Unpunished Murder: Massacre at Colfax and the Quest for Justice (Scholastic Focus) - Softcover

Goldstone, Lawrence

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1338239465 ISBN 13: 9781338239461

Publisher: Scholastic Focus, 2020

Synopsis

The riveting story of how the Supreme Court turned a blind eye on justice, stripped away the equal rights promised to all Americans, and ushered in the era of Jim Crow.

On Easter Sunday of 1873, just eight years after the Civil War ended, a band of white supremacists marched into Grant Parish, Louisiana, and massacred over 100 unarmed African Americans. The court case that followed reached the highest court in the land. Yet, following one of the most ghastly incidents of mass murder in American history, not one person was convicted.

The opinion issued by the Supreme Court in US v. Cruikshank set in motion a process that would help create a society in which black Americans were oppressed and denied basic human rights -- legally, according to the courts. These injustices paved the way for Jim Crow and would last for the next hundred years. Many continue to exist to this day.

In this compelling and thoroughly researched volume for young readers, Lawrence Goldstone traces the evolution of the law and the fascinating characters involved in the story of how the Supreme Court helped institutionalize racism in the American justice system.

About this title

About the Author

Lawrence Goldstone has written more than a dozen books for adults, including three on Constitutional Law. Unpunished Murder was his first book on that subject for young readers. He lives in Sagaponack, New York, with his wife, medieval and Renaissance historian Nancy Goldstone.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The Redeemers had been determined to kill every black man they could find, but some survived, many of them with terrible wounds.

And thus Levi Nelson lived to bear witness to what would be known in the North as the Colfax Massacre.

But not in the South. There, and in some Democratic newspapers in the North, such as the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, the incident was referred to as the Colfax Riot. The Daily Eagle, which boasted "the largest circulation of any evening newspaper published in the United States," blamed the incident entirely on the freedmen, claiming, without any proof or eyewitness testimony, that James Hadnot had been shot down in cold blood after offering a flag of truce, and that the white invaders had merely taken possession of government buildings that were rightfully theirs, all with a minimum of force. A memorial headstone was later erected in Louisiana in honor of the three Redeemers "who fell in the Colfax Riot fighting for white supremacy."

The tragedy of Colfax did not end with the massacre, however, but in the most hallowed courtroom in the land, a place where the Founding Fathers, in particular Alexander Hamilton, had promised that the rights of oppressed citizens would be protected.

The story of Colfax, then, is the story of America, and it begins where America began, in the State House in Philadelphia, now known as Independence Hall. From there, a new Constitution was issued, signed on September 17, 1787, which spawned a series of great battles that determined not only the laws of the new nation, but also its soul. Those battles continue today.

About this edition

• Publisher: Scholastic Focus
• Publication date: 2020
• ISBN 10: 1338239465
• ISBN 13: 9781338239461
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288