John Oliver Killens Quotes
To the average white man, a courthouse even in Mississippi is a place where justice is dispensed. To me, the black man, it is a place where justice is dispensed with.
John Oliver Killens, Writer, "Explanation of the Black Psyche," New York Times, June 7, 1964
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Johnson was then Vice President.
Brewster was commenting on the murder trial of the Black Panther leader Bobby Seale. At the time, feeling and fear were so great, and the media coverage so intensive, as to make such fair trials difficult.
At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, he was told by a senator to lower his voice.
Captain W.W. Polk, commanding the Coast Guard revenue cutter Florida, wrote Treasury Secretary asking permission to employ a young Negro on board. Existing regulations prohibited such. The Negro in question was a free Black born in New York who was an “expert sailor for his age and competent to the duty of a boy of the first class.” Polk had hired the boy as a servant after he had worked at sea for another Captain. Good seamen were hard to come by, decision was extremely contentious. Ingham “compromised” by limiting the allowable role of Negroes at sea—a practice that lasted till the Second World War.
Incredibly enough, after the Civil War and emancipation, most Virginia leaders opposed any form of rights for Blacks with one of the major reasons being that they were ignorant and uneducated. It was actually a crime to teach even a free Black to read.
Blacks were not allowed to testify in court in the Southern States. The reasons why has never been clear. Many slave keeping societies like Ancient Rome not only allowed slaves to testify in the courts, but required them to do so in many circumstances even when their owners were opposed.
Booth was the younger son of a very prominent Northern family of actors. His older brother was considered the greatest American actor, and the rest of the family were abolitionists and vehement Union supporters. They found young John’s views reprehensible.
His solution was not to change the prejudice or improve the opportunity for Blacks but to have complete separation of the races. See {625687}.
John Oliver Killens was an American fiction writer from Georgia. His novels featured elements of African-American life. He also wrote plays, short stories and essays, and published articles in a range of outlets.
