THIS COLUMN IS PRIMARILY MEANT FOR THE EDIFICATION OF THOSE PEOPLE OF ALL RACES, ETHNICITIES, NATIONALITES AND RELIGIONS, WHO LIVE IN THE USA (the United States of Amnesia), AND PERPETUALLY DENY RACISM’S VICIOUS OCTOPUSSIAN TENTACLES.
(My thanks to the “Knowledge Ark LLC” and “Wikipedia”: amongst other sources).
“THE KISSING CASE.”
On October 28, 1958, two black boys, 7-year-old James Hanover Thompson, and 9-year-old David “Fuzzy” Simpson, were among a group of children in Monroe, North Carolina, who were playing as young children do: without much pattern or apparent direction. Most of the children were white. Their ages ranged from six to ten. They were unsupervised at the time.
One of the girls called “Sissy” kissed Hanover on the cheek. Later, Sissy’s mother overheard her relaying that apparent highlight of the day’s events, to one of her sisters. The woman was irate. She became so livid when she heard about the kissing part that she called the parents of the other white kids who were there. They then armed themselves and eventually gathered as a group. A little while later they went looking for blood.
The woman (Mrs. Sutton) carried her posse to Hanover’s home, seeking to lynch somebody. They arrived almost at the identical time that six carloads of policemen (almost the entire police force of Monroe) arrived. Fortunately, no one was at home.
Later that evening a squad car spotted the two boys pulling a little red wagon filled with soda-pop bottles. The police officers jumped from the car with guns drawn; snatching the boys, and then handcuffing them. After throwing them into the car, one of the white cops slapped-around Hanover: the first of many beatings he would endure. When they got to the jail, both boys were further beaten: unmercifully. They were held without counsel: neither their parents, relatives, nor friends were allowed to see them.
For many nights the black mothers were so frightened that they didn’t sleep in their own homes. Anonymous gunmen -in passing cars- fired dozens of shots into the Thompson home. They even killed Hanover’s dog. The mothers of both these boys were eventually fired from their jobs as housekeepers/servants. They had been employed by white families in the area for years. Mrs. Thompson was later evicted from her home also. The Klu Klux Klan held daily demonstrations outside of the jail. The KKK was all over this issue like white on rice; many blacks in the town of Monroe, faced terror and intimidation throughout this incident.
On November 4, 1958, six days after taking the boys into custody, local authorities finally held a hearing. The boys had still not seen their parents, friends, or legal counsel. At the hearing, the Caucasian (white) judge found the boys guilty of three charges of assault (kissing) and molestation. He ordered that the boys be incarcerated in an adult facility for black prisoners, and told them that if they behaved, they might be released at age 21.
The state’s regional NAACP director didn’t want anything to do with the ‘sex case’ as he called it. Roy Wilkins, of the national NAACP, also declined to get involved. Eventually, it was the communists who had to step in attempting to restore some semblance of sanity. Members of the Socialist Workers-Party came to the rescue. They did everything they could to publicize what was happening in Monroe. Although the former first lady of the USA (Eleanor Roosevelt) tried to intervene with the governor and state officials, it eventually took foreign media to lift these events to the proper level of public attention and scrutiny it deserved.
Joyce Egginton, a reporter for the London News-Chronicle traveled from England to North Carolina. She sneaked in the prison at Monroe posing as a social-worker. She also sneaked in a camera and took pictures of the conditions under which the boys were being jailed. Ten days before Christmas of 1958, a front page picture of Hanover and Fuzzy in the reformatory, along with an article about the issues at hand, appeared in many European newspapers/countries. News organizations in England, Germany, Italy, France, Belgium and Spain, highlighted and continuously carried stories of this incident. The United States Information Agency received more than 12,000 letters expressing outrage at the events. An international committee was formed in Europe to defend Thompson and Simpson. Huge demonstrations were held in Paris, Rome, Vienna and Rotterdam, against the United States and its inhumane racial practices. The U.S. Embassy in Brussels was stoned. It was an international embarrassment for the U.S. government. It was just one of the many thousands of everyday racial-incidents that didn’t get swept under the rug; and that only happened because of the international public outcry.
In February of 1959, North Carolinian officials asked the black mothers to sign a waiver as a pre-condition to releasing the kids. The mothers refused to sign the waiver, which would have required the boys admitting guilt to the charges laid. Two days after their refusal -after the boys had spent three months in detention- the governor surprisingly pardoned both Thompson and Simpson, with no conditions whatsoever. No public explanation was given. The state and city never publicly apologized to the boys or their relatives for the gross and unjust treatment they had received. There is no public record of any kind of civil-action undertaken in this matter.
Look; undeniably, there are millions of sordid stories in this country’s racial past: this was just one of them. Do remember that when people forget or ignore the lessons of the past, then they are apt to repeat both its mistakes and horrors; for the humongous elephant (racism) in this country’s backroom, the next time around will be much more fiery than the last.
In this event about which I just wrote, these kids escaped being lynched by the skin of their pre-pubescent teeth. And yet today -56 years later- these types of stories still play-out: in a variety of strange forms, ways and shapes. Pre-teenagers like Hanover and Fuzzy are now embodied in dead young men like Trayvon Martin, Amadou Diallo, Rodney King, Sean Bell and Michael Brown. And towns like “Monroe” in North Carolina have given way to big cities like New York.
And in small towns like “Ferguson” in Missouri, blacks still await profound legal decisions from authority-figures who are still predominantly white. Dare I ask it again: despite the many changes in this country over time, aren’t we still more or less the same?
Stay tuned-in folks: amnesia is alive and thriving.