Scottsboro Tragedy Vs To Kill A Mockingbird

The book “To Kill a Mockingbird” written by Harper Lee and the article “Scottsboro Boys Trial” both contain controversial court cases. For “To Kill a Mockingbird” a black male named Tom Robinson was accused of raping a white woman named Mayella Ewell. In the “Scottsboro Boys Trial” nine young black men and teenagers are accused of raping two white females named Victoria Price and Ruby Bates. Both cases transpired in the 1930s in Alabama. This is bad for the accused as racism was at an all-time in the 1930s especially in the deep south. This was around the time when the Jim Crow Laws were still intact and black people were not still considered people and they would still lynch black people. If a black man was accused of any crime involving a white person the jury would take the white man's word over the black man’s word. These exact things

In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, the famous father named Atticus says “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… until you climb into his skin and walk around in it (Judith 2).  This quote is said during a time of intense racism. “Not long after Obama took office, the National Urban League released its 2009 State of Black America report. The findings showed that racial inequities continued in employment, housing, health care, education, criminal justice, and other areas” (Buckley 1).  This essay will primarily focus on the criminal justice area of this when discussing the Scottsboro trials and comparing the trials to the famous novel To Kill a Mockingbird.  In some schools, To Kill a Mockingbird is mandatory for students to read (“Harper Lee dies at 89: A quiet life, a lasting legacy-- see the photos” 2) however, in others it is banned.  Jon Stewart said there is a “gaping racial wound that will not heal, yet we pretend doesn’t exist” (Judith 2). There are similarities between the famous Scottsboro Trials and Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird.

The trial of the Scottsboro boys was a trial that was the cause of two white women accusing nine black men of raping them. Their appeals, retrials, and legal proceedings attracted the attention of the nation and produced to Supreme Court rulings in their favor. The Scottsboro boys trial demonstrates that nonconformity to unjust practices can lead to justice for all people because their trial triggered The Supreme Court ruling that had a major impact on the American system of laws for the right to adequate counsel, the ruling for the right to not be excluded from a jury based on race, and still has a continuing effect in our own time which affirms the principle of equal protection under the law. Their case not only saved them from the death sentence but also started up debate about equal protection under the law such as in the first Supreme Court ruling.

On March 25, 1931, during the height of the Great Depression, a group of nine black boys, later known as the Scottsboro Boys, was traveling on a train towards Memphis, Tennessee, in search of work. The Boys’ names were Haywood Paterson, Eugene Williams, Roy Wright, Andy Wright, Clarence Norris, Charlie Weems, Olen Montgomery, Ozie

In to kill a mockingbird the Maycomb trial was practically a “gala occasion” (pg 173) The scottsboro trial got international recognition. Tom Robinson’s case was only known to his small town. Harper Lee definitely uses facts about the trial when she says that when they announced the verdicts of the guilty, people ran out. Another instance is when she used the example of a group of people trying to get to the boys so that they could harm them. They had the sheriff protecting them. Another piece of evidence is when Harper Lee writes that Mayella did not want to cooperate even though she eventually has to answer Atticus’s question. (pg 205) Victoria from the Scottsboro trial also didn’t want to answer some questions and she was kind of shady like Mayella was. Another strong piece of evidence is that they are both accused of rape in both instances; the difference is that in To Kill a Mockingbird there is only one accused man. Clearly she used this case as the foundation for Tom’s case in her

Birmingham, Alabama, on September 15, 1963 a church bombing took place. 16th street Baptist church was a segregated church it belongs to the colored men and women of the town. There was 4 girls deaths and 14 injured during church service. The 4 victims were Addie Mae Collins age 14,Densie McNair age 11,Carole Robertson age 14, and Cynthia Wesley also age 14. After the bombing a riot broke out and two African boys died, 20 in all got injured from the bombing and riot combined.

American history is a sad and bloody history with many bumps that have created it into the superpower it is today. This hardship from our history played a crucial part in many books and especially To Kill A Mockingbird. Harper Lee created a writing masterpiece by using real life events as well as using real life corrupted laws. Connections like the Jim Crow laws, the mob mentality, and issues of racism that were taking place in that time.

