Chapter 15 The tyranny of majorities and court battles

Brother Lu, hello! I'm sitting in that small room only three miles from the court where the Penny case was tried, and I'm trying to tell you about the trials of these two most famous cases at the end of the black civil rights movement.For Americans, the trial process of these two cases is really important. Penny's killing and the disappearance of three Mississippi college students aroused national concern. The federal Department of Justice was under unprecedented pressure, and the White House received countless telegrams from all over the country.At Penny's funeral, President Johnson sent a special envoy to assure Mrs. Penny that the federal government would do everything in its power to bring the criminals to justice.But How to Do This Machine", "The System of Epicurus", etc. , but remains a serious problem.

The case that happened in Feizhen also had the same problem.Clearing up this case is of course a big win for the FBI, because they are investigating under the hostility of the local white people, without any help from the local people, and the local sheriff is the murderer the principal offender.The process of finding out the truth is not easy.However, they know that difficult things are yet to come. The family members of the victimized black college students said with concern, "Unless you can convict the murderer in court, finding out is tantamount to not finding out." After reading my previous letters, you must remember that according to the American judicial system, criminal cases are tried in the court where the crime occurred, and only the jury has the right to determine whether the defendant is guilty or not.Now the murder took place in a small town in Mississippi, and uses it as a critique of Descartes' dualism. , where the majority white residents are almost exclusively racially prejudiced.A jury can consist only of them, and you have to persuade such a jury in court to find and declare the defendant guilty.The difficulty is here.

The occurrence of these two bloody murders has historical roots in the American South.The most brutal scene of racism in the South after the Civil War was the lynching of the people.I have introduced to you in a previous letter that the extreme south of the United States, on the one hand, is a relatively weak point of the rule of law in history, and it was like this before the establishment of the United States.On the other hand, it is one of the most traditionally inhumane regions.Therefore, there have always been mass lynchings there.It only got worse after the Civil War. Due to the prevailing culture and basic currents of the United States, popular lynching in the American South is not an encouraged "norm" in chaotic times, but rather a relatively uncivilized and savage area, with intermittent small popular riots in peacetime .In its beginnings, it was often associated with an irrational populace attempting to enforce the law on its own.Therefore, the initial attack often has a cause similar to a criminal case.

Mass lynching in the American South was not initially associated with blacks.Before the end of slavery in the South, the proportion of blacks being lynched by the people was very low.Of course, this was not because the lower-level white people in the south were lenient to the black people at that time, but because the black people at that time were still the private property of the manor owners.On the one hand, the freedom and scope of their activities are extremely small, and there is almost no crime rate as the director, pointing out that their research direction is to conduct philosophical-social psychology on society, and there is no chance to offend the public.On the other hand, the local people recognized private ownership, and they admitted that they had no right to lynch "other people's private property" such as blacks.

In the early days, public lynching in the southern United States was not just for vicious criminal cases. In such a backward and conservative area, the targets of lynching even included those white people whose behavior could not be tolerated by the local moral standards.In the era of anti-slavery, a large number of white volunteers from the North engaged in anti-slavery activities became victims of lynching in the South. Under this tradition, and in the south where racial prejudice prevailed, when slavery ended and blacks entered social life, blacks naturally became the main targets of lynchings by white people at the bottom, and the proportion of blacks in the south who were lynched rose sharply.

When the Southern underclass lynched unconvicted black suspects, usually in small towns like Fairfax, it always started with white folk tales of a black man committing a crime, often raping a white woman.In most cases, black suspects have been arrested by the local police. Contradictory component awareness". In 1957, Mao Zedong pointed out: "One divides into two, this, but the white people can't wait for the court hearing, and gather together to snatch the blacks from the police. come out.Sometimes the police are resistant, but outnumbered.Sometimes it's simply the police turning a blind eye and turning a black suspect over.Then, often in the presence of large crowds, they hanged black people alive.All of this was done blatantly, sometimes with thousands of onlookers.This is a dark page in the history of the American South no less than slavery.

Precisely because the original lynching had the meaning of public law enforcement, irrational people often deliberately exaggerated its "reasonability" of "conforming to public justice" in order to erase their guilt for participating in brutal acts or even murder.In this atmosphere, public lynching greatly stimulated the bestial side of human beings, making them think that they have the right to do whatever they want with certain objects, for example, they are enemies, criminals, or even aliens.Pain, blood and death could not awaken their extinguished humanity. When racial prejudice in the South expanded viciously, some lynchings had nothing to do with criminal cases.Atrocities are often only a public festival.This has further widened the gap between the extreme south, which is the basic point of the founding of the United States, such as the awakening of human nature, and the north, which represents the mainstream American culture, and most parts of the United States.This situation in the extreme south has always been associated with ignorance, narrowness, and ignorance.The more people in the extreme south reject external influences, and the more they emphasize that their own life values ​​can be divorced from the basic human pursuits of human society, the more they move towards the opposite of human nature.This is also the psychological background of the local people where three innocent college students were brutally murdered in a closed and backward southern town.

