Arkansas State press. [volume] (Little Rock, Ark.) 1941-1959, 1952-05-09
Communist Leader, Ex. Tenant Farmer
Describes Violence Against Negro

Petis Perry former Alabama tenant farmer now acting
his defense attorney in the Smith Act indictment of
sixteen Negro and white Communist leaders in New York. de-
caed in his opening address the jury that Because
consistent advocates of and democracy he and his fell
low defendants now trial
The Negro leader told the court will show during the
of this trial that have theoretically and consistent
~ urged not but negotiations and agreements resolve
international differences and tensions We have advocated
since June 1880 end the senseless and tragic
in Korea convinced that this would greatly enhance reai
zation of the universal desire for peace"
Perry of sixteen New York leaders charg
ed with Conspiracy teach overthrow of the
by force and violence told the that while
Alabama he had witnessed and experienced force
lence against the Negro people"
lie told of seeing, YOUTH Negro prisoner beaten
while his legs were chained He recalled witnessing the
der of Negro minister in Hamburg Alabama.
AS secretary of the National Negro commission of the
Communist Party he said he had the special responsibility
to recommend policy and help implement policy
tvs program Negro rights.
He explained HON the Communists worked to improve
conditions of the Negro people and the white workers.
Thus not teaching force and violence but advocating unity
and brotherhood" Perry to show that il was
the leaders of the Communist Party of New York especially
that great of Georgia family Benjamin Davis ir
named as co-eonspiraor of mine who member
city council of New York among the first raise the
whole issue of jicrow in Suyvesan town. housing deve
opment owned by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Co.
We intend to show that of this advocacy had
the remotes resemblance to conspiracy 1t advanced
the city council by Benjamin j. Davis and developed through
public mass meetings petitions delegations demonstrations
conferences
I'VE intend to show that far from advocating force and
violence our Party has fought for the constitutional rights
TO vote for the millions of Negro and still
main disfranchsed in the poll the south This
program serves the democratic interests the
In that it will, among other things insure the removal of
the antdemocrac representatives in congress who
key positions in the House and Senate"
Perry told the jury that the defense evidence show
how the Communists fought for program selfdetermna-
ton for the Negro people in the Black Belt area cutting across
3O0 counties in the South This fight, he said fight for
sefe and for the right of the Negro people to determine
their own destiny
I'VE intend to show that flowing from understanding
OF MarxsmLe nnism Perry continued that the inereste
OF the white workers. the white middle class city and
rural and the small business people, tied up with the
teress of the Negro people, and that the working class of
our country cannot attain its emancipation it failed to fight
for national liberation of the oppressed Negro people"
Marxism-Leninsm he explained, condemns and combats
the Hterdeas of AngoSaxon supremacy and the ideas of
white supremacy the myth of the nferiory the Negro
and colored peoples.
MarxstLennst theory" Perry stated "is based on the
separation OF people because of nationality religion race or
color but on the equality and brotherhood peoples the abo
hon of the exploitation of by man. and the oppression of
one nation by another nation"