We live in a society today where judging others is a regular, everyday activity. Many people may blame a significant amount of this issue on the excessive amount of technology we have access too, but this problem has been around for much longer. In the book, To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, it shows the ugliness that can come from judging others, but it also teaches two young children, Scout and Jem, to listen to others, so that you can have the opportunity to learn from them. Throughout the story many characters were able to demonstrate this lesson for the kids, but three that were true examples of it were Tom Robinson, Atticus Finch and Boo Radley. With only aiming to stand up for what they believe in and not worrying what everyone

As shocking as it may seem to hear, witch hunts still exist in modern times. One of the most prevalent examples of a modern day witch hunt was the case of the Scottsboro boys in the 1930s. The Scottsboro case revolved around nine innocent African-American teenagers charged with the gang rape of two white women, Victoria Price and Ruby Bates, on a train in 1931. It dealt with issues of racism, prejudiced juries, and rushed trials, causing it to be cited

Sources: Remembering Scottsboro: The legacy of an infamous trial, The Trials of the Scottsboro boys, and Scottsboro and its legacy: The cases that challenged american legal and social justice.

In the 1930s, African American men were believed to have strong sexual desires towards white women so extreme that they couldn’t even control themselves, that whenever they saw white women they would rape them right then and there. The Tragedy of the nine Scottsboro Boys was rumored as “Negros are going to beat up the whites”. When the train got to Jackson County on March 25, 1931, dozens of armed white men rounded up with ropes and weapons in order to beat the nine black youths, and during the time of this chaos, two white women raised their voices, claiming that they had been raped by the nine scottsborro boys. At that time in Alabama, whenever black people saw a group of white men, they feared and knew they were in a lot of trouble due to the fact that Alabama was one of the most aggressive and violent states towards African Americans.

The book To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and the book Mississippi Trial, 1955 by Chris Crowe are two different books surround by the same ideas. To Kill a Mockingbird was a book about a girl named Scott, whose dad, Atticus, is a lawyer, who tried to win a case defending an innocent black man. Atticus did not win the case and Scott started to learn about injustice and what went on at that time in the South. Mississippi Trial, 1955 was about a boy named Hiram, who lived in the South with his grandpa because his parents were too busy working. His grandpa represented the South in the book and Hiram’s dad represented the North, and Hiram had a stronger relationship with his grandpa and did not really like his dad at the time. After a trial involving

Many people were hopping onto freight trains to travel to the next city in hopes of finding work. A website and museum dedicated to the Scottsboro boys described the event which led to their imprisonment. A museum and organization that speaks on the boys lives and what injustice they had said that on March 25, 1931 nine black teens ages thirteen to nineteen and many other people were aboard a freight train heading South (“History”). A famous author and historian said a fight broke out when a white male stepped on Haywood Patterson 's hand. A stone throwing fight ensued. The black youths managed to push all but one white youth off the train. The white men went to the next city and reported an “assault by a gang of blacks.” When the train stopped at Paint Rock the nine black youths were arrested in Alabama and sent to jail to await their trials (Linder). The creator of the website”The trials of the Scottsboro Boys” said that there were two girls on the train near the boys these two white girls named Victoria Prince and Ruby Bates falsely accused the nine boys of rape. The girls said the boys had pistols and knives and chased them through different carts of the train and raped them(Linder). This was the beginning of years of jail, retrials, and waiting death row for a crime the Scottsboro boys did not

Imagine one day being wrongfully accused of a crime and sent to jail without a fair trial or even a proper representative in court. That seems a little unjust, does it not? Unfortunately, many people in the past were imprisoned and killed for crimes they did not commit like in the Salem Witch Trials or the Scottsboro Trials. Even though the Salem Witch Trials and Scottsboro Trials were over two-hundred years apart, there are many similarities between them. Such similarities include the false imprisonment of innocent people based off of prejudice beliefs and heavily biased justice systems.

The Scottsboro Case was the only crime in American History to produce many trials, convictions, and retrials as the alleged rape of two white girls by nine black teenagers on March 25, 1931 (Linder). Two mill girls hoboed their way by a freight train from Huntsville, Alabama to Chattanooga, Tennessee (Ransdall). The two mill girls, Victoria Price and Ruby Bates told members of the posse (men the sheriff would summon to enforce the law) they have been raped