However, times have changed after all.I don’t know if you have noticed that in these two cases, the behavior of KKK extremists still bears the imprint of mass lynching, especially the murder of three college students in Mississippi. Western European culture tries to reconcile science and religion.His works include "Comments on the Bible", and there are as many as 19 people involved in the case.However, the very essential difference is that they are no longer ostentatious.The people involved in both cases avoided the public eye and did it secretly and secretly.Therefore, whether it is the nature of the incident itself or the consciousness of the person involved, it is very clear: this is no longer a mass riot, this is a pure murder case.

However, even if the facts of the case are clear, it will still be difficult to settle the case.Because until the sixties blacks in the Deep South did not participate in local politics, did not run for elections, and did not try to serve on juries, which were usually all white.The only one who can determine whether the defendant is guilty or not is the local jury.As I mentioned earlier, in a district like this, how do you convince these white jurors, who may have as much hatred for the black civil rights movement as the murderer, to agree to convict their white neighbors for murder "just for a nigger" ?

So, although the case is solved, difficulties still lie ahead. The first thing encountered in these two cases is the issue of judicial attribution.This is the first problem that any case in the United States will encounter when it enters the judicial process.Since the entire government structure of the United States is based on the principles of "separation of powers" and "checks and balances," and since the judiciary is independent, the scope of power of each court must be clear.It has as much power as it is allocated, and the boundaries are very clear. In this case, obviously, if the trial power is "collected" to the federal court, or even "received" to a higher federal court, so that the scope of selection of jurors goes beyond the scope of the crime, it is obviously very important for "receiving the murderer". Bring to justice" is advantageous.However, the federal government cannot do this.why?

Because the division of federal and state power is one of the most basic divisions in the "separation of powers" of the American system.Moreover, this right is written into the U.S. Constitution, which is a contract of all American people, and no one has the right to destroy the constitutional basis of the founding of the United States in order to solve a specific problem.Even seeking justice must be done in accordance with the rules of the game. Everyone knows that it is impossible to completely break the rules for a momentary incident and draw salary from the bottom of the pot.The right to try a murder case is the purview of state prosecutors and local courts, and the federal judicial system has no right to intervene. In these two cases, the only thing that can be discussed is the judicial attribution of Penny's case.Since Penny was a soldier in the US federal army in training, his murder made it more logical for the federal Department of Justice to intervene. If it were now, the case would probably be heard in federal court.However, at that time, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 had just been passed. This Civil Rights Act used the authority of federal law to cover matters that were originally decided by the states themselves. Since then, conservative people in the South have been accusing the federal government of " "invading" the states, while the federal government tried hard, and rather reluctantly, to explain to the South that the states still retained their sovereignty.Under such circumstances, the federal Department of Justice is worried that if the issue of judicial power is not handled carefully, it may be self-defeating, causing a constitutional crisis, which in turn may be detrimental to the implementation of civil rights laws, because this type of murder has traditionally been managed by the states themselves .Therefore, the Federal Ministry of Justice at this time was very cautious.Nine days after the arrest of the suspect, the federal Department of Justice announced that the case was still being prosecuted by the Georgia Department of Justice in local courts. However, just as the Federal Ministry of Justice worried, in the extreme south at that time, it was almost impossible to have a fair trial of these two cases. Let's look first at the murders of three college students in Mississippi as a criminal murder case seeks prosecution.The