In the face of murderous legal and extralegal resistance the Communist Party bravely attempts to hold interracial May Day celebrations across the Jim Crow South in 1931, mobilizing with a particular focus on the just-developing Scottsboro Case.

‘Hold May Day Meets in Southern Cities’ from Southern Worker. Vol. 1 No. 38. May 9, 1931.

Smash Meet In Greenville; Jail Binkley on Gang

GREENVILLE, S.C. W.G. Binkley, organizer of the Trade Union Unity League, who was arrested when the May Day Demonstration here was broken up by 36 carloads of police and millowner agents, was sentenced to 60 days on the chain gang in Magistrate Bates Aiken’s court on May 2. Comrade Binkley was charged with vagrancy and breach of peace and was immediately put on the chain gang to serve his sentence.

The mob of police and mill forces included M.O. Alexander, superintendent of the Woodside Mill. The workers gathered at the Perry Ave. show grounds were dispersed and the organizers threatened and told to leave town, and the workers were told that “n***s and whites can’t meet together.” Comrade Binkley was arrested before the time scheduled for the meeting by Sheriff Bramlett. The charges, which were not made until late in the afternoon, were conspiracy, disorderly conduct and affray.

The hearing was a farce from beginning to end. Every cop, deputy and dick of the city was in the courtroom. Although Binkley proved that he was paid organizer of the T.U.U.L., he was convicted of vagrancy and no effort was made to prove breach of peace. Solicitor Leatherwood, after reading one of the leaflets calling the demonstration, shouted at Binkley: “You are a leper of society. Down with Communism!”

Comrade Binkley took the stand and told of the work and demands of the Unemployed Council. He stated that the workers would continue to organize and demand relief from the millowners and the city. He denounced the stretchout and wage-cuts in the mills.

Not having succeeded in breaking up the Unemployed Council through the mob terrorism of the K.K.K., police and millowners, they are now trying to break it up by due process of law” in the courts, but the workers are organizing and continuing the struggle.

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Evade Cops and Hold Successful Demonstrations

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. Despite the fact that demonstrations in this city are banned and are broken up by police as soon as they are discovered, a May Day demonstration of 100 white and Negro workers was held here near Logtown under the auspices of the Communist Party.

A telegram protesting the legal lynching at Scottsboro was adopted; without a dissenting voice by the white and Negro workers at the demonstration and sent to Gov. Miller of Alabama.

The meeting lasted close to an hour, with Harris Gilbert, organizer of the Young Communist League, as speaker. Most of the workers at the demonstration were miners from nearby mine towns, although some of the workers came from many parts of the city. White workers, who said that they were dead set against the Communists because of lies they had been told, came up to the speaker after the demonstration and enthusiastically declared that they now supported the Communist Party completely.

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2 Meetings in Atlanta

ATLANTA, Ga. Two May Day meetings were held here and were well attended despite the terrorist methods used by the bosses and police in an effort to locate the whereabouts of the meetings. One meeting was held on May Day under the auspices of the Communist Party and the other on May Day eve, called by the League of Struggle for Negro Rights. The meetings were exceptionally enthusiastic and both sent telegrams to Gov. Miller of Alabama, demanding the release of the nine Negro youths convicted at Scottsboro, Comrade Dave Doran, Communist organizer, spoke at both meetings.

Leaflets distributed by workers at night led the city authorities to send out reserve squads of motorcycle police to patrol the city in an attempt to stop the leaflet distribution on May Day. Owners of the Atlanta Woolen Mill tried to intimidate some of the workers by drilling them on whether they were going to attend the meetings and where they were going to be held. The meetings were called together by word of mouth and several workers joined the League of Struggle for Negro Rights and the Communist Party.

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CHARLOTTE, N.C. Because of heavy rains the scheduled outdoor May Day demonstration was not held, but white and Negro workers marched to the hall, where a meeting was held and five workers joined the Communist Party.

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CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. Despite rains that lasted throughout the day on and off, about 150 workers demonstrated here on May Day at Market and Sixteenth Street. Comrade Harry Gordon, Communist Party organizer, spoke on the meaning of May Day and the Scottsboro case.

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NEW ORLEANS. For the first time in the history of this city International May Day was celebrated here at a meeting of about 50 Negro and white workers. The workers responded unanimously to a proposal that a wire of protest be sent from the meeting to the Governor of Alabama against the Scottsboro lynch law verdict. The workers pledged themselves to do everything possible for the defense of the boys and to mobilize the workers for a city-wide Scottsboro Defense Conference on May 17th.

Begun in August 1930, Southern Worker was a semi-legal regional newspaper of the Communist Party, USA (CPUSA) primarily aimed at building the Party in the South among Black workers and farmers. Pseudonyms of editors and writers, false publication places, illegal paper drops, and clandestine meetings were a necessary hallmark of the Southern Worker’s life. The paper extensively covered the campaign against lynching and southern unionization efforts. Originally a weekly, it went to a monthly in 1934 and ceased publishing in 1937. Editors included Solomon Auerbach (under the name “Jim Allen”), Harry Wicks, and Elizabeth Lawson.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/southernworker/v1n37-may-02-1931-sw.pdf