Goldstone - Inherently unequal: the betrayal of equal rights by the Supreme Court, 1865-1903

The Activist

Dark Bargain

The Astronomer

The Anatomy of Deception

INHERENTLY
UNEQUAL

The Betrayal of Equal Rights by the
Supreme Court, 18651903

LAWRENCE GOLDSTONE

Copyright 2011 by Lawrence Goldstone

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address Walker & Company, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

Published by Walker Publishing Company, Inc., New York

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Goldstone, Lawrence, 1947

Inherently unequal : the betrayal of equal rights by the Supreme Court, 1865 1903 / Lawrence Goldstone.1st U.S. ed.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN: 978-0-8027-1792-4 (hardcover

1. African-AmericanLegal status, laws, etc.History19th century. 2. Race discriminationLaw and legislationUnited StatesHistory19th century. 3. United States. Supreme CourtHistory19th century. I. Title.

KF4757.G655 2010

342.7308'73dc22

2010015538

First published by Walker Publishing Company in 2011
This e-book edition published in 2011

E-book ISBN: 978-0-8027-7886-4

Visit Walker & Companys Web site at www.walkerbooks.com

Many lawyers complain that constitutional law is not law but politics. Perhaps, however, all law is more politics than some may be willing to confess.

Thomas Reed Powell

Every important principle which is developed by litigation is in fact and at bottom the result of more or less definitely understood views of public policy.

Oliver Wendell Holmes

How many times can a man turn his head and pretend that he just doesnt see?

Bob Dylan

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE
A DEATH IN GEORGIA

ON APRIL, 11, 1899, twenty miles southwest of Atlanta, Georgia, just outside Palmetto in Coweta County, a laborer named Sam Hose approached his employer, a wealthy farmer named Alfred Cranford. Hose asked for his accrued wages and permission to visit his mother, Mary Wilkes. Mrs. Wilkes, who lived in a cabin on a farm forty miles to the south, was a near-invalid, forced to care for another son who was retarded. Sam Hose had that day received a letter informing him that she had taken a turn for the worse. Hose, who was about twenty-five years old, had taught himself to read and write, the better to provide support for his family.

Cranford refused either to pay his employee or allow him time off. Sam Hose made the mistake of talking back. Cranford, known for a hot temper, stalked off. He seethed all night at the unimaginable slight.

Sam Hose, of course, was black. Alfred Cranford was white.

The next day, Cranford walked out to where Sam Hose was chopping wood. Cranford drew a gun and announced that he intended to shoot his disrespectful field hand dead on the spot. As they both knew, such a crime would have drawn not the slightest recrimination from the local authorities. In the unlikely event Cranford did go to trial, his acquittal by an all-white jury was a certainty. Sam Hose was a small man, only five feet eight inches tall, weighing not more than 140 pounds. In fear for his life, he flung his ax, striking the white man in the head and killing him instantly. He then fled in terror.

For the previous three months, a series of suspicious fires had plagued Palmetto. Two businesses and a home had gone up in flames. County officials insisted Palmetto Negroes were responsible and, further, that the fires were part of a grand conspiracy. White leaders would be murdered and the entire town burned to the ground. Local citizens were frantic.

In March, nine local black men had been arrested. All were later described by an outside investigator as hard-working and intelligent. No evidence against any of them was ever produced, and each claimed to be able to easily prove his innocence. Palmetto had no jail, so the men were incarcerated in a local warehouse, to be guarded, at least in theory, by sheriffs deputies. The night of their arrest, before any formal proceedings could be initiated, a group of concerned citizens, 150 white men, visited the prisoners. With the guards either ignoring the mob or joining it, eight of the nine were shot. Four died, and the others were seriously wounded.

Although the fires ceasedactually, they had stopped weeks before the arreststalk of insurrection by marauding Africans continued to spread panic throughout Palmetto. The day after the shootings, for example, an Atlanta newspaper reported, All business has been suspended, the town is under military patrol, and every male inhabitant is armed to the teeth, in anticipation of an outbreak which is expected to-night. Although no uprising ever took place, news, a month later, of Alfred Cranford lying dead outside his home with an ax in his head revived fears of an impending race war. Bloodhounds were set on Sam Hoses trail.

Sensational as the killing already was, rival newspapers in Atlanta, the Journal and the Constitution, decided that the story should be made even more lurid. Making no effort whatever to determine the actual facts of the case, they competed with each other for maximum embellishment and, one assumes, maximum sales. Sam Hose therefore became a monster in human form. This beast, the Journal reported to its readers, had burst in on the Cranford family during dinner, attacking the farmer from behind, cleaving his head in two. The Constitution took up the story from there. After brutally murdering the husband with the ax, Sam Hose then repeatedly raped Cranfords wife, Mattie, on the kitchen floor, within arms reach of where the brains were oozing out of her husbands head. Whats more, this rampaging savage was afflicted with syphilis, which he intended to pass on to the pitiable widow. Not content with what he had done to the adults, Sam Hose then set upon either a Cranford infant, or two young Cranford children depending on which account one read. The infant was dashed to the ground. Or the young children were assaulted. The details of this final outrage were kept from the Journals God-fearing readers, but the clear implication was that the assault was unnatural.

For ten days, Sam Hose was tracked by a posse said to number as many as three hundred men. During the hunt, on April 18, the Constitutions headline read CIRCLE OF VENGEANCE SLOWLY CLOSING ON FLEEING SAM HOSE. HUNDREDS OF ARMED MEN ARE BEATING THE COUNTRY FOR THE MURDERER OF ALFRED CRANFORD. HE CANNOT ESCAPE, THEY SAY DETECTIVE BEDFORD HAS FOUND THE MURDERERS DISCARDED SHOES. ONE NEGRO CAPTURED SEVERAL TIMES. THE ENTIRE SECTION THROUGH WHICH HE IS SUPPOSED TO BE MAKING HIS ESCAPE IS UP IN ARMS, DETERMINED TO LYNCH HIM. The article went on to say, When Hose is caught he will either be lynched and his body riddled with bullets or he will be burned at the stake. The newspaper added, There have been whisperings of burning at the stake and of torturing the fellow low, and so great is the excitement, and so high the indignation, that this is among the possibilities. Two days later, the Constitution added, Several modes of death have been suggested for him, but it seems to be the universal opinion that he will be burned at the stake and probably tortured before burned. Clark Howell, the editor of the newspaper, offered a $500 reward, an amount matched by Georgias new governor, Allen D. Candler. The town of Palmetto added $250 more.

On April 22, Sam Hose was finally apprehended at his mothers cabin. He was taken by train to Newnan, the Coweta County seat, which, unlike Palmetto, had its own jail. He was repeatedly questioned, both at the time of his arrest and during the train ride. Described later by white deputies as free from excitement or terror, he told his story in a straightforward way, said he was sorry he had killed Cranford [in self-defense], and always denied that he had attacked Mrs. Cranford.