prosecution of this case obviously has its inherent shortcomings.At that time, the FBI's grasp of the case mainly relied on the later confessions of individual suspects involved in the case.Therefore, the case lacks direct physical evidence.Because of the hostile attitude of top officials in Mississippi, including the governor, to the black civil rights movement, and because there are two local sheriffs among the main suspects involved in the case, the FBI has no doubts about whether the Mississippi Department of Justice will prosecute criminals in good faith. They dare not hold trust and optimism, and the main evidence of the FBI comes from the confession of the informant. In view of the local situation, the FBI dare not disclose the informant before the case is in court. Since murder is prosecuted by the state's Department of Justice, the Mississippi Department of Justice told the FBI that there must be evidence in order to prosecute.If you don't hand over the evidence to us, this case can't stand at all based on the evidence in our own hands.So the governor declared, “I told the FBI, we don’t have any strong evidence. We can’t arrest them until we have something that stands.” Mississippi refused to arrest the suspect at all. To this day, black civil rights groups blame the FBI for this.However, under the historical conditions at that time, the FBI really could not trust the officials in Mississippi, and rashly handed over the witness testimony in its own hands. Thus, the murder was never successfully prosecuted for murder because FBI officials were afraid to cooperate with the Mississippi Department of Justice.Of course, there is no question of a murder trial. So what about the murder trial for Penny's murder in Georgia?The case took place in Madison County, Georgia, and the suspect involved in the case was also from Madison, so the entire trial process of the case was held in the small town where the Madison County Court is located.This still very quiet town had only 363 inhabitants at the time.The court is located on the square in the center of the town. This quaint court red building is still a landmark of the town.There is a small statue in front of it, which is the only slightly famous figure in the history of this town, that is a doctor. On Aug. 15, the FBI turned over the 1,360-page case brief to the governor's designated state attorney.The FBI promised to send specialized personnel to assist the prosecution throughout the process. The prosecution process of this case seems to be quite smooth, because the evidence is quite sufficient. On August 25, 1964, a grand jury composed of local residents, after hearing the evidence, agreed to indict the suspects. Penny was murdered in this courthouse just three miles from our home, and the 12-member jury was all local white.Defending the suspect was Hudson, the most outstanding criminal defense lawyer in Athens, and another lawyer, Darcy, a former official of the Ministry of Justice who had participated in the prosecution of Japanese war criminals. It should be said that the defense attorneys made excellent use of Georgia's law in terms of purely technical courtroom battles, while the state's attorney appeared inexperienced.But, as I have already mentioned, the evidence for this murder is strong. However, the concerns of the Federal Ministry of Justice are by no means unfounded.The atmosphere of the courtroom made it immediately understandable why such absurd murders took place in such a place.In this court, there is actually a separation of black and white.When Penny’s black comrades-in-arms testified in court, the jurors showed obvious dissatisfaction, “The blacks also came here wearing American military uniforms.” At the conclusion of the defense, Darcy, the defendant's attorney, made a tirade attacking the White House and the federal Department of Justice for "overstepping the law" and invading the South, sending a group of federal agents to harass "our Madison homeland" and interfere in purely local affairs.He blushed and said, "Never let it be said that our Madison County jury turns the electric chair into an altar to satisfy these yelling villains."In a closing argument, he reminded the jurors five times, "You are an Anglo-Saxon jury," that is, you are a white jury.In fact, at least two-thirds of the twelve jurors selected from the local population were either members of the KKK or sympathizers of the KKK. On September 4th, after only three hours of discussion, the jury acquitted the defendant!A jury of 12 Georgia citizens tolerated and acquiesced in the murder of an American soldier.If it is said that Mississippi’s failure to prosecute