Prejudice And Racism In The 1930's

“Racism is still with us. But it is up to us to prepare our children for what they have to meet, and, hopefully, we shall overcome.” (Parks). Racism was was a major problem in the 1930’s and was the main controversy at that time. Many people had different views and opinions on racism which in turn led to the civil rights movement in the later 1950’s and 1960’s that Rosa Parks was a major contender in. The justice system in the 1930’s was enormously corrupt by the racism and Jim Crow laws. In that period of time the trials, evidence, jury, and the people’s reactions were very different than the time we live in today, all of this due to racism and prejudice.

During the time period of the 1920-1930’s, the trials were dealt with differently than

The evidence was a less developed thing in the 1920’s and 1930’s because there were not any video cameras to capture videos of the alleged to be guilty. Due to lack of technology the court had to rely on the testimony of the alleged witnesses to be true and that was not always the case. For example in the Scottsboro Boys case “Two women, fearful of being prosecuted for their sexual activity aboard the train, agreed to testify that nine black youths had raped them.” (Wormser). Another example is from Roy Wright "I was sitting in a chair and one of those girls was testifying. One of the deputy sheriffs leaned over to me and asked if I was going to turn state's evidence, and I said no, because I didn't know anything about this case. Then the trial stopped awhile and the deputy sheriff beckoned to me to come out into another room-- the room back of the place where the judge was sitting-- and I went. They whipped me and it seemed like they were going to kill me. All the time they kept saying, "Now will you tell?" and finally it seemed to me like I couldn't stand it no more and I said yes.” (Linder, In Their Own Words) Also in the cases the defendants usually testified about the crime they were alleged of committing, but the jury due to the racism of the society had already decided that the defendant of defendants were guilty and totally disregarded their

For example, during the Scottsboro Boys trial many local newspapers had made their conclusions about the defendants before the trials began. One headline read: "All Negroes Positively Identified By Girls And One White Boy Who Was Held Prisoner With Pistol And Knives While Nine Black Fiends Committed Revolting Crime"- (Linder, A Trial Account). The problem was that since they didn’t see the blacks as equal they thought it was right to treat them how they pleased. Furthermore due to that in this time period many people jumped to conclusions about trials. The public of the black community found it unfair and horrifying that because of ethnicity many blacks were being tried and determined guilty when in fact they were innocent. The problem with the public was that the verdict swayed to the whites which upset and enraged many black communities of the