2. The Facts of the Case:
♦ March 25: In the depths of the Depression, a fight
breaks out between white and black young men who
are riding as hoboes on a Southern Railroad freight
train. The train is stopped by an angry posse in Paint
Rock, Alabama, and nine black youths are arrested for
assault. Rape charges are added, following accusations
from two white women who have also come off the
train, Victoria Price and Ruby Bates. The accused are
taken to Scottsboro, Alabama, the Jackson County seat.
The women are examined by Drs. R. R. Bridges and
Marvin Lynch.
♦ News of the incident spreads quickly; the Jackson
County Sentinel, printed that evening, decries the
"revolting crime." White outrage erupts over the
allegations, and a lynch mob gathers at the Scottsboro
jail, prompting the sheriff to call Alabama Governor
Benjamin Meeks Miller. Governor Miller in turn calls in
the National Guard to protect the jail and its prisoners.
3. The Facts of the Case:
March 30: A grand jury indicts all nine
"Scottsboro Boys."
April 6-9: 8 of the Scottsboro Boys are tried and
sentenced to death.
April 9: The case against Roy Wright, aged 13,
ends in a hung jury when 11 jurors seek a
death sentence, and one votes for life
imprisonment.
4. Haywood Patterson
Patterson was eighteen at the time he was accused of rape by Victoria Price and
Ruby Bates.
Patterson entered jail illiterate, but within eight months was writing letters home,
reading, and challenging guards to name a state that he could not name the capitol
of. His favorite prison reading, when he could get his hands on it, was the
magazine True Detective. Patterson's smarts, his enterprising nature, and his
defiance helped him tolerate the tough conditions of Alabama prison life better
than most of the other Scottsboro Boys.
After being falsely accused of rape in 1931, Patterson spent the next sixteen years
in Alabama courtrooms and prisons. Tried four times, Patterson was convicted
and sentenced to death three times, before receiving a seventy-five year sentence
from his fourth jury.
5. Judge James E. Horton
If the tale of the Scottsboro Boys can be said to have heroes, there is no person
more deserving of the label than James E. Horton, the judge who presided over
Haywood Patterson's second trial in Decatur. Judge Horton's decision to set aside
the verdict and death sentence of Haywood Patterson, made despite warnings that
ordering a new trial for Patterson would end his career as an elected circuit judge,
was a remarkable act of courage and principle. Horton made it abundantly clear
that he stood on the side of fair process and fair treatment for all, regardless of
color.
His full anger only showed once in the trial. On the third day of the trial, after
hearing reports of plans for a lynching, the judge raised his voice to a near shout
and denounced would-be lynchers as "cowardly murderers." Horton, saying that
he had "absolutely no patience with the mob spirit," announced that he had
ordered police guards to shoot to kill if necessary in defense of the black
prisoners.
6. Judge James E. Horton
Horton, along with virtually every other white person in Alabama, initially assumed
that the Scottsboro defendants were probably guilty, but began to have doubts after
listening to Price's contradiction-riddled testimony. His doubts grew to a conviction
that the defendants were innocent after hearing the medical testimony of one
examining physician, Dr. Bridges. On June 22, 1933, Horton shocked those assembled
by announcing that he would grant the motion on the ground that the jury's verdict was
not supported by substantial evidence. In a careful, point-by-point review of the
medical testimony and that offered by other prosecution witnesses, Horton found
Price's testimony to be "not only uncorroborated, but it also bears on its face
indications of improbabilty and is contradicted by other evidence."
In May of 1934, Horton, who had been unopposed in his previous election to the
bench, faced two primary opponents. He was defeated. No one doubted but that his
defeat was attributable entirely to his decision in the Scottsboro case.
When asked about his decision in a 1966 interview, Horton quoted what he said was a
phrase often-repeated in the Horton family, "fiat justicia ruat colelum" -- let justice be
done though the heavens may fall.
7. Victoria Price
No one deserves more blame for the long ordeal suffered by the Scottsboro Boys
than does a lower class white woman from Huntsville named Victoria Price. Price
was the promiscuous, hard drinking, hard swearing daughter of a Huntsville
widow who lived in a poor, racially mixed section of town. She made love in box
cars and fields, slept in hobo jungles, and rode the rails in a pair of beaten
overalls. A defense affidavit of a one-time neighbor of Price's described her as "a
common street prostitute of the lowest type," a woman who would "be out at all
hours of the night and curse and swear, and be a general nuisance to the negro
population." Price's sensational story of being gang-raped by six pistol and knivewaving blacks was attacked by defense lawyer Samuel Leibowitz. Price,
however, proved to be a difficult witness to trap. She was evasive, sarcastic, and
frequently used ignorance and bad memory to avoid answering difficult
questions. When asked about her conviction for adultery, she claimed not to
know what adultery was.
8. Victoria Price
To any dispassionate observer, the medical testimony provided adequate
refutation of Price's charge. There was no evidence of forceful or recent sexual
intercourse. Defense testimony indicated that Price had sexual intercourse with
Jack Tiller in the Huntsville train yards less than two days before the alleged gang
rape.
In 1982, Victoria Price died without ever having apologized for her role in the
injustice visited upon the Scottsboro Boys. Unlike Price, Ruby Bates later
recanted her story of rape aboard a Chattanooga to Memphis freight train, and
went on to actively campaign for the release of the jailed black defendants.
9. The Scottsboro Trials
♦Took place in the 1930s
♦Took place in northern Alabama
♦Began with a charge of rape made by white women against African American men
♦The poor white status of the accusers was a critical issue.
♦A central figure was a heroic judge, a member of the Alabama Bar who overturned a guilty
jury verdict against African American men.
♦This judge went against public sentiment in trying to protect the rights of the African American
defendants.
♦The first juries failed to include any African Americans, a situation which caused the U.S.
Supreme Court to overturn the guilty verdict.
♦The jury ignored evidence, for example, that the women suffered no injuries.
Tom Robinson's Trial
♦Occurs in the 1930s
♦Takes place in southern Alabama
♦Begins with a charge of rape made by a white woman against an African American man
♦The poor white status of Mayella is a critical issue.
♦A central figure is Atticus, lawyer, legislator and member of the Alabama Bar, who defends an
African American man.
♦ Atticus arouses anger in the community in trying to defend Tom Robinson.
♦ The verdict is rendered by a jury of poor white residents of Old Sarum.
♦ The jury ignores evidence, for example, that Tom has a useless left arm.
10. The Scottsboro Trials
♦Took place in the 1930s
♦Took place in northern Alabama
♦Began with a charge of rape made by white women against African American men
♦The poor white status of the accusers was a critical issue.
♦A central figure was a heroic judge, a member of the Alabama Bar who overturned a guilty
jury verdict against African American men.
♦This judge went against public sentiment in trying to protect the rights of the African American
defendants.
♦The first juries failed to include any African Americans, a situation which caused the U.S.
Supreme Court to overturn the guilty verdict.
♦The jury ignored evidence, for example, that the women suffered no injuries.
Tom Robinson's Trial
♦Occurs in the 1930s
♦Takes place in southern Alabama
♦Begins with a charge of rape made by a white woman against an African American man
♦The poor white status of Mayella is a critical issue.
♦A central figure is Atticus, lawyer, legislator and member of the Alabama Bar, who defends an
African American man.
♦ Atticus arouses anger in the community in trying to defend Tom Robinson.
♦ The verdict is rendered by a jury of poor white residents of Old Sarum.
♦ The jury ignores evidence, for example, that Tom has a useless left arm.
