AMERICAN "JUSTICE" PROTECTS ITS OWN “pase
By Evelyn Sell a |
The release of 21 men accused by the FBI of the murder of three. young civil-rights workers in Mississippi last June, continues. to be a topic of bitter discussion in the United States. Since the. 21 still face a grand jury hearing, some people hope that they may yet be brought to-trial, Others are not so hopeful, and it.is to be noted that racists throughout the country have been encouraged by the action of U.S. Commissioner Esther Carter in dismissing charges Decein ber 10 against 19 of the accused because, in her opinion, a confession produced by the FBI was only "hearsay." (Charges against the other two were later dropped. ‘)
The freed men were jubilant over their. release, and. put on smirks for the press photographers. As they left the * courtroom they were surrounded by well-wishers. Their lawyers claimed that. Miss Carter's action had the effect of exonerating their clients.
‘Against this gross violation of the most elementary justice, a - group of civil-rights supporters staged a brief demonstration on the steps of the courthouse. Among them was the brave Mrs. Fannie Chaney, mother of | one of the victims,
The whole world now knows | that three. local law officers were. included in the group of 21 charged with conspiracy in the triple murder, They are Sheriff Lawrence Rainey, Deputy Sheriff Cecil Price and Patrolman Otha Neal Burkes, According tothe FBI, Cecil Price’ played.a key role in the- murder: plot.
"It was part of ‘the plan and purpose of the conspiracy," states the FBI complaint, "that Cecil Ray Price, deputy sheriff of : Neshoba County, Miss., acting under the color of his office, would arrest Michael Henry Schwerner, James Earl Chaney and Andrew Goodman without lawful cause, and detain them in the Neshoba County Jail, located in Philadelphia, Miss., and would release them from custody, and that [Price and the others | would thereupon intercept [the three youths] shortly after they departed from Philadelphia, Miss. , OY automobile, and would threaten, assault, shoot and kill them.’ Not So Unusual a On what basis could a U.S. Commissioner dismiss such serious charges, backed as they were by evidence that ine luded a confession?
-.. The sad fact is that Miss Carter is a typical representative of "justice" in the South. She is not a lawyer, has’ no legal train- -ing. She was appointed to her post by Federal Sudge Mize, who, in turn,. was appointed to his post with the help of Mississippi Senator Tom Stennis. As an influential leader ofthe Democratic party, Stennis has long advised winners in the race for the White House on
appointments to the federal bench in his state. ~-This was, of course, in strict accordance with the hallowed American custom of dipping into what is known as the "federal pork barrel,"
It should not be overlooked that a cousin of the senator, who works as a law clerk for Judge Mize, advised Commissioner Carter, during the December hearing which freed the 19 men. ;
“The dismissal of charges contradicted a long-established procedure. A Justice Department lawyer stated, “It is absolutely routine at hearings for-government attorneys to give. an account of confession. no
Other members of the department said they were unable to find a Similar example in the entire body of American and British law where a commissioner refused to find such a reported confession sufficient grounds for prosecution. ;
Bight years ago the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on a case involv= ing a virtually identical issue. A gambler, accused of tax evasion, © objected that his: indictment rested solely on hearsay evidence from " government agents. The Supreme Court unanimously rejected this objection, me v4
. In the United States, naturally, tax evasion -~ if committed by a. gambler -- is a much more serious matter for the courts and public officials than the murder of civil-rights workers. Anger among Negro People
. Charles Evers, Mississippi. state chairman of the National | Association for the Advancement of Colored People [NAACP], called the dismissal "typical of Mississippi justice. . . No white man in Mississippi ever has or ever will be convicted of any crime against Negroes or decent white. people until a firmer hand is taken by the. federal government. Presenting the cases to the grand jury would be a repetition, because the grand jury would be made up of: Mississippians who sympathize with and support the murdering, bombing, and beating of true Americans, both Negro and White,"
The Rev. Martin Luther King issued a statement from. Oslo where he had gone to accept the Nobel Peace Prize,
“TT have long. hoped that Mississippi would show signs “of change and that an economic boycott would be unnecessary," he told reporters. "But unless the federal government or the state of Mississippi can find methods of maintaining justice for all men in that state, I will shave ‘no alternative but to call upon forces of goodwill: of the nation to effect a complete. boycott of Mississippi products as an attempt to demonstrate the revolt of the national-conscience against this accept-~ ance of murder,:and_ attempts to absolve persons whom the government seeks to indict for murder,"
Both the NAACP and the Congress of Racial Equality [CORE] supported the boycott call and urged investors not to underwrite Mississippi securities currently on sale.
| But big Northern financial interests bid heavily on State of Mississippi bond issues on December 17. Mississippi Governor Paul Johnson commented, "The civil rights demand, rather than adversely affecting the sales, brought out more bidders than we have had in the past few years,"
So much for the effectiveness of appeals to white capitalists to boycott racist Mississippi! : Another Farce?
. What can be expected from the next step -- the calling of a grand jury to consider the murder charges lodged against the .21?
The grand jury has been meeting under U.S. Judge William Cox. This white Southern gentleman has referred in court to Negroes as that "bunch of niggers" and has compared them to "shimpanzees." He happens to be a former campaign manager for the notorious racist Senator Eastland, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee,
- With judges like these and with all-white juries, it is no surprise to discover that although 825 civil-rights legal actions have been initiated in the South since (1959, there have been 811 acquittals and only: 14° convictions. m
On December L7, twenty © U. S. congressmen urged. the Justice Department to replace Judge Cox with an "unbiased" person. The congressmen also asked that a new "nondiscriminatory" jury be set up to hear the triple murder case,
It would be quite a departure for such a request to be heeded, Much more likely is continuation of the pattern.we have seen up to now.
- Both the FBI and the Justice Department refused to protect the ‘students engaged in civil-rights projects in the South last summer.
‘The plot against the Freedom workers and the names of the murderers were common knowledge in the town of Philadelphia, where the lynching was planned and executed, but it teok the FBI six months to arrest anyone; and then it was timed to come after the presidential elections.
- The. exclusion of Negroes from jury panels in the South and the appointment of known segregationists to. the bench by Democratic presidents precludes equal treatment under the law for Negroes and their . oppressors, The attitudes and actions of public officials, from state governors down to local officeholders encourage and shield the sadists, the bomb-throwers and murderers,
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