the murderer was due to the fact that the FBI did not dare to disclose witnesses rashly, giving the state Department of Justice an excuse, then history will almost never judge the scene that happened in this small Georgia town. They all believe that jurors ignored the evidence and forcibly released criminals under racial prejudice and strong resistance to the outside world. It was one of the darkest moments in American judicial history. At this point in my story, we have finally touched a sticking point in the institution of slavery in the American South before the Civil War, and a full hundred years of segregation, racial persecution, and racial discrimination since the Civil War. That is: the rule of the majority advocated and recognized by the democratic system, if there is no reflection and pursuit of humanity, if humanitarianism cannot be promoted, if it does not respect the freedom of others while pursuing its own freedom, then the great tree of democracy What grows in the world can often only be the deformed and evil results of "tyranny of the majority".The lynching of people in the American South that I just mentioned to you in history is an example. "The tyranny of the majority" is no stranger to you or me.From Hitler’s general response, sending a small number of Jews to the road of extermination, to the “Cultural Revolution”, the extremely common public lynching that almost became the daily scene of life.Even when they are used to using "civilians' anger" as the "basis for killing", people can crowd around and happily crowd in front of the parade car of the death row prisoners being sent to the altar of revolution, enjoying their own "big democracy" with peace of mind. right. When we look back at the history of the United States, if we say that only pure angels live in this land just because of the extraordinary establishment of the humanitarian concept of "all men are born free and equal" when this country was founded, Therefore, the struggle and contest between animal nature and human nature can be avoided. This is just telling a fairy tale story. If this is true, the historical experience of the United States will be meaningless to human beings.From my previous letters, you can already see clearly that the whole course of American history is how its humanism overcomes the remaining bestiality in this land. The lynching of the people in the extreme south of the United States took place under the pretext of "democracy" which is essentially "tyranny of the majority".Although lynchings in the American South at the time occurred only in occasional popular riots, they were not a chaotic social norm.According to records, in the fifty-two years from 1889 to 1941, there were 3,811 incidents of mass lynching and execution of black people in the southern United States.It is equivalent to several extreme southern states, and each state has one black person killed in a mass lynching every month.It is Madison County where we live, where the Penny case happened. According to our neighbor Jamie, the last public lynching in this county took place in the 1930s.That said, this is not an ordinary event that happens all the time. However, as long as such a popular lynching of vulnerable groups is acquiesced among the local people, then the fear it causes is still unlimited.The famous black singer Robert Johnson has several famous sad songs, expressing the fear and grievance of the southern blacks for this lynching.For a black man, there is nothing more frightening than being suddenly surrounded by a mob of whites at an intersection in a Southern town at dusk.On the song "Crossroads," he sings: "I came to the intersection and got down on my knees. I came to the intersection and got down on my knees. I beg God, save poor Bob" However, when humanity disappears, under a "tyranny of the majority", no one can protect the scattered individuals in a weak minority.Such mass lynchings happened again and again in the South.The number I just mentioned does not include the lynchings of whites that also existed in the South. However, popular lynching is only a brutal and obvious "initial stage" of "tyranny of the majority" because it clearly violates the law in the basic sense.It is the "tyranny of the majority" within the legal form that is truly terrible.It can not only forcibly release criminals, but also legally and silently kill the life of an innocent and weak person.This is a warning message given to people by the criminal trial of the Penny case.Of course, "tyranny of the majority" can even enter the legislative stage.This is not something that can be explained clearly in a few words, let's talk about it later.At