Emmett Till's Murder and the Montgomergy Bus Boycott Hanna beaulieu
Emmet had grown up in the north, and didn't have a lot of experience with the level of segregation down in the south. He was in Money, Mississippi visiting some family when he whistled at a white girl in a store.
Emmett Till was 14 years old when he was brutally murdered by Roy Braynt and J.W. Miliam. They made him carry a 75 pound cotton gin fan down to the river where they beat him, gouged his eyes out, and shot him in the face, then threw Emmett in the river with barb wire wrapped around his neck and the fan to keep him from floating. His body was found 3 days later but was so disfigured that the only way his mom could identify him was by his initialed ring.
Emmett Till's mom Maime decided to have an open casket funeral for her son to show the world what had happened to him. Roy and Miliam were tried infront of an all white jury, and were found not guilty. Moses Wright was Emmets uncle, and was who he was staying with while he was in Mississippi. He testified against the two suspects defying all odds. He pointed at the two men claiming that they were the ones the killed him, and he said he felt the jury become very angry, and saw their blood boiling. This case was the very first time a black man had accused a white man in open court and lived. Moses fled to Chicago with his wife in order to stay alive. Later on, after the trial was over, and with out fear of being tried twice for the same crime, Roy and Miliam admitted to it in detail to Look magazine. This case exposed the brutality of the Jim Crow laws in the South.
The Washington Post, October 15, 1955 Letters to the Editor: No Justice for Till "The trial in the case of Emmett Louis Till was merely a farce... ...Are you asking intelligent people to believe that a jury of white men suddenly got rid of their hate and dislike for the Negro (something they've had for years) for a few hours until the verdict was rendered and then started hating and disliking them again the instant after the verdict? Please! Let us by truthful to ourselves at least.... ...justice did not prevail in the case of Emmett Louis Till." Madgielene Hughes Washington.
The POV of this press statement is from a civil rights activist that is fed up with the injustice for African Americans. The murder of Emmett Till exposed just how mistreated blacks were in the south. The target audience is people in the north and south and civil rights activists. It's trying to show how unfair the trial really was, and how Roy and Miliam were obviously going to be seen as not guilty infront of an all white jury.
The Chicago Defender, early September 1955: Thousands at Rites for Till
"More than 50,000 people appeared to mourn over the body of 14-year-old Emmett Louis Till as it lay in state in the Rayner Funeral Home at 4141 Cottage Grove, on Friday....
Rev. Isiah Roberts officiated at the service. He called the burial lynching of the boy a black mark against the U.S. and called for justice and a swift trial of the boy's slayers...."
The purpose of this press statement is to show how many people want justice for Emmett Till and his mother. Over 50,000 people had shown up to the funeral and saw just how bad he was treated for whistling at a white woman. It spurred people into action trying to get equality for African Americans.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott took place a few months after Emmett Till's murder. Rosa Parks is a civil rights activists that had refused to give up her seat in the front of the bus to a white man. This in turn, led to her getting arrested, and over 40,000 people joined the boycott that was organized in 2 days.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott was where all African Americans would, instead of taking the bus, walk or carpool with others to get to their destination. They were boycotting the segregated busses. They only wanted black passengers to be treated with respect, and that seating should work under a first come first serve basis.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott started in December 1955, and didn't end until November 23, 1956 where the Supreme Court ruled in favor of banning segregated bussing. As a result of the boycott the bussing system lost thousands of dollars. The boycott was a nonviolent protest, however it did trigger violence. Martin Luther King Jr. Was a leader of the boycott, and his house along with Ralph Abernathys house was bombed. Montgomergy officers stopped at nothing to try and end the boycott.
Plessy Nears Its End
"...A succession of cases dealing with both transportation and education in recent years has brought the judicial doctrine of Plessy v. Ferguson to its grave. Burial took place on May 17, 1954, when the decisions rejecting the constitutionality of "separate but equal" school facilities were handed down.
The tombstone was set when the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond last July ruled against enforced segregation even on city buses, asserting that -- in the light of the school decision -- "we do not think the separate but equal doctrine ... can any longer be regarded as a correct statement of law."...
...This conclusion will come hard to some states and cities where segregation of public transport has been practiced for generations. "I hereby defy the ruling handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court," grandiloquently declared the president of the Alabama Public Service Commission, in whose state capital, Montgomery, a Negro boycott of segregated bus lines has been going on since December...
...Too much must not be demanded too soon. Friends of the Negro in the North will do him no service in the South by exacerbating what is already an extremely difficult situation. In a social upheaval of this magnitude it is neither wise nor just to issue hot-headed statements quivering with self-righteousness, as so many of us in this part of the world are wont to do when it comes to segregation. But the law must and will be enforced, though the process can be expected to take time."
The purpose of this press statement is to bring about awareness that segregation is ending. The 'separate but equal' doctrine deemed acceptable by the Supreme Court in the case Plessy v. Ferguson is coming to an end. It would have taken southern states to long for them to integrate so African Americans took matters into their own hands.
Montgomery Sticks to Bus Segregation
"An order to stop segregation on city buses brought angry threats of reprisal today from city and state officials who vowed to keep the races apart as long as possible...
City and state officials insisted Alabama's segregation laws are still in effect despite the Supreme Court action of yesterday.
That applied directly only to South Carolina, and Alabama officials contended segregation laws here will remain intact until a court order is directed specifically at them.
Until the city and state laws are knocked down, Police Commissioner Clyde Sellers and other city officials and President Jack Owen of the Alabama Public Service Commission declared segregation will be rigidly maintained.
The City Commission, all three of whose members belong to the White Citizens Council, issued a statement saying it "does not consider that the Supreme Court construes Alabama laws or city ordinances by which we are governed." The council is dedicated to preservation of racial segregation...
...Sellers said he would order the arrest of any passenger or bus driver who permits or indulges in desegregation.
..."As far as I'm concerned, this damn thing (the Supreme Court action) applies only to South Carolina," Sellers said. "Until they tell us in this suit filed here that it applies to us, I'm going to enforce all city laws to maintain segregation."
The purpose of this press statement is to let the participants of the boycott that segregation isn't going to end. Montgomery officials were still going to enforce their laws even though the Supreme Court ruled for integrated schools and busses.