NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #30/NN_1992_30.iso/spool/misc/activism/progress/9453

Internet Message Format | 1992-12-21 | 5.3 KB

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Subject: Racism, Death Penalty & Truth
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Date: 18 Dec 92 20:32:24 GMT
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Via The NY Transfer News Service * All the News that Doesn't Fit


A reply from the WW editors:

RACISM, THE DEATH PENALTY AND TRUTH

Every week, two editions of Workers World are published--one on
paper, the other electronic. After Workers World is sent to the
printer on Wednesday nights, one of our staff sends the major
articles to New York Transfer News Service by telephone modem.

New York Transfer distributes the articles throughout the
international electronic networks known as Internet and Peacenet,
an electronic service used by many in the anti-war and other
progressive movements. These articles are then available for
people throughout the world to read.

Every week New York Transfer forwards responses from the
electronic edition to us. Responses have come from every
continent, but the greatest number have been from U.S. college
campuses where Internet is often available free to students.

Many responses are positive--from German activists telling of
their translation of Sam Marcy's analysis of developments in
Russia to students in Kentucky requesting permission to reprint
articles. But an article on voters in Washington, D.C., rejecting
the death penalty from the Nov. 12 issue of Workers World sparked
a flurry of negative responses, including personal attacks on the
writer.

Workers World takes many positions that might be considered to be
controversial. But none had evoked this many responses.

The controversy revolves around a sentence that appeared in the
electronic edition but did not appear in the printed version. The
electronic version was not checked against the corrections on the
printed edition, an error that should not occur again, since we
have changed our procedures.

The statement in question was "not one white person has ever been
sentenced to death for killing a person of color." One of our
fact-checkers flagged this and pointed out that it was
technically not true. So the sentence was removed from the
printed edition.

But that sentence caused a curious uproar on the electronic
network. The writer was even accused of personally setting back
the movement against the death penalty.

Typical of the negative responses were phrases like: "absolutely
inaccurate,'' "totally absurd,'' and a "gross misstatement.'' A
spokesperson for Amnesty International sent the writer a long
letter attacking that one sentence.

Well, a look at the facts shows that while the statement is
technically not accurate, in spirit it is on the mark. It is not
"absolutely inaccurate"--only technically inaccurate. It's in no
way absurd. And it is at most a minor misstatement.

RACISM AND THE DEATH PENALTY

Before the Civil War, there were white people executed for
killing African Americans. But the sentences were not for
murder--they were charged with destroying property--slaves. This
could hardly be an argument for those who disagree with the
article on the death penalty.

Since the Civil War, only three white people have been executed
for killing a Black person. One was in Alabama in 1890, one in
1938 in Kansas. The other was last year in South Carolina, and
that case involved someone accused of killing both Black and
white people.

So technically we should not write that no white person has been
executed for killing a Black person. But the overwhelming weight
of history supports the statement.

Many of those executed since the Civil War were Black people
accused of killing whites. Yet racist murders of Black people
were occurring at an alarming rate. And no one was being arrested
for it, much less put in jail or on death row.

In the post-Reconstruction period in the South, for example, from
1877 to the turn of the century, there were 2,000 recorded
lynchings. No white person was executed for a lynching during
that period.

If the writers of the responses were concerned about a technical
inaccuracy but understood the long history of the racist use of
the death penalty as a way to oppress the Black population, they
could have simply passed along a simple note. Instead they all,
including the representative of Amnesty International, seemed to
want to open a polemical debate--as if the racist character of
the death penalty might be in question.

They not only need to learn about the history of the death
penalty in this country, they need a better understanding of
racism and its history. That's necessary for any effective
opposition to the death penalty and should be welcomed by all who
want it abolished.


(Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if
source is cited. For more info contact Workers World, 46 W. 21
St., New York, NY 10010; email: [e-mail]; "workers"
on PeaceNet; on Internet: "[e-mail]".)


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