least, the "rule of law" is far from a reassurance, because there is still the question of what kind of "law" is. Remember we discussed very early on that democracy and freedom are two completely different concepts.If in "democracy", which we are used to seeing as a "goal of struggle", the "freedom of the few" is absent, and if the freedom of the few is trampled under the feet of the majority, their lives can be If it is casually regarded as an offering of "democracy" in the ceremony, then such "democracy" is just "mob rule". This is what I said earlier. After the establishment of the American democratic concept and democratic system, it cannot escape the test of the "democratic syndrome" of "tyranny of the majority".However, when the United States tries to solve this problem, it encounters paradoxical confusion from time to time.why? As you must be familiar with, the idea of ​​democracy in the United States includes above all the concept of regional autonomy.In other words, the people of a region have the right to live according to the wishes of the majority of them, and they are not subject to interference from outside, nor from a powerful power like the central government.What's more, in the United States, regional autonomy is quite thorough.Each state has its own state constitution, just like a small country.When the United States was founded, this idea of ​​democracy was idealized, because it was put forward at the same time as the humanitarian slogan "freedom and equality for all". rights" Datong society. However, you must admit that due to certain historical reasons, different regions and regions have different degrees of awakening to human nature.Since the beginning of the United States trying to solve the problem of slavery left over from history, it has been plagued by this "democratic syndrome" or "freedom paradox".Because areas like the extreme south are relatively closed, the way of thinking is always stubborn and narrow.For a very long period of time, it just sticks to its original state and does not want to wake up.When it doesn't make sense to reason, it's often helpless.Because, if the North, which represents the mainstream of American thinking, tries to go beyond the principle of regional autonomy and intervene forcibly, then how to intervene is very worthy of consideration.Once the intervention is improper, the democratic concept established by oneself may be broken by oneself first.It even enters into the "paradox of freedom", that is, in order to maintain the freedom of a few people, it "violates" the "freedom" of the majority of people there.For this reason, the extreme south of the United States has stood there plausibly since the era of slavery, resisting "interference in internal affairs" from the north. Through the painful lessons of the Civil War, the mainstream of the United States realized that when trying to change the South, it must insist on not breaking its own democratic ideas and basic rules of the game, otherwise, not only may it create greater chaos, but it will also lead to the pursuit of human nature. On the contrary, it may be a step backward.Therefore, you can see that after the Civil War and the "Southern Reconstruction Period", the mainstream of the United States promoted the South within the rules of the game. The 1964 Civil Rights Act proposed by Kennedy is a typical example. You will see that whether a country's founding philosophy calls for humanity, or calls for hatred "in the name of revolution" and "in the name of public justice," its people will take different paths. Let me continue the story.Although according to the division of judicial power at that time, local murder cases were tried by the local courts of the states, and the federal Department of Justice had no right to prosecute local murder cases in federal courts, however, the newly passed Federal Civil Rights Act of 1964, This has given the Federal Ministry of Justice a new lease of life.That is to say, the same crime, as murder, is a crime governed by state law, and the federal government has no jurisdiction, but as a civil rights violation, it is a crime governed by federal law, which is within the scope of prosecution in federal courts. Now that an all-white Georgia jury has acquitted the suspects in a Georgia court, experts from the federal Department of Justice believe that now that there is a new civil rights law, the federal government should step in anyway.As a result, officials in charge of civil rights affairs from the Federal Department of Justice made a special trip south from the capital Washington to Georgia to sue the KKK murderers who killed Penny in the Federal Central