Chief counsel for the I.L.D. and a lead attorney on the Scottsboro case, Joseph Brodsky reviews the first three years of struggle in the 1930s most prominent anti-racist fight.

‘Three Years of the Scottsboro Case–Some Highlights’ by Joseph R. Brodsky from Labor Defender. Vol. 10. No. 4. April, 1934.

My first memory of the Scottsboro case is the time when I went down to Scottsboro to arrange for the hearing on a new trial. It was the first time anyone directly connected with the I.L.D. as an I.L.D. attorney had appeared in Scottsboro. A few days before some photographer had been there and a mob had advised him to get out. They asked him “if he was that son of a bitch Jew lawyer.” This was of course a beautiful introduction for me.

After the motion was argued I was immediately surrounded in the courtroom itself, “Come on you son of a bitch, we’re waiting for you outside.” A newspaperman saved that situation by making a pretty speech to the crowd “That’s what brings us into disrepute” and so on. He took me through the back door. A crowd was waiting on the steps of the courthouse and when they spotted me they came towards me. Before they could say Jack Robinson, we were in a car and off. That was my first introduction to a Southern Court.

My first visit to the boys had preceded that. Before I was to appear in court we wanted reassurance that the I.L.D. was handling the case and not the NAACP. To make sure, on my trip down I stopped at Chattanooga at the office of Chamlee (who was a friend of Claude Patterson, Haywood’s father and had accepted the retainer from the I.L.D. to stay on the case) and saw the parents of the boys. They all said they wanted the I.L.D. to handle the case so we arranged to bring the parents to Kilby Prison. The arrangement was made, with great difficulty, with Judge Horton, to have them see their boys.

I went in first to see the boys and talk with them. When I told them they were going to see their parents, that their parents were there, they were skeptical. They had had many previous promises, but since their arrest had not only not seen their parents, or any of their friends or relatives, had seen no newspapers, had had no idea of what a furor and fight was going on in their behalf.

When I walked into the jail I was searched. I don’t know what they expected me to do, especially after I got into the Death Cell. The impression is still very vivid. I walked through a long corridor. Half way down are stairs at the head of which is a solid steel door. It slammed behind me. The sound was not encouraging. The cell block is about 40 feet long and 30 wide with cells on both sides. The boys were two in a cell on each side. The bars are covered with a heavy steel mesh through which it is very hard to see, and as soon as we entered and started walking, they lay down on their backs on the floor–the mesh did not reach the bottom–to get a glimpse of who was coming in.

I had never seen them before and their youth, especially 14-year-old Roy Wright, impressed me. Although I’m pretty hardboiled, the situation affected me and I started to talk to those boys They had been sentenced April 9th and this was May. The only encouragement had been to see a few of the prisoners led to the electric chair which was almost within their view. I told them about the I.L.D. and told them to keep up their courage because outside the workers, black and white were carrying on the fight for their freedom. That if they stick with us the united struggle of all workers would win them their freedom. At this point the warden interjected, “Stop! You can’t come in here and stir up these N***s!” But the boys got the point. When the parents came in they rushed to the bars and tried by all means to greet their children, kissing them through the bars, through the steel mesh. The deputy warden snapped out, “Stand back.” It was heartbreaking to see them there, trying to kiss each other through the cold steel.

At the hearing we raised the questions of inclusion of Negroes on the jury, and the question of change of venue. In spite of the argument and proof that the counsel had been brow- beaten and cowed, that the jury was prejudiced, the motion was denied.

Next was the Supreme Court of Alabama where we went to argue the appeal. The Chief Judge, Anderson, opened the proceedings by waving a telegram in my face: “This court has been flooded with telegrams and pro- tests. This is an outrageous attempt to browbeat the court.” Attorney Thomas E. Knight appeared on the scene for the first time to argue against the motion and used the same argument as the Chief Judge. The courtroom was jammed. The protests had their effect. A Negro reporter fought to get in–and he won. The courtroom was on a level with the street. Outside the Negroes of the city had collected. As you argued you could see their faces plastered against the windows all around. And I argued the case in a loud voice, loud enough to be heard outside.

The Judge sitting at the end of the bench interested me very much. Every time Attorney Knight spoke, he listened I carefully, smiled, nodded his head. asked the clerk who he was and the clerk said “Thomas E. Knight, Sr.” I said “No, I mean the judge on the bench, not the Attorney.” He said “That’s right, he is Thomas E. Knight, Sr., father of Thomas E. Knight, Jr.” That was a pretty picture. The Attorney General argues a case before his father, Judge in the Supreme Court, who smiles indulgently at his sonny boy, and thinks his son is o.k. The appeal was denied.

The U.S. Supreme Court–for the first time in the history of that highest of high courts, that sancto sanctorum of Justice, which opens promptly at 12, where the court attendants are not dressed in uniforms but in afternoon formal clothes, cut-aways, striped grey pants–in the first time in the history of this Court of Courts, workers came oved and demonstrated. Ah! It was a shock.

Impossible. Standing on the steps of the Capitol–Wm. L. Patterson of the I.L.D., Mother Mooney, whose son was bas also a victim of capitalist “justice,” Chamlee, the Democratic Baptist, and myself, and hundreds of workers demonstrating.

The argument was made by Walter H. Pollack, constitutional lawyer. It was a brilliant presentation. There was an obvious attempt on the part of the court to make it an ordinary case. We were preceded by some sort of bootleg case.

After the argument, the court sat silently, asked no questions, then called “Next Case.” There was a rustle in the courtroom, his Honor, Judge Hughes showed signs of confusion and turned a bit pink. And for the first time in history the court clerk wrapped in history the court clerk wrapped lightly on the desk for order in the courtroom. The decision was reversed.

The motion for change of venue was then brought before Judge Hawkins in Alabama. He said he would be fair. We wanted to have the trial in Birmingham, but he sent us to Morgan County, the next door neighbor of Scottsboro. When we came back for retrial, we met Callahan. The Southerners didn’t want Horton, so they gave us Callahan. He’s a beaut. I never met his equal.

Well, after the guilty verdict, Callahan thought he’d play a nice trick. He said we had 30 days for appeal, but the court had expired and of course we didn’t have that time. But we had 12 lawyers and 3 printing plants working day and night and we got that appeal ready in time!

So once more we’ll go before the Alabama Supreme Court and have the pleasure of meeting Thomas E. Knight, Sr. who will listen to the arguments of his son, Jr. And after that the U. S. Supreme Court again. There has not yet been a decision on the question of Negroes on the Jury.

We must remember that although the I.L.D. has kept those boys alive for 3 years, that they’re still in jail, still in danger. There is a great danger of the people forgetting this, of forgetting that they are still in jail oppressed and terrorized. The protests must go on.

Labor Defender was published monthly from 1926 until 1937 by the International Labor Defense (ILD), a Workers Party of America, and later Communist Party-led, non-partisan defense organization founded by James Cannon and William Haywood while in Moscow, 1925 to support prisoners of the class war, victims of racism and imperialism, and the struggle against fascism. It included, poetry, letters from prisoners, and was heavily illustrated with photos, images, and cartoons. Labor Defender was the central organ of the Scottsboro and Sacco and Vanzetti defense campaigns. Editors included T. J. O’ Flaherty, Max Shactman, Karl Reeve, J. Louis Engdahl, William L. Patterson, Sasha Small, and Sender Garlin.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1934/v10n04-apr-1934-orig-LD.pdf