Word: leibowitz
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Dates: during 1933-1933
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...conviction of one Scottsboro (Ala.) Negro on the mortal charge of raping two white girls (TIME, April 17 et ante): indefinite postponement of the trial of the other six defendants; in Decatur, Ala. Grounds: alleged insults to Alabamans by Chief Defense Counsel Samuel S. Leibowitz, creating "sentiment that might not allow a fair trial." Interviewed by a northern newshawk about the Alabama jurors. Leibowitz was quoted as saying, "If you ever saw those creatures; those bigots, whose mouths are slits in their faces, whose eyes pop out at you like frogs, whose chins drip tobacco juice, bewhiskered and filthy...
Lily White Justice. Counsel Leibowitz first moved that the indictments against his clients be quashed on the grounds that, by banning Negroes from the Jackson County jury roll, the State of Alabama had denied the defendants their constitutional rights at the original trial. Attorney General Thomas E. Knight, whose father wrote the Alabama Supreme Court decision sustaining the prior verdict, put the burden of proof on the defense. What Counsel Leibowitz had to prove, every Southerner knows to be true: Negroes simply are not allowed on juries in Alabama. After two days of bickering, Judge James E. Horton, a Lincolnesque...
...defense next moved that the present indictment be quashed because of similar "systematic exclusion" of Negroes from the Morgan County venire. When jury board commissioners failed to say whether or not their jury rolls contained Negro names, Counsel Leibowitz threatened to have all 2,000 talesmen subpoenaed "if it takes till doomsday," to see what color they were...
...State claimed that if there were no Negroes on the Morgan County roll it was because none had sufficient education, "integrity, good character and sound judgment" to qualify. Thereupon, Counsel Leibowitz began bringing in dozens of reputable Negroes who were not on the roll. One was a doctor from the University of Illinois, another a graduate of Phillips Exeter Academy and Howard University...
Next day the defense won and lost a point. Judge Horton ruled that prima facie evidence had been established that the Morgan County jury roll was allwhite. Counsel Leibowitz then moved that Negro talesmen be considered for the present jury, a proposal which brought to horrified Southerners visions of carpetbagging days. The courtroom was tense when Judge Horton softly said: "Motion denied...