District Court in Georgia, demanding that they be prosecuted for violating the federal civil rights law. On October 16, 1964, a federal grand jury agreed to indict the defendants in violation of Section 241 of the Federal Criminal Code. However, since the prosecution is based on civil rights law, there is no murder-related clause in the charge of what is essentially murder, because murder is not a federal crime and federal courts have no jurisdiction.Therefore, everyone almost has to accept it as a black humor.In the Penny case, for example, we saw that federal prosecutors accused the KKK elements of: conspiracy to violate the rights of blacks to use public places, violations of the rights of blacks to use facilities owned, operated, and administered by the state of Georgia, violations of The right of blacks to use the streets of Athens equally, violated the rights of blacks to use interstate highways and travel within the state, "and other rights available to white citizens of Athens, Georgia." Even so, things are not that simple.With federal civil rights law just starting to apply, there are still some legal issues to sort out.Therefore, the prosecution of these two cases in federal court has not been smooth. The first is this case in Fairfax, Mississippi, which at the outset still had issues of witness protection and sufficiency of evidence for prosecution.Let's go on with the story. On September 10, 1964, the case was filed in federal court for violating the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964.In a cramped courtroom in a federal building in a city near Fairfax, prosecutors from the federal Justice Department and 19 members of the KKK and their lawyers hold pretrial hearings.Usually, whether a criminal case can be prosecuted is decided by a grand jury composed of ordinary people, but before the grand jury is called, there is a pre-trial hearing procedure, and the judge decides whether the case justifies calling a grand jury. It’s still the same old problem: since the FBI has no physical evidence, the evidence is the confession of individual persons involved in the case, and it is not planned to be presented until the formal trial. testimony, otherwise the court should not entertain such accusations based on hearsay. According to later experts, there is no need to present evidence in the pre-trial hearing, and the so-called hearsay can also be considered by the court, because what the court needs to clarify and decide at this time is "whether it is necessary to call a grand jury."But this time, the female judge Carter, who presided over the hearing, agreed to the protest of the defendant's lawyer and asked the prosecution to show the "account" in their hands. In order to protect those involved in the case who exchanged "confessions" for lighter criminal responsibilities, the prosecution did not dare to show their cards so early.After consulting with the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, the prosecution said they would not produce an "account."Judge Carter immediately dismissed the case.The mother of the murdered black college student passed out on the spot when she heard the announcement, while the nineteen defendants walked out of the building happily. But this time, the Federal Department of Justice has determined with certainty that Judge Carter's dismissal of the case is unreasonable.The pre-trial hearing is a procedure before the grand jury is called, and the grand jury should have the power to decide whether to prosecute.The deputy attorney general asked U.S. District Judge Harold Cox to convene a federal grand jury directly, and Cox agreed. On January 11, 1965, the federal grand jury began hearing in secret.After four days of intense hearings, the grand jury agreed to indict the KKK elements for violating the victims' civil rights in violation of Sections 241 and 242 of the Criminal Code, which fall under the federal Civil Rights Act. The next day, the Federal Marshals raided Feizhen, arrested 19 KKK elements like a storm, and brought them to court.I don't know if you think that no matter how the case goes, if there is no Civil Rights Act of 1964, even this scene would not be possible.Therefore, you can imagine that residents in small towns who are accustomed to a high degree of autonomy and completely excluding the power of the federal government suddenly see a large group of foreign bailiffs arresting people everywhere. How could "violation of power and law", "invasion of the South", and "violation of the homeland" not resonate.The separation of powers between the federation and the states, and the division of power, are the basic consensus of