The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-05-28
He Dared to Organize
Negro and White
Unemployed
By MYRA PAGE

| THE sombre walls Of Fulton
1 County Prison, where Angelo
Herndon is entombed, rise in the
very heart of Atlanta, cultural
center of the South" The Jail door
bell jangles several minutes before
the jailer bestirs himself from his
comfortable chew and gossiping
with bluecoat, to let us in. We spy
him cycling us oddly through a grilled
window, like some slow-witted Bos-
sic behind barbed-wire fence.
The heavy door swings back. He
takes us into his Office. NY COM
panion, member of well-known
Atlanta law firm whom the Inter-
national Labor Defense has Just in
terested in the case, produces his
card. The jailer's waddling person
exudes an ingratiating importance.
And what may he do for us?
1--WE came to see a prisoner-An-
gelo Herndon."
The keepers jaw says, THAT gol-
dern niggerl You come to see him!"
Perplexed fear in his eyes. his bear
ing resumes its old hardness. He
surveys me and him, with mutual
contempt. To think that this biped
has in his keeping that rare spirit
and working class fighter, Angelo
Herndonl
He may manhandle and insult as
he likes our young comrade, SEN
fenced to twenty years on the
chain-gang for having organized
Atlanta's jobless in a march to the
Fulton County Commission to de-
mand relief. This alone has been
his "crime."
What had most Infatuated the
Coca Cola and mill and cotton in
terests controlling Georgia was his
defiance of Jim Grow. That damn
white niger" had dared organize
unemployed councils and demon
STATIONS that included both colored
and white. This was open rebellionl
melting to riot!
The orderly demonstrators won
their demands. The Commission
found an extra $4,000 for relief.
(But get that Redo Some days
later, as he was entering the post
Office for his mail, Angelo was ar
rested. For eleven days he re-
NAMED without any charges. Mean
while he was treated to trips to
the electrocution cell and similar
diversions, ito make the bastard
talk" Terror proved useless.
Finally the Red-baiting Solicitor
Hudson bethought himself of an old
law directed against rebelling slaves,
and resurrected in recent years for
rebellion workers. So in the sum-
mer Of 1882, Angelo Herndon was
charged under a law dating back
to 1920, "for melting to insurrec-
ton" The penalty was death.
For six months before was
tried" the 20-year-old organizer
writes, "I was forced to live in a cell
with condemned men. I almost died
from starvation and lack of medi-
cine" After three days of farci-
cal trial, he was found guilty. But
the wide protest reused by the IL.
D. caused the jury to recommend
mercy" Sentence was from Is to
20 years on the Georgia chain gang.
John L. Spivak in his book,
Georgia Niger" showed what a
death trap these gangs are.
THE jailor shoots stream of
L 'baccy into the spitoon. THAT gol
dern niggerl The one get all
them kilograms about-demanding
I release him. Imagine that! De-
manding!" At my involuntary grin
the keepers fury pulls him to his
feet. ''That blasted coonl Oughta
be on the chain gang, that's what.
Where I'd put him, too" eyes, but
for those wiresD
Remembering the lawyers quite
wide connections, our host jingleS
his keys. His bearing modif1es.
What you mixing up in such a
case for?" he queries, adding quick
", Come on. This amt visiting
day for niggers, but seeing as it's
you, Mr.. Lagnley."
His glum waddle precedes us to
high steel door, one side of a
barred cage. Within are penned hui
man beings. In the half-light, at
square peepholes stand bedraggled
white men, receiving their families.
On the outside, staring through the