We shall be heard: Images of American activists

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Scott Nearing
1919

In the patriotic fervour of the First World War, more than 2,000 people were prosecuted for disagreeing with the government's war policies

Every day, every day, the rah-rah boys – preachers, teachers, newspapermen – were saying, "Whatever you do, don't rock the boat". The boat was on the way to war. The war hysteria mounted. The right to conduct meetings was cancelled. When people tried to hold meetings against the war, we were called traitors. People who opposed the war were fired. They lost their jobs widely and freely. I wrote a simple little 32-page pamphlet called The Great Madness, which was published before the end of the war. I analysed the causes of the war – the political causes, the economic causes, and so on – showing that it was not a war of patriotism or a war for democracy, but a businessman's war. The Espionage Act, which was enacted ostensibly to cope with the German spy system, was used against people such as me who opposed the war. An indictment against me was handed down in New York after the end of the war, and I was charged with writing a pamphlet that would interfere with recruitment and enlistment in the armed forces of the United States. It carried up to a 20-year sentence. We felt the trial was our chance to publicise our views and we used the pamphlet in presenting our case. We spent eight days going through it, paragraph by paragraph, and I gave a detailed explanation each time. The newspapers and magazines were full of it. We said we didn't care if we were found guilty or not: we were interested in furthering the cause of peace and socialism. In the end, the jury acquitted me for writing the pamphlet and convicted the Rand School for publishing it.

Louise Thompson Patterson
1934

In Birmingham, Alabama in the 1930s, demonstrations for relief from the Depression were attacked. Police beat up speakers and raided the homes of suspected leaders

I came to the International Workers Order (IWO) in New York as an office worker in 1933: a fraternal group for immigrant workers, it gave them a base in this country, and provided them with low-cost insurance. I expressed an interest in organising for them, so I went down to Alabama, Georgia and New Orleans, and got groups together through churches and local trade unions. This I did in 1933 and 1934. I was in Birmingham when the coal strike was on. I had gone to a meeting in a middle-class, white neighbourhood, but when I opened the door, the police were in the middle of a raid. I was so stunned. The woman who lived there tried to protect me, and said: "I have no sewing for you today." But this one cop said, "Oh, no. That won't go. I know you're one of them." They took me off to an ancient city jail. This one, like all the others in Alabama, was segregated. About 50 black women were there in a long room. At the end of the room was one filthy bathroom. The next morning, they told me they were going to take my picture and fingerprints. I met Bull Connor in the elevator. He said, "Whatcha got there?" They said, "We got one of them Yankee bitches. We ought to do like Mussolini does, put them up against the wall and shoot them." They transferred me to the county jail. As we went in, I noticed a saying over the door about "justice" – and here I was in prison for the crime of attending a meeting.

more.. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/we-shall-be-heard-images-of-american-activists-841571.html