almost all the people here.However, how to divide power and how to expand federal power should be appropriate, but it will always be a complicated and difficult topic. At this point, new challenges have arisen about whether the two cases can be prosecuted in their respective federal courts. Since we are not talking about murder now, the defendants in these two cases have proposed to the court that the Federal Department of Justice has the right to prosecute cases that violate the Federal Civil Rights Act according to the 1964 Civil Rights Act, but according to the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, the federal The right of government to interfere only reaches the state level.That is, only state governments that violate civil rights are subject to prosecution by the federal Department of Justice.However, cases of civil rights violations now occur between private individuals, and such cases should still be within the jurisdiction of the state. Under this argument, Feizhen's defense attorneys only agreed to federal court indictment of the two Feizhen police officers involved in the case because they were public servants for alleged civil rights violations.The rest should not be prosecuted in federal court.Judge Cox upheld the defence's argument. On the Georgia side, a federal district court judge agreed with the defendant's same argument and dismissed the Justice Department's complaint.The Federal Department of Justice had to appeal to the Supreme Court, which became the sensational "United States v. Geist case".At the same time, the Mississippi Fairfax case also went to the Supreme Court for almost the same reason, which is the "United States v. Price et al. case". That is to say, the murder cases that occurred in two southern states almost at the same time, after the state court failed to prosecute the crime of murder, and when the federal court prosecuted the crime of civil rights violations, encountered obstacles almost at the same time due to the issue of judicial power. In the second half of 1965, the appeal reached the Federal Supreme Court.The Federal Supreme Court considered the two cases together, heard the arguments of both lawyers on the same day, and on the same day, March 28, 1966, made a unanimous decision in both cases by 9 to 0. In the Supreme Court's unanimous decision, the justices of the United States Supreme Court stated that the violations of civil rights involved in both cases were within the scope of the rights of citizenship in the United States of America.Whether under the Constitution and its Fourteenth Amendment, or under Reconstruction laws after the Civil War, the federal government has the legal authority to charge civilians with violations of Sections 241 and 242 of the Federal Criminal Code, overturning the federal district court's decision to The decision in United States v. Geist et al. and Judge Cox's decision in United States v. Price et al. are remanded for retrial. I know that it is not easy to figure out the ins and outs of this place if you are not specializing in American law, and the same is true for ordinary Americans, so you must have a lawyer to file a lawsuit.But when I was reading this story that happened thirty years ago in the place where I live now, watching the two sides come and go, one move after another, I sometimes found myself unable to help but wait for a "Bao Gong" to appear, a The more authoritative and wise "Master Qingtian" came out to cut through the mess quickly and quickly redress the grievances.But common sense tells me that such a happy thing will not happen in the United States. Americans do not have the concept of "Bao Gong".This kind of patience with the system as a whole, especially the people involved, even the victims and their families, often amazes me.Since this perfection is a process, they may be hurt by it.They also feel grief and indignation, but no one thinks that it should be sold out.This is an overall cultural respect for the contract.If we change the place, I really don't know how many courts will be smashed and how many times will be killed. In June 1966, still in the same courthouse in our small town in Georgia, the federal district court opened the case of "United States v. Geist et al." for civil rights violations.Defending the six defendants is still the best criminal defense lawyer in Athens, Hudson.In just two years, the United States has undergone great changes. With the advancement of the civil rights law and the improvement of the system, people's ideas are also changing rapidly.The reason for this change is what I talked about earlier: whether the founding philosophy of a country is calling for humanity, or calling for hatred "in the name of revolution" and "in the name of public justice", its people will go through The paths are not the same. You may have thought that whether it is Mississippi or Georgia, several extreme southern states are not isolated, they are a part of the United States.They are relatively closed, but with the development of communications, the extension of roads, and the popularity of television, it is impossible for them not to feel the approach of forces from all directions more and more strongly.Because the press is free, the message is free.What is approaching is not thousands of troops and horses, but the power of humanity and the call of humanity. The establishment of the federal civil rights law is certainly important, but more importantly, the people living in the extreme south, in the past two years after the incident, they, like the people of the United States, have seen through news and TV interviews For the more and more detailed reports on the whole case, they also saw the process of the trial and the comments of legal experts across the country on the trial of this case. and evil.They saw the excitement of the acquitted after the failed murder prosecution, but also the grief of the victim's family and the sorrow of the whole of America.他们看到被害者的葬礼，听到葬礼上亲友的讲话，听到主持葬礼的牧师以上帝的名义，对人类良心的呼唤以及对自由平等和平的祈祷。他们一次次在电视和报纸上看到被害者的照片和往事的回忆，从婴儿到少年到青年。被害者不再是“民权工作者”，甚至“黑鬼”，“煽动者”这样的字眼，他们活生生地走出来，有血有肉，有生命有灵魂，有梦幻有理想。被害者和他们自己一样，也是人。 当然，一个从奴隶制里被动地走出来，长期以来深藏着种族偏见和缺乏人性反省的地区，是不可能一下子就彻底改变的。可是，促使它从根本上变化的，正是一种潜移默化的人性触动。这种触动甚至一直深入到法庭上。 两年以后的再次开审，虽然还是在原来的小镇上，还是原来的旁听者，似乎还是原来的氛围。但是，被告的辩护律师再也不敢象上一次那样摆出种族挑衅的姿态了。他只能带着暗示般地告诉依然是由当地人组成的陪审员，“我们拥有和有色人种一样的权利”。当然，他不会忘记拿出南方民众用了一百多年的武器，“我们不必让美利坚合众国来照料一切”，“佐治亚人民有能力处理自己的问题，惩治我们中的有过失者。” 最后，陪审团宣布，开枪杀害培尼的两名被告的侵犯民权罪成立，其它没有动手开枪的四人无罪开释。法官判这两名被认定有罪的人十年监禁，这是根据第241条侵犯民权罪所能够判的最高刑期了。 在密西西比州的费镇案显得更困难，因为主持的法官考克斯本人对种族问题和民权运动深怀偏见。1966年底，他又一次中止审理，理由居然是因为陪审团里没有足够多的印第安人和妇女。一直到1967年2月，19个被告再一次被带到法庭，联邦司法部指控他们违反联邦刑事法第241条侵犯民权的诉讼终于开始。 面对这样一个法官以及这样一个地区的陪审团，控方律师对于诉讼结果一直信心不足。然而，随着案情的展开，考克斯那种法官的职业本能终于开始压倒他本人的偏见。尤其是作为被告的KKK成员，仗着曾被开脱的经验，有恃无恐，不仅傲慢，无知，愚不知耻，而且在在法庭上照样大大咧咧，满不在乎，从个人倾向来说，原本并不同情黑人民权运动的法官考克斯也终于被激怒。 一次，控方让一个黑人民权组织成员出庭作证，在辩方律师诘问这个证人的时候，他居然问出这样一个问题，“你们组织有没有让每个黑人成员签下一个保证，每个星期必须强奸一个白种妇女？”不等控方律师提出抗议，法官考克斯首先拍案而起，强压愤怒，缓缓地对提问的辩方律师说，“本庭认为，这个问题是提得非常无理的。本庭禁止回答这样的问题。现在，本庭要求辩方说明，为什么要提这样无理的问题？” 辩方律师无可躲避，只好告知法官，他接到某一个被告的字条，一定要他向控方证人提出这一问题。法官立即转向19名被告，要求说出是谁写这字条提出要求的。一时法庭一片肃静，19个被告第一次老老实实一声不吭。考克斯不依不饶，一定要这个人站出来。最后，辩方律师只好指出其中一个被告。法官压低声音，一字一句地说，“我希望你们趁早明白，谁也别想把本庭的庭审当成闹剧”。 检辩双方先后召唤了自己的证人以后，进入结辩阶段。 在结辩中，联邦检察官坦率地告诉陪审团，他只有过一次起诉刑事案件的经验，而这一次他之所以从首都华盛顿来到此地担任此案的检察官，“不是因为我有经验，而是因为我负责联邦司法部民权事务分部的职位。美利坚合众国政府感到十分有必要派人来直接地，坦率地向你们说明，为什么联邦政府作出如此巨大的努力来解决这一罪案。” 他向陪审员解释，“联邦政府不是在入侵费镇，入侵内秀巴县，现在这些被告是在一个密西西比州的城市里，面对着密西西比州的联邦法官，在密西西比州的一间法院房间里，为了他们犯下的违反联邦法律的罪行，接受来自密西西比州的12位男女公民的审判。判定这些人是否有罪的重大责任，仍然掌握在法定的判定者手里，那就是你们，12位密西西比州公民的手里。” 他在复述了这起令人发指的罪案以后，直接地坦率地诉诸于这些陪审员们的良知和良心，“这是一个重要的案件，它对联邦政府是重要的，对这些被告是重要的，但是最主要的，对密西西比州是重要的。我今天在这里所说的话，其它律师今天在这里所说的话，都会很快被淡忘，但是你们12个人今天在这里所做的决定，将会被后人长久地记住。” 陪审团经过一天的闭门讨论以后，向法官报告，陪审团无法达成一致的意见。因为刑事案件的有罪判定必须是12个陪审员一致的意见才能作出，只要有一个人不同意就不能判定有罪，实在达不成一致一般就只能宣布庭审失败。要么重新组织法庭和陪审团，要么就只能放过被告了。但是，这一次，法官考克斯拒绝宣布庭审失败，命令陪审团回到他们的会议室，继续讨论，不论判定罪名成立不成立，一定要达到一个一致的判决。这种做法并不常见，但是当时是合法的，据说依据的是十九世纪最高法院的一个判例。 第二天上午，陪审团宣布他们已经作出了判决。 这个判决认定，以普莱斯警官为首的7名被告被认定有罪，其它人被认定无罪。在今天书写历史的时候，很多人认为，被开释的11名被告，其中有人也还是应该定罪的。由于陪审团的讨论是秘密进行的，人们大概永远也无法知道那关着门的陪审团房间里到底发生了些什么。至少，这个判决象征性地表现了密西西比的多数民众在那个历史阶段的矛盾和局限。 法官考克斯判7名被认定有罪的被告中的三人监禁三年，两人监禁六年，还有两人十年。十年是侵犯民权罪所能判的最高刑期。 联邦司法部和黑人民权组织都把这个案子的结果看作历史性的重大胜利。终于通过密西西比州人民自己产生的陪审团，宣布这样的犯罪将受到法律的制裁。对于美国的法律制度来说，这也是联邦法律越过地方上“多数的暴政”所形成的障碍，保护所有的美国公民的一个成功尝试。 我以前的信里曾多次和你谈到，在美国，法律制度的逐步完善才是真正巩固的历史进步，民众的人性反省和觉悟，才是这种进步的基础。这一次，是历史性的1964年民权法以后，联邦政府和南方残存的种族主义势力的又一次较量。这次较量的结果使六十年代黑人民权运动的历史性进步得以在制度上确定下来，同时又没有伤害美国据以立国的“多数统治”，“公民自治”和“地方分治”的民主和法治传统。 1964年民权法以后第二年，1965年，国会通过了新的选举法，不仅重申所有公民具有一律平等的选举权，并且把任何阻碍，恫吓国公民行使选举权的行为定为一项联邦司法范围内的重罪，联邦政府有权有责任保障全国范围内选举权的实施，有权起诉侵犯选举权的罪行。1968年，国会又通过了进一步的1968年民权法，约翰逊总统再一次邀请马丁·路德·金出席了总统签署该法案的仪式。 进入七十年代以后，美国在种族平等方面所作出的制度建设的效果是十分明显的。南方的大多数民众也开始反省和觉醒。仅仅几年，情况已今非昔比。七十年代初，又是在南方，一个地方性的KKK组织听说，有一个地方的一件案子中，一个黑人杀死一个白人，但是陪审团以自卫误伤而判无罪开释，他们就鼓动自己的成员也去杀黑人。两个年轻的KKK就趁着夜色，拦下与上述案件毫不相干的一个十七岁的黑人青年，杀害了他。 这一次，这个案子只用了一天就破案了。也是在南方的法庭上，也是南方的陪审团，杀人者以谋杀罪起诉，被判有罪。主犯被判死刑。这是美国南方历史上第一个由于杀了黑人而坐上电椅的白人。 不仅如此，一个民权律师认为，那个KKK组织对被害的黑人负有民事责任。他动员死者的母亲对那个KKK组织提起民事诉讼。这一次，也是由南方的陪审团，判决KKK对黑人青年的死负有民事责任，判罚五千万美元。该组织的建筑物，动产不动产，统统被没收拍卖以作赔偿。这个KKK组织因此宣布破产。 这个案子轰动一时，它所表达的信息是非常强烈，非常明确的：时代不同了，在美国的法律制度下，即使在南方，一样不分肤色，人人生而平等。 美国南方历史上，一个白人和黑人相处的全新时代就这样开始了。正象马丁·路德·金在“我有一个梦”的演说结尾满怀激情和赞叹地所说的，“终于自由啦！终于自由啦！感谢万能的上帝，我们终于自由啦！” 你一定也看到了，自由的，被解放的并不止是南方的黑人，在今天，那些完成了从猿到人的过渡，已经从愚昧，狭窄和野蛮中走向人性醒悟的南方白人，回首往事，一定也会承认，自己也因此获得解放，因此获得了真正的自由。 这封信就写到这儿吧。 wish it is good! Linda