The Northwest Enterprise

TENNESSEE NEGROES JEOPARDIZE LIVES TO PREVENT ANOTHER LYNCHING

COLUMBIA, TENN.— Despite the greatest amount of gunfire ever heard in this little town, Tennessee and the nation are undoubtedly viewing the world than they would have been had not a group of colored men jeopardized their lives and the lives of their families and property to prevent another lynching in Maury County. Whatever is to the outcome of the trials of a number of colored leaders, who were languishing in jail here Wednesday, the verdict of all unbiased persons who will have gotten the real facts that brought on the trouble which has been miscalled "race riot," will be that the jailed colored leaders acted in self-defense, and had they been white men they would have been called alert and useful citizens, instead of being smeared as criminals.

There were about 70 colored men in jail Wednesday. Among them were such well known Columbians as James Morton, undertaker; Solomon Blair and his father, Julius Blair, owners of a drug store and other business places on Eighth Street, and Rev. Calvin Lockridge, Baptist pastor.

The understanding is that these leaders are to be charged with "attempted murder" and if convicted, will be sent to prison. Their indictment, if any, will be made by an all-white grand jury, because, despite what the Supreme Court of the United States has said, they have only all-white grand juries in Maury County. If they are brought to trial they will face an all-white petit jury and a full array of court officials, all of whom will be white.

The daily press associations and newspapers of this area have already given the white folks' side of the Columbia trouble. They have suppressed all of the facts that would lead an unbiased person to appreciate the harassment of Columbia's colored people, both before and at the time of the flare-up on Monday and Monday night of this week.

Prior to Monday's trouble, colored Columbians were aware of two lynchings in or near Columbia in recent years, and for which not a single member of the mobs was brought to justice. The first of these two lynchings was in the heart of the city. It is said that for a year or so thereafter, one of the sights of Columbia was the courthouse from which the colored man was lynched, showing the rope with which he was hanged, dangling from a window.

The other lynching was that of a boy named Cordie Cheek, charged with molesting a white girl but who after being spirited to (Continued on Page 2)

With only ten persons injured amount of gunfire ever heard in and the nation are undoubtedly red men of Columbia jeopard- of their families and property they are brought to trial they will
MORE ABOUT RIOTS

Nashville for safekeeping, was set free by grand jury action.

Cordie, after being released from the Nashville jail, went to the home of a relative near Fisk University, and very shortly thereafter, members of a mob came to the home brandishing shotguns, took the boy away in a car and lynched him near Columbia. It is reported that there were some 500 persons in the mob. Nobody was ever convicted or tried for that brutal lynching.

It was with these thoughts in mind that colored Columbians prepared to prevent the lynching of a mother and her son here this past week. The mother was Mrs. Gladys Stephenson, 37, and her son, James Stephenson, 19. On Monday the mother and son were in the Castner Knott store on Columbia's Public Square. There the mother had words with a white radio repairman in which she disputed his claim that the radio had been repaired. A fight ensued, resulting in the mother being beaten and knocked down. The boy and mother fought back, which resulted in the young white man being knocked through a glass window, and injured by the broken glass. Shortly thereafter, policemen came and arrested the mother and her son but did not arrest the white man, the mother states.

Mother and son were put in jail. Colored business leaders, fearing the mother and son would be taken out and lynched, got both out of jail on bond, amounting to more than $3,000.

The fighting incident, and the fact that the mother and son had been released from jail, appear to have aroused a number of whites. Rev. Calvin Lockridge, colored Baptist pastor, testifies that he heard that a man had gone into a store to purchase a rope and had said they intended to lynch the Negroes in "Mink Slide," the colored business section of Columbia.

When this threat got to the colored people of the section they went to their homes, got their guns and decided to defend themselves as best they could against mob violence.

As a first precaution they put out all of the lights in their section of the town.

With their section blacked out and all of them excited over the expected visit of the mob, the nervousness of the colored citizens was intensified when some white men came through the section and fired guns, presumably to frighten the people of the community. Colored citizens say that these were the first shots fired- the shots by the white motorists.

Later, four white policemen drove their car into the section and they were fired upon, presumably by some of the colored citizens. The report of colored persons is that it was not possible to tell the police from any other white persons.

It was after the officers had been shot that city and county officials called for help. One hundred highway patrolmen and about 500 members of the State Guard were rushed to Columbia promptly by Gov. Jim Nance McCord.

These completely surrounded the colored business section but did not move in until after daybreak Tuesday morning. When they did go in they used their tommy guns with devastating effect, but succeeded only in wrecking about all of the business places in the area.

No serious casualties resulted.

Much property was damaged, and according to a relative of Julius Blair, drugstore owner, his soda fountain was wrecked and, when the smoke of the conflict had lifted, he was minus most of the money he had in the drug store.

After the highway patrolmen and militia had taken over the area, the sheriff appointed about 125 of them as his deputies and they were sent on a house-to-house search for firearms.

It appears that very little consideration was given to that clause in the Constitution of the United States which protects citizen from unreasonable search and seizure.

There was no report of white homes being searched and their arms taken from them. Even white citizens who were seen roaming the streets with sawed off shotguns, reportedly were merely asked by authorities to go home and put them away.

On their visit to the home of Undertaker Morton, about 12 citizens were found. They were said to have had guns and officers claim to have found some liquor.

Undertaker Morton appears to have been selected as a ringleader when the "unreasonable search and seizure" of his home was made. He was put in jail and kept all through Tuesday night.

Nashville friends of the undertaker and other leaders made bond of $2,000 each for the jailed men. However, Columbia citizens had not released the men Wednesday afternoon.

When news of the Columbia trouble spread throughout the nation it was made much of in metropolitan dailies, all of them taking the angle that Negroes had staged a riot. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People took prompt action in petitioning Gov. McCord for a fair administration of the law. U.S. Attorney General Clark was importuned to have District Attorney Horace Frierson make an investigation.

After all of the danger to lives and damage to property had taken place the mayor and highway patrol chief took commendable action to allay the trouble. They went about the city, and especially the colored section, with loud speakers assuring the people that it was well and that the military men were in town to protect all citizens, regardless of race. It is believed that had this sort of broadcast been done at the very beginning of threatened hostilities there never would have been any shooting. Colored citizens breathed happily when it was made plain to them that they, too, would be protected by the large contingent of uniformed men sent to Columbia. They did not have such assurance when they observed that only colored homes were invaded in search of firearms, and when, out of 70 persons arrested, 63 were Negroes and only two were white.

Attorneys of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People of both the Chattanooga and Nashville branches are understood to have been instructed to make a full investigation of the Columbia outbreak and to seek by every legal means to protect the colored citizens in their civil rights.

One phase of the affair, out of which unfair newspapers my much ado, was that colored men papers, ministers and aig of o lumbians sought to take phone calls to the city aad w thwarted in their effort An vestigation is to be mai- to 5 out if anybody in Colurbta am ally had the right to refuse t complete a regular long dists telephone call to Columbia c mers of the Telephone System their eagerness to get messi through to colored persots in o city it was necessary to s telegrams. one attempte: user his telephone is saying Colored leaders In Columbu lieve that had they no: goz Mrs. Stephenson and Der5 James out of jail promtply andi so taken the precaution to r and then black out the sectigi which they lived. these n boastfully stated that they going to carry out a lync might have done so. They did: believe t h a t local author would prevent a lynching i any more than their preiecess did in other cases with which s ored Columbians have b-en ue ed for the past 15 years or mr
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