Author: Gilbert King
On opening this book you find yourself smack dab in the middle of the segregation and abuse of African Americans in Florida in the late nineteen forties. While the main storyline is around the trial and retrial of the four blacks who were accused of raping a seventeen year old white girl, in Groveland FL, the book is interspersed with the details of the rising influence of Thurgood Marshall in the NAACP and the country as a whole.
At a higher level the book makes you wonder about how difficult it must have been for a black man to get a fair hearing in the mid twentieth century United States. A subtle point to note is that the judicial system was not inherently broken. There was a judge and jury before which the trial was held. However, the judge and jury were too biased and prejudiced in their view of Black people. Also the racially charged atmosphere of 1950s Florida, dominated by the Ku Klux Klan, made it virtually impossible for white people to come out and testify for the defense, lest they be branded "nigger-lovers".
While reading this book, I was reminded of my first encounter with reality TV as I witnessed the OJ Simpson trial in all its glory. This was another case that was split along racial lines. But this time the pendulum swung the other way. Most black folk felt that OJ was not guilty, while most white folks were convinced that he was the murderer. Regardless of the preponderance of incriminating evidence, the predominantly black jury acquitted OJ Simpson.
It got me thinking of what it takes to make the judicial system fair. Maybe we ought to ensure that for cases where race or other prevailing prejudices are a huge influencing factor, the jury should be comprised of foreigners ;-)
Whether, or not, you are intrigued by the US judicial system, the book makes a compelling read as you flip the pages trying to figure out whether any of the defendants survive the racially charged atmosphere that was prevalent during that time across the Southern United States. I could not put the book down till I reached the end and then went on to research the internet to see what happened after that trial.
Overall, this is a great book that everyone in the United States should read to understand how lucky we are to have survived those dark times in the history of the United States.
On opening this book you find yourself smack dab in the middle of the segregation and abuse of African Americans in Florida in the late nineteen forties. While the main storyline is around the trial and retrial of the four blacks who were accused of raping a seventeen year old white girl, in Groveland FL, the book is interspersed with the details of the rising influence of Thurgood Marshall in the NAACP and the country as a whole.
At a higher level the book makes you wonder about how difficult it must have been for a black man to get a fair hearing in the mid twentieth century United States. A subtle point to note is that the judicial system was not inherently broken. There was a judge and jury before which the trial was held. However, the judge and jury were too biased and prejudiced in their view of Black people. Also the racially charged atmosphere of 1950s Florida, dominated by the Ku Klux Klan, made it virtually impossible for white people to come out and testify for the defense, lest they be branded "nigger-lovers".
While reading this book, I was reminded of my first encounter with reality TV as I witnessed the OJ Simpson trial in all its glory. This was another case that was split along racial lines. But this time the pendulum swung the other way. Most black folk felt that OJ was not guilty, while most white folks were convinced that he was the murderer. Regardless of the preponderance of incriminating evidence, the predominantly black jury acquitted OJ Simpson.
It got me thinking of what it takes to make the judicial system fair. Maybe we ought to ensure that for cases where race or other prevailing prejudices are a huge influencing factor, the jury should be comprised of foreigners ;-)
Whether, or not, you are intrigued by the US judicial system, the book makes a compelling read as you flip the pages trying to figure out whether any of the defendants survive the racially charged atmosphere that was prevalent during that time across the Southern United States. I could not put the book down till I reached the end and then went on to research the internet to see what happened after that trial.
Overall, this is a great book that everyone in the United States should read to understand how lucky we are to have survived those dark times in the history of the United States.
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