want us to
still our voices and deliver the boys
to the tender mercies of district and
supreme court Judge Hawkinses.
In other words, they want lynching
with due process of law.
\ DON'T believe that we who have
1 got the case In our hands now
are going to hand it back to these
courts. II we do we will be guilty
Of contributing to the death Of the
boys. Our weapon is protest and
more protest. Protest, that will
penetrate to the remotest corners
Al Alabama, staying the hands OF
he courts while it makes the issue
10 plain that even the victinaized
and kept-ignorant whites Of that
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 Our Judgment is
that they must go free. It's up to
us to enforce our judgment. Mass
protest Is our only weapon of en-
forcement. Its volume must swell
q million fold. The lives Of nine
innocent boys are in our handsl