Evening star., 1951-02-04
The MortinsviIIe Seven

The case of THE Martnsville Seven" affords
an instructive lesson in the uses of propaganda.
TWO years ago a white woman was raped
in MartinSville, Virginia, and seven men-aH
Negroes-were brought to trial for the offense
and convicted. The Virginia Supreme Court said
that lone can hardly conceive of a more
atrocious, more beastly crime"
The evidence showed that the woman, wife
of Martinsville merchant, had gone into the
Negro section of the town to collect for clothing
that had been sold. In the course of the mass
assault she was bitten, scratched and suffered
serious internal injuries. She is still under
medical care
All of the seven men made written confess
sions. Four OF them testified in open court and
gave details of the assault. Among the witnesses
for the prosecution were Negro boy, a Negro
woman, and the wife of one of the defendants
So there was no substantial question as to their
guilt and, indeed the attorneys who represented
the men on appeal have not contended that
they were innocent of the crime
Nevertheless, after all seven had been SEN
~ fenced to death, flour have been executed and
the three others are scheduled to die tomorrow
tremendous campaign in their behalf was put
under way.
This campaign falls roughly into three
phases. First came the strenuous efforts in
behalf of the condemned men by their attorneys
The case was carried through the appellate
processes of the Virginia courts and taken twice
TO the Supreme Court. The theory of the appeal
was that the men had been Disseminated
against because of their race, and this rested on
the contention that only Negroes are sentenced
to death for rape in Virginia 1t was not a
meritorous appeal, and the courts uniformly
rejected it. Still, lawyer has a right and
duty, to do all that he can in behalf of client
The second phase took the form of appar-
emily sincere appeals to Virginia's Governor
Battle for clemency. One such appeal came for
instance from the president of the Richmond
Ministerial Union. Appeals of this sort may seem
to manifest greater concern for guilty men
than for the victim of their crime Nevertheless,
they are legitimate exercises of the right of
petition
1t is the third phase that should be matter
OF concern for all people, white or colored.
This phase was a propaganda campaign
headed up by the Communist Daily Worker and
the Civil Rights Congress, which is on the
Attorney Generals subversive list. The truth
means nothing to these people. But they saw in
the case of THE Martinsville Seven an oppor-
tunity to stir up racial discord in this country
and to blacken the reputation of the United
States abroad And they did a masterful
job of it.
These propagandists saw to it that Governor
Battle was swamped with kilograms and protests,
From Red China came a cable signed in the
names of three organizations. It said that news
OF the imminent executions had aroused the
deepest indignation" among the Chinese people,
and added that the confessions had been
extracted by inhuman torture and later were
repudiated by the accused in open court" This
followed the line of material that had been put
out by Civil Rights Congress-
In Moscow all of the leading papers pub
lished summary Of letter of protest signed
by 80 Russian writer's composers and scientists
Another protest came from Bucharest and there
were still others from groups in England
In this way, the case of men guilty of a
brutal crime, men found guilty after receiving
the beneht OF all the safeguards afforded by
American justice, becomes an instrument to be
used in discrediting the United States abroad
And there is no doubt that the instrument has
been used effectively, for the people in other
parts of the world will hear only the Communist
version. They will never have an opportunity
to know the truth-certainly not from the
Communist propagandists
There is one other aspect of this matter
which is entitled to some serious consideration.
Virginia has a drastic anti-lynch law, and
there has not been lynching in the State since
the law was passed more than quarter of a
century ago. That law is respected by the people
OF Virginia because it rests on the eminently
correct proposition that mob violence is intol-
er7He, that any person, white colored. who
is accused or suspected of crime is entitled
to judicial trial.
The case of "The MartnSville Seven" pre-
sentS the shoe on the other foot. The vicious,
lying propaganda, the march of hundreds of
demonstrators into Richmond, the picketing of
the White House-all of these things were de-
signed to nullify the judicial process and to
coerce elected officials into reversing or modi-
flying the judgment of the courts Of course,
the effort did not succeed in this case. But the
intent was there, and that should be a matter of
some concern For the position of those who
still would resort to mob violence will be
strengthened in direct proportion to the extent
that pressure groups may succeed in interfering
with the judicial function or in nufying a
judgment of the courts that has been rendered